Humane learning

Use in the book

Burton’s defence of writing about medicine begins from a boundary between professions. He is a clergyman, and the imagined objector might accept the same book if a physician had written it. Burton admits that subjects in humanity and divinity would have been more familiar to him and more convenient for display. His choice of melancholy is therefore not a claim that theology has no value: he calls it the queen of professions, but sees less need for another doctrinal book and fears endless controversy. His later defence joins bodily and spiritual care. The distinction names fields of knowledge while the argument permits their cooperation.

Social reward draws different boundaries. The philologer or poet advances more slowly than a person who paints Thais, plays music or curls hair. The precise meaning of painting Thais, portraiture or cosmetics, remains unsettled; the original margin’s flute also differs from the body’s fiddle. The point is the poor return on literary labour. In the university discussion, lack of patrons pushes students from poetry, mathematics, philosophy and philology towards law, medicine and divinity. The ensuing account sarcastically converts every art into a means of personal advancement. Burton describes the pressure to abandon these studies, rather than agreeing that they are intrinsically worthless.

Wealth can produce a different refusal. The rich people he attacks think learned work suitable for younger brothers and poor men’s sons, not gentlemen. Their practical excuse is that they have no use for such knowledge. Burton rebukes this attitude and elsewhere expressly honours worthy learned patrons. Religious zeal can also become hostility to learning: in the final partition he accuses some rigorists within his own camp of rejecting degrees, universities and humane learning. An original English margin says some permit only Scripture, then judges them worthy of pity rather than refutation. These are polemical accusations against specified sorts of opponents, not a neutral account of all religious readers.

Yet the defender of learning also satirizes it. Ambitious compilers raid divine and humane authors without becoming wiser; Burton’s following we includes himself. Once scholastic theology has been censured, he asks what defence humanity can make, personifying the discipline. In the catalogue of unnecessary pursuits, philology shrinks to vain textual criticisms. The counterweight appears in the exercise discussion, where philology supplies pleasurable reading, and in the consolations, where secular authors offer useful counsels after Scripture. Those passages assign learning value through use and judgment, while the exercise argument ultimately requires moderation and care for the body.

The vocabulary also exposes inflated claims to cultivation. Philologers appear among the Rosy Cross brotherhood’s supposed universal experts, immediately followed by doubt whether such people exist. Lipsius’s claimed combination of literature with humane learning and wisdom with practical judgment receives mock praise as the achievement of an eighth sage. In the consolation based on changing fortunes, Greece is called the former mother of the humanities; the contrast with its alleged present decline is sweeping historical rhetoric. None of these examples establishes that possessing a learned title guarantees wisdom.

Learning can finally become a person. In Burton’s condensation of Martianus Capella, Mercury learns languages and polished speech to please Philologia; the disciplines themselves serve the courtship. The example illustrates love’s power to encourage accomplishments. This is distinct from humanity as humane behaviour: in the account of joking, even a real fault does not justify humiliating its author, while satire against vice in general remains permitted. Latin humanitatis in the Camden margin likewise concerns cultivated civil life. These neighbouring senses connect education with conduct without making every occurrence mean either literature or kindness alone.

In Calisto’s boast that he seems to transcend humanity, humanitatem means the human condition. Burton presents an overconfident lover’s elation after the prospect of an encouraging reception, not a literal escape from mortal limits. The quoted character’s seeming matters; the ensuing sequence of lovers’ delights eventually turns to lamentation when desire is thwarted. The precise Latin excerpt from Celestina and its intermediary remain uncollated.

Related entries

Divine: Theologian, cleric and the related field of divinity.

Cento: Compilation from earlier writings.

Neoterics: The relation of older and more recent learned authorities.

Study and reading: Learning as activity and regimen, including its pleasures and limits.

Exhibition: Financial support for institutions of learning.

Church patronage: The rewards and obligations of learned professions.

Fustian and bombast: Pretension in learned language.

Art and artificial: Acquired disciplines and skills.

Charity: Humane conduct and the limits of humiliating another.

Places to read

1. Democritus Junior to the Reader · paragraphs 3–5religious and secular sources in ambitious compilation, followed by the self-including we.
2. Democritus Junior to the Reader · paragraphs 7–21humanity and divinity, the medical subject’s defence, theology’s acknowledged primacy and the proposed cooperation of professions.
3. Democritus Junior to the Reader · paragraphs 8–10the philologer’s poor rewards, with Thais unresolved and the body’s fiddle distinguished from the marginal flute.
4. Democritus Junior to the Reader · paragraphs 6–8; note 899humanitatis cultu as cultivation of civil life; the wider Latin comparison omits the minus supplied in translation.
5. Democritus Junior to the Reader · paragraphs 41–48learned pretension, satirists’ vulnerability and humanity asked to defend itself after scholastic theology.
6. Democritus Junior to the Reader · paragraphs 4–9the doubtful Rosy Cross experts, followed by mock praise of Lipsius’s humane cultivation.
7. Subsection 15 Love of Learning or Excessive Study With a Digression on the Misery of Scholars and Why the Muses Are Melancholy · paragraphs 32–34inadequate rewards drive students away from philology; mathematical skills become ironic devices for advancement.
8. Subsection 15 Love of Learning or Excessive Study With a Digression on the Misery of Scholars and Why the Muses Are Melancholy · paragraphs 33–35; Subsection 15 Love of Learning or Excessive Study With a Digression on the Misery of Scholars and Why the Muses Are Melancholy · paragraphs 18–20contempt for humane learning, its occupational excuse and the worthy-patron exception.
9. Subsection 4 How Mockery, Slander and Bitter Jokes Cause Melancholy · paragraphs 48–50humanity as considerate conduct; the distinction between humiliating people and general satire against vice.
10. Subsection 7. A Collection of Other Events That Cause Melancholy: The Death of Friends, Losses, and So On · paragraphs 17–23classical learning and philology within the attack on needless, unprofitable inquiry.
11. Member 4 Exercise of Body and Mind Regulated · paragraphs 42–44; Member 4 Exercise of Body and Mind Regulated · paragraphs 21–22philology among delightful studies, with the concluding demand for moderation.
12. Member 3 Against Poverty and Want and Other Such Adversities · paragraphs 1–3the humanities in the rhetorical account of changing civic fortunes.
13. Member 7 Against Rejection, Abuse, Injuries, Contempt, Disgrace, Insults, Slander, Mockery and the Like · paragraphs 9–14Scripture and secular authors supply counsels; the two collections are distinguished without dismissing either.
14. Member 4 Subsection 1 Symptoms or Signs of Love Melancholy in Body and Mind Good and Bad Signs and So Forth · paragraphs 63–73; Member 4 Subsection 1 Symptoms or Signs of Love Melancholy in Body and Mind Good and Bad Signs and So Forth · paragraph 64; note 9905humanitatem as the human condition in Calisto’s first-person boast, framed by conditional encouragement, overconfidence and the later reversal from elation to distress.
15. Member 4 Subsection 1 Symptoms or Signs of Love Melancholy in Body and Mind Good and Bad Signs and So Forth · paragraphs 24–27Philologia personified, disciplines acquired for love, and the qualifications to the ensuing literary examples.
16. General Symptoms: Love of Their Own Sect; Hatred of All Other Religions; Obstinacy and Ill Temper; Readiness to Undergo Any Danger or Adversity for It; Martyrs; Blind Zeal and Blind Obedience; Fasts and Vows; Belief in Incredible and Impossible Things. Particular Symptoms Among Pagans, Muslims, Jews and Christians; and Among Christians, Heretics Old and New, Schismatics, Scholastic Theologians, Prophets, Enthusiasts and So On · paragraphs 14–18; Subsection 4. Prognosis of Religious Melancholy · paragraphs 48–51; note 12654accusations of religious rejection of secular learning; some and pity qualify the attack, while the surrounding hostile anecdote is not verified history.

In this edition

“humanity and divinity” → “secular learning and theology”; “a philologer or a poet” → “a student of literature or a poet.” The modern terms identify fields and scholarly activity. They neither turn humanity into benevolence in the first pair nor define the philologer by a kindly temperament. Elsewhere humanity becomes humanistic learning, classical learning or the humanities according to its context, while the ethical use remains humanity. The heading gathers this educational family rather than quoting one phrase from the two central passages.

The Latin pairing cum humanitate literas & sapientiam cum prudentia is rendered “literature together with humane learning, and wisdom with practical judgement.” Literature belongs to literas, humane learning to humanitate, wisdom to sapientiam and practical judgement to prudentia. The Camden margin’s humanitatis cultu concerns cultivation of civil life, a distinct construction. Philologia is retained as a personal name in the allegory. The original English margin defending humane learning remains a note-level witness, not an invented sentence in the modern body.

Humanitatem transcendere videor becomes I seem to transcend humanity. Humanitatem is the accusative object, humanity or the human condition; transcendere supplies to transcend and videor I seem. Neither the first-person qualification nor the distinction from learning and humane conduct can be dropped.

Humane authors

Printed “humane authors” (English; phrase).

Secular writers, distinguished from religious writers.

Here: Ambitious compilers raid both religious and secular texts without becoming better scholars.

Context: Burton’s criticism of book-making; the following we explicitly includes him in the borrowing he mocks.

Source: original body

Source wording and original alignment: divine, humane authors

Modern rendering: religious and secular authors

Alignment scope: Equal-scope phrase or construction in the supplied parallel text.

Word and construction: Divine contributes religious; humane secular; authors is shared, and English supplies and in the coordination.

Further local use

Printed “humane Authors” (English; phrase).

Citation key: Humane authors.

Secular writers.

Here: Non-scriptural writers supply moral counsels after the biblical precepts, including self-knowledge and contentment.

Context: Burton recommends observing the counsels as a means of peace of mind; secular does not here mean morally useless or hostile to religion.

Source: original body

Source wording and original alignment: Out of humane Authors

Modern rendering: From secular writers

Alignment scope: Equal-scope phrase or construction in the supplied parallel text.

Word and construction: Humane contributes secular; Authors writers; Out of becomes From.

Sense relation: A further local application of the same educational family, with its own argumentative force.

Humane learning

Printed “humane learning” (English; phrase).

Secular or humanistic learning.

Here: Wealthy people neglect learning as supposedly beneath their station and suitable only for dependent professionals.

Context: Burton reports and attacks their reasoning; his national generalization is his own, and the later worthy-patron exception prevents making it universal.

Source: original body

Source wording and original alignment: all humane learning

Modern rendering: all human learning

Alignment scope: Equal-scope phrase or construction in the supplied parallel text.

Word and construction: Humane learning becomes human learning in the supplied column; this is a field of cultivation, not merely information about biological humanity.

Further local use

Printed “humane learning” (English; phrase).

Citation key: Humane learning.

Secular learning, as distinguished from exclusively scriptural teaching.

Here: Some religious rigorists are accused of rejecting universities and all human learning.

Context: Burton’s polemic against some people within his own religious camp; the devil’s sewer is the reported hostile valuation, not his recommendation.

Source: original body

Source wording and original alignment: all humane learning

Modern rendering: any human learning

Alignment scope: Equal-scope phrase or construction in the supplied parallel text.

Word and construction: Learning remains learning; humane becomes human. Any replaces all under the modern negative construction.

Sense relation: A further local application of the same educational family, with its own argumentative force.

Further local use

Printed “humane learning” (English; phrase).

Citation key: Humane learning.

Secular learning.

Here: An English margin condemns those who allow only Scripture and reject secular authors and disciplines.

Context: Burton attributes this refusal to ignorance and excessive zeal, then says such men deserve pity rather than refutation.

Source: original marginal quotation

Source and modern wording: they oppose all humane learning

Alignment scope: Equal-scope phrase or construction in the supplied parallel text.

Word and construction: The English wording is retained in the supplied note; its definition comes from the author’s contrast with allowing only Scripture. It is not a separate main-column translation.

Modern container: note

Sense relation: A further local application of the same educational family, with its own argumentative force.

Humanitas; civil cultivation

Printed “humanitatis” (Latin; family).

Civilization, civil life or humane culture; genitive singular here dependent on cultu.

Here: The cultivation of civil life is praised alongside military achievement in the account of England after the Normans.

Context: Burton’s Latin margin attributed to Camden; the original omits minus in the wider comparison, which the supplied translation restores from Camden.

Source: original marginal quotation

Source wording and original alignment: humanitatis cultu

Modern rendering: through the cultivation of civil life

Alignment scope: Equal-scope phrase or construction in the supplied parallel text.

Word and construction: Humanitatis supplies of civil life; cultu is ablative singular, cultivation, expressing the means rendered through. The supplied no less belongs to the wider comparison, outside this selected unit.

Modern container: note

Humanitas; human condition

Printed “humanitatem” (Latin; family).

Humanity or the human condition; accusative singular of humanitas, object of transcendere.

Here: Calisto feels as though erotic delight carries him beyond mortal humanity.

Context: Burton quotes Calisto in Celestina and frames the speech as overconfidence, following the conditional possibility of an encouraging look, kiss or message. First-person seeming belongs to the quoted character, not an assertion of actual transcendence. The ensuing examples turn from elation to distress. The precise Latin excerpt and intermediary remain uncollated under the accompanying note.

Source: original body

Source wording and original alignment: humanitatem transcendere videor

Modern rendering: I seem to transcend humanity

Alignment scope: Equal-scope phrase or construction in the supplied parallel text.

Word and construction: Humanitatem supplies humanity, transcendere to transcend, and first-person videor I seem. The human condition is the object surpassed in the boast, not humanistic education or kindness.

Humanitas; humane cultivation

Printed “humanitate” (Latin; family).

Humane cultivation and literary learning, in the ablative after cum.

Here: Literature is coupled with humane cultivation in Lipsius’s asserted teaching, as wisdom is with practical judgment.

Context: Burton’s mocking account of Lipsius’s self-praise; the exact letter and intended Ammonius remain unlocated.

Source: original body

Source wording and original alignment: cum humanitate literas & sapientiam cum prudentia

Modern rendering: literature together with humane learning, and wisdom with practical judgement

Alignment scope: Equal-scope phrase or construction in the supplied parallel text.

Word and construction: Literas contributes literature; cum humanitate together with humane learning; sapientiam wisdom; cum prudentia with practical judgement. The two with-phrases do not make all the learning the meaning of humanitate alone.

Humanity; humane conduct

Printed “humanity” (English; family).

Considerate or humane conduct.

Here: Mocking someone for a fault violates humanity even when the fault is real.

Context: Burton limits sociable wit by harmlessness, then expressly exempts general satire against vice from the condemnation of personal abuse.

Source: original body

Source wording and original alignment: no good manners or humanity

Modern rendering: neither good manners nor humanity

Alignment scope: Equal-scope phrase or construction in the supplied parallel text.

Word and construction: Humanity is retained in its ethical sense; the negative coordination is made explicit as neither... nor.

Humanity; secular learning

Printed “humanity” (English; family).

Secular learning, especially language and literature, distinguished here from theology.

Here: Burton says other subjects in both fields would have been more familiar to him if he had sought literary display.

Context: Burton answers the objection that a clergyman has intruded into medicine; the continuation retains theology’s primacy while defending the usefulness of his medical subject.

Source: original body

Source wording and original alignment: humanity and divinity

Modern rendering: secular learning and theology

Alignment scope: Equal-scope phrase or construction in the supplied parallel text.

Word and construction: Humanity contributes secular learning; divinity theology; and coordinates the two fields.

Further local use

Printed “humanity” (English; family).

Citation key: Humanity; secular learning.

Humanistic learning.

Here: Secular learning is rhetorically asked to defend itself after scholastic theology has been censured.

Context: Burton’s satirical question, within an attack that also exposes satirists themselves to criticism.

Source: original body

Source wording and original alignment: what shall become of humanity?

Modern rendering: what will become of humanistic learning?

Alignment scope: Equal-scope phrase or construction in the supplied parallel text.

Word and construction: Humanity names the field, personified by the ensuing she and her followers.

Sense relation: A further local application of the same educational family, with its own argumentative force.

Further local use

Printed “Humanity” (English; family).

Citation key: Humanity; classical learning.

Classical literary learning.

Here: Classical learning is one field in which needless and inappropriate inquiry can exhaust people.

Context: Burton’s sweeping satire of unprofitable studies, which includes disciplines central to his own book.

Source: original body

Source wording and original alignment: Religion, Humanity, Magick, Philosophy, policie

Modern rendering: religion, classical learning, magic, philosophy, politics

Alignment scope: Equal-scope phrase or construction in the supplied parallel text.

Word and construction: Humanity contributes classical learning; the other listed terms retain their distinct fields.

Sense relation: A further local application of the same educational family, with its own argumentative force.

Further local use

Printed “humanity” (English; family).

Citation key: Humanity; humane learning.

Humane learning or the humanities.

Here: Greece is called the former mother of learning and the humanities in a consolation based on historical change.

Context: Burton’s contrast of past and present fortunes; the sweeping claims about contemporary Greece and cities are not independently established.

Source: original body

Source wording and original alignment: mother of sciences and humanity

Modern rendering: mother of learning and the humanities

Alignment scope: Equal-scope phrase or construction in the supplied parallel text.

Word and construction: Sciences contributes learning here; humanity becomes the humanities; mother is personification.

Sense relation: A further local application of the same educational family, with its own argumentative force.

Philologer

Printed “philologer” (English; lemma).

A student or scholar of language and literature.

Here: Literary scholarship earns slower advancement than fashionable accomplishments and practical services.

Context: Democritus Junior’s satire of unequal rewards; the surrounding social hierarchy and contempt belong to his account.

Source: original body

Source wording and original alignment: a philologer or a poet

Modern rendering: a student of literature or a poet

Alignment scope: Equal-scope phrase or construction in the supplied parallel text.

Word and construction: Philologer contributes student of literature; poet names a separate comparison.

Uncertainty: Paint Thais in the preceding list may mean portray or cosmetically adorn a courtesan; the text does not decide. The original margin has flute where the body has fiddle.

Further local use

Printed “Philologers” (English; lemma).

Citation key: Philologer.

Scholars of language and literature.

Here: Philologers are among the supposed Rosy Cross brotherhood’s extraordinary learned capacities.

Context: Burton’s extravagant exception to general folly is immediately qualified by doubt whether such people exist and whether their followers are credible.

Source: original body

Source wording and original alignment: Philologers

Modern rendering: scholars of language

Alignment scope: Equal-scope phrase or construction in the supplied parallel text.

Word and construction: The plural names scholars by their linguistic learning, without implying that the asserted brotherhood is established.

Sense relation: A further local application of the same educational family, with its own argumentative force.

Philologia

Printed “Philologia” (Latin name in English syntax; lemma).

Philology or learned cultivation personified as a woman.

Here: Mercury acquires languages, polished speech, arts and sciences to please Philologia, illustrating love as an incentive to accomplishment.

Context: Burton condenses Martianus Capella; the ensuing generalization about women abandoning accomplishments after marriage remains his claim.

Source: original body

Source and modern wording: in love with Philologia

Alignment scope: Equal-scope phrase or construction in the supplied parallel text.

Word and construction: The proper name is retained, not silently replaced by a generic beloved. Her educational meaning is activated by the surrounding acquired disciplines.

Philology

Printed “Philology” (English; lemma).

The study of language and literary texts.

Here: Students neglect philology and related arts because of poor rewards and few patrons, turning to lucrative professions.

Context: Burton’s causal criticism of inadequate support, followed by a satire reducing learned disciplines to techniques for advancement.

Source: original body

Source wording and original alignment: History, Philosophy, Philology

Modern rendering: history, philosophy, philology

Alignment scope: Equal-scope phrase or construction in the supplied parallel text.

Word and construction: Philology retains the field name; history and philosophy remain distinct neighbouring studies.

Further local use

Printed “Philology” (English; lemma).

Citation key: Philology.

The study of language and texts, here disparagingly reduced to textual criticism.

Here: A rhetorical question asks whether philology amounts only to vain criticism.

Context: Burton’s satire of needless study; this is a local accusation, not the dictionary definition or his only valuation of the field.

Source: original body

Source wording and original alignment: Philology, but vain Criticisms?

Modern rendering: Philology but vain textual criticisms?

Alignment scope: Equal-scope phrase or construction in the supplied parallel text.

Word and construction: Philology is retained; textual specifies the contextual kind of criticisms in the modern rendering.

Sense relation: A further local application of the same educational family, with its own argumentative force.

Further local use

Printed “Philologie” (English; lemma).

Citation key: Philology.

Study of language and texts.

Here: Philology appears among studies whose books provide intellectual pleasure.

Context: Burton’s positive catalogue within exercise of the mind, later qualified by the need for moderation and bodily care.

Source: original body

Source wording and original alignment: Philologie

Modern rendering: philology

Alignment scope: Equal-scope phrase or construction in the supplied parallel text.

Word and construction: The spelling is modernized; the disciplinary meaning remains.

Sense relation: A further local application of the same educational family, with its own argumentative force.