And thus much for the second disease of
learning.
(8) For the third vice or disease of learning, which concerneth
deceit or untruth, it is of all the rest the foulest; as that which
doth destroy the essential form of knowledge, which is nothing but a
representation of truth: for the truth of being and the truth of
knowing are one, differing no more than the direct beam and the beam
reflected. This vice therefore brancheth itself into two sorts;
delight in deceiving and aptness to be deceived; imposture and
credulity; which, although they appear to be of a diverse nature,
the one seeming to proceed of cunning and the other of simplicity,
yet certainly they do for the most part concur: for, as the verse
noteth -
"Percontatorem fugito, nam garrulus idem est,"
an inquisitive man is a prattler; so upon the like reason a
credulous man is a deceiver: as we see it in fame, that he that
will easily believe rumours will as easily augment rumours and add
somewhat to them of his own; which Tacitus wisely noteth, when he
saith, Fingunt simul creduntque: so great an affinity hath fiction
and belief.
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