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23. But why, then, did I dislike Greek learning which was full
of like tales? x For Homer also was skilled in inventing similar
stories, and is most sweetly vain, yet was he disagreeable to me as a
boy. I believe Virgil, indeed, would be the same to Grecian
children, if compelled to learn him, as I was Homer. The
difficulty, in truth, the difficulty of learning a foreign language
mingled as it were with gall all the sweetness of those fabulous
Grecian stories. For not a single word of it did I understand, and
to make me do so, they vehemently urged me with cruel threatenings and
punishments. There was a time also when (as an infant) I knew no
Latin; but this I acquired without any fear or tormenting, by merely
taking notice, amid the blandishments of my nurses, the jests of those
who smiled on me, and the sportiveness of those who toyed with me. I
learnt all this, indeed, without being urged by any pressure of
punishment, for my own heart urged me to bring forth its own
conceptions, which I could not do unless by learning words, not of
those who taught me, but of those who talked to me; into whose ears,
also, I brought forth whatever I discerned. From this it is
sufficiently clear that a free curiosity hath more influence in our
learning these things than a necessity full of fear. But this last
restrains the overflowings of that freedom, through Thy laws, O
God, Thy laws, from the ferule of the schoolmaster to the trials
of the martyr, being. effective to mingle for us a salutary bitter,
calling us back to Thyself from the pernicious delights which allure us
from Thee.
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