Page:The battle of the books - Guthkelch - 1908.djvu/140

 those that flourished in that short period after they began among us.

It were too great a mortification to think that the same fate has happened to us even in our modern learning, as if the growth of that, as well as of natural bodies, had some short periods beyond which it could not reach, and after which it must begin to decay. It falls in one country, or one age, and rises again in others, but never beyond a certain pitch. One man, or one country at a certain time runs a great length in some certain kinds of knowledge, but loses as much ground in others that were perhaps as useful and as valuable. There is a certain degree of capacity in the greatest vessel, and when it is full, if you pour in still, it must run out some way or other, and the more it runs out on one side, the less runs out at the other. So the greatest memory, after a certain degree, as it learns or retains more of some things or words, loses and forgets as much of others. The largest and deepest reach of thought, the more it pursues some certain subjects, the more it neglects others.

Besides few men or none excel in all faculties of mind. A great memory may fail of invention: both