Next, as to the matter with which it deals, whether private or public, it may compare with some others that think very well of themselves. For not to touch upon ordinary affairs of common life, will matters of learning in any kind of argument make a tongue of account? Our nation then, I think, will hardly be proved to have been unlearned at any time, in any kind of learning, not to use any stronger terms. Therefore, having learning by confession of all men, and uttering that learning in their own tongue for their own use, they could not but enrich the tongue, and bring it consideration. Will matters of war, whether civil or foreign, make a tongue of account? Neighbouring nations will not deny our people to be very warlike, and our own country will confess it, though loth to feel it, both on account of remembering the suffering, and of fearing to gall our friends by vaunting ourselves. Now, in offering material for speech, war is such a breeder that, though it is opposed to learning because it is an enemy to the Muses, yet it dares compare with any department of learning for the multitude of its discourses, though these are not commonly so certain or useful as learned subjects. For war (besides the many grave and serious considerations about it) as sometimes it sends us true reports, either privately in the form of projects and devices that are intended, or publicly in events which are blazed abroad because they have occurred, so mostly it gives out--I dare not say lies, but--very incredible news, because it can hatch these at will, being in no danger of control, and commonly free from witnesses. Every man, moreover, seeks both to praise himself and to harm his enemy, besides procuring some courteous entertainment by telling what is not true to those that love to hear it. All these tales about stratagems and engines of war and many other such things, give matter for speech and occasion for new words, and by making the language so ready, make it of renown. Will all kinds of trade, and all sorts of traffic, make a tongue of account? If the spreading sea and the spacious land could use any speech, they would both show you where and in how many strange places they have seen our people, and also let you know that they deal in as much, and in as great a variety of matters, as any other people, whether at home or abroad. This is the reason why our tongue serves so many uses, because it is conversant with so many people, and so well acquainted with so many matters, in such various kinds of dealing. Now all this variety of matter and diversity of trade, both make material for our speech, and afford the means of enlarging it. For he who is so practised will utter what he practises in his natural tongue, and if the strangeness of the matter requires it, he who is to utter, will rather than stick in his utterance, use the foreign term, explaining that the people of the country call it so, and by that means make a foreign word an English denizen.