The Learned Lady in England, 1650-1760Reynolds, Myra
History
The Learned Lady in England, 1650-1760
Reynolds, Myra
Women -- Education -- Great Britain; Women -- Great Britain; Women authors, English
Margaret had three sons and two daughters and she took the same care
of their education as had been taken of hers. Dr. John Morwen, a
noted Greek scholar, was preceptor in Greek and Latin to her daughter
Mary. Other tutors were Dr. Cole and Dr. Christopherson, also famous
for Greek. Mary seems to have followed in her mother's footsteps so
far as attention to learned pursuits is concerned, but without her
mother's ability and charm. Her Latin orations were, however, so much
admired that her tutor, Dr. Morwen, translated them into English. Sir
Thomas More's other daughters, Elizabeth Dancy (b. 1509) and Cecilia
Heron (b. 1510), and Margaret, a talented kinswoman who married her
tutor, Dr. John Clement, in 1531, were given the same educational
advantages as Margaret. A characteristic eulogy of the three sisters
was by Mr. John Leland, its Latin being thus Englished in Ballard's
_Memoirs_:
Forbear too much t' extoll, great Rome, from hence,
Thy fam'd Hortensius' Daughter's Eloquence;
These boasted names are now eclips'd by Three
More learned Nymphs, Great More's fair Progeny;
Who over-pas'd the Spinster's mean Employ;
The purest Latin Authors were their Joy;
They loved in Rome's political Style to write,
And with the choicest Eloquence indite,
Nor were they conversant alone in these,
They turn'd o'er Homer and Demosthenes;
From Aristotle's Store of Learning too
The mystic Art of Reasoning well they drew.
Then blush you Men if you neglect to trace
These Heights of Learning which the Female grace.[33]
Public-domain text, read in full here on John Shaqi.
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