[61] _L’Enfant’s History of the Council of Constance, book i. sect. xxxix._ [62] _Hodius de Græcis illustribus, p. 14._ [63] _Hodius, p. 15._ [64] _Hodius, p. 15._ [65] _Ibid._ [66] Pietro Paulo Vegerio was a native of Capo d’Istria, a town situated at the extremity of the Adriatic gulf, not far from Trieste. He was eminent for his knowledge of the civil law, and made considerable proficiency in the study of philosophy and the mathematics. Under the instruction of Manuel Crysoloras, he also attained a respectable knowledge of the Grecian language. He composed a treatise, _De moribus ingenuis_, which was received by the literary characters of his time with considerable applause; and at the request of the emperor Sigismund, he translated into Latin Arrian’s history of the expedition of Alexander the Great. In the execution of this translation, he purposely avoided the cultivation of elegance of style, through an apprehension, as he himself said, lest his royal reader should stand in need of the assistance of an interpreter. He testified his zeal for the honour of classical learning, by publishing an invective against Carlo Malatesta, who, in detestation of heathens and heathenism, had removed from the market place of Mantua, a statue of Virgil. In the latter period of his life he lost his reason, which however returned at intervals before his death, the date of which event is uncertain.—_Facius de Viris illustribus, p. 8._ [67] _Hodius, p. 23._ [68] _Hodius, p. 23._ [69] _Poggii Opera, p. 297._ [70] _Leonardo Aretini Epist., lib. iv. ep. iv._ This letter is erroneously dated January 10, 1415. Aretino wrote from Constance a description of his journey to that city, on the 29th of December, 1414. It is therefore evidently impossible that he could have returned to Italy, and have there received letters from Poggio within twelve days from that date. For 1415, we should certainly read 1416. [71] Leonardo Aretino, who does not appear to have possessed the slightest knowledge of Hebrew, in a very curious letter to Giovanni Cirignano, entered into a long train of argument, to prove the inutility of the study of that language. Nothing is more disgusting, than the propensity of men of narrow minds to undervalue those acquisitions in knowledge, to which they have not themselves attained; and which they consequently have not the means of appreciating. Excellent indeed is the precept of the Apulian bard, “Neu tua plus laudes studia, aut aliena reprendas.” This letter of Leonardo also shews the unhappy influence of religious bigotry and sacerdotal tyranny, in checking the progress of science. The most cogent argument which he advances, to prove the folly of spending time in the perusal of the Hebrew scriptures, is this, that St. Jerome having translated the Old Testament into Latin, whosoever presumes to study that book in the original, manifests a distrust of the fidelity of Jerome’s version.—_Leonardi Aretini Epist., lib. ix. ep. xii._