I need not remind you of my devotion to learning. You know that from my earliest boyhood I have followed a course of study which has embraced all subjects. I have made myself acquainted with all knowledge which the world possesses. To enable me to do this I mastered all languages in which books are written. During my recent visit to foreign lands, I have recognized how far my country falls behind others in language, and consequently in literature. I would draw your special attention to the remarkable advance which has been made in these matters in France during your lordship's lifetime. When I arrived there in 1576 I made myself acquainted with the principles of the movement which had been carried through by Du Bellay, Ronsard, and their confrères. They recognized that their native language was crude and lacking in gravity and art. First by obtaining a complete mastery of the Greek and Latin languages, as also of those of Italy and Spain, they prepared themselves for a study of the literatures of which those languages, with their idioms and peculiarities, form the basis. Having obtained this mastery they reconstructed their native language and gave their country a medium by which her writers might express their thoughts and emotions. They have made it possible for their countrymen to rival the poets of ancient Greece and Rome. They and others of their countrymen have translated the literary treasures of those ancient nations into their own tongue, and thereby enabled those speaking their language, who are not skilled in classical languages, to enjoy and profit by the works of antiquity. Your lordship knows well the deficiencies of the language of our England, the absence of any literature worthy of the name. In these respects the condition of affairs is far behind that which prevailed in France even before the great movement which Ronsard and Du Bellay initiated. I do not speak of Italy, which possesses a language melodious, facile, and rich, and a literature which can never die.