It was not, however, a period of brilliant authorship among women. The new learning had first to be imbibed and become a part of the national thought before it could express itself in literary products. Translations of the classics and the works of the Church Fathers, with literary correspondence and discussions in choice Latin prose, as well as the composition of distiches in the same tongue, with occasional instances of adventure into Greek and Hebrew composition, summed up the literary labors of the women of the times. As such matters possess little interest to posterity, not many of these literary essays and letters have been preserved; but such as have come down to us mirror the intellect of the women of the age so creditably as to invite comparison with the results of modern education for the sex. Lady Jane Grey may be cited as one of the women of the day who became notable for learning and scholarship. Of her, Fox writes: "If her fortune had been as good as her bringing up, joined with fineness of wit, undoubtedly she might have seemed comparable not only to the house of the Vespasians, Sempronians, and the mother of the Gracchi, yea, to any other women besides that deserve of high praise for their singular learning, but also to the University men, who have taken many degrees of the Schools." The facility of this noble lady in Greek composition was strongly commended by Roger Ascham. Her remarkable knowledge of the cognate tongues of the East and of modern languages made her almost deserving of the encomium which was passed upon Anna Maria van Schurman, a Dutch contemporary, of whom it was said: "If all the languages of the earth should cease to exist, she herself would give them birth anew." The conversance of the literary ladies of the sixteenth century with the languages of the East, as well as with philosophy and theology, and the really marvellous attainments of some of them in these subjects, indicate a sound education, even though an unserviceable one.