De Studiis et Litteris

1. Education has been consistent in the modern world, but they don’t exist in the exact shape. Lionardo D’Arezzo still believed, out of all forms of education, “high standard of education to which I referred at the outset is only to be reached by one who has seen many things and read much” (Woodward, p. 7). The common theme is that experience and literature, “these two sides of learning, indeed, show not be separated: they afford mutual aid and distinction” (Woodward, p. 8). For experience gives us the understanding of emotions or capture observations and details of the scene; words then are used for expression, to communicate and spread the understanding. I think this is important: you cannot simply study a field with either great knowledge or great literacy skills; lacking knowledge would fail you to contribute to discoveries, and lacking literary skills only complicates the description, and either remove the presence, or fake the absence.
2. I found it interesting when I first read “we may gain much from Servius, Donatus, and Priscian, but more by careful observation in our own reading, in which we must note attentively vocabulary and inflexions, figures of speech and metaphors, and all the devices of style, such as rhythm, or antithesis, by which fine taste is exhibited” (Woodward, p. 3). The meaning of texts may not to be delivering a set of facts, truth, or lessons that you are forced to remember, but you would learn so much more by attaching your own memories and passion into it. For that is what makes a mind unique, because we all view things from different perspectives, and take different paths in describing something with words. Thus, words are nothing but signifiers and are unique to each person, and exist with different meanings to each individual. But it does not matter what the signifiers do, nor does it matter how others viewed a text, the most important is how you associate yourself with the text; this observation will lead to great self- reflection, and allow people to learn the most out of literature.

1. Lionardo D’ Arezzo proposed an idea that the access to literature, especially for females, had decreased: “for they lived in days when learning was no rare attainment, and therefore they enjoyed no unique renown” (Woodward, p. 2-3). The author foreshadowed that people would never feel the uniqueness of their fame since education was so accessible. This brought up two interesting points: what has caused a decrease in access to education? Also, the author simply said that the fame of multiple well-known authors isn’t unique due to access to learning. What caused the author to believe that fame has to do with what resources they have?
2. The author wrote that “it us from the former that we learn how to employ the emotions. Further, from oratory we derive out store of those elegant or striking turns of expression which are used with so much effect in literary compositions” (Woodward, p. 5). Lionard  D’ Arezzo stated that true education consisted in learning literature, from poets or philosophers, because we can understand emotions more, and still have the literary skills to describe the feelings. He also mentioned that “be careful as to the accuracy of the translations you adopt” (Woodward, p. 3). This foreshadowed the existence of famous books, but are badly translated, and thus lost some of the essence of the original and added the non- existent details due to personal bias. If earlier the author mentioned that we learn emotions and literary skills from reading, but still believed heavily that only the original is worth reading, then wouldn’t today’s education be completely useless because all the texts we are reading and translated, and after different versions?

1. Do words describe or do they modify the meaning of an existence?
2. Does literature blind us from reality by proposing fiction with words?