denotes learning or knowledge; and chiefly that of history and antiquity, of languages and of books, which is the result of hard study and extensive reading. The Scaligers were men of deep erudition: the writings of M. Launoy, a priest of the Oratory, are full of erudition.

Mr Locke says, it is of more use to fill the head with reflections than with points of erudition. If the mind be not just and right, ignorance is better than erudition, which only produces confusion and obscurity. M. Balzac calls a heap of ill-chosen erudition the luggage of antiquity.