President of the Court of Moneys, that the Ministers of some Princes
having asked him whether he were attached to any Court, as was reported;
he answered, that he would always remember with gratitude the favours
shewn him in France, but that since he came away he was free and his own
master: he adds, that several considerable settlements both with regard
to honour and profit were offered him; "but, says he, I keep always in
mind the maxim, to deliberate long before coming to a resolution. I hope
however that my situation will permit me to see France again, and my
dear friends, and to thank them personally; you, Messieurs de Thou,
Descordes, Du Puis, Pelletier, whose names will remain engraven on my
heart wherever fortune carries me." Lusson yielded to his reasons, and
approved of his disinterestedness[182].

He led a dull life at Hamburg. "I am extremely solitary here (he writes
to his brother August 3, 1633[183]:) even the men of learning keep up no
correspondence with one another. I might easily support this irksomeness
if I had my books and papers: for I could employ myself in some work
that would be useful to the public and no discredit to me: but at
present without these I am a kind of prisoner."

The disagreeableness of his situation and the uneasiness of his mind
were increased by the death of his Landlord after fourteen days
illness[184]. He was a Merchant of more knowledge and good sense than we
commonly find in men of that profession. He left some young children, in
whose education Grotius interested himself. Writing on this subject to
Vossius, he tells him that his Landlord's two sons were at the Hague
learning Grammar; that they were beginning to make Themes and Versions;
that if what they had already learnt were not cultivated, they would
soon forget it; and that the time which boys spent in their Studies at
Hamburg was lost, the method of teaching being only fit to make
blockheads. "Several, he adds, employ preceptors in the education of
their children; which method answers not expectation. I never approved
of it because I know that young people learn not but in company, and
that study languishes where there is no emulation. I also dislike those
schools when the master scarce knows the names of his scholars, and
where their number is so great that he cannot give that attention to
each, which his different genius and capacity may require. For this
reason I would have a middle course followed: that a master