Wawrzyniec Grzymała Goślicki

Wawrzyniec Grzymała Goślicki (Latin: Laurentius Grimaldius Goslicius; between 1530 and 1540 – 31 October 1607) was a Polish nobleman, Bishop of Poznań (1601–1607), political thinker and philosopher best known for his book De optimo senatore (1568).

Born near Płock, after studying at Kraków's Jagiellonian University and at Padua and Bologna, he entered the Roman Catholic Church. In 1569 he also joined the Polish royal chancery and as a secretary served two kings, Sigismund II Augustus and Stefan Batory, and was successively appointed bishop of Kamieniec Podolski (1586), Chełm (1590), Przemyśl (1591), and Poznań (1601). Goślicki was a man of affairs, highly esteemed by contemporaries, and frequently engaged in active politics. He was also a staunch advocate of religious tolerance in Poland. It was due to his influence and to a letter that he wrote to the Pope against the Jesuits that they were prevented from establishing schools at Kraków during his reign. He was the only prelate who, in 1587, acceded to the Warsaw Confederation.

Goślicki's Latin book De optimo senatore (published during his stay in Italy in Venice, 1568) and dedicated to King Zygmunt August, subsequently appeared in four English translations: as The Counsellor ( considered inaccurate) in 1598, A commonwealth of good counsaile in 1607, The Accomplished Senator... Done into English... By Mr. Oldisworth in 1733, and most recently as The Accomplished Senator in K. Thompson's translation in 1992. The book proved immensely important in Britain among forces opposed to the Tudor monarchy; it was widely quoted and cited in opposition pamphlets and leaflets during the period leading up to the British Civil Wars of the 1640s.

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