Christian History Institute Presents Pastwords #186: The Life of Erasmus Reduced from a Larger Work of Dr. Jortin by A. Laycey ©2007

In The Beginning...

ERASMUS, DESIDERIUS. The most renowned scholar of his age, Erasmus was a man of vast if not always deep erudition, of uncommon intellectual powers, but averse to metaphysical speculation, esp. in its medieval and Scholastic forms. Though he had himself paved the way for the Reformation by his merciless satires on the doctrines and institutions of the Church, his scholarly character, which abhorred violence and sought tranquility, prevented him from joining the Protestants, and threw him back on the tradition of the Church as the safeguard of stability. In the later years of his life he became suspect to both parties. Luther inveighed against him as a sceptic and Epicurean, and on the other side, though the Popes, esp. Leo X, had been favourble to him. Oxford Dictionary of the Christian Church

THE LIFE OF ERASMUS

N the celebrated Erasmus, we behold a man, who in his youth lying under no small disadvantages of birth and education, depressed by poverty, friendless and ill-supported, made his way through all these obstacles; and, by the help of bright parts and constant application, became one of the most considerable scholars of his age, acquiring the favour and protection of princes, nobles, and prelates, of the greatest names in church and state.

1467 He was born at Rotterdam, probably on October 28, 1467, but the year is uncertain, as, by his letters, he knew it not himself. From his native city he always called himself Roterodamus; and she was grateful to a name from which she derived so much credit, perpetuating her acknowledgments by inscriptions, medals, and a celebrated whole-length statue in the market-place.

His father, called Gerard, of Tergou, made love to Margaret, daughter of a physician of Sevenbergen; by whom, after a solemn promise of marriage, he had Peter and Erasmus. He was a man of wit and gaiety, a disposition which he transmitted to his younger son. His relations intended to make him an ecclesiastic, hoping to share his patrimony; and by ill usage they compelled him to leave his country. He went to Rome and employed himself in transcribing ancient authors. His friends, intending to frustrate his design of returning to Margaret, send him word that she was dead, which gave him a religious cast of mind and made him take orders. Finding on his return to Holland that he had been deceived, he lived apart from his Margaret, and she never married. He sent Erasmus to school at four years of age, and the boy, having a pretty voice, was soon afterward chosen chorister in Utrecht cathedral.

1476 At nine years of age, he went to a school at Deventer, where Alexander Hegius was his master, and Adrianus Florentius, afterward Pope Adrian VI. his schoolfellow, who continued to be his friend. Zinthius, visiting that school, is said to have foretold the progress which Erasmus afterward made in literature. It is reported of him that he had then a great memory, and could repeat the whole of Horace and Terence by heart.

1480 His affectionate mother followed him to Deventer, to have an eye over her child; but she died there of the plague when he was about thirteen, and Gerard, deeply affected with the loss, soon followed her, aged, as well as herself, a little more than forty. With Dido in Virgil she might have said, Huic uni sorsan potui succumbere culpae.

Her fault, very different from that of a common prostitute, produced so excellent a person, that, had she lived long enough to see the abilities and the merit of her son, she would have had much greater reason to have boasted of her failings, than the mother of Peter Lombard, of Gratian and of Comestor, is said to have done.

Gerard had left his sons in the hands of three guardians who proved dishonest, and agreed to devote the boys to a religious life, that they might the most easily plunder their little patrimony. They first drove Erasmus into a convent of friars at Bolduc in Brabant, where he passed, or rather, as he says, lost three years of his life, having a complete aversion to the monastic state, which adhered to him through life. Young as he was, he had the resolution not to part with his liberty, by becoming a regular, and submitting to all their stupid and ridiculous ceremonies; even then he could discern, that religion was the thing least regarded in religious houses. They next tried him at another convent, Sion, near Delft; and when that attempt would not succeed, they sent him to a third, Stein, near Tergou. 1484 Here he was attracted by one Cantel, his school-fellow; took the habit at about seventeen, 1486 and made his profession at nineteen. His brother broke loose from his confinement and led a dissolute life; while Erasmus applied closely to study, and conducted himself with sobriety and regularity. Erasmus once accidentally mentions his brother, as dead, in Epistle 922.

He is supposed to have quitted the monastic state for this among other reasons, he could not bear the tyranny of an ignorant and insolent Superior; and such were usually the head of those houses. A trick is related on this occasion, which he put upon his Superior and a lame monk of the fraternity, while in the Monastery of Tergou. There was a favourite pear-tree in the garden, the fruit of which the Superior reserved for is own eating. Erasmus had in this instance the same taste with his master, and rose some mornings ere break of day to rob the tree. The Superior observing the decrement of his pears, watched at his chamber-window to discover the delinquent, and one morn actually perceived somebody in the tree, but it was still dusky. He resolved, however, to wait till he could discern the robber, but by accident he made some noise, which was heard by Erasmus, who, fearing discovery, hastened down the tree and returned limping all the way. The Superior, satisfied that he had discovered the thief, called his monks together, and after a discourse on the duty of canonical obedience, turned to the same friar and accused him of robbery and contempt of the commands of his Superior. In vain the poor man insisted on his innocence; that only irritated his master the more, who imposed a heavy penance on him notwithstanding his protestations. In his Ecclesiastes, Erasmus has represented in strong terms the insolence of these petty monarchs.

He at first went by his father's name, Gerard; but afterward, embracing the fashion of learned men of those times, who affected to give their names a Latin or Greek turn, he called himself Desiderius and Erasmus, which have the same signification (Amiable) in those two languages with Gerard in the German. Afterward he was sensible that he should rather have called himself Erasmius, and gave this name to his godson Joannes Erasmius Frobenius.

1490 In 1490 Erasmus was with Henry a Bergis, Bishop of Cambray, who had taken him out of the monastery into his family. He says of himself that he was not fit to bear the watchings, fastings, diet and austerities of a monastery; and complains that he was often ill at the bishop's house, though he wanted for nothing. It appears indeed from many of his letters, that he was of a weakly constitution. He had a mind at this time to go to Italy and take a doctor's degree; and complains of the bishop's parsimony, who, giving him little beside good words and fair promises, would not furnish him with the needful for his purpose. It was thirteen or fourteen years after this that he first went to Italy.

1492 In 1492 he was ordained priest by the Bishop of Utrecht.

1496 In 1496 he was at Paris, where the Bishop of Cambray had promised to assist him with a small pension, but sent him nothing. He had here some young pupils, but found it hard enough to subsist, wanting money to buy books or obtain transcripts, for in those days printed books were scarce and dear. "Erasmus, says Baillet, was a student in the college of Montaigu; he returned to Cambray, went thence to Holland, and thence again to Paris, where he passed some years in poverty; which, obliging him to study incessantly and to raise himself by his industry, contributed to make him afterward so illustrious in the republic of letters. Among his disciples at Paris, he found the friendship of no one more constant than that of William Lord Montjoy, who afterward gave him an annual pension of 100 crowns. His 5th Epistle is an excuse to that young nobleman, for having omitted to read a lecture to him upon a certain day.

About this time he refused a large pension and larger promises, from a young illiterate Englishman, who was to be made a bishop, and wanted him for a preceptor; he would not, he says, be so hindered from prosecuting his studies, for all the wealth in the world. This youth seems to have been James Stanley, son of the Early of Derby, and son in law to Margaret the king's mother. He was afterward made Bishop of Ely by her interest.

1497 In 1497 Erasmus left Paris, on account of the plague, and came to the Low-countries. He was at the Castle of Tornenhens, belonging to Anna Berfala, a lady of great merit and Marchionefs of Vere, who was liberal to him, and whom he has celebrated more than once in his letters. He was also this year at London and Oxford, and became acquainted with John Colet, afterward Dean of St. Paul's and his singular friend, as also with William Grocyn, Thomas Linacer and William Latimer.

Grocyn was at that time professor or public teacher of Greek at Oxford, and Erasmus owns great obligations to him, representing him as one of the best divines and scholars of the English nation.

Linacer was so superstitiously exact in his compositions, and found it so difficult to satisfy himself, that it is probably he would not have published anything; which occasioned Erasmus to press him earnestly to communicate his labours to the public. He was afterward physician to the royal family, and Erasmus often consulted him on account of his frequent indispositions, which came early upon him. I have no Linacer here to assist and prescribe for me, he complained when he was ill at Paris; and at another time he wrote to him from St. Omer for a prescription. Linacer being in great favour with Henry VIII. warmly recommended Erasmus to the king; and when he afterward did something to offend Erasmus, the latter overlooked it on account of his many obligations to him. Erasmus calls Linacer vir non exacti tan um sed severi judicii; but in his Praise of Folly he ingeniously banters, without naming, him, for giving himself up too much to grammatical studies.

William Latimer, says Erasmus, was a man of more than virgin modesty, under which was veiled the greatest worth; he also call him vere theologus, integritate vitae conspicuus. Knowing him to be very accurate, Erasmus begged his assistance in preparing his New Testmanet for a second edition.

At Oxford, Erasmus studied in St. Mary's College, and became acquainted with Thomas More, afterward Lord Chancellor; with Thomas Wolsey, the great cardinal, then bursar of Magdalen College; with John Claymond, afterward president of Magdalen and then head of Corpus-christi College; and with Thomas Halfey, afterward English penitentiary in St. Peter's at Rome, the pope's prothonotory of Ireland and Bishop of Laiglin. With these he kept up a correspondence.

In a long letter of this time, (Ep. 13) in answer to one of Joannes Sixtinus, he speaks modestly of himself, and writes with much wit and vivacity, though in no Ciceronian style. In his next, which is to Piscator, (Robert Fisher) he writes with much affection of Lord Montjoy, who had brought him over to England, and with much respect of the English literati.

Of Wolsey, Erasmus in early life conceived too good an opinion, and said many things in his favour; but he found himself deceived in several instances, by a man who had more of the courtier than of the friend and patron. In some of his later writings he altered his style, and said severe things of Wolsey, which must attribute to a course of ill-usage, which he, in common with the cardinal's best friends, had met with from him; not to mention the general odium which Wolsey's pride and insolence had incurred. Thus the aspersions cast upon Erasmus by Dr. Fiddes in his Life of Wolsey, (which should have been called an Apology for Wolsey and a Libel on the Reformation) are unjustly severe; and the subsequent censure of Erasmus, that the cardinal was feared by all and beloved by few or none, is probably very just.

From England Erasmus returned this year to Paris, where, it appears from this letters, he had pupils, but did not pass his time agreeably. One of them is a violent invective against some person who had deprived him of his pupil Thomas Grey, son perhaps of the Marquis of Dorfet; in a letter to which young friend he tells him that a friendship like theirs, founded upon probity and a love of literature, would be perpetual. Colet had read divinity-lectures at Oxford upon St. Paul's Epistles, and wished Erasmus to do the same upon the Old Testament; but the latter prudently excused himself from the task as too heavy for him, and though Wood reports otherwise, it is probably that Erasmus never made any long stay at Oxford after this time. His letter to Colet is written, Oxonion, e collegio Canonicorum ordinis Divi Auguslini, quad vulgo dicitur S. Mariae, and though without date probably belongs to this year.

1498 After a residence of three months at Orleans, Erasmus returned to Paris in 1498, whence he wrote several letters. He had been ill there in Lent, and says that St. Genevieve cured him, but not without the assistance of William Cope, a skilful physician. He was preparing his Adages and applying himself closely to Greek; and says, that as soon as he could get any money, he would purchase, first Greek authors, and secondly clothes--few students would do the same.

The Marchioness of Vere invited him, by James Battus, a particular friend of his and tutor to her son, to come and see her; but he wanted money and a horse for the journey, and wished that the lady would furnish him with both. It seems that he understood a little French, and had written to her in that language. He again projected to go to Italy and take a doctor's degree, if his friends would furnish him with necessaries. It appears also from his letters that he was this year in England, but we find him again at Paris early in 1499.

He had not carried away much money from our country, for his friends sent him eight franks by an especial messenger; eight franks was, however, at that time, a tolerable sum in a scholar's pocket. He complains of bad health and poverty, and wishes that his patroness, the Marchioness of Vere, would send him 200 franks; a very trifle, as he said, compared with her superfluous expences on other occasions, and her liberality to some rascally monks whom she maintained, and whom he calls cucullatos scortatores et turpissimos nebulones.

Erasmus was now reprinting his book De ratione conscribendi epislolas, De copia verborum, &c. and intended to dedicate them to Adolphus, son of the marchioness. The tract De scribendis epistolis was first written at the suggestion of Montjoy, at Paris, about 1493, and finished in twenty days; but Erasmus was afterward sensible that he had drawn it up too hastily.

Upon some journey he lost his wallet, which contained his linen, ten pieces of gold, and his Preces Horariae. He writes his friend Battus, he could not take a second journey, partly from the loss of the money, but principally from having lost his prayer-book.

At midsummer he went to the Low-countries, and says the air of Holland agreed with him, but that he was much offended at their Epicurean repasts; add to this, that the people are sordid, unpolished, despisers of learning, which meets there with no encouragement and much envy--Holland, as we all know, hath subsequently been much improved in these respects.

Erasmus wrote a jesting letter this year to Faustus Andrelinus, the poet-laureat, exhorting him to leave France and repair to England, for the sake of conversing with the British ladies, &c. He expresses himself much pleased with the English fashion of saluting the ladies, but did not like our fashion of searching those who left the nation, and of not suffering them to carry away more than six angels. He was deeply affronted that a custom-house officer stripped him of 20l. (all the money which he had above that sum) when he wanted to pass from Dover to France. There is a story, that Henry VIII. ordered the custom-house officers to pillage Erasmus, who returned to complain to the king; and that the king laughed at him, and sent him away with a present and with an order to receive his money again. But Bayle treats this as a fable, and Henry did not reign till 1509.

Toward the end of year Erasmus was at Orleans, and returned thence to Paris, where he with difficulty subsisted, being ill-used by one Augustin, who had obligations to him and robbed him. In going from Amiens to Paris, he was in great danger of being robbed and murdered, which he describes in a very lively manner in his 81st letter.. . . .

At The End...

We now come to the year 1536, the last of the life of Erasmus. This winter he published his Commentary on Psalm XIV. intituled Of the purity of the Christian Church, and consisting of allegorical interpretations and moral reflections on the text. He also republished his Letters, adding several which he had received from popes, kings, and princes, and men of high station; to let the world see, that, though despised by some and insulted by others, he had enjoyed the approbation and esteem of the Great: Cum magnis vixiffe invita satebitur usque Invidia.

For some time past, he says, he had neglected to preserve copies of his own letters, because they were so numerous that his amanuenses were not able to transcribe them. Many were found after his death, and retrieved while the Leyden edition of his works was preparing; yet it were to be wished, that he had taken the pains himself to arrange his Epistles in proper order.

He complains that while revising them, he found that within ten years many of his best friends and old correspondents were dead; which made him meditate on the shortness and uncertainty of life. Tomicius, Bishop of Cracow, was dead in Poland, Zafius at Friburg, and all his English friends were either dead, or dead to him from fear of corresponding with him in those dangerous times.

Dangerous indeed! In 1535 More and Fisher were executed, the monasteries suppressed, and many papists and protestants suffered together. In 1536 Anne Bulleyn and her brother the Lord Rochford were put to death, the king's marriage with her was annulled, the English nation abounded with discontented, and insurrections and rebellions ensued. The later times of Henry VIII. may be compared with those of Constantius, who, as Ammianus Marcellinus observes, was cruel toward all who truly or falsely were charged with treason. Any accusation, how slight soever, served to ruin a man; and his subjects were so far from daring to tell their dreams, lest they should have a reasonable interpretation put upon them, that they dared not to own they ever slept.

"They (says Erasmus) who paid me pensions, now excuse themselves; yet Thomas Cromwell, the King's Secretary and the person who is most in his favour, hath sent me, I know not why, twenty angels, the Archbishop of Canterbury (Cranmer) eighteen, and the Bishop of Lincoln fifteen; but none of them have sent me letter."

At this time he was revising and printing the works of Origen and adding a few short notes, but the work was not published till after his decease, and then with a preface of Rhenanus containing an epitome of his life. He had been ill at Friburg, and continued so at Basle. Rhenanus and Amerbach say, that he intended to go to Brabant, as he had promised Mary Queen of Hungary, who had sent him money for the journey long before; but it may be questioned from his letters, if he entertained such a design

In the summer he grew worse; and the last letter we have of his writing is dated June 28th, and subscribed Erasmus Rot. aegra manu. It is to his old friend Goclenius, who had advised him to write to a lady of the house of Nassau. "Had you known exactly (he says) the state of my affairs, you would have sent word to this lady, that I had been obliged to leave Friburg on account of my ill health, with design to go to Bezancon as soon as I had finished my Ecclesiastes, that I might still continue in the Emperor's territories. But my complaint growing worse, I had been obliged to pass the winter at Basle. For though I am here with my best friends and such as I could not have at Friburg, yet because of the difference of religious sentiments, I could have been glad to end my days elsewhere, I wish Brabant were nearer at hand."

For nearly a month he was ill of a dysentery, and saw plainly that his disease would prove mortal. For several months he had foreseen he could not hold-out long, and foretold it again three days, and then two, before his death. Amerbach, Froben, and Episcopius, coming-in to pay him a visit, he told them that in them he beheld Job's three friends, and asked them smiling, why they had not rent their clothes and put ashes on their heads. During the remainder of his time he constantly implored the mercy of Almighty God and Jesus Christ, without speaking of those minute devotions which had so much derided in the monks; and he preserved his reason to the last. He died calmly on the 12th of July, and was buried with a great concourse of attendants in the Cathedral Church of Basle, where his tomb is to be seen, with a Latin inscription, of which a copy is given in the first volume of his works. The monks might justly say in their accustomed jargon, which Erasmus hath more than once derided, that he died fine crux, fine lux, fine Deus; not failed they to say it.

He had made his will in February, by which he bequeathed handsome legacies to several friends, and the residue he ordered to be distributed by his executors, to relieve the sick and poor, to marry young women, assist young men of good character, and such as they should judge to be necessitous and deserving. With his accustomed discernment, he chose for his executors Amerbach, Froben, and Episcopius, men of honour, probity, and generosity, who fulfilled his orders more than exactly, and to their own determinant, in distributing his charitable donations.

From his testament it appears, that he was not in low circumstances, nor so bad an oeconomist as, between jest and earnest, he sometimes seemed to represent himself. It was reported that he left more than 7000 ducats. We cannot too much extol the liberality of the English nobles and prelates, and other illustrious persons, who enabled him to live decently, and to serve the public by such studies as suited his genius and inclination. His generosity to his old friends, and his charities to the poor, were infinitely more laudable than the pretended piety of those who leave their effects to monksé who are to pray for them after their decease; as if The Almighty could be supposed to regard prayers bought and sold, and sung or said after a man is in his grave!

Such was the last will of Erasmus, and thus he departed from this life, aged nearly sixty-nine, in the arms of his dearest friends, who yet were then in the religious sentiments of Zuinglius and Oecolampadius. Had he died in a Catholic country, he could not have escaped seizing solicitations of officious priests to make some sort of sordid retractation, or perform some act of minute superstition, which would have tarnished his memory, and which he could not easily have avoided, if he would have received the Sacraments of the Church and have slept in holy ground.

He hath drawn his own character in his letters, from which we have principally collected this account of his life; and hath performed it in so masterly a manner, that we could not have wished for better materials to work upon. He may be justly censured for his weakness in flattering a party, whose sentiments and conduct he is many things disapproved; and in finding fault with those, whom on the whole he resembled much more than he did their adversaries. But if he deserved some blame on this account, they who compelled him to dissemble in this manner, who hated the very name of a reformation, and who treated as vile heretics all those who dared even to wish for some amendment, were beyond measure more blameable. There was the same difference between them and him, as between a tyrant and his poor subjects, who are obliged to humour him that they may save their lives and effects, and to do what they would never have done if violence had not constrained them. If Erasmus wanted courage, they who took advantage of his infirmity were far more deficient in honesty and piety.

Rhenanus hath given us a description of her person, temper, and behavior. He tells us Erasmus was low in stature, but not remarkably short, that he was well-shaped, of a fair complexion, with hair in his youth of a pale yellow, grey eyes, a cheerful countenance, a low voice, an agreeable elocution; that he was neat in his apparel, had a very tender and infirm constitution, and a vast memory, that he was an agreeable companion, a very constant friend, generous and charitable, &c. Erasmus hath declared of himself that he was not fond of money, and appeals to everyone who knew him.

All the learned of Basle, says Moreri, carried Erasmus on their shoulders to the Cathedral Church, where he was buried. If so (adds Bayle) his coffin must at least have been as big as the bed of Og, King of Basan, mentioned in Deutronomy.

On the decease of Erasmus (if we may believe Melchior Adam) some vile wretches who had interest in the Emperor's court, represented him as one who died a Lutheran and heretic, and said his will ought to be set-aside, his effects confiscated, and his works prohibited. They would have carried their point, if Mudaeus, once a disciple of Erasmus, an eminent lawyer, and much in favour at court, had not stopped their attempt.

In 1557, Farel and Beza also attacked his memory and reputation at Basle, with much malignity and effrontery; upon which his heirs treated them as they deserved, and gave them the lie in a public manner. Tapper and his associates, at Louvain, caused all their versions of the scriptures to be condemned, the vulgate excepted; and endeavoured to have all the works of Erasmus destroyed, but could not succeed, being crossed by the President of Brabant, the Bishop of' Aras, &c. Erasmus at first did not care to sit for his picture, but was afterward frequently drawn by Holbein. Beza wrote this epigram to be inscribed on his picture, which Bayle hath justly censured as a piece of false wit; it is hardly good enough for a schoolboy.

Ingens ingentem quem personat orbis Erasmum,
Hic tibi dimidium picta tabella refert.
At cur non totum? Mirari define, lector,
Integra nam totum terra nec ipfa capit.

LUDOVICUS Mafius wrote this distich on the death of Erasmus:

Fatalis feries nobis invidit Erasmum;
Sed Defiderium tollere non putuit.

Nothing hath made Rotterdam more famous than her having given birth to Erasmus. Had homer been as much esteemed in his life as after his decease, so many cities would not have claimed him; the true parent would have made clear her title before time could have obscured it. It hath been pretended that he was rather a burgess of Tergou, because the place where children are born accidentally is not accounted their country; and some French writers, founding their pretensions on Caesar's division of Gaul, have as reasonably claimed Erasmus for a countryman. The house in which he was born at Rotterdam, has an inscription to inform strangers of its distinction. The college, where Latin, Greek, and rhetoric are taught, bears his name and is consecrated to him. A statue of wood was raised to his memory in the city, in 1549, and one of stone erected in its stead eight years later. In 1572 the Spaniards, having thrown it down, the inhabitants re-erected it as soon as they could; and in 1622 they substituted one of bronze, which is to this day the admiration of the curious. Thus, in common with the deities of ancient Rome, the materials of his statue advanced in value;

Nunc te marmoreum pro tempore fecimus; at tu
Si saetura gregem suppleveret, aureus esto.

When Philip II, made his solemn entry into Rotterdam as sovereign prince of the Low-countries, the senate placed, as its greatest ornament, the statue of Erasmus before the house where he was born, dressed in ecclesiastical habit, holding a pen in his right hand, and with the left presenting the prince a roll of verses suitable to the occasion.

Joost van den Vondel wrote the following verses on this statue;

"Whatever wisdom Greece and Rome conceal'd,
Erasmus to the Christian world reveal'd"
Thus to himself he gain'd immortal fame,
And grac'd his native city with his name.
Proud of the glory by his merit won,
The grateful city to her godlike son
A statue rais'd aloft of sold stone,
While envy strove to hurl him from the throne;
Fruitless attempt! No storms of envious breath
The hero move, triumphant e'en in death;
Immortal garlands do his temples grace,
And time adds beauty to his rev'rend face,
Tho' once but stone, in brass his features shine,
If envy storm, gold shall our saint enshrine."

The Contraremonstrants hated the memory of their countryman Erasmus, as much as they did the persons of Grotius and Episcopius, and wanted to have his statue pulled-down. They could not bear the sight of this hero even in brass; it had the same effect on them as Statius supposes the image of Hercules to have had on the Argives;

Haud illum impavidi, quamvis et in aere, summque
Inachidae videre decus.

At Basle, the house in which Erasmus died was exhibited, and the place where the professors of divinity read their winter-lectures obtained the name, the college of Erasmus. His cabinet was esteemed one if the greatest curiousities in the city, containing, among other things, his ring, seal, sword, knife, and pencil; his will in his own hand, and his picture, a master-piece by Holbein. The magistrates bought this cabinet in 1661 of Amberbach, god 9000 crowns, and either presented or sold it to the University.

Erasmus had for his seal the god Terminus, with the inscription Concedo nulli. Hence he was accused by some of his stupid and malicious enemies of insufferable vanity, or representing himself as superior to all mankind. The seal was not of his own contrivance, but an ancient seal, given him by his pupil the Archbishop of St. Andrews. Erasmus added the legend, thinking it was a good symbolical representation of death, which every wise man ought to have before his eyes, and for which he should hold himself prepared.

Bayle justly observes that Erasmus had too much sensibility when attacked by malicious and inconsiderable adversaries, and was too ready to answer them. He wanted a friend to overrule him and say, let these men alone, they cannot live in their own writings, why should they live in yours? Yet be it remembered, that he was fighting for his honour and his life, being often accused of nothing less than heterodoxy, impiety, and blasphemy, by men whose forehead was a rock and their tongue a razor. To be misrepresented as a pedant and a dunce, is no great matter, for time and truth put foully to flight. But to be accused of heresy by bigots, hypocrites, politicians, and infidels, is a serious affair; as they too well know, who have had the misfortune to feel the effects of it.

Le Clerc hath observed that he was not recompensed according to his desert; which is also true. Yet if we consider how many presents, invitations, and favours he received, how many he refused, and how little inclination he had for ecclesiastical preferments, more of which he might have obtained, we cannot with propriety place him among the infelices literati.

The style of Erasmus is that of a man who had a strong memory, a natual eloquence, a lively fancy, and a ready invention; who composed with facility and rapidity, and hated the trouble of revising; who had spent all his days in reading, writing, and talking Latin, for he seems to have had no turn for modern languages, and perhaps had almost forgotten his mother-tongue. It is ever unaffected, easy, copious, fluent, and clear; but not always perfectly pure and strictly classical. He hath been censured as a dealer in barbarisms, by those who had not half his ability and erudition, and did not even write Latin half so well.

His verses are evidently the compositions of one who had much learning and good sense, and understood prosody or the technical part of poetry; but who had not an equal elegance of taste, or an ear for poetical numbers. Thus he is a versifier rather than a poet, and is not to be ranked among the Italian poets of those days, Sannazarius, Farcastorius, Vida, &c. many of whom wrote better than any of the ancients, save Lucretius, Virgil, Horace, and a few more.

In early life, he carefully studies the Greek and Latin grammar, read lectures on them, and translated Greek books into Latin. This was laying a proper foundation for criticism and philology, and it is to be wished that our students would in some measure follow his example. Be you ever so ingenious and industrious, if you neglect to cultivate and preserve this humble part of knowledge, you will be perpetually stumbling when you tread on classic ground; when you attempt to explain, translate, or correct ancient authors, to discuss any learned subject, or to write a few pages of Latin in prose or verse. Beware then of blunders, nor think to make amends for them in insulting and ridiculing grammarians, scholiasts, commentators, lexicographers, verbal critics, word-catchers, syllable-mongers, and poachers in Stobaeus and Suidas.

Milichius, who was a student at Friburg, and had there the pleasure of being well acquainted with Erasmus, says, "he used to dine late that he might have a long morning for study. After dinner he would converse cheerfully with his friends on any subject, and deliver his opinions very freely on men and things." He was, indeed, of so facetious a temper, and so fond of a witty story, that he loved a good jest though made upon himself.

"What, it may be asked, was the religion of Erasmus? -- Answer, it is best to leave the reader to judge for himself and make his inferences from the premises, observing only, that had he had absolute power to establish a form of religion in any country, he would have been a moderate man and a latitudinarian as to the credenda; he would have proposed few articles of faith, and those with a primitive simplicity. He hath been accused of Arianism by many ecclesiastics, and claimed as an Arian by Saudius and others. Yet it is certain that he denied the charge, and often expressed himself on this subject like those who are called orthodox. The passages which shew this are to be found quite through his fifth volume and in many other places.

Yet he said enough and more than enough, to make himself suspected by violent and unreasonable men. He gave up some passages of scripture, which had been, and are now frequently urged against the Arians, and which prove nothing beside the ignorance, disingenuity, or prejudices of those who make use of them. He said, Arianism was rather a faction and schism than a heresy; that the Arians surpassed their adversaries in learning and eloquence; that they were skilful in the knowledge of the scriptures; that they might be good men, and in the favour of God, notwithstanding their error; that Arius and his followers were ill used by the Consubstantialists; that creeds ought to be drawn-up with simplicity; that the Christians in the 4th century did wrong to insert ________ in the Nicene Creed; the Apostles Creed was sufficient; and that the Athanasian Creed, unless very favourably interpreted, was rather heterodox than orthodox.

He also defended the doctrine of Subordination. He thought that the Son, though of the same nature with the Father, yet personally considered was less and inferior to him, as the Father was the fountain of divinity, from whom the Son and Spirit received their being and perfections. Could he have been seen the Confession of Faith, presented to Francis I, by the poor persecuted remains of the Albigenses or Valdenses, he would probably have approved it.

"It is to be presumed (says Burigni) that had Erasmus lived long enough, he would have changed his opinion, and submitted himself to the decision of the Council of Trent concerning auricular confession." Can the Frenchman be in earnest? It is to be presumed, that, had he lived to see that ecclesiastical cabal, he would have had the same opinion of it as Father Paul had. Who knows not that two hundred logs of wood, cut in the shapes of cardinals, bishops, abbots, and scholastic divines, and properly appareled, would have made as good a set of fathers as those who were assembled at that venerable council, each of whom (a few excepted) was --nervis alienis mobile lignum?

Of the theological works of Erasmus, his Paraphrases were best received, and met the least opposition. Yet our Bishop Gardiner inveighed vehemently against them; but his remarks were frivolous and malicious.

The Paraphrases of Erasmus (says Strype) were printed in English as the charge and direction of the amiable and learned Queen Catharine Par, who employed Nic. Udal and others in that work, and is supposed to have done part of it herself. The Lady Mary also, afterward Queen Mary, employed herself in translating some of it; but alas! she profited little it seems from studying that excellent work, with neither mended her vile temper nor enlightened her cloudy mind. Edward VI. ordered that all the Bachelors of Divinity should study them, and Elizabeth commanded that in every church there should be a copy on a desk for the use of the congregation. His prefaces and notes to the Fathers, says Du Pin, are full of critical discernment; and though he may be sometimes too bold, yet must it be confessed that he hath opened the way to all those who followed him.

In Erasmus, as has been observed, we behold a man, who in his youth lying under no small disadvantages of birth and education, depressed by poverty, friendless and ill-supported, overcame all these obstacles; and, by the help of bright parts and constant application, became one of the most considerable scholars of his age, acquiring the favour and protection of princes, nobles, and prelates, of the greatest names in church and state. Every man of letters must not indulge the vain hope, though he be as learned, as ingenious, and as industrious as Erasmus, to be as much favoured and encouraged as he was. Yet this is not a sufficient cause to deter any person from a studious life. Learning is in many respects its own reward; learning applied to useful purposes and adorned with good manners. Without these, though it may be of some service to the public, it will be of small comfort to the possessor. "After personal merit (says Bruyere) high stations and pompous title are the principal and most splendid marks of distinction; and he who cannot be an Erasmus, must think of being a bishop."

The high stomach of the learned Joseph Scaliger, and his resentment against the age in which he lived, made him talk in a manner beneath himself, when he advised all parents to keep their children from literature, and to turn them entirely to occupations more lucrative and more respected by the world. Such sentiments did not become either the Prince of the Republic of Letters or the Prince of Verona.