Part 1

ERASMUS.

London: C. J. CLAY AND SONS, CAMBRIDGE UNIVERSITY PRESS WAREHOUSE, AVE MARIA LANE. Glasglow: 263, ARGYLE STREET.

Leipzig: F. A. BROCKHAUS. New York: THE MACMILLAN COMPANY. Bombay: E. SEYMOUR HALE.

ERASMUS

_THE REDE LECTURE DELIVERED IN THE SENATE-HOUSE ON JUNE 11, 1890_

BY

R. C. JEBB, LITT. D.

REGIUS PROFESSOR OF GREEK AND FELLOW OF TRINITY COLLEGE IN THE UNIVERSITY OF CAMBRIDGE.

SECOND EDITION.

CAMBRIDGE: AT THE UNIVERSITY PRESS 1897

Cambridge: PRINTED BY J. AND C. F. CLAY, AT THE UNIVERSITY PRESS.

ERASMUS.

Desiderius Erasmus was born at Rotterdam on the 27th of October, 1467. His father, Gerhard de Praet, belonged to a respectable family at Gouda, a small town of south Holland, not far from Rotterdam: his mother, Margaret, was the daughter of a physician at Sevenberg in Brabant. Gerhard's parents were resolved that he should become a monk. Meanwhile he was secretly betrothed to Margaret. His family succeeded in preventing their marriage, but not their union. After the birth of a son--the elder and only brother of Erasmus--Gerhard fled to Rome. A false rumour of Margaret's death there induced him, in his despair, to enter the priesthood. On returning to Holland, he found Margaret living at Gouda with his two boys. He was true to the irrevocable vows which parted him from her. After a few years, during which the supervision of their children's education had been a common solace, she died, while still young; and Gerhard, broken-hearted, soon followed her to the grave.

The boy afterwards so famous had been given his father's Christian name, Gerhard, meaning 'beloved.' Desiderius is barbarous Latin for that, and Erasmus is barbarous Greek for it. If the great scholar devised those appellations for himself, it must have been at an early age. Afterwards, when he stood godfather to the son of his friend Froben the printer, he gave the boy the correct form of his own second name,--viz., Erasmius. The combination, Desiderius Erasmus, is probably due to the fact that he had been known as Gerhard Gerhardson. It was a singular fortune for a master of literary style to be designated by two words which mean the same thing, and are both incorrect.

He was sent to school at Gouda when he was four years old. Here it was perceived that he had a fine voice; and so he was taken to Utrecht, and placed in the Cathedral choir. But he had no gift for music. At nine years of age he was removed from Utrecht to a good school at Deventer. His precocious genius soon showed itself, and his future eminence was predicted by the famous Rudolph Agricola--one of the first men who brought the new learning across the Alps.

Erasmus was only thirteen when he lost both parents, and was left to the care of three guardians. They wished him to become a monk: it was the simplest way to dispose of a ward. The boy loathed the idea; he knew his father's story; and now it seemed as if the same shadow was to fall on his own life also. However, the guardians sent him to a monastic seminary at Hertogenbosch, where the brethren undertook to prepare youth for the cloister. The three years which he spent there--_i.e._, from thirteen to sixteen--were wholly wasted and miserable: he learned nothing, and his health, never strong, was injured by cruel severities. 'The plan of these men,' he said afterwards, 'when they see a boy of high and lively spirit, is to break and humble it by stripes, by threats, by reproaches, and various other means.' The struggle with the monks and his guardians was a long one; when menaces failed, they tried blandishments,--especially they promised him a paradise of literary leisure. At last he gave in. When he was about eighteen, he took the vows of a Canon Regular of the order of St Augustine. Looking back afterwards on the arts by which he had been won, he asks, 'What is kidnapping, if this is not?'

The next five years--till he was twenty-three--were spent in his monastery at Stein, near Gouda. The general life of the place was odious to him; but he found one friend, named William Hermann. They used to read the Latin classics together--secretly, for such studies were viewed with some suspicion. It was then that he laid the basis of his Latin style, and became thoroughly familiar with some of the best Latin authors.

In 1491 he left the monastery, having been invited by the Bishop of Cambray, Henry de Bergis, to reside with him as his secretary. Soon afterwards he took orders; and the Bishop subsequently enabled him to enter the University of Paris, for the purpose of studying theology. He was then, perhaps, about twenty-seven years of age.

At this point we may attempt,--aided by Holbein, and by tradition--to form some idea of his personal appearance. Erasmus was a rather small man, slight, but well-built; he had, as became a Teuton, blue eyes, yellowish or light brown hair, and a fair complexion. The face is a remarkable one. It has two chief characteristics,--quiet, watchful sagacity,--and humour, half playful, half sarcastic. The eyes are calm, critical, steadily observant, with a half-latent twinkle in them; the nose is straight, rather long, and pointed; the rippling curves of the large mouth indicate a certain energetic vivacity of temperament, and tenacity of purpose; while the pose of the head suggests vigilant caution, almost timidity. As we continue to study the features, they speak more and more clearly of insight and refinement; of a worldly yet very gentle shrewdness; of cheerful self-mastery; and of a mind which has its weapons ready at every instant. But there is no suggestion of enthusiasm,--unless it be the literary enthusiasm of a student. It is difficult to imagine those cool eyes kindled by any glow of passion, or that genial serenity broken by a spiritual struggle. This man, we feel, would be an intellectual champion of truth and reason; his wit might be as the spear of Ithuriel, and his satire as the sword of Gideon; but he has not the face of a hero or a martyr.

On entering the University of Paris, Erasmus took up his residence at the Montaigu College. It was on the south side of the Seine, not far from the Sorbonne, and is said to have stood on the site now occupied by the Library of St. Geneviève. The Rector of the College was a man of estimable character; but he believed in extreme privation--which he had himself endured in youth--as the best school for students of theology. Erasmus has described the life there. The work imposed on the students was excessively severe. They were also half starved; meat was proscribed altogether; eggs, usually the reverse of fresh, formed the staple of food; the inmates had to fetch their drinking water from a polluted well. When wine was allowed, it was such as implied by the nickname 'Vinegar College' (a Latin pun on Montaigu). Many of the sleeping-rooms were on a ground-floor where the plaster was mouldering on the damp walls, and in such a neighbourhood that the air breathed by the sleepers--when they could sleep--was pestilential. One year's experience of this place--these are the words of Erasmus--doomed many youths of the brightest gifts and promise either to death, or to blindness, or to madness, or to leprosy; 'some of these,' he says, 'I knew myself,--and assuredly every one of us ran the danger.' Similar testimony is given by his younger contemporary, Rabelais:--'The unhappy creatures at that College are treated worse than galley-slaves among the Moors and Tartars, or than murderers in a criminal prison.'

No wonder Erasmus, a delicate man at the best, soon fell ill; indeed, his constitution was permanently impaired. He went back to the Bishop at Cambray. Then, after a short visit to Holland, he returned to Paris--but not to the Montaigu College. He rented a one-room lodging, and resolved to support himself during his University course by taking private pupils. It was a hard struggle that he went through then; but better days were at hand. He had already become known in Paris as a scholar of brilliant promise, and especially as an admirable Latinist. Latin was then the general language, not only of learning, but of polite intercourse between persons of different nationalities; and to speak Latin with fluent grace--an art in which Erasmus was already pre-eminent--was the best passport to cultivated society in Paris, whose University attracted students from all countries. Then he had a bright and nimble fancy, a keen sense of humour, a frank manner, and also rare tact; in short, he was a delightful companion, without ever seeking to dominate his company. One of his pupils was a young Englishman, William Blunt, Lord Mountjoy, who was studying at Paris. Mountjoy settled an annual pension of a hundred crowns on Erasmus, and presently persuaded him to visit England.

This was in 1498. Erasmus was now thirty-one. For eighteen years--ever since he left the school at Deventer--his life had been a hard one. The coarse rigours of Hertogenbosch, the midnight oil of Stein, the miseries of the Montaigu College, the later battle with poverty in Paris--all these had left their marks on that slight form, and that keen, calm face. Men who met him in England must have found it difficult to believe that he was so young. The sallow cheeks, the sunken eyes, the bent shoulders, the worn air of the whole man seemed to speak of a more advanced age. But neither then, nor at any later time, was he other than youthful in buoyant vivacity of spirit, in restless activity of mind, in untiring capacity for work.

And now a new world opened before him. In England he was not only an honoured guest, but, for the first time, perhaps, since he left school, he found himself among men from whom he had something to learn. He went to Oxford, with a letter of introduction to Richard Charnock, Prior of a house of his own order, the Canons Regular of St Augustine, and was hospitably received by him in the College of St Mary the Virgin. At that time the scholastic theology and philosophy still held the field in both the English Universities--as everywhere else, north of the Alps. But at Oxford there were a few eminent men who had studied the new learning in Italy, and had brought the love for it home with them. Erasmus was just too late to see William Selling of All Souls College, who died in 1495,--one of the first Englishmen who endeavoured to introduce Greek studies in this country. And he was too early to meet William Lilly, who was still abroad then. But he met some other scholars who were among the earliest teachers or advocates of Greek at Oxford,--William Grocyn, William Latimer, and Thomas Linacre;--the last-named, who became Founder of the Royal College of Physicians, had studied at Florence under Politian and Chalcondyles. Erasmus speaks with especial praise of Grocyn's comprehensive learning, and of Linacre's finished taste. It is certain that his intercourse with the Oxford Hellenists must have been both instructive and stimulating to him; we can see, too, that it strengthened his desire to visit Italy. On the other hand, his letters show that when he left Oxford in 1500, he had not advanced far in the study of Greek. The years from 1500 to 1505, during which he worked intensely hard at Greek by himself in Paris, were those in which his knowledge of that language was chiefly built up.

The two Oxonians with whom Erasmus formed the closest friendship were John Colet and Thomas More. Colet was just a year his senior, and was then lecturing on St Paul's Epistles in what was quite a new way,--endeavouring to bring out their meaning historically and practically. He was not a Greek scholar; but it was he who, more than anyone else, encouraged Erasmus to print the New Testament in the original tongue. Thomas More, who was then a youth of twenty, had left Oxford, and was reading law in London, where Erasmus first met him. The story that they met at dinner, and that, before an introduction, each recognised the other by his wit, is perhaps apocryphal. At any rate, it expresses the truth that such perfectly congenial minds would be drawn to each other at once.

In the winter of 1499 Erasmus visited Lord Mountjoy at Greenwich. It would seem, too, that he had a glimpse of Henry VII.'s Court. He writes that he has become 'a better horse-man, and a tolerable courtier.' In January, 1500, just before Erasmus left England, Thomas More went down from London to Greenwich, to say farewell,--bringing with him another young lawyer named Arnold. More proposed a walk, and took his friends to call at a large house in the neighbouring village of Eltham. They were shown into a hall where some children were at play: it was, in fact, the royal nursery. The eldest, a boy of nine years old, was the future Henry VIII.; he was not then Prince of Wales, but Duke of York, his brother Arthur being still alive. The tutor in charge of the children was John Skelton, the poet. Three days afterwards, in fulfilment of a promise, Erasmus sent the little Prince a Latin poem; it is in praise of England, and of Henry VII. There is no doubt that the praise of England came from his heart: his letters show that.

At the end of January, 1500, he sailed from Dover for France. A serious mishap befell him just before he went on board. He carried with him a considerable sum of money, contributed by friends for the purpose of enabling him to visit Italy. The custom-house officers at Dover deprived him of nearly the whole, on plea of a law forbidding the exportation of gold coin of the realm above a certain amount. His friends at court afterwards tried to recover it for him,--but in vain. On reaching Paris, he fell ill. When he recovered, he set hard to work. The next five years were spent chiefly at Paris, with occasional visits to Orleans or the Netherlands. They form a quiet yet memorable period of his life. In 1500 he published his first collection of proverbial sayings from the classics,--the _Adagia_,--which, in its enlarged form, afterwards brought him so much fame. And during these years his incessant labour at Greek gradually qualified him for yet greater tasks. He had no teacher in Paris; and, though not absolutely in want, he had difficulty in buying all the books that he required.

Towards the end of 1505 Erasmus paid a second visit to England,--staying only about six months. On this occasion he visited Cambridge. The Grace Book of our University shows that permission was given to Desiderius Erasmus to take the degrees of B.D. and D.D. by accumulation. It would seem, however, that he took the degree of B.D. only; so Dr John Caius says, and he must be right, if it is true that in the doctor's diploma which Erasmus received at Turin in 1506 he was described as a bachelor of theology. Had he possessed the higher degree, it would have been mentioned in the Turin document. During this second visit he saw a good deal of More and other old acquaintances. Grocyn took him to Lambeth, and introduced him to Warham, Archbishop of Canterbury and Lord Chancellor of England,--who, in the sequel, was one of his best friends.

He had now become able to realise the dream of his youth--to visit Italy. It was arranged that he should accompany the two sons of Dr Baptista Boyer, chief physician to Henry VII., who were going to Genoa; a royal courier was to escort them as far as Bologna. The party left Dover in the spring of 1506, and were tossed about for four days in the Channel. After a rest at Paris, they set out on horse-back for Turin. Erasmus has vividly described the squalid German inns, which he contrasts with those of France. Another discomfort of the journey was that the tutor and the courier quarrelled a good deal. At Turin--his companions having left him--he stayed several weeks, and received from the University the degree of Doctor in Theology.

The stay of Erasmus in Italy lasted three years--from the summer of 1506 to that of 1509. It is well to remember what was the general state of things in Italy at that time,--for the impressions which Erasmus received there had a strong and lasting effect upon his mind. In literature the humanistic revival had now passed its zenith, and was declining into that frivolous pedantry which Erasmus afterwards satirised in the 'Ciceronian.' Architecture, sculpture and painting were indeed active; Bramante, Michael Angelo and Raphael were at work. But the fact which chiefly arrested the attention of Erasmus was that Italian soil was the common ground on which the princes of Europe were prosecuting their intricate ambitions, and that the Pope had unsheathed the sword in pursuit of temporal advantage. Julius II. was already an elderly man, but full of military ardour. Venice seemed to be his ulterior object; meanwhile, in the autumn of 1506, he had reduced Perugia and Bologna. Erasmus was in Bologna when the Pope entered in November, and the late roses of that strangely mild autumn were strewn in his path by the shouting multitudes who hailed him as a warrior equal to his Roman namesake of old, the conqueror of Gaul. Erasmus was at Rome, too, in the following March, when the Pope celebrated his triumph with a martial pomp which no Caesar could have surpassed. Then came the revolt of Genoa from France,--the futile war of Maximilian, 'Emperor Elect,' against Venice,--and lastly the iniquitous League of Cambray, by which Maximilian, the Pope, Louis XII. and Ferdinand of Spain banded themselves together for the spoliation of the Venetian Republic. Such things as these sank deep into the heart of Erasmus. 'When princes purpose to exhaust a commonwealth'--he wrote afterwards--'they speak of a just war; when they unite for that object, they call it peace.'

But there was a bright side also to his years in Italy; in many places he enjoyed intercourse with learned men; and he formed some enduring friendships. At Venice he spent several months with Aldus in 1508, and saw an enlarged edition of the _Adagia_ through his famous press. The kind of reputation which he had now won may be seen from his own account of his visit to Cardinal Grimani at Rome, in 1509: it is a characteristic little story, and ought to be told in his own words. 'There was no one to be seen in the courtyard of the Cardinal's palace,' he says, 'or in the entrance-hall.... I went upstairs alone. I passed through the first, the second, the third room;--still no one to be seen, and not a door shut; I could not help wondering at the solitude. Coming to the last room, I there found only one person,--a Greek, I thought,--a physician,--with his head shaved, standing at the open door. I asked him if I could see the Cardinal; he replied that he was in an inner room, with some visitors. As I said no more, he asked me my business. I replied, 'I wished to pay my respects to him, if it had been convenient, but as he is engaged, I will call again.' I was just going away, but paused at a window to look at the view; the Greek came back to me, and asked if I wished to leave any message. 'You need not disturb him,' I said,--'I will call again soon.' Then he asked my name, and I told him. The instant he heard it, before I could stop him, he hurried into the inner room, and quickly returning, begged me not to go--I should be admitted directly. The Cardinal received me, not as a man of his high degree might have received one of my humble condition, but like an equal: a chair was placed for me, and we conversed for more than two hours. He would not even allow me to be uncovered,--a wonderful condescension in a man of his rank. Grimani pressed Erasmus to stay permanently at Rome. But he replied that he had just received a summons to England, which left him no choice.

In the April of that year, 1509, the little boy whom Erasmus had seen in the nursery at Eltham had become Henry VIII.; and in May, Mountjoy had written to his old tutor, urging him to return. Erasmus reached England early in the summer of 1510. Soon afterwards, in More's house at Bucklersbury, he rapidly wrote his famous satire, the _Encomium Moriac_, or 'Praise of Folly,' in which Folly celebrates her own praises as the great source of human pleasures. He had been meditating this piece on the long journey from Rome; it is a kaleidoscope of his experiences in Italy, and of earlier memories. As to the title, _Moria_, the Greek word for 'folly,' was a playful allusion, of course, to the name of his wise and witty host. This 'Praise of Folly' is a satire, not only in the modern but in the original sense of that word,--a medley. All classes, all callings, are sportively viewed on the weak side. But in relation to the author's own life and times, the most important topics are the various abuses in the Church, the pedantries of the schoolmen, and the selfish wars of kings. If this eloquent Folly, as Erasmus presents her, most often wears the mocking smile of Lucian or Voltaire, there are moments also when she wields the terrible lash of Juvenal or of Swift. The popularity of the satire, throughout Europe, was boundless. The mask of jest which it wore was its safeguard; how undignified, how absurd it would have been for a Pope or a King to care what was said by Folly! And, just for that reason, the _Encomium Moriae_ must be reckoned among the forces which prepared the Reformation.

Where was Erasmus to settle now? That was the great question for him. He decided it by going to Cambridge, on the invitation of Fisher, the Bishop of Rochester, who was then Chancellor of the University. Rooms were assigned to him in Queens' College, of which Fisher had been President a few years before. In that beautiful old cloister at Queens', where the spirit of the fifteenth century seems to linger, an entrance at the south-east corner gives access to a small court which is known as the court of Erasmus. His lodgings were in a square turret of red brick at the south-east angle of the court. His study was probably a good-sized room which is now used as a lecture-room; on the floor above this was his bedroom, with an adjoining attic for his servant. From the south windows of these rooms--looking on the modern Silver Street--he had a wide view over what was then open country, interspersed with cornfields; the windings of the river could be seen as far as the Trumpington woods. The walk on the west side of the Cam, which is called the walk of Erasmus, was not laid out till 1684: in his time it was open ground, with probably no trees upon it. His first letter from Cambridge is dated Dec. 1510, and this date must be right, or nearly so. He says himself that he taught Greek here before he lectured on theology; and also that, after his arrival, the commencement of his Greek teaching was delayed by ill-health. Now he was elected to the Lady Margaret Professorship of Divinity in 1511, and in those days the election was ordered to take place on the last day of term before the Long Vacation. His residence, then, can hardly have begun later than the early part of 1511.