Selections from Erasmus: Principally from his Epistles Part 15

121. CELEBRITAS] abstract for concrete.

130. TONITRUI] This form occurs in the Vulgate; but in cla.s.sical Latin the singular follows the fourth declension.

XXII

[This and the following extract are to some extent coincident, but each contributes something to the picture of Warham which the other has not.

Both were written in 1533, shortly after Warham's death, XXII in the first book of the _Ecclesiastes_ (see p. 15[*]), which was begun some time before it was published; XXIII as a new preface for an edition of Jerome which was being printed in Paris.

[* At the end of LIFE OF ERASMUS. Transcriptor.]

William Warham (c. 1450-1532) was an eminent lawyer before he received ecclesiastical preferment. He was Master of the Rolls 1494-1502, Bishop of London 1501, Archbishop of Canterbury 1503, Lord Chancellor of England 1504-15, and Chancellor of Oxford University from 1506 until his death.

In the severance of the English Church from Rome he was an unwilling agent to Henry VIII.]

8. IURIS UTRIUSQUE] The two branches of law, civil and canon (or church).

34. VENATUI] Cf. XVIII. 12 n.

48. A CENIS] See p. 157. [ADDITIONAL NOTES at the end of this text.

Transcriptor.]

66. IBI] in England.

79, 80. FUIT ... EST] The subjunctive would be grammatically regular, but in both cases the indicative is used to express a fact independent of any condition.

82. ESSET] The subjunctive expresses the ground of the refusal.

84. PRAESTARE] Cf. l. 100 and _oratorem gerere_, XVIII. 47.

93. CUI RESIGNARAM] John Thornton, Suffragan Bishop of Dover, who was appointed to succeed Erasmus on 31 July 1512. Cf. XVI. 145 n.

94. _a suffragiis_] A suffragan. This form was common in late Latin for the designation of an office; cf. ab epistolis, a secretary; a libellis, a notary; a cubiculis, a poculis.

95. IUVENEM] Richard Masters, appointed in Nov. 1514. He was afterwards involved in the affair of the 'Holy Maid of Kent' and was deprived in 1534.

101. METROPOLITa.n.u.s] The t.i.tle of an archbishop as head of an ecclesiastical province. All the bishops in his province are suffragans to him.

XXIII

5. CONCINNATUS] i.e. compositus.

16. CHARTIS] 'playing-cards.' An Act of 1463 forbade the importation of them into England; Foxe's statutes for C.C.C. Oxford (XX. 10 n.), dated 1517, prohibit the use 'chartarum pictarum (_cardas_ nuncupant)'.

24. COMMUNIONEM] Cf. XVIII. 57-8.

32. PRO MORE REGIONIS] The following extracts from Erasmus' writings show the reputation of the English at this time in the matter of entertainment: 'Angli ostentatores': 'miramur si quis videat frugalem Anglum': 'a.s.scribo Anglis lautas mensas et formam.'

33. VULGARIBUS] _sc_. cibis.

38. HOLOSERICIS] _sc_. vestibus. Similarly _byssinis ac damascenis_, l.

44.

40. CONVENTUM] This took place in July 1520, shortly after Henry's meeting with Francis I at Ardres, known as the 'Field of the Cloth of Gold '.

41. UNDECIM] Erasmus' memory for dates was uncertain.

42. EBORACENSIS] Wolsey.

XXIV

[A letter written in 1521 from Anderlecht, a suburb of Brussels, to Jodocus Jonas, a member of the University of Erfurt, and afterwards one of the followers of Luther. Jonas had asked for a sketch of the life of Colet, who had died on 16 Sept. 1519; and Erasmus in reply sent this letter, to convey some impression of the man to whom he felt himself to owe so much. With it he coupled a slighter sketch of another friend, also dead, in whose character he traced much the same features as he had admired in Colet. Very little is known of Vitrarius beyond the information contained in this letter; without which our knowledge of Colet and also of Henry VIII--the 'divine young king', as he was often called in these early years--would not be so full as it is.]

2. PAUCIS] _sc_. verbis.

17. ORDINIS FRANCISCANI] The order of friars founded by St. Francis of a.s.sisi (1182-1226).

18. ADOLESCENS INCIDERAT] Here and in l. 38 Erasmus is clearly thinking of the circ.u.mstances under which he himself had embraced the monastic life (see p. 8[*]). His strong bias against monasticism, which is very evident throughout this piece, often makes him unjust in his representations of it.

[* At the beginning of LIFE OF ERASMUS. Transcriptor.]

27. SCOTICAS ARGUTIAS] An unflattering allusion to the philosophy of John Duns Scotus (the Scot), who was one of the leaders of mediaeval thought; _fl_. 1300.

30. Ambrose, Bishop of Milan (died 397) was--with Jerome, Leo, and Gregory--one of the four great Doctors of the Latin Church. Cyprian (died 257) was also one of the Latin Fathers.

50. OFFENDICULO] Cf. 1 Cor. 8. 9.

55. UNGUES] Cf. Juv. 7. 232.

56. DEDISSES] A conditional clause; the condition being expressed by placing the verb first, without _si_. Cf. Verg, _Aen_. 6. 31 'Partem opere in tanto, sineret dolor, Icare, haberes'; or in English such forms as 'Give him an inch, he will take an ell'.

68. DIVIDEBAT] Mr. Lupton, who has edited this letter, gives an example of this chilling method of division and subdivision, from a sermon on the Son of the Widow of Nain. 'Death is first divided into (1) the natural, (2) the sinful, (3) the spiritual, (4) the eternal. Of these 1 is further cla.s.sified as (_a_) general, (_b_) dreadful, (_c_) fearful, (_d_) terrible. 2 is next compared to 1 in respect of four common instruments of natural death, that is to say, (_e_) the sword, (_f_) fire, (_g_) missiles, (_h_) water; and so on, to the end. This is no exaggerated specimen.'

81. Thomas of Aquino (1225-1274) was, like Duns Scotus, one of the leading mediaeval philosophers.

Durandus (c. 1230-1296) was a French writer on canon law and liturgical questions.

IURIS UTRIUSQUE] Cf. XXII. 8 n.

83. CENTONES] _cento_ is lit. a patchwork, such as a quilt. The term was then applied to a kind of composition which came into fas.h.i.+on in later cla.s.sical times and was very popular in the Middle Ages. It was made by stringing together detached lines and parts of lines from an author into a complete whole with a definite subject. Such centos were often made from Vergil and on Christian themes; but the term is probably used here for collections of texts from the Bible or the Fathers.