Selections from Erasmus: Principally from his Epistles Part 16

118. Ghisbertus was town-physician of St. Omer and a friend of Erasmus.

119. UTRIUSQUE SCHOLAE] 'of each party, or cla.s.s.'

122. VIRTUTES] The Vulgate word, which in the English Bible is regularly translated 'mighty works'.

143. SODALI] As a safeguard against scandal the Franciscan rule prescribed that no brother should go outside the monastery without another brother as companion.

152. HILARI DATORE] Cf. 2 Cor. 9. 7.

154. Antony of Bergen, Abbot of St. Bertin's at St. Omer, was brother of the Bishop of Cambray, Henry of Bergen, to whom Erasmus had been secretary on leaving Steyn. This incident occurred in 1502, the only year in which Erasmus was at St. Bertin's in Lent.

157. QUADRAGESIMAE] Lent, the first day of which was roughly the fortieth before Easter. Cf. Septuagesima, s.e.xagesima, and Quinquagesima Sundays; where the calculation is again only approximate.

163. OMITTERES] _Si_ must be understood from _nisi faceres_.

165. IUBILAEO] The faithful were encouraged to make pilgrimage to Rome in years of Jubilee, those that did so receiving the Jubilee Indulgence. The offerings made in return for these became so fruitful a source of revenue that successive Popes were tempted to reduce the interval at which Jubilees recurred from a hundred years to fifty, then to thirty-three, and finally Paul II (1464-1471) to twenty-five. Erasmus' statement may be an incorrect attribution to Alexander VI (1493-1503) of the action of Paul II in halving the period of fifty years; or it may be an allusion to the custom of celebrating the Jubilee outside Rome in the second year. In any case the Jubilee of 1500 is referred to here. The practice also grew up of selling the Jubilee Indulgence away from Rome; and bishops used to purchase the rights in their own dioceses for a fixed sum, afterwards reimbursing themselves by collecting what they could through their own agents.

169. SORTEM] princ.i.p.al; the sum given by the bishop for the right to sell indulgences.

182. SIMONIACI] Cf. Acts 8. 18 seq. The sin of selling spiritual privileges was called simony.

188. AFFIXA EST] to the doors of the princ.i.p.al church, or to some equally public place.

195. EPISCOPUM MORINENSEM] The Bishop of Terouenne, whose t.i.tle, _Morinensis_, was derived from the coincidence of his diocese with the territory of the Morini in cla.s.sical times.

199. AURI SACRA FAMES] Cf. Verg. _Aen_. 3. 56, 7.

201. COLLEGERANT] _sc_. accusatores.

222. THYNNUM] a tunny-fish caught in their nets, i.e. a rich person from whom gifts might be extracted.

231. GUARDIANUM] Warden; the regular t.i.tle of the head of a Franciscan community.

244. HUNC] The new warden; _qui cupiebant_ being his former companions.

246. SUBOLESCERET] 'grew up'; i.e. came to be.

249. VIRGINUM] Cf. XVI. 251 n.

261. GEMMEUM] Probably an allusion to the resemblance between _Vitrarius_ and _Vitrum_. The vernacular form of his name is not known. Mr. Lupton conjectures Vitrier; or perhaps it was Vitre.

269. STOIc.u.m] used to denote a morose fellow. The Stoics were a school of Greek philosophers, founded by Zeno in the third century B.C. They practised great austerity of life.

275. PATER] Sir Henry Colet, Kt., was Lord Mayor of London in 1486 and again in 1495.

285. SCHOLASTICAE] of the 'schoolmen', Scotus, Aquinas, &c., who taught philosophy in the mediaeval universities.

287. SEPTEM ARTIUM] A course of education introduced in the sixth century. It was divided into the _trivium_, grammar, logic, and rhetoric; and the _quadrivium_, arithmetic, geometry, music, and astronomy.

290. Plotinus (died 262 A.D.) was the Founder of Neo-Platonism; which he taught in Rome.

296. DIONYSIO] The reference here is to some philosophical writings, which in the Middle Ages were regarded as the work of Dionysius the Areopagite, who is mentioned in Acts 17. 34 as a pupil of St. Paul. They are now attributed to an unknown writer in the fifth century A.D.

303. Dante (1265-1321) and Petrarch (1304-1374) are evidently mentioned here as masters of Italian poetry, not for their work as forerunners of the Renaissance. Mr. Lupton conjectures with probability that Gower (c.

1325-1408) and Chaucer (c. 1340-1400) are the English poets intended.

309. ENARRAVIT] 'lectured on'.

316. CODICIBUS] ma.n.u.scripts or printed copies of the Epistles to refer to.

319. DOCTORIS t.i.tULUS] Cf. X. 23 n.

324. COLLEGIO] Chapter.

337. SYMBOLUM FIDEI] the Creed.

366. Erasmus describes a visit with Colet to Canterbury in the _Peregrinatio religionis ergo_, one of the _Colloquia_.

383. St. Paul's School was founded in 1510-1.

389. PRIMUS INGRESSUS] The portion of the room first entered.

CATECHUMENOS] A Greek word denoting candidates for admission to the Christian religion, who were undergoing instruction before baptism: here, pupils just entered.

399. REM DIVINAM] Divine service, with the ma.s.s; cf. ll. 551 seq.

437. PARADOXIS] 'unusual.'

438. PROCELLIS] Cf. ll. 597 seq.

449. PUERO] Probably here 'a servant'.

459, 60. SUMPTO ... PUSILLO] This substantival use of a neuter adjective is confined in cla.s.sical Latin to the nominative and accusative cases.

474. ALTERAM ... PARTEM] _sc_. epistolae; i.e. the sketch of Colet.

489. HUNC] The person intended here must be not Scotus but Aquinas, who is the author of the _Catena Aurea_, a continuous commentary on the Gospels. This violation of the ordinary rule that _hic_ refers to the nearer of two persons mentioned is necessitated by the appropriation of _ille_ to Colet.

493. AFFECTUUM] Mr. Lupton translates 'unction'.

511. DECIDIT] 'settled,' 'left.'

516. APUD ITALOS] Mr. Seebohm, _Oxford Reformers_, 3rd ed. p. 22, conjectures that these Italian monks may have been Savonarola and his companions.

519. GERMANOS] Mr. Lupton conjectures that the Order of the Brethren of the Common Life, founded at Deventer by Gerard Groot in 1384, may be here intended. If this is correct, there is significance in the use of _residerent_, marking Colet's opinion, instead of _resident_; which would make the statement Erasmus' own: for Erasmus had been for two years at a school kept by the Brethren in Hertogenbosch and had not a high opinion of them.

542. COLLEGIA] Colet's censure of the colleges in the English universities must apply to the older inst.i.tutions founded before the Renaissance. Erasmus is probably recalling here some utterance of the days before the foundation of Christ's (1506) and St. John's (1516) at Cambridge, and Corpus Christi (1516) at Oxford.

544. SCHOLIS PUBLICIS] Mr. Lupton rightly interprets this of the 'schools' at the universities, in which public lectures were given; and shows that as the lecturer had to hire the 'school' for his lecture, the compet.i.tion for fees would necessarily be keen. Cf. also l. 576. The term is also used at this period for a school maintained publicly by a town.