"You, perhaps, would think it the highest felicity to die among the brethren. In fact not only you but almost everyone is deceived and imposed upon by this notion that Christ and true piety are to be found in certain places, in dress, in food, in prescribed ceremonies. We fancy a man is ruined, if he put on a black gown instead of a white one, if he change a cowl for a hat, if he from time to time change his residence. But I dare say the opposite, that great injury to Christian piety has come from those so-called 'religious' acts, although they were, perhaps, first introduced with a pious purpose. Gradually they have increased and broken up into six thousand diversities. The approval of the supreme pontiffs has been given to them, but in many ways quite too easily and indulgently; for what is more corrupt and impious than those loose religious practices? Why, if you speak only of praiseworthy, even of the most praiseworthy ones, I know not what image of Christ you will find in them beyond certain chilling and Judaising ceremonies. By these things they please themselves and condemn others,—although it is the teaching of Christ that all the world is as one great house, or as it were one monastery, and all men are its canons and its brethren; that the sacrament of baptism is the supreme act of religion and that we are to consider, not where we live, but how we live."

"If I am not approved by everyone—a thing I do not strive for—surely I am in good standing with the chief men at Rome. There was not a cardinal who did not receive me as a brother, though I had no such ambition for myself, especially the cardinal of St. George, the cardinal of Bologna, cardinal Grimani, the cardinal of Fornovo [?], and he who is now supreme pontiff, to say nothing of archdeacons and men of learning; and this honour was paid, not to wealth, which I neither have nor desire, nor to ambition, to which I was ever a stranger, but to letters alone, which our countrymen laugh at, but the Italians worship.

"In England there is not a bishop who is not glad to salute me, who does not seek me as a table-companion, who does not wish me as an inmate of his house. The king himself, just before my departure from Italy, wrote me a most affectionate letter with his own hand, and still speaks of me in the most honourable and friendly fashion. As often as I pay my respects to him he embraces me most affectionately and looks at me with such friendly eyes that you can see that he thinks as well of me as he speaks. The queen wished me to be her teacher; everyone knows that, if I had chosen to spend even a few months at the royal court, I might have heaped up as many benefices as you please, but I subordinate everything to the opportunity of leisure for study."

"The two universities, Oxford and Cambridge, are vying with each other to get possession of me; at Cambridge I taught for many months Greek and sacred literature, and that for nothing as I am determined always to do.[102] There are colleges there, in which there is so much of true religion that you could not fail to prefer them to any 'religious' life, if you should see them. There is at London John Colet, dean of St. Paul's, a man who combines the greatest learning with the most admirable piety, a man of great influence with all men; he is so fond of me, as everyone knows, that he lives not more intimately with anyone than with me, —to say nothing of countless others, lest I weary you at once with my boasting and my much speaking."

"During the last two years, besides much other work, I revised the epistles of Jerome, marking with an obelus spurious and interpolated passages. By a comparison of ancient Greek texts I have emended the whole New Testament and have annotated more than a thousand passages, not without profit for the theologians. I have begun commentaries to the epistles of Paul and shall complete them when I have disposed of the others. For I have made up my mind to spend my life in sacred studies and to this end I am devoting all my spare time. In this work men of great repute say that I can do what others cannot; in your kind of life I should simply accomplish nothing at all. I am on intimate terms with many learned and serious men, both here [England?] and in Italy and in France, but I have thus far found no one who would advise me to return to you, or think it the better course. Nay, more, even your predecessor, Nicholas Wittenherus, always used to advise me rather to attach myself to some bishop, adding that he knew both my nature and the ways of his brethren."

"I will explain this to you very simply and, as befits a German, frankly. At that time I had fully decided to go to England. I was called thither by ancient ties of friendship, by the most ample promises of powerful friends, by the devoted favour of the most prosperous of kings. I had chosen this country as my adopted fatherland; the resting-place of my declining years [he was forty-one at the time]. I was invited, nay I was importuned in repeated letters and was promised gold almost in mountains. From all this I, hitherto a man of severe habits, a despiser of wealth, conceived a picture in my mind of such a power of gold as ten streams of Pactolus could hardly have washed down. And I was afraid that if I should return to your Eminence I might change my mind.

"For if you so weakened, so fired my mind at that first interview, what would you not have done, if I had come into closer and more permanent relations? For what heart of adamant would not be moved by the gentle courtesy of your manner, your honeyed speech, your curious learning, your counsel so friendly and so sincere; especially by the evident good-will of so great a prelate. I already felt my decision perceptibly weakening and began even to repent of my plan and yet I was ashamed to seem so inconstant a person. I felt my love for the City, which I had hardly thrust aside, silently growing again, and in short, had I not torn myself away from Rome at once, never should I have left it. I snatched myself away, lest I should be blown back again and rather flew to England than journeyed thither. [Flying we have seen, was Erasmus' favourite method of travelling on paper.]

"Now, then, you will ask, have I repented of my decision? Do I regret that I did not follow the advice of so loving a counsellor? Lying is not my trade. The thing affects me variously. I cannot help a longing for Rome as often as the great multitude of attractions there crowds upon my thoughts."

"These things make it impossible that any fortune, however kind, could banish this Roman longing from my heart. As to England, though my fortune has not been so bad as to make me regret it, yet, to tell the truth, it has not at all corresponded either to my wishes or the promises of my friends."

"Why, I wonder how anyone can ever tear himself away from there."

Bert. "Why so?"

Will. "Because it is a place from which the companions of Ulysses could not be torn away; there are sirens there. One could not be better treated in his own house than there in an inn."

Bert. "What do they do?"

Will. "At table there was always some woman present, who enlivened the meal with her humour and her charms. Then you find there the most agreeable manners. The first one to meet you is the lady of the house, who salutes you, bids you be merry and excuse the faults of what is set before you. Then follows the daughter, an elegant person, so gay in speech and manner that she would have cheered up Cato himself. They converse with you not as with strange guests, but as with familiar friends."

Bert. "I recognise the refinement of the French."

Will. "But, as these could not always be present on account of domestic duties and the welcoming of other guests, there was always at hand a maid-servant thoroughly posted in all kinds of chaff; she alone could take up the jokes of everyone, and kept things going until the daughter came back. The mother was quite along in years."

Bert. "But how about the provision? for one can't fill one's belly with stories."

Will. "Really splendid. I can't understand how they can entertain at so small a price. Then after dinner they amuse you with merry tales, so that you cannot get tired. I thought I was at home and not in a strange land."

Bert. "How about the chambers?"

Will. "Always some girls about, laughing, frolicking, and playing. They asked of their own accord if we had any soiled linen, washed it, and brought it back resplendent. Need I say more? We saw everywhere only girls and women, except in the stables, and even there the maids were often bursting in. When you go away, they embrace you and dismiss you with as much affection as if you were all brothers or the nearest of relatives."

Bert. "I dare say that suits the French well enough, but for my part I like better the customs of the Germans as being more suited to men."

Will. "I have never happened to be in Germany, so, if you don't mind, pray let us hear how they receive a guest."

Bert. "I cannot say whether it is the same everywhere, but I will tell what I have seen. No one welcomes the newcomer, nor do they seem to want guests; for that would seem to them mean and low and unworthy the seriousness of a German. When you have been calling a long time, someone sticks his head out of the little window of the room where the stove is, like a tortoise out of its shell. They live in these rooms almost until midsummer. You have to ask him whether you may stay, and if he doesn't say 'no' you know that you are to have a place. You ask where the stables are and he shows you with a motion of his hand, and you may take care of your horse as best you can. In the larger inns a man shows you to the stables and points out a poor enough place for your horse. The better places they keep for the late-comers, especially for the nobility. If you complain, the first thing you hear is, 'If you don't like it here, go to another inn.' In the cities it is all you can do to get a little hay and you have to pay for it about as much as for grain. When you have cared for your horse you go over into the common room, riding-boots, baggage, mud, and all."

Will. "In France they show you a separate room where you can change your dress, brush up, get warm, and even take a nap if you please."

Bert. "There's nothing of the sort here. In the common furnace you pull off your boots, put on your slippers, change your dress if you will; your dripping clothes you hang by the stove and betake yourself there to dry off. Water is ready if you wish to wash your hands, but generally so nasty that you have to go hunting about for more water to wash away that first ablution."

Will. "It's a fine thing for men not to be spoiled by luxury!"

Bert. "If you arrive at four o'clock in the afternoon you'll not get your supper before nine or ten."

Will. "Why is that?"

Bert. "They get nothing ready until they see all their guests, so that they may serve them all at one time."

Will. "They are trying to cut it close."

Bert. "You're right, they are. Sometimes they will crowd into that sweat-box eighty or ninety persons, footmen and horsemen, merchants, sailors, carters, farmers, boys, women, sick and well."

Will. "Why, that's a regular monastery!"

Bert. "There is one combing his hair; another wiping off his sweat, another pulling off his cowhides or his riding-boots; another smells of garlic. In short there is a confusion of men and tongues as once in the tower of Babel. But if they see a foreigner of a certain dignity they all fix their eyes upon him, staring at him as if he were some new kind of animal brought from Africa; even after they have sat down at table they screw their necks about and continue their gazing, even forgetting to eat."

Will. "At Rome, or Paris, or Venice, no one marvels at anything."

Bert. "Meanwhile it is a crime to ask for anything. When the evening is far gone and there is no prospect of any further arrivals, there appears an old servant, with white hair, a shaven head, a crooked face, and dirty clothes."

Will. "Such a fellow ought to be cupbearer to a Roman cardinal!"

Bert. "He casts his eyes about and counts the guests, and the more he finds the more he heats up the stove, though the weather be boiling hot. For in Germany it belongs to good entertainment to set everyone to dripping with sweat, and if anyone unaccustomed to this steaming opens a crack of a window to save himself from suffocation, he hears at once: 'Shut it! shut it!' and if you answer: 'I can't stand it!' you hear: 'Go find another inn then!'"

"They are tough people; they laugh at these things and take no thought of them.... Now hear the rest of the story. This bearded Ganymede comes back and spreads as many tables as are enough for the guests—but, ye gods! not with linen of Miletus; one would say with the canvas of old sails. To each table he assigns at least eight guests. They who know the ways of the country drop where they are put; for there is no distinction of rich and poor, master or servant."

Will. "This is that ancient equality which tyranny has now driven from the world. I suppose that's the way Christ lived with his disciples!"

Bert. "After all are seated, that crooked old Ganymede appears again, and again counts his company. Then he gives each one a wooden bowl, a spoon of the same metal, and a glass cup—some time afterward some bread, which everyone eats up to pass the time while the soup is cooking; and so they sit sometimes the space of an hour."

Will. "Does no guest meanwhile ask for food?"

Bert. "Not one who knows the ways of the country. At last they bring on wine—good God! what a taste of smoke! The sophists ought to drink it, it is so keen and sharp. If any guest, even offering extra money, asks for another sort, they first put him off, but look at him as if they would murder him. If you press them they answer—'So many counts and marquises have put up here and there was never a complaint of my wine; if you don't like it, get you to another hostelry.' They think their own nobles are the only men in the world and are always showing you their coats of arms."

"The loss of my own brother I bore with great equanimity; but I cannot overcome my longing for Froben. I do not rebel at my grief, reasonable as it is, but I am pained that it should be so great and so lasting. As it was not merely affection which bound me to him in life, so it is not merely that I miss him now that he is gone. For I loved him more on account of the liberal studies which he seemed given us by Providence to adorn and to promote, than on account of his kindness to me and his genial manners. Who would not love such a nature? He was to his friend just a friend, so simple and so sincere that even if he had wished to pretend or to conceal anything he could not do it, so repugnant was it to his nature; so ready and eager to help everyone that he was glad to be of service even to the unworthy, so that he was a natural and welcome prey to thieves and swindlers. He was as pleased to get back money from a thief or from bad debtors as others are with unexpected fortune.

"He was of such incorruptible honour that never did anyone deserve better the saying 'He is a man you could throw dice with in the dark,' and, incapable of fraud himself, he could never suspect it in others though he was often deceived. What the disease of envy was he could no more comprehend than a man born blind can understand colour. Even serious offences, he pardoned before he asked who had committed them. He could never remember an injury, nor forget even the smallest service. And here, in my judgment, he was better than was fitting for the wise father of a family. I used to warn him sometimes that he should treat his sincere friends becomingly, but that while he used gentle language towards impostors he should protect himself and not at the same time get cheated and laughed at. He would smile gently, but I told my tale to deaf ears. The frankness of his nature was too much for all warnings. And as for me, what plots did he not invent, what excuses did he not hunt up to force some gift upon me? I never saw him happier than when he had succeeded by artifice or persuasion in getting me to accept something. Against the wiles of the man I had need of the utmost caution, nor did I ever need my skill in rhetoric more than in thinking up excuses to refuse without offending my friend; for I could not bear to see him sad. [One feels that Erasmus' rhetoric was running away with him a little at this point.] If by chance my servants had bought cloth for my clothes, he would find it out and pay the bill before I suspected it; and no entreaties of mine could make him take payment for it. So it was if I wanted to save him from loss; I had to make pretences and there was such a bargaining; quite different from the usual course, where one tries to get as much as possible and the other to give as little as possible. I could never bring it to pass that he should give me nothing; but that I made a most moderate use of his kindness, all his household will bear me witness. Whatever work I did for him I did for love of learning. Since he seemed born to honour, to promote, and to embellish learning, and spared no labour or care, thinking it reward enough if a good author were put into the hands of the public in worthy form, how could I prey upon a man like this?

"Sometimes when he showed to me and other friends the first pages of some great author, how he was transported with joy! how his face glowed! what triumphant words! You would say that he had already taken in the profits of the whole work in fullest measure and was expecting no other return. I am not exalting Froben by decrying others; but it is notorious what incorrect and inelegant editions some publishers have sent us even from Venice and from Rome. From his office, within a few years what volumes have gone forth, and in what noble form! And he has always kept his house free from books of controversy, by which others have gained great profit, lest the cause of good literature and learning should be defiled by any personal hostilities.... Surely it will be an act of gratitude for us all to pray for the welfare of the departed, to celebrate his memory by due praises, and to lend our favour to the house of Froben, which is not to be closed by the death of its master, but will ever strive to its utmost to carry forward what he has begun to still greater and better things."

"The weightiest contribution was that of the brothers Amerbach, at whose expense and by whose labours, in common with those of Froben, the work was mainly carried through. The Amerbach family was, as it were, pointed out by the fates, that Jerome might live again through their exertions. The excellent father had his three sons educated in Latin, Greek, and Hebrew, for this very purpose. Upon his death he commended the work to his children as an inheritance, devoting to its accomplishment all his resources. And these admirable youths entering upon the fair field committed to them by an admirable father, are labouring diligently therein, and have so divided the Jerome with me that they are doing everything except the epistles."

"that illustrious man, almost equally skilled in Latin, Greek, and Hebrew, and so well versed in every sort of learning that he can hold his own with the best. Wherefore all Germany looks up to him and reveres him as the phenix and the chief glory of the nation."

"as I have lately seen with the utmost regret in the case of that great man John Reuchlin. For it was fitting and it was time that this man of reverend years should enjoy his noble studies and should be reaping the happiest harvest from the faithful planting of his youthful labours. A man skilled in so many tongues, and in so many kinds of learning, ought to have been able, in this autumn of his days, to pour forth into all the world the rich products of his genius. He ought to have been spurred on by praise, called out by rewards, fired by others' zeal. And I hear that men have arisen—I know not who they are—who, unable of themselves to bring anything great to pass, are seeking for reputation by the basest of methods. Immortal God! what a tumult they have stirred up and on what frivolous grounds! From a little book, a mere letter, which he neither published nor wished to have published, such a storm has arisen! Who would ever have known that he wrote this letter if those fellows had not published it to the world?

"How much better it would have served the cause of peace, supposing he had erred in any way,—as all men do err,—to conceal this, or frankly interpret it, or surely to pardon it out of consideration for the distinguished virtues of the man. I am not saying this because I have found any errors in him; that is for others to decide; but this I will say, that if anyone after the same malicious fashion,—and as the Greeks say, ?p?t???, should explore the books of St. Jerome, he would find many a thing very widely differing from the views of our theologians. To what end then was it that a man venerable in years and in letters should for an affair of no moment, be dragged into turmoils of this sort, in which he has now, I believe, lost seven years. Would that he might have spent this labour and this time in furthering the cause of honest study! Instead of this, he, a man worthy of all reward, is involved in vexing quarrels to the great grief and anger of all learned men, and indeed of all Germany. And yet all have hopes that through your assistance, so distinguished a man may be restored to learning and to the world."

"I was getting on finely here until they began to heat up their stoves. Jerome is in progress. They have already begun on the New Testament. I cannot stay on account of the intolerable stench of the stoves, and I cannot leave on account of the work that is begun and which cannot possibly be carried through without me.... If my health permits, I shall stay here until Christmas; if not, I shall either return to Brabant or go straight to Rome."

"I left Basel," he says, "in a languid and enervated condition, like a man who has not yet got on good terms with out-of-doors, so long had I been shut up in the house, and yet busied with incessant work. [This refers to a long illness which had kept him indoors through the summer.] The sail was not unpleasant, only that towards noon the heat of the sun was rather oppressive. We dined at Breisach,—the worst kind of a dinner. The stench was enough to kill you and the flies worse than the stench....

"Towards night we were turned out into a chilly town, whose name I didn't care to know, nor if I knew it, should I care to speak it. There I was just about killed."

"In the morning we were routed out of bed by the shouts of the sailors and I went on board ship without supper and without sleep. We reached Strassburg at about nine o'clock in the forenoon and were pretty well entertained there, especially as SchÜrer furnished the wine. A part of the fraternity was on hand and soon they all came to welcome us.... Thence we went on to Speier by horse and saw never a shadow of a soldier though dreadful rumours were abroad. My English horse was just about used up and scarcely got to Speier. That scoundrel of a blacksmith had so abused him that both his ears were burned with a hot iron. At Speier I took myself quietly out of the inn and went to my friend Maternus near by. There the dean, a man of learning and culture, entertained me for two days with great kindness. We met there by chance Hermann Busch. Thence we journeyed by carriage to Worms and Mainz. There happened into the same carriage a certain Ulrich, a secretary of the emperor, whose surname was Farnbul—as who should say, 'Fern-Hill.' He paid me the greatest attention on the journey and at Mainz would not suffer me to go to the common inn, but took me to the house of a certain canon and saw me to the boat when I started off. The weather was very agreeable and the voyage well enough only that the sailors tried to make it longer than was necessary, and the smell of the horses was unpleasant....

"At Boppard I was walking on the river-bank while they were locking up a boat and someone who knew me gave my name to the toll-collector. This man's name was Christopher and, I believe, Cinicampius, or in the vulgar tongue, Eschenfeld. It was marvellous how the fellow jumped for joy. He dragged me to his house and there on a little table, among his toll-receipts, lay the writings of Erasmus. He cries out that he is a blessed man, calls his wife, his children, and all his friends. To the clamorous boatmen he sends two jugs of wine and when they burst out into new clamours he sends some more, and promises that on their return he will remit the toll because they have brought him so great a guest. From here I was escorted as far as Coblenz by John Flaminius, head of a convent of women there, a man of angelic purity, of sound and sober judgment, and of unusual learning. At Coblenz Matthias, a chaplain of the bishop, took me to his house,—a young man, but of settled ways, of accurate Latin learning, and thoroughly trained in the law as well. There we had a merry supper. At Bonn the canon [one of his fellow-travellers] left us, in order to avoid the city of Cologne, which I also desired to avoid. My servant had, however, gone ahead thither with the horses; there was no safe person on the boat whom I could send after him, and I had no confidence in the sailors. On Sunday morning before six o'clock, in dismal weather, I arrived at Cologne, went to an hotel, gave orders to the servants to get a two-horse carriage, and called for breakfast at ten. I went to mass, but no breakfast! Nothing was done about the carriage. I tried to get a horse, for mine were of no use,—no result. I saw what was up; they were trying to keep me there. At once I ordered my horses to be got ready, packed one portmanteau and gave over the other to the innkeeper; then on my lame nag I hurried off to the Count of Neuenaar, a ride of five hours. He was staying at Bedburium and I spent five days with him so pleasantly and quietly that I got through a good part of my revision there; for I had brought with me a part of the New Testament."