[330] His critics, however, accuse him of often enough falling into the like absurdities. In his version of the New Testament he was accused of continually using pagan expressions, and even of adopting the word fable when speaking of the plan of Redemption, using it in the sense in which it is employed by the ancient dramatists to express the action which they portray.
[331] Also known as Philip of Having, or Philip de Bonne Espérance, from the name of the abbey which he governed in the twelfth century. He was the author of many learned works, and the good studies he established in his abbey continued to flourish down to the eighteenth century.
[332] A word first created by the Humanists, who made the name of Duns Scotus to stand for an ignoramus.
[333] Ps. lxx. 15.
[334] For the decrees of the Council on these heads, see Rohrbacher, vol. xxii. ch. v.
[335] Audin. Hist. de Luth., ch. viii.
[336] Zach. viii. 3.
[337] Knight, in his life of Colet, remarks that “the History and Antiquities of Oxford sufficiently confess that nothing was known there but Latin, and that in the most depraved style of the schoolmen.” Yet two pages back he has quoted from Wood an account of Colet’s university studies, which show that this statement, like many of a similar import, is grossly exaggerated. Colet, he says, was educated in grammaticals in London, and then, after spending seven years at Oxford in logicals and philosophicals, was licensed to proceed to arts, “in which he became so exquisitely learned that all Tully’s works were as familiar to him as his Epistles.” He also read, conferred, and paralleled Plato and Plotinus (in Latin translations), and attained great eminence in mathematics. Erasmus, on occasion of his first visit to Oxford, writes thus to his friend Pisco:—“You ask, does our beloved England please me? Nothing ever pleased me so much. I have found here classic erudition, and that not trite and shallow, but profound and accurate, both Latin and Greek, so that I no longer sigh for Italy.” In fact, his own Greek learning was chiefly acquired at Oxford, for previous to his coming thither, his knowledge of that language was very superficial. Elsewhere, he says, “I think, from my very soul, there is no country where abound so many men skilled in every kind of learning as there are here.”
[338] “Right studious she was in books,” says Bishop Fisher in his funeral sermon on this princess, “of which she had great number both in English, Latin, and French, and did translate divers matters of devotion out of French into English.”
[339] Mr. Seebohm’s interesting work on the “Oxford Reformers of 1498” has appeared since the publication of our first edition. His view of Colet’s character is naturally a more favourable one than that here given; but in representing him as a sort of Broad Churchman of the sixteenth century, he sufficiently justifies our strictures on Colet as a Catholic divine.