He found Parliament sitting, and the war party having all their own way. He found the compliant Commons supporting by lavish grants of subsidies Henry VIII.’s ambition ‘to recover the realm of France, his very true patrimony and inheritance, and to reduce the same to his obedience,’[466] and carried away by the fulsome speeches of courtiers who drew a triumphant contrast between the setting fortunes and growing infirmities of the French king and the prospects of Henry, who, ‘like the rising sun, was growing brighter and stronger every day.’[467] While tax-collectors were pressing for the arrears of half a dozen previous subsidies, and Parliament was granting new ones, the liberality of English patrons was likely to decline. Their heads were too full of the war, and their purses too empty, to admit of their caring much at the moment about Erasmus and his literary projects.
Invited to the court of Prince Charles.
No wonder, therefore, that when his friends at the Court of the Netherlands urged his acceptance of an honorary place in the Privy Council of Prince Charles, which would not interfere with his literary labours, together with a pension which would furnish him with the means to carry them on—no wonder that under these circumstances Erasmus accepted the invitation and concluded to leave England.
In reply to the Abbot of St. Bertin, he wrote an elegant letter,[468] gracefully acknowledging his great kindness in wishing to restore him to his fatherland. Not that he disliked England, or was wanting in patrons there. The Archbishop of Canterbury, if he had been a brother or a father, could not have been kinder to him, and by his gift he still held the pension out of the living in Kent. But the war had suddenly diverted the genius of England from its ordinary channels. The price of everything was becoming dearer and dearer. The liberality of patrons was becoming less and less. How could they do other than give sparingly with so many war-taxes to pay? He then proceeded:—
Letter to the Abbot of St. Bertin.
‘Oh that God would deign to still the tempest of war! What madness is it! The wars of Christian princes begin for the most part either out of ambition or hatred or lust, or like diseases of the mind. Consider also by whom they are carried on: by homicides, by outcasts, by gamblers, by ravishers, by the most sordid mercenary troops, who care more for a little pay than for their lives. These offscourings of mankind are to be received into your territory and your cities that you may carry on war. Think, too, of the crimes which are committed under pretext of war, for amid the din of arms good laws are silent; what rapine, what sacrilege, what other crimes of which decency forbids the mention! The demoralisation which it causes will linger in your country for years after the war is over....
‘It is much more glorious to found cities than to destroy them. In our times it is the people who build and improve cities, while the madness of princes destroys them. But, you may say, princes must vindicate their rights. Without speaking rashly of the deeds of princes, one thing is clear, that there are some princes at least who first do what they like, and then try to find some pretext for their deeds. And in this hurlyburly of human affairs, in the confusion of so many leagues and treaties, who cannot make out a title to what he wants? Meanwhile these wars are not waged for the good of the people, but to settle the question, who shall call himself their prince.
‘We ought to remember that men, and especially Christian men, are free-men. And if for a long time they have flourished under a prince, and now acknowledge him, what need is there that the world should be turned upside down to make a change? If even among the heathen, long-continued consent [of the people] makes a prince, much more should it be so among Christians, with whom royalty is an administration, not a dominion.[469]...’
He concluded by urging the abbot to call to mind all that Christ and his apostles said about peace, and the tolerance of evil. If he did so, surely he would bring all his influence to bear upon Prince Charles and the Emperor in favour of a ‘Christian peace among Christian princes.’[470]
In writing to the Prince de Vere on the same subject Erasmus had expressed his grief that their common country had become mixed up with the wars, and his wish that he could safely put in writing what he thought upon the subject.[471] Whether safely or not, he had certainly now dared to speak his mind pretty fully in the letter to the Abbot of St. Bertin.