In the meantime symptoms had appeared portending that a storm was brewing in another quarter against Erasmus. It was not perhaps to be wondered at that the monks should persist in regarding him as a renegade monk. His bold reply to the letter of Servatius, and the unsubdued tone in which he had answered the attack of Martin Dorpius, must have made the monastic party hopeless of his reconversion to orthodox views. At the same time, neither his letter to Servatius nor his reply to Dorpius had at all converted them to his way of thinking. Men perfectly self-satisfied, blindly believing in the sanctity of their own order, and arrogating to themselves a monopoly of orthodox learning, were in a state of mind, both intellectually and morally, beyond the reach of argument, however earnest and convincing. They still really did believe, through thick and thin, that the Latin of the Vulgate and the Schoolmen was the sacred language. They still did believe that Hebrew and Greek were the languages of heretics; and that to be learned in these, to scoff at the Schoolmen and to criticise the Vulgate, were the surest proofs of ignorance as well as impiety.
‘Epistolæ Obscurorum Virorum.’
It was in the years 1516 and 1517 that the ‘Epistolæ Obscurorum Virorum’ were published. They were written in exaggerated monkish Latin, and professed to be a correspondence chiefly between monks, conveying their views and feelings upon current events and the tendencies of modern thought. Of course the picture they gave was a caricature, but nevertheless it so nearly hit the truth that More wrote to Erasmus that ‘in England it delighted every one. To the learned it was capital fun. Even the ignorant, who seriously took it all in, smiled at its style, and did not attempt to defend it; but they said the weighty opinions it contained made up for that, and under a rude scabbard was concealed a most excellent blade.’[638]
The first part was full of the monks’ hatred of Reuchlin and the Jews. One monk writes to his superior to consult him in a difficulty. Two Jews were walking in the town in a dress so like that of monks that he bowed to them by mistake. To have made obeisance to a Jew! Was this a venial or a mortal sin? Should he seek absolution from episcopal authority, or would it require a dispensation from the Pope?[639]
Side by side with scrupulosity such as this were hints of secret immorality and scandal. Immense straining at gnats was put in contrast with the ease with which camels were swallowed within the walls of the cloister.
Mention of Erasmus in them.
In the appendix to the first part Erasmus at length makes his appearance. The writer of the letter, a medical graduate, informs his learned correspondent that, being at Strasburg, he was told that a man who was called ‘Erasmus Roterdamus’ (till then unknown to him) was in the city—a man said to be most learned in all branches of knowledge. This, however, he did not believe. He could not believe that so small a man could have so vast a knowledge. To test the matter, he laid a scheme with one or two others to meet Erasmus at table, get him into an argument, and confute him. He thereupon betook himself to his ‘vademecum,’ and crammed himself with some abstruse medical questions, and so armed entered the field. One of his friends was a lawyer, the other a speculative divine. They met as appointed. All were silent. Nobody would begin. At length Erasmus, in a low tone of voice, began to sermonise (sermonizare), and when he had done, another began to dispute de ente et essencia. To which the writer himself responded in a few words. Then a dead silence again. They could not draw the lion out. At length their host started another hare—praising both the deeds and writings of Julius Cæsar. The writer here again put in. He knew something of poetry, and did not believe that Cæsar’s ‘Commentaries’ were written by Cæsar at all. Cæsar was a warrior, and always engaged in military affairs. Such men never are learned men, therefore Cæsar cannot have known Latin. ‘I think,’ he continued, ‘that Suetonius (!) wrote those “Commentaries,” because I never saw anyone whose style was so like Cæsar’s as his. When I had said this,’ he continued, ‘Erasmus laughed, and said nothing, because the subtlety of my argument had confounded him. So I put an end to the discussion. I did not care to propound my question in medicine, because I knew he knew nothing about it, since, though himself a poet, he did not know how to solve my argument in poetry. And I assert before God that there is not as much in him as people say. He does not know more than other men, although I concede that in poetry he knows how to speak pretty Latin. But what of that!’[640]
In the second part, published in 1517, Erasmus makes a more prominent figure. One correspondent had met him at Basle, and ‘found many perverse heretics in Froben’s house.’[641] Another writes that he hears Erasmus has written many books, especially a letter to the Pope, in which he commends Reuchlin:—
‘That letter, you know, I have seen. One other book of his also I have seen—a great book—entitled “Novum Testamentum,” and he has sent this book to the Pope, and I believe he wants the Pope’s authority for it, but I hope he won’t give it. One holy man told me that he could prove that Erasmus was a heretic; because he censured holy doctors, and thought nothing of divines. One of his things, called “Moria Erasmi,” contained,’ he said, ‘many scandalous propositions and open blasphemies. On this account the book would be burned at Paris. Therefore I do not believe that the Pope will sanction his “great book.”’[642]
Another reports that his edition of St. Jerome has been examined at Cologne; that in this work Erasmus says that Jerome was not a Cardinal; that he thinks evil of St. George and St. Christopher, the relics of the saints and candles, and the sacrament of confession; that many passages contain blasphemy against the holy doctors.[643]