II. ERASMUS AGAIN LEAVES ENGLAND FOR ITALY (1506).
Erasmus seems to have spent some months during the spring of 1506 with his English friends, busying himself, as already mentioned, in translating in More’s company portions of Lucian’s works, and, so far as his letters show at first sight, not very eagerly pursuing those sacred studies at which he had told Colet that he longed to labour.
Erasmus longs to visit Italy, but wants funds.
Nor was there really anything inconsistent in this. The truth was that, in order to complete his knowledge of Greek, without which he had declared he could do nothing thoroughly, he had yet to undertake that journey to Italy which had been the dream of his early manhood, and the realisation of which six years ago had only been prevented by his unlucky accident at Dover. This journey to Italy lay between him and the great work of his life, and still the adage of Plautus remained inexorable, ‘Sine pennis volare haud facile est.’
It was therefore that he was translating Lucian. It was therefore that he dedicated one dialogue to one friend, another to another.[317] It was therefore that he paid court to this patron of learning and that. It was not that he was importunate and servilely fond of begging, but that, by hook or by crook, the necessary means must be found to carry out his project.
It was thus that we find Grocyn rowing with him to Lambeth to introduce him to Archbishop Warham, and the two joking together as they rowed back to town, upon the small pecuniary result of their visit.[318]
Erasmus leaves for Italy, with two pupils.
Funds, it appeared, did not come in as quickly as might have been wished, but at length the matter was arranged. Erasmus was to proceed to Italy, taking under his wing two English youths, sons of Dr. Baptista, chief physician to Henry VII. A young Scotch nobleman, the Archbishop of St. Andrew’s, was also to be placed under the scholar’s care.[319] By this arrangement Erasmus was, as it were, to work his passage; which he thankfully agreed to do, and set out accordingly. With what feelings he left England, and with what longings to return, may be best gathered from the few lines he wrote to Colet from Paris, after having recovered from the effects of the journey, including a rough toss of four days across the Straits:—
Erasmus to Colet.