[641] Quarterly Review, vol. xxii., an article ascribed to the Bishop of London. The commentaries of Budæus are written in a very rambling and desultory manner, passing from one subject to another as a casual word may suggest the transition. Sic enim, he says, hos commentarios scribere instituimus, ut quicquid in ordinem seriemque scribendi incurreret, vel ex diverticulo quasi obviam se offerret, ad id digredi. A large portion of what is valuable in this work has been transferred by Stephens to his Thesaurus. The Latin criticisms of Budæus have also doubtless been borrowed.
Budæus and Erasmus are fond of writing Greek in their correspondence. Others had the same fancy; and it is curious, that they ventured upon what was wholly gone out of use since the language has been so well understood. But probably this is the reason that later scholars have avoided it. Neither of these great men shine much in elegance or purity. One of Budæus, 15 Aug. 1519, (in Erasm. Epist. cccclv.) seems often incorrect, and in the mere style of a schoolboy.
Greek grammars and lexicons. 15. These Commentaries of Budæus stand not only far above any thing else in Greek literature before the middle of the sixteenth century, but are alone in their class. What comes next, but at a vast interval, is the Greek grammar of Clenardus, printed at Louvain in 1530. It was, however, much beyond Budæus in extent of circulation, and probably, for this reason, in general utility. This grammar was continually reprinted with successive improvements, and, defective as, especially in its original state, it must have been, was far more perspicuous than that of Gaza, though not perhaps more judicious in principle. It was for a long time commonly used in France; and is in fact the basis of those lately or still in use among us; such as the Eton Greek grammar. The proof of this is, that they follow Clenardus in most of his rules, erroneous or not, and, nine times or more out of ten, in the choice of instances.[642] The account of syntax in this grammar, as well as that of Gaza, is wretchedly defective. A better treatise, in this respect, is by Varenius of Malines, Syntaxis Linguæ Græcæ, printed at Louvain about 1532. Another Greek grammar by Vergara, a native of Spain, has been extolled by some of the older critics, and depreciated by others.[643] The Greek lexicon, of which the first edition was printed at Basle in 1537, is said to abound in faults and inaccuracies of every description. The character given of it by Henry Stephens, even when it had been enlarged, if not improved, does not speak much for the means that the scholars of this age had possessed in labouring for the attainment of Greek learning.[644]
[642] Clenardus seems first to have separated simple from contracted nouns, thus making ten declensions. Wherever he differs from Gaza, our popular grammars seem to have followed him. He tells us, that he had drawn up this for the use of his private pupils. Baillet observes, that the grammar of Clenardus, notwithstanding the mediocrity of his learning, has had more success than any other; those who have followed having mostly confined themselves to correcting and enlarging it. Jugemens des Savans, ii. 164. This is certainly true, as far as England is concerned; though the Eton grammar, bad as, in the present times, it appears, is in some degree an improvement on Clenardus.
[643] Vergara, De omnibus Græcæ Linguæ Grammaticæ Partibus, 1573; rather 1537, for “deinde Parisiis,” 1550, follows in Antonio, Bibl. Nova.
[644] H. Stephanus, De Typographiæ suæ Statu. Gesner himself says of this lexicon, which sometimes bore his name: Circa annum 1537 lexicon Græco-Latinum, quod jam ante a diversis et innominatis nescio quibus miserè satis consarcinatum erat, ex Phavorini Camertis Lexico Græco ita auxi, ut nihil in eo extaret, quod non ut singulari fide, ita labore maximo adjicerem; sed typographus me inscio, et præter omnem expectationem meam, exiguam duntaxat accessionis meæ partem adjecit, reservans sibi forte auctarium ad sequentes etiam editiones. He proceeds to say, that he enlarged several other editions down to 1556, when the last that had been enriched by his additions appeared at Basle. Cæterum hoc anno, quo hæc scribo, 1562, Genevæ prodiisse audio longe copiosissimum emendatissimumque Græcæ linguæ thesaurum a Rob. Constantino incomparabilis doctrinæ viro, ex Joannis Crispini officinâ. Vide Gesneri Biblioth. Universalis, art. Conrad Gesner: this is part of a long account given here by Gesner of his own works.
Editions of Greek authors. 16. The most remarkable editions of Greek authors from the Parisian press were those of Aristophanes in 1528, and of Sophocles in 1529; the former printed by Gourmont, the latter by Colinæus; the earliest edition of an entire Diodorus in 1539, of Dionysius Halicarnassensis in 1546, and of Dio Cassius in 1548; the two latter by Robert Stephens. The first Greek edition of the elements of Euclid appeared at Basle in 1533, of Diogenes Laertius the same year, of five books of Diodorus in 1539, of Josephus in 1544; the first of Polybius in 1530, at Haguenaw. Besides these editions of classical authors, Basil, and other of the Greek fathers, occupied the press of Frobenius, under the superintendence of Erasmus. The publications of Latin authors by Badius Ascensius continued till his death in 1535. Colinæus began to print his small editions of the same class at Paris about 1521. They are in that cursive character, which Aldus had first employed.[645] The number of such editions, both in France and Germany, became far more considerable than in the preceding age. They are not, however, in general, much valued for correctness of text; nor had many considerable critics even in Latin philology yet appeared on this side of the Alps. |Latin Thesaurus of R. Stephens.| Robert Stephens stands almost alone, who, by the publication of his Thesaurus in 1535, augmented in a subsequent edition of 1543, may be said to have made an epoch in this department of literature. The preceding dictionaries of Calepio and other compilers had been limited to an interpretation of single words, sometimes with reference to passages in the authors who had employed them. This produced, on the one hand, perpetual barbarisms and deviations from purity of idiom, while it gave rise in some to a fastidious hypercriticism, of which Valla had given an example.[646] Stephens first endeavoured to exhibit their proper use, not only in all the anomalies of idiom, but in every delicate variation of sense to which the pure taste and subtle discernment of the best writers had adapted them. Such an analysis is perhaps only possible with respect to a language wherein the extant writers, and especially those who have acquired authority, are very limited in number; and even in Latin, the most extensive dictionary, such as has grown up long since the days of Robert Stephens, under the hands of Gesner, Forcellini, and Facciolati, or such as might still improve upon their labour, could only approach an unattainable perfection. What Stephens himself achieved would now be deemed far too defective for general use; yet it afforded the means of more purity in style than any could in that age have reached without unwearied exertion. Accordingly, it is to be understood, that while a very few scholars, chiefly in Italy, had acquired a facility and exactness of language, which has seldom been surpassed, the general style retained a great deal of barbarism, and neither in single words, nor always in mere grammar, can bear a critical eye. Erasmus is often incorrect, especially in his epistles, and says modestly of himself in the Ciceronianus, that he is hardly to be named among writers at all, unless blotting a great deal of paper with ink is enough to make one. He is, however, among the best of his contemporaries, if a vast command of Latin phrase, and a spirited employment of it, may compensate for some want of accuracy. Budæus, as has been already said, is hard and unpolished. Vives assumes that he has written his famous and excellent work on the corruption of the sciences with some elegance; but this he says in language which hardly warrants the boast.[647] In fact, he is by no means a good writer. But Melancthon excelled Erasmus by far in purity of diction, and correctness of classical taste. With him we may place Calvin in his Institutes, and our countryman Sir John Cheke, as distinguished from most other cisalpine writers of this period by the merit of what is properly called style. Bunel of Toulouse is reckoned the best model of language in this period. The praise, however, of writing pure Latin, or the pleasure of reading it, is dearly bought when accompanied by such vacuity of sense as we experience in the elaborate epistles of Paulus Manutius and the Ciceronian school in Italy.
[645] Greswell’s History of the early Parisian Greek Press.
[646] Vives de causis corrupt. art. (Opera Lud. Vives, edit. Basle, 1555, i. 358.) He observes, in another work, that there was no full and complete dictionary of Latin. Id. p. 475.
[647] Nitorem præterea sermonis addidi aliquem, et quod non expediret res pulcherrimas sordidè ac spuriè vestiri, et ut studiosi elegantiarum [orum?] literarum non perpetuo in vocum et sermonis cognitione adhærescerent; quod hactenus fere accidit, tædio nimirum infrugiferæ ac horridæ molestiæ, quæ in percipiendis artibus diutissimè erat devorata, i. 324.