Erasmus and the Age of Reformation | Page 9

AGE OF 51]
[Illustration: II. VIEW OF ROTTERDAM, EARLY SIXTEENTH
CENTURY]
Nec si quot placidis ignea noctibus Scintillant tacito sydera culmine,
Nec si quot tepidum flante Favonio Ver suffundit humo rosas, Tot sint
ora mihi...
Was it strange that the youth who could say this felt himself a poet?--or
who, together with his friend, could sing of spring in a Meliboean song
of fifty distichs? Pedantic work, if you like, laboured literary exercises,
and yet full of the freshness and the vigour which spring from the Latin
itself.
Out of these moods was to come the first comprehensive work that
Erasmus was to undertake, the manuscript of which he was afterwards
to lose, to recover in part, and to publish only after many years--the
Antibarbari, which he commenced at Steyn, according to Dr. Allen. In
the version in which eventually the first book of the Antibarbari
appeared, it reflects, it is true, a somewhat later phase of Erasmus's life,
that which began after he had left the monastery; neither is the
comfortable tone of his witty defence of profane literature any longer

that of the poet at Steyn. But the ideal of a free and noble life of
friendly intercourse and the uninterrupted study of the Ancients had
already occurred to him within the convent walls.
In the course of years those walls probably hemmed him in more and
more closely. Neither learned and poetic correspondence nor the art of
painting with which he occupied himself,[1] together with one Sasboud,
could sweeten the oppression of monastic life and a narrow-minded,
unfriendly environment. Of the later period of his life in the monastery,
no letters at all have been preserved, according to Dr. Allen's carefully
considered dating. Had he dropped his correspondence out of spleen, or
had his superiors forbidden him to keep it up, or are we merely left in
the dark because of accidental loss? We know nothing about the
circumstances and the frame of mind in which Erasmus was ordained
on 25 April 1492, by the Bishop of Utrecht, David of Burgundy.
Perhaps his taking holy orders was connected with his design to leave
the monastery. He himself afterwards declared that he had but rarely
read mass. He got his chance to leave the monastery when offered the
post of secretary to the Bishop of Cambray, Henry of Bergen. Erasmus
owed this preferment to his fame as a Latinist and a man of letters; for
it was with a view to a journey to Rome, where the bishop hoped to
obtain a cardinal's hat, that Erasmus entered his service. The
authorization of the Bishop of Utrecht had been obtained, and also that
of the prior and the general of the order. Of course, there was no
question yet of taking leave for good, since, as the bishop's servant,
Erasmus continued to wear his canon's dress. He had prepared for his
departure in the deepest secrecy. There is something touching in the
glimpse we get of his friend and fellow-poet, William Hermans,
waiting in vain outside of Gouda to see his friend just for a moment,
when on his way south he would pass the town. It seems there had been
consultations between them as to leaving Steyn together, and Erasmus,
on his part, had left him ignorant of his plans. William had to console
himself with the literature that might be had at Steyn.
* * * * *
Erasmus, then twenty-five years old--for in all probability the year

when he left the monastery was 1493--now set foot on the path of a
career that was very common and much coveted at that time: that of an
intellectual in the shadow of the great. His patron belonged to one of
the numerous Belgian noble families, which had risen in the service of
the Burgundians and were interestedly devoted to the prosperity of that
house. The Glimes were lords of the important town of
Bergen-op-Zoom, which, situated between the River Scheldt and the
Meuse delta, was one of the links between the northern and the
southern Netherlands. Henry, the Bishop of Cambray, had just been
appointed chancellor of the Order of the Golden Fleece, the most
distinguished spiritual dignity at court, which although now Habsburg
in fact, was still named after Burgundy. The service of such an
important personage promised almost unbounded honour and profit.
Many a man would under the circumstances, at the cost of some
patience, some humiliation, and a certain laxity of principle, have risen
even to be a bishop. But Erasmus was never a man to make the most of
his situation.
Serving the bishop proved to be rather a disappointment. Erasmus had
to accompany him on his frequent migrations from one residence to
another in Bergen, Brussels, or Mechlin. He was very busy, but the
exact