The Ship of Fools | Page 5

finest, which were executed in the fifteenth century, a worthy
school of Holbein. According to the opinion of Herr Rudolph Weigel,
they might possibly be the work of Martin Schön of Colmar.... The
composition in the better ones is genuinely Hogarth-like, and the longer
one looks at these little pictures, the more is one astonished at the
fulness of the humour, the fineness of the characterisation and the
almost dramatic talent of the grouping." Green, in his recent work on
emblems, characterizes them as marking an epoch in that kind of
literature. And Dibdin, the Macaulay of bibliography, loses his head in
admiration of the "entertaining volume," extolling the figures without
stint for "merit in conception and execution," "bold and free
pencilling," "spirit and point," "delicacy, truth, and force," "spirit of
drollery," &c., &c.; summarising thus, "few books are more pleasing to
the eye, and more gratifying to the fancy than the early editions of the
'Stultifera Navis.' It presents a combination of entertainment to which
the curious can never be indifferent."

Whether it were the racy cleverness of the pictures or the
unprecedented boldness of the text, the book stirred Europe of the
fifteenth century in a way and with a rapidity it had never been stirred
before. In the German actual acquaintance with it could then be but
limited, though it ran through seventeen editions within a century; the
Latin version brought it to the knowledge of the educated class
throughout Europe; but, expressing, as it did mainly, the feelings of the
common people, to have it in the learned language was not enough.
Translations into various vernaculars were immediately called for, and
the Latin edition having lightened the translator's labours, they were
speedily supplied. England, however, was all but last in the field but
when she did appear, it was in force, with a version in each hand, the
one in prose and the other in verse.
Fifteen years elapsed from the appearance of the first German edition,
before the English metrical version "translated out of Laten, French,
and Doche ... in the colege of Saynt Mary Otery, by me, Alexander
Barclay," was issued from the press of Pynson in 1509. A translation,
however, it is not. Properly speaking, it is an adaptation, an English
ship, formed and fashioned after the Ship of Fools of the World. "But
concernynge the translacion of this boke; I exhort ye reders to take no
displesour for y^t, it is nat translated word by worde acordinge to ye
verses of my actour. For I haue but only drawen into our moder tunge,
in rude langage the sentences of the verses as nere as the parcyte of my
wyt wyl suffer me, some tyme addynge, somtyme detractinge and
takinge away suche thinges as semeth me necessary and superflue.
Wherfore I desyre of you reders pardon of my presumptuous audacite,
trustynge that ye shall holde me excused if ye consyder ye scarsnes of
my wyt and my vnexpert youthe. I haue in many places ouerpassed
dyuers poetical digressions and obscurenes of fables and haue
concluded my worke in rude langage as shal apere in my translacion."
"Wylling to redres the errours and vyces of this oure royalme of
England ... I haue taken upon me ... the translacion of this present
boke ... onely for the holsome instruccion commodyte and doctryne of
wysdome, and to clense the vanyte and madness of folysshe people of
whom ouer great nombre is in the Royalme of Englonde."

Actuated by these patriotic motives, Barclay has, while preserving all
the valuable characteristics of his original, painted for posterity perhaps
the most graphic and comprehensive picture now preserved of the folly,
injustice, and iniquity which demoralized England, city and country
alike, at the beginning of the sixteenth century, and rendered it ripe for
any change political or religious.
"Knowledge of trouth, prudence, and iust symplicite
Hath vs clene
left; For we set of them no store.
Our Fayth is defyled loue, goodnes,
and Pyte:
Honest maners nowe ar reputed of: no more.
Lawyers ar
lordes; but Justice is rent and tore.
Or closed lyke a Monster within
dores thre.
For without mede: or money no man can hyr se.
Al is disordered: Vertue hath no rewarde.
Alas, compassion; and
mercy bothe ar slayne.
Alas, the stony hartys of pepyl ar so harde

That nought can constrayne theyr folyes to refrayne."
His ships are full laden but carry not all who should be on board.
"We are full lade and yet forsoth I thynke
A thousand are behynde,
whom we may not receyue
For if we do, our nauy clene shall synke

He oft all lesys that coueytes all to haue
From London Rockes
Almyghty God vs saue
For if we there anker, outher bote or barge

There be so many that they vs wyll ouercharge."
The national tone and aim of the English "Ship" are maintained