Erasmus from Rotterdam
Dedicatory Letter
Erasmus of Rotterdam, to his friend Thomas More,* greetings:
When I was returning to England recently from Italy, I had to spend
a lot of time on horseback, and I didn’t want to waste it all on chatter
that was trite and (as the Greeks would say) devoid of the Muses.
I preferred sometimes to turn over in my mind subjects of common
interest to us both, or to enjoy the memory of the friends that I had
left behind here – friends whose great learning is matched only by
their great charm. And among these friends it was you, my dear More,
that were regularly in the forefront of my thoughts. The constant
enjoyment I found in remembering you while we were apart matched
the joy I’d just as constantly found in your company when we were
together. In fact I’ll be damned if anything else has ever given me such
happiness in all my life! Anyhow, I felt that I absolutely had to occupy
myself with something, and as the circumstances seemed little suited
to serious endeavour, I decided to amuse myself with an encomium of
Mo ̄ria,* a “praise of Folly”.
“But what in Wisdom’s name put that into your head?” you’ll ask.
Well, first, your family name More suggested it to me, because it’s
as close to the word “Mo ̄ria” as you are remote from its meaning
– indeed, by universal assent you couldn’t be remoter. Then I had a
suspicion that this intellectual game of mine would appeal particularly
to you, for the reason that you always get a great deal of pleasure
from jests of this kind that contain both learning (if I’m not mistaken)
and, here and there, some wit; you’re always, too, playing the role of
a “laughing philosopher”* in everyday human life. Your exceptional
mental discernment, it’s true, sets you utterly apart from the common
run of humanity, but at the same time the legendary charm and good
nature of your personality mean that you’re able, indeed delighted, to
be for everyone “a man for all seasons”.* So please be willing not just
erasmus
to accept this little dissertation as a “memento of your pal”,* but also
to take up its defence: it’s dedicated to you, and no longer mine now
but yours.
I ask this because there’ll surely be detractors who’ll allege that
these tomfooleries are either too frivolous to befit a theologian or have
too sharp a sting to accord with Christian humility. They’ll loudly
accuse us of reviving the old-style comedy of Athens* or composing
satires like a latter-day Lucian* – of sinking our teeth into everything,
that is, without discrimination.
People that are upset by the flippancy and playfulness of my subject
matter will bear in mind, I hope, that I’m not the first in this field:
what I’m doing is identical to what was done time and again by the
great authors of the past. Think how many centuries ago Homer had
fun with his ‘Battle of Frogs and Mice’,* Virgil with his ‘Gnat’ and his
‘Garlic Salad’,* Ovid with his ‘Nut Tree’.* Think how both Polycrates
and his critic Isocrates composed eulogies of Busiris;* how Glaucon*
praised injustice; Favorinus,* Thersites and malaria; Synesius,* baldness;
and Lucian, a fly and a sponger.* Think how Seneca* amused
himself with the apotheo ̄sis of Claudius, Plutarch* with his dialogue
between Gryllus and Odysseus, Lucian and Apuleius with their asses,*
and someone-or-other with their testament of Grunnius Corocotta the
piglet* (which even St Jerome recalls).
Would my critics rather imagine me to have amused myself by
playing draughts from time to time, or, if they prefer, by “galloping
around on a long stick”?* For it really is quite unreasonable to grant
every other of life’s professions its opportunities for fun, but to allow
no fun at all to scholars. What if the jokes bring with them some serious
ideas? What if the absurdities are handled in such a way that the
not altogether undiscriminating reader gains rather more benefit from
them than from some people’s forbiddingly elaborate treatises? I’m
thinking of the sort that spend long hours stitching together a discourse
in praise of public speaking or philosophy; or who compose a
eulogy of some head of state; or a speech urging war against the Turks;
or a prophecy of future events; or a discussion of every last argument
about goat’s wool.* Nothing’s more futile than to treat serious subjects
in a frivolous way – but at the same time nothing’s more entertaining
than to treat frivolities in such a way that you come across to others
as the opposite of frivolous. The verdict on me is for others to deliver;
praise of folly
nevertheless, (unless self-love* is duping me completely) though it’s
Folly we’ve praised, it’s not altogether foolishly we’ve done it.
I’ll deal now with the taunt about sting. Intelligent critics have
always been allowed the liberty of using irony to make fun of our
shared humanity without fear of consequences, provided only that
the freedom doesn’t express itself in rage. That’s why I’m so surprised
at the tenderness of modern ears, which can barely now tolerate anything
beyond conventional compliments: you’ll find some people so
religiously correct, in a back-to-front way, that they’re readier to stomach
the most harshly offensive language against Christ than to have a
pope or head of state sullied by the gentlest of jokes, especially if it
touches on what Aristophanes terms “pay and rations”.* Anyhow, if
one censures the way people live their lives without criticizing a single
person by name, I question whether that should be regarded as administering
a sting so much as offering information and advice. Or try
totting up the counts on which I’m censuring myself. Besides, if critics
exempt no class of people from reproof, then they’re not displaying
animosity against any individual but against human shortcomings in
general. So, if anyone should come forwards to complain that they’ve
been libelled, they’ll be betraying their guilty conscience, or at least
their unease. St Jerome* indulged in the same kind of ridicule as I
have with much more bluntness and sting, often exposing identities.
As for us, not only have we refrained completely from naming names;
we’ve also regulated our manner of writing to ensure that the perceptive
reader can readily comprehend that our aim is to entertain rather
than to sting. Unlike Juvenal,* we’ve left unstirred the hidden cesspool
of wickedness; we’ve made it our business to identify what’s laughable
rather than what’s loathsome. If there are some that can’t be won
round even by these arguments, let them at least remember this: to be
rebuked by Folly is a compliment; since we’ve made Folly the speaker,
it’s only right that she be true to character.
But why do I go on like this to you? Outstanding advocate that
you are, it’s in upholding cases less than strong that you show your
strength. So fare you well, my eloquent More, and defend your Mo ̄ria
with vigour!
From the country, 9th June*
Goddess Folly is the Speaker
Folly Introduces Herself
Humans may talk about me in public as they like –
I realize how bad a name Folly has even among the
biggest fools. But I’m the one, I tell you, yes the only one,
to use my divine power to bring good cheer to all, gods
and humankind alike. I’ve more than ample proof of it
too: as soon as I stepped forwards to address this packed
congregation, all your faces at once beamed out with a
new and unaccustomed cheerfulness; you suddenly lost
your frowns; you showed your delight; you gave me a
friendly laugh and clapped your hands. As I look round
at you on every side, you really seem, all of you, to be
merry on the nectar that Homer’s gods drank, nectar
laced with nepenthe* to banish sorrow. Yet only just now
you were sitting there glum and worried, just as if you’d
freshly emerged from Trophonius’s cave.*
To put it another way, you know how it is when that
beautiful golden sun first rises on the earth, or when
after a harsh winter the new spring makes the balmy
west winds blow: everything immediately takes on a
new aspect again, a new colour, a new youth even.
That’s the way your faces changed as soon as you
caught sight of me. To dispel cares that vex the soul
– that’s something great preachers can hardly manage
with a lengthy, long-rehearsed sermon; but that’s what
I’ve achieved in an instant, just by my appearance.
Why is it, though, that I’ve come before you today
in such a bizarre costume?* You’ll hear soon enough,
provided you can bear to lend me your ears as I talk
– I don’t mean the ears that you normally lend to those
that rant at you here in church, but the ears you prick up
for charlatans, jesters and fools outside – the donkeys’
First Impressions
Why I’ve Come
erasmus
ears that long ago our friend Midas* sprouted for Pan’s
sake. The fact is, I’ve decided I want to spend a little
time giving you the benefit of my doctorate – not, I
hasten to add, a doctorate of the sort held by teachers
that these days stuff schoolboys with unsettling nonsense
and give them an argumentativeness worse than
a woman’s. No: my model will be those clever men of
long ago who, to avoid the discredited title of “doctor
of philosophy”, preferred to be known as “spin doctors”.*
It was these “doctors” who busied themselves
composing encomiums in praise of gods and mighty
men. And it’s an encomium you’re now going to hear,
not one of some demigod like Hercules or lawgiver like
Solon,* but my encomium of myself, Folly.
Now I don’t care a finger snap for those educated
people who call it the height of foolishness and bad
taste for someone to boast of their own merits: it can
be as foolish as they want, but let them at least admit
that it’s fitting. What’s more apt than for Mo¯ ria herself
to blow her own trumpet – “pipe herself on the flute”,*
as the Greeks say? Who can talk about me better than I
can? – unless there’s anyone who knows me better than
I know myself!
Actually I consider praising myself a good deal less
pretentious than what the well-bred, well-educated
crowd do all the time: through a twisted sense of modesty
they prevail on some ingratiating speechwriter or
windbag of a poet (and pay them, what’s more) to tell
them how good they are – and it’s all lies, pure lies!
Yet the bashful subject lifts his tail like a peacock and
raises the feathers of his crest, while his bare-faced
flatterer equates a paltry human being with the gods:
he declares the man perfectly attuned to every virtue,
though the fellow knows himself to be more than “two
octaves distant”* (as the Greeks express it); he dresses
the pathetic crow in another bird’s plumage; and (more
Greek sayings) he “whitens the African” and “makes
an elephant out of a fly”.* Well, I go along with this
An Encomium
of Myself?
praise of folly
well-worn proverb: “you can fairly praise yourself if
there’s no one else to praise you”.
How extraordinary, by the way, is human ingratitude
– or should I call it inertia? Humans all worship me
devotedly; they all gladly acknowledge the good I do
them; but not one has come forwards in all these centuries
to celebrate Folly’s merits in an appreciative speech.
And yet there’s never been a shortage of people to extol
tyrants like Busiris and Phalaris, malarial fevers, flies,
bald heads* and similar afflictions in eulogies crafted
late at night at great cost of oil and sleep.
This speech of mine you’re about to hear will be
impromptu and unworked, but truer for all that. I
wouldn’t want you to think it’s been put together to
show off my cleverness, as happens with the mass of
public speakers. They, as you know, publish a speech
they’ve worked on for all of thirty years – or may sometimes
have borrowed from someone else – and then
swear on oath that they’ve written it, or even dictated
it, in three days for fun. As for me, I’ve always taken the
greatest pleasure in speaking (as the Greeks say) “whatever
comes to my unready tongue”.*
No one, what’s more, should now expect me to proceed,
as those run-of-the-mill public speakers of yours
do, by subjecting myself to definition or – still less – to
analysis.* Drawing a boundary round someone whose
divine power is so vast, or dissecting someone whose
worship unites the universe – either would invite heaven’s
disfavour. In any case, what possible point is there
in presenting a shadow or outline of myself by way of
definition, when you and I are here together in the same
place and you can behold me for myself.
So I am, as you see, the great dispenser of blessings*
that they call in Latin “Stultitia” and in Greek “Mo ̄ria”
– that is, “Folly”. Why did I need say even this, though?
Don’t I display who I am adequately on my person – “on
countenance and brow”, as they say? If anyone claimed
I was the incarnation of Wisdom, whether pagan or
My Manner of
Speaking
Who I Am
erasmus
10
Christian, wouldn’t they be set right at once just by
the sight of me, even without my giving voice (that
least deceptive mirror* of the personality)? Rouging
cheeks* is not for me: I don’t profess one thing on my
face and hide another deep within. I resemble myself
exactly from every angle – so much so that I can’t be
mistaken even in people who are the keenest to claim
for themselves the mask and title of Wisdom and who
parade about, as in those Greek fables, like “baboons
in fine robes” and “donkeys in lion skins”.* But, for
all their careful pretences, the long ears sprouting from
somewhere or other betray the foolish Midas. Oh, the
ingratitude of people like this: they’re leading members
of our troupe, but are so ashamed of our name in public
that they use it as a major insult to throw indiscriminately
in other people’s faces. These people, who are in
reality the greatest morons but want to be regarded as
intellectuals and philosophers* – surely we’ve an excellent
right to call them “morosophers”.*
You see, we’ve decided to copy today’s public speakers
in one respect: they evidently consider themselves gods
if they show themselves two-tongued, like leeches,* and
they think it a splendid achievement if they can keep
embroidering a few little decorative Greek-sounding
words onto their Latin speeches, even if out of place.
What’s more, if foreign material fails, they dig four or
five archaic words out of some mouldering manuscript
to darken the reader’s mind. The purpose, of course,
is this: those who understand become more and more
pleased with themselves and those who don’t are the
more impressed the less they understand. It’s really
rather charming, the pleasure our people find in looking
up to things the more foreign they are. It allows the
vainer sort to laugh and applaud, and (as in the Greek
saying) “twitch their ears like donkeys”,* to show the
company how excellently they comprehend.
Well, καὶ ταῦτα δὴ μὲν ταῦτα* (as the Greeks say!).
Now I’ll return to my theme.
I Can Speak
Greek
— credits to almaclassics.com —
[…] Erasmus from Rotterdam […]
LikeLike