The Praise of Folly

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The apostles also confuted the heathen philosophers and Jews, a people
than whom none more obstinate, but rather by their good lives and
miracles than syllogisms: and yet there was scarce one among them that
was capable of understanding the least "quodlibet" of the Scotists. But
now, where is that heathen or heretic that must not presently stoop to
such wire-drawn subtleties, unless he be so thick-skulled that he can't
apprehend them, or so impudent as to hiss them down, or, being furnished
with the same tricks, be able to make his party good with them? As if a
man should set a conjurer on work against a conjurer, or fight with one
hallowed sword against another, which would prove no other than a work to
no purpose. For my own part I conceive the Christians would do much
better if instead of those dull troops and companies of soldiers with
which they have managed their war with such doubtful success, they would
send the bawling Scotists, the most obstinate Occamists, and invincible
Albertists to war against the Turks and Saracens; and they would see, I
guess, a most pleasant combat and such a victory as was never before. For
who is so faint whom their devices will not enliven? who so stupid whom
such spurs can't quicken? or who so quick-sighted before whose eyes they
can't cast a mist?

But you'll say, I jest. Nor are you without cause, since even among
divines themselves there are some that have learned better and are ready
to turn their stomachs at those foolish subtleties of the others. There
are some that detest them as a kind of sacrilege and count it the height
of impiety to speak so irreverently of such hidden things, rather to be
adored than explicated; to dispute of them with such profane and
heathenish niceties; to define them so arrogantly and pollute the majesty
of divinity with such pithless and sordid terms and opinions. Meantime
the others please, nay hug themselves in their happiness, and are so
taken up with these pleasant trifles that they have not so much leisure
as to cast the least eye on the Gospel or St. Paul's epistles. And while
they play the fool at this rate in their schools, they make account the
universal church would otherwise perish, unless, as the poets fancied of
Atlas that he supported heaven with his shoulders, they underpropped the
other with their syllogistical buttresses. And how great a happiness is
this, think you? while, as if Holy Writ were a nose of wax, they fashion
and refashion it according to their pleasure; while they require that
their own conclusions, subscribed by two or three Schoolmen, be accounted
greater than Solon's laws and preferred before the papal decretals;
while, as censors of the world, they force everyone to a recantation that
differs but a hair's breadth from the least of their explicit or implicit
determinations. And those too they pronounce like oracles. This
proposition is scandalous; this irreverent; this has a smack of heresy;
this no very good sound: so that neither baptism, nor the Gospel, nor
Paul, nor Peter, nor St. Jerome, nor St. Augustine, no nor most
Aristotelian Thomas himself can make a man a Christian, without these
bachelors too be pleased to give him his grace. And the like in their
subtlety in judging; for who would think he were no Christian that should
say these two speeches "matula putes" and "matula putet," or "ollae
fervere" and "ollam fervere" were not both good Latin, unless their
wisdoms had taught us the contrary? who had delivered the church from
such mists of error, which yet no one ever met with, had they not come
out with some university seal for it? And are they not most happy while
they do these things?

Then for what concerns hell, how exactly they describe everything, as if
they had been conversant in that commonwealth most part of their time!
Again, how do they frame in their fancy new orbs, adding to those we have
already an eighth! a goodly one, no doubt, and spacious enough, lest
perhaps their happy souls might lack room to walk in, entertain their
friends, and now and then play at football. And with these and a thousand
the like fopperies their heads are so full stuffed and stretched that I
believe Jupiter's brain was not near so big when, being in labor with
Pallas, he was beholding to the midwifery of Vulcan's axe. And therefore
you must not wonder if in their public disputes they are so bound about
the head, lest otherwise perhaps their brains might leap out. Nay, I have
sometimes laughed myself to see them so tower in their own opinion when
they speak most barbarously; and when they humh and hawh so pitifully
that none but one of their own tribe can understand them, they call it
heights which the vulgar can't reach; for they say 'tis beneath the
dignity of divine mysteries to be cramped and tied up to the narrow rules
of grammarians: from whence we may conjecture the great prerogative of
divines, if they only have the privilege of speaking corruptly, in which
yet every cobbler thinks himself concerned for his share. Lastly, they
look upon themselves as somewhat more than men as often as they are
devoutly saluted by the name of "Our Masters," in which they fancy there
lies as much as in the Jews' "Jehovah;" and therefore they reckon it a
crime if "Magister Noster" be written other than in capital letters; and
if anyone should preposterously say "Noster Magister," he has at once
overturned the whole body of divinity.

And next these come those that commonly call themselves the religious and
monks, most false in both titles, when both a great part of them are
farthest from religion, and no men swarm thicker in all places than
themselves. Nor can I think of anything that could be more miserable did
not I support them so many several ways. For whereas all men detest them
to that height, that they take it for ill luck to meet one of them by
chance, yet such is their happiness that they flatter themselves. For
first, they reckon it one of the main points of piety if they are so
illiterate that they can't so much as read. And then when they run over
their offices, which they carry about them, rather by tale than
understanding, they believe the gods more than ordinarily pleased with
their braying. And some there are among them that put off their
trumperies at vast rates, yet rove up and down for the bread they eat;
nay, there is scarce an inn, wagon, or ship into which they intrude not,
to the no small damage of the commonwealth of beggars. And yet, like
pleasant fellows, with all this vileness, ignorance, rudeness, and
impudence, they represent to us, for so they call it, the lives of the
apostles. Yet what is more pleasant than that they do all things by rule
and, as it were, a kind of mathematics, the least swerving from which
were a crime beyond forgiveness--as how many knots their shoes must be
tied with, of what color everything is, what distinction of habits, of
what stuff made, how many straws broad their girdles and of what fashion,
how many bushels wide their cowl, how many fingers long their hair, and
how many hours sleep; which exact equality, how disproportionate it is,
among such variety of bodies and tempers, who is there that does not
perceive it? And yet by reason of these fooleries they not only set
slight by others, but each different order, men otherwise professing
apostolical charity, despise one another, and for the different wearing
of a habit, or that 'tis of darker color, they put all things in
combustion. And among these there are some so rigidly religious that
their upper garment is haircloth, their inner of the finest linen; and,
on the contrary, others wear linen without and hair next their skins.
Others, again, are as afraid to touch money as poison, and yet neither
forbear wine nor dallying with women. In a word, 'tis their only care
that none of them come near one another in their manner of living, nor
do they endeavor how they may be like Christ, but how they may differ
among themselves.

And another great happiness they conceive in their names, while they call
themselves Cordiliers, and among these too, some are Colletes, some
Minors, some Minims, some Crossed; and again, these are Benedictines,
those Bernardines; these Carmelites, those Augustines; these Williamites,
and those Jacobines; as if it were not worth the while to be called
Christians. And of these, a great part build so much on their ceremonies
and petty traditions of men that they think one heaven is too poor a
reward for so great merit, little dreaming that the time will come when
Christ, not regarding any of these trifles, will call them to account for
His precept of charity. One shall show you a large trough full of all
kinds of fish; another tumble you out so many bushels of prayers; another
reckon you so many myriads of fasts, and fetch them up again in one
dinner by eating till he cracks again; another produces more bundles of
ceremonies than seven of the stoutest ships would be able to carry;
another brags he has not touched a penny these three score years without
two pair of gloves at least upon his hands; another wears a cowl so lined
with grease that the poorest tarpaulin would not stoop to take it up;
another will tell you he has lived these fifty-five years like a sponge,
continually fastened to the same place; another is grown hoarse with his
daily chanting; another has contracted a lethargy by his solitary living;
and another the palsy in his tongue for want of speaking. But Christ,
interrupting them in their vanities, which otherwise were endless, will
ask them, "Whence this new kind of Jews? I acknowledge one commandment,
which is truly mine, of which alone I hear nothing. I promised, 'tis
true, my Father's heritage, and that without parables, not to cowls, odd
prayers, and fastings, but to the duties of faith and charity. Nor can I
acknowledge them that least acknowledge their faults. They that would
seem holier than myself, let them if they like possess to themselves
those three hundred sixty-five heavens of Basilides the heretic's
invention, or command them whose foolish traditions they have preferred
before my precepts to erect them a new one." When they shall hear these
things and see common ordinary persons preferred before them, with what
countenance, think you, will they behold one another? In the meantime
they are happy in their hopes, and for this also they are beholding
to me.

And yet these kind of people, though they are as it were of another
commonwealth, no man dares despise, especially those begging friars,
because they are privy to all men's secrets by means of confessions, as
they call them. Which yet were no less than treason to discover, unless,
being got drunk, they have a mind to be pleasant, and then all comes out,
that is to say by hints and conjectures but suppressing the names. But if
anyone should anger these wasps, they'll sufficiently revenge themselves
in their public sermons and so point out their enemy by circumlocutions
that there's no one but understands whom 'tis they mean, unless he
understand nothing at all; nor will they give over their barking till you
throw the dogs a bone. And now tell me, what juggler or mountebank you
had rather behold than hear them rhetorically play the fool in their
preachments, and yet most sweetly imitating what rhetoricians have
written touching the art of good speaking? Good God! what several
postures they have! How they shift their voice, sing out their words,
skip up and down, and are ever and anon making such new faces that they
confound all things with noise! And yet this knack of theirs is no less a
mystery that runs in succession from one brother to another; which though
it be not lawful for me to know, however I'll venture at it by
conjectures. And first they invoke whatever they have scraped from the
poets; and in the next place, if they are to discourse of charity, they
take their rise from the river Nilus; or to set out the mystery of the
cross, from bell and the dragon; or to dispute of fasting, from the
twelve signs of the zodiac; or, being to preach of faith, ground their
matter on the square of a circle.

I have heard myself one, and he no small fool--I was mistaken, I would
have said scholar--that being in a famous assembly explaining the mystery
of the Trinity, that he might both let them see his learning was not
ordinary and withal satisfy some theological ears, he took a new way, to
wit from the letters, syllables, and the word itself; then from the
coherence of the nominative case and the verb, and the adjective and
substantive: and while most of the audience wondered, and some of them
muttered that of Horace, "What does all this trumpery drive at?" at last
he brought the matter to this head, that he would demonstrate that the
mystery of the Trinity was so clearly expressed in the very rudiments of
grammar that the best mathematician could not chalk it out more plainly.
And in this discourse did this most superlative theologian beat his
brains for eight whole months that at this hour he's as blind as a
beetle, to wit, all the sight of his eyes being run into the sharpness of
his wit. But for all that he thinks nothing of his blindness, rather
taking the same for too cheap a price of such a glory as he won thereby.

And besides him I met with another, some eighty years of age, and such a
divine that you'd have sworn Scotus himself was revived in him. He, being
upon the point of unfolding the mystery of the name Jesus, did with
wonderful subtlety demonstrate that there lay hidden in those letters
whatever could be said of him; for that it was only declined with three
cases, he said, it was a manifest token of the Divine Trinity; and then,
that the first ended in _S_, the second in _M_, the third in _U_, there
was in it an ineffable mystery, to wit, those three letters declaring to
us that he was the beginning, middle, and end (_summum, medium, et
ultimum_) of all. Nay, the mystery was yet more abstruse; for he so
mathematically split the word Jesus into two equal parts that he left the
middle letter by itself, and then told us that that letter in Hebrew was
_schin_ or _sin_, and that _sin_ in the Scotch tongue, as he remembered,
signified as much as sin; from whence he gathered that it was Jesus that
took away the sins of the world. At which new exposition the audience
were so wonderfully intent and struck with admiration, especially the
theologians, that there wanted little but that Niobe-like they had been
turned to stones; whereas the like had almost happened to me, as befell
the Priapus in Horace. And not without cause, for when were the Grecian
Demosthenes or Roman Cicero ever guilty of the like? They thought that
introduction faulty that was wide of the matter, as if it were not the
way of carters and swineherds that have no more wit than God sent them.
But these learned men think their preamble, for so they call it, then
chiefly rhetorical when it has least coherence with the rest of the
argument, that the admiring audience may in the meanwhile whisper to
themselves, "What will he be at now?" In the third place, they bring in
instead of narration some texts of Scripture, but handle them cursorily,
and as it were by the bye, when yet it is the only thing they should have
insisted on. And fourthly, as it were changing a part in the play, they
bolt out with some question in divinity, and many times relating neither
to earth nor heaven, and this they look upon as a piece of art. Here they
erect their theological crests and beat into the people's ears those
magnificent titles of illustrious doctors, subtle doctors, most subtle
doctors, seraphic doctors, cherubin doctors, holy doctors, unquestionable
doctors, and the like; and then throw abroad among the ignorant people
syllogisms, majors, minors, conclusions, corollaries, suppositions, and
those so weak and foolish that they are below pedantry. There remains yet
the fifth act in which one would think they should show their mastery.
And here they bring in some foolish insipid fable out of _Speculum
Historiale_ or _Gesta Romanorum_ and expound it allegorically,
tropologically, and anagogically. And after this manner do they and their
chimera, and such as Horace despaired of compassing when he wrote "Humano
capiti," etc.

But they have heard from somebody, I know not whom, that the beginning of
a speech should be sober and grave and least given to noise. And
therefore they begin theirs at that rate they can scarce hear themselves,
as if it were not matter whether anyone understood them. They have
learned somewhere that to move the affections a louder voice is
requisite. Whereupon they that otherwise would speak like a mouse in a
cheese start out of a sudden into a downright fury, even there too, where
there's the least need of it. A man would swear they were past the power
of hellebore, so little do they consider where 'tis they run out. Again,
because they have heard that as a speech comes up to something, a man
should press it more earnestly, they, however they begin, use a strange
contention of voice in every part, though the matter itself be never so
flat, and end in that manner as if they'd run themselves out of breath.
Lastly, they have learned that among rhetoricians there is some mention
of laughter, and therefore they study to prick in a jest here and there;
but, O Venus! so void of wit and so little to the purpose that it may be
truly called an ass's playing on the harp. And sometimes also they use
somewhat of a sting, but so nevertheless that they rather tickle than
wound; nor do they ever more truly flatter than when they would seem to
use the greatest freedom of speech. Lastly, such is their whole action
that a man would swear they had learned it from our common tumblers,
though yet they come short of them in every respect. However, they are
both so like that no man will dispute but that either these learned their
rhetoric from them, or they theirs from these. And yet they light on some
that, when they hear them, conceive they hear very Demosthenes and
Ciceroes: of which sort chiefly are our merchants and women, whose ears
only they endeavor to please, because as to the first, if they stroke
them handsomely, some part or other of their ill-gotten goods is wont to
fall to their share. And the women, though for many other things they
favor this order, this is not the least, that they commit to their
breasts whatever discontents they have against their husbands. And now, I
conceive me, you see how much this kind of people are beholding to me,
that with their petty ceremonies, ridiculous trifles, and noise exercise
a kind of tyranny among mankind, believing themselves very Pauls and
Anthonies.

But I willingly give over these stage-players that are such ingrateful
dissemblers of the courtesies I have done them and such impudent
pretenders to religion which they haven't. And now I have a mind to give
some small touches of princes and courts, of whom I am had in reverence,
aboveboard and, as it becomes gentlemen, frankly. And truly, if they had
the least proportion of sound judgment, what life were more unpleasant
than theirs, or so much to be avoided? For whoever did but truly weigh
with himself how great a burden lies upon his shoulders that would truly
discharge the duty of a prince, he would not think it worth his while to
make his way to a crown by perjury and parricide. He would consider that
he that takes a scepter in his hand should manage the public, not his
private, interest; study nothing but the common good; and not in the
least go contrary to those laws whereof himself is both the author and
exactor: that he is to take an account of the good or evil administration
of all his magistrates and subordinate officers; that, though he is but
one, all men's eyes are upon him, and in his power it is, either like a
good planet to give life and safety to mankind by his harmless influence,
or like a fatal comet to send mischief and destruction; that the vices of
other men are not alike felt, nor so generally communicated; and that a
prince stands in that place that his least deviation from the rule of
honesty and honor reaches farther than himself and opens a gap to many
men's ruin. Besides, that the fortune of princes has many things
attending it that are but too apt to train them out of the way, as
pleasure, liberty, flattery, excess; for which cause he should the more
diligently endeavor and set a watch over himself, lest perhaps he be led
aside and fail in his duty. Lastly, to say nothing of treasons, ill will,
and such other mischiefs he's in jeopardy of, that that True King is over
his head, who in a short time will call him to account for every the
least trespass, and that so much the more severely by how much more
mighty was the empire committed to his charge. These and the like if a
prince should duly weigh, and weigh it he would if he were wise, he would
neither be able to sleep nor take any hearty repast.

But now by my courtesy they leave all this care to the gods and are only
taken up with themselves, not admitting anyone to their ear but such as
know how to speak pleasant things and not trouble them with business.
They believe they have discharged all the duty of a prince if they hunt
every day, keep a stable of fine horses, sell dignities and commanderies,
and invent new ways of draining the citizens' purses and bringing it into
their own exchequer; but under such dainty new-found names that though
the thing be most unjust in itself, it carries yet some face of equity;
adding to this some little sweet'nings that whatever happens, they may be
secure of the common people. And now suppose someone, such as they
sometimes are, a man ignorant of laws, little less than an enemy to the
public good, and minding nothing but his own, given up to pleasure, a
hater of learning, liberty, and justice, studying nothing less than the
public safety, but measuring everything by his own will and profit; and
then put on him a golden chain that declares the accord of all virtues
linked one to another; a crown set with diamonds, that should put him in
mind how he ought to excel all others in heroic virtues; besides a
scepter, the emblem of justice and an untainted heart; and lastly, a
purple robe, a badge of that charity he owes the commonwealth. All which
if a prince should compare them with his own life, he would, I believe,
be clearly ashamed of his bravery, and be afraid lest some or other
gibing expounder turn all this tragical furniture into a ridiculous
laughingstock.

And as to the court lords, what should I mention them? than most of whom
though there be nothing more indebted, more servile, more witless, more
contemptible, yet they would seem as they were the most excellent of all
others. And yet in this only thing no men more modest, in that they are
contented to wear about them gold, jewels, purple, and those other marks
of virtue and wisdom; but for the study of the things themselves, they
remit it to others, thinking it happiness enough for them that they can
call the king master, have learned the cringe _a la mode_, know when and
where to use those titles of Your Grace, My Lord, Your Magnificence; in a
word that they are past all shame and can flatter pleasantly. For these
are the arts that speak a man truly noble and an exact courtier. But if
you look into their manner of life you'll find them mere sots, as
debauched as Penelope's wooers; you know the other part of the verse,
which the echo will better tell you than I can. They sleep till noon and
have their mercenary Levite come to their bedside, where he chops over
his matins before they are half up. Then to breakfast, which is scarce
done but dinner stays for them. From thence they go to dice, tables,
cards, or entertain themselves with jesters, fools, gambols, and horse
tricks. In the meantime they have one or two beverages, and then supper,
and after that a banquet, and 'twere well, by Jupiter, there were no more
than one. And in this manner do their hours, days, months, years, age
slide away without the least irksomeness. Nay, I have sometimes gone away
many inches fatter, to see them speak big words; while each of the ladies
believes herself so much nearer to the gods by how much the longer train
she trails after her; while one nobleman edges out another, that he may
get the nearer to Jupiter himself; and everyone of them pleases himself
the more by how much more massive is the chain he swags on his shoulders,
as if he meant to show his strength as well as his wealth.

Nor are princes by themselves in their manner of life, since popes,
cardinals, and bishops have so diligently followed their steps that
they've almost got the start of them. For if any of them would consider
what their Albe should put them in mind of, to wit a blameless life; what
is meant by their forked miters, whose each point is held in by the same
knot, we'll suppose it a perfect knowledge of the Old and New Testaments;
what those gloves on their hands, but a sincere administration of the
Sacraments, and free from all touch of worldly business; what their
crosier, but a careful looking after the flock committed to their charge;
what the cross born before them, but victory over all earthly affections
--these, I say, and many of the like kind should anyone truly consider,
would he not live a sad and troublesome life? Whereas now they do well
enough while they feed themselves only, and for the care of their flock
either put it over to Christ or lay it all on their suffragans, as they
call them, or some poor vicars. Nor do they so much as remember their
name, or what the word bishop signifies, to wit, labor, care, and
trouble. But in racking to gather money they truly act the part of
bishops, and herein acquit themselves to be no blind seers.

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