B E T WE E N U T O P I A

A N D D Y S T O P I A
B E T WE E N U T O P I A
A N D D Y S T O P I A
Erasmus, Thomas More, and the Humanist
Republic of Letters
Hanan Yoran
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Yoran, Hanan, 1963
Between utopia and dystopia : Erasmus, Thomas More, and the humanist Republic of
Letters / Hanan Yoran.
p. cm.
Includes bibliographical references and index.
ISBN 978-0-7391-3647-8 (cloth : alk. paper) ISBN 978-0-7391-3649-2 (electronic)
1. Erasmus, Desiderius, d. 1536. 2. More, Thomas, Sir, Saint, 14781535. 3.
HumanismHistory. 4. Autonomy (Philosophy)EuropeHistory16th century. I.
Title. II. Title: Erasmus, Thomas More, and the humanist Republic of Letters.
B785.E64Y67 2010
199'.492dc22
2009048742

The paper used in this publication meets the minimum requirements of American
National Standard for Information SciencesPermanence of Paper for Printed Library
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To my parents
vii
Acknowledgments ix
Abbreviations xi
Introduction 1
Part I: The Erasmian Republic of Letters
1 Humanism as Form 17
2 The Construction of the Erasmian Republic of Letters 37
3 Erasmian Humanism: The Reform Program of the
Universal Intellectual 69
Part II: The Erasmian Republic and Its Discontents
4 The Politics of a Disembodied Humanist 107
5 Mores Richard III: The Fragility of Humanist Discourse 133
6 Utopia and the No-Place of the Erasmian Republic 159
Conclusion 187
Notes 191
Bibliography 229
Index 245
Contents
ix
S
TUDYING THE RENAISSANCE GENEALOGY of the modern intellectual during the
early years of the twenty-first century has been a riveting, ambivalent and
enlightening endeavor. This book was written during a period dominated by
the eroding position of the humanities and by an often blatant anti-intellec-
tualism aggressively promoted by an ever-more intellectually impoverished
neoliberal ideology. Such times call for a determined response. At first glance,
this book does not provide such a response. Indeed, it reveals the problems
inherent in any attempt to employ humanist knowledge and skills on behalf
of a vision of a better society. It examines the internal strains and paradoxes
that are no less characteristic of the identity of the intellectual than are his or
her achievements. These troubles cannot be evaded. They must be contem-
plated and confronted. The experience of the past several centuries surely
confirms this insight. Recognition of the inherent strains in the intellectuals
identity is, in fact, the only viable path available today. For only by turning
the self-examination of the contradictions of their own position into an es-
sential part of their intellectual activity can modern intellectuals hope to make
a difference.
The invaluable aid Ive received from others during the course of writing
this work has also proved to be related to my subject. My teachers, colleagues
and friends have proved to be true intellectuals. Their scholarly activity is
both self-reflective and informed by wider social and political concerns. My
greatest debt is to Rivka Feldhay, who introduced me to the human sciences
and the wonders of the Renaissance. She then followed every step of my re-
search. Long discussions with Igal Halfin, true friend and true scholar, always
Acknowledgments
provided new insights. Miri Eliav-Feldon, Joseph Mali, Yahuda Elkana, my
brother Noam, Michela Turno, Ofer Gal, Raz Chen-Morris, Michael Zakim
and Gur Zak read parts of the study (and listened to my protracted mono-
logues about other parts) and their critical responses greatly improved my
arguments and sharpened my thinking. A Yad Hanadiv fellowship enabled
me to quietly pursue my research for two years. The beautiful Villa I Tatti,
the Harvard University Center of Italian Renaissance Studies, where I spent a
year as a visiting scholar, was an ideal place to conduct that research. There,
in Fiesole, the late Salvatore Camporeale and John Najemy showed me how
much I still needed to learn about the Renaissance. This book was published
with the support of the Israel Science Foundation.
Earlier and abridged versions of chapters 5 and 6 were published as
Thomas Mores Richard III: Probing the Limits of Humanism in Renais-
sance Studies 15 (2001) and Mores Utopia and Erasmuss No Place in Eng-
lish Literary Renaissance 35 (2005), respectively.
My warmest gratitude goes to my wife, Limor, who patiently endured all
the moods invariably involved in writing (not to mention other aspects of
academic life), and to my daughter, Anat, who at the age of three already
knows that daddy works in books.
x Acknowledgments
xi
Works of Erasmus
AB The Antibarbarians. Translated by Margaret Mann Phillips. In CWE
23, 16122.
Civ On Good Manners for Boys. Translated by Brian McGregor. In CWE
25, 27389.
Co Copia: Foundation of the Abundant Style. Translated by B. Knott. In
CWE 24, 296659.
CR The Godly Feast. Translated by Craig R. Thompson. In CWE 39,
171243.
CWE Collected Works of Erasmus. Various editors. Toronto: University of
Toronto Press, 1974.
DB War Is a Treat for Those Who Have Not Tried It. Translated by Denis
L. Drysdall. In CWE 35, 399440.
E The Handbook of the Christian Soldier. Translated by Charles Fan-
tazzi. In CWE 66, 8127.
EtV Letter to Paul Volz. Translated by Charles Fantazzi. In CWE 66,
823.
FD A Fish Diet. Translated by Craig R. Thompson. In CWE 40, 675
762.
FW A Discussion of Free Will. Translated by Peter Macardle. In CWE 76,
589.
IP The Education of a Christian Prince. Translated by Neil M. Cheshire
and Michael J. Heath. In CWE 27, 20388.
Abbreviations
LB Desiderii Erasmi Roterodami opera omnia, 10 vols. Edited by Jean
Leclerc. Leiden, 17036.
P The Paraclesis. Edited by J. C. Olin. In Christian Humanism and
the Reformation: Selected Writings of Erasmus, 93106. New York,
1965.
Puer A Declamation on the Subject of Early Liberal Education for Children.
Translated by Beert C. Verstraete. In CWE 26, 295346.
Pan Panegyric for Archduke Philip of Austria. Translated by Betty Radice.
In CWE 27, 675.
QP A Complaint of Peace. Translated by Betty Radice. In CWE 27,
289322.
RS On the Method of Study. Translated by B. McGregor. In CWE 24,
66591.
SA The Sileni of Alcibiades. Translated by R. A. B. Mynors. In CWE 34,
26282.
Scar A Dung-Beetle Hunting an Eagle. Translated by Denis L. Drysdall. In
CWE 35, 178214.
Works of Thomas More
CWM The Complete Works of St. Thomas More. Various editors. 15 vols.
New Haven, Conn.: Yale University Press, 19631986.
MtD Letter to Martin Dorp. Edited by Daniel Kinney. In CWM 15,
1127.
MtL Letter to Edward Lee. Edited by Daniel Kinney. In CWM 15,
15195.
MtM Letter to a Monk. Edited by Daniel Kinney. In CWM 15, 197
311.
LtO Letter to the University of Oxford. Edited by Daniel Kinney. In
CWM 15, 12949.
R The History of King Richard the Third. Edited by Richard S. Sylves-
ter. In CWM 2, 193.
RL Historia Richardi Tertii. Edited by Daniel Kinney. In CWM 15,
313485.
U Utopia. Edited by George M. Logan, Robert M. Adams and Clarence
H. Miller. Cambridge, 1995.
xii Abbreviations
2 Introduction
establishment or social estate, but only the ideals and values of the Erasmian
humanist qua humanist. In contrast to the medieval scholastic philosophers
and theologianswith whom the humanists struggled for cultural hege-
monythe views elaborated by Erasmus were not primarily derived from
eternal metaphysical and religious truths. The Erasmian humanist, in other
words, did not produce knowledge and instruct society from a transcendent
sphere. The Erasmian humanist was therefore a modern universal intellectual,
perhaps the first universal intellectual.
3
Among the citizens of the humanist Republic of Letters, Thomas More
stands out as the most profound thinker, not least because he attempted, in
his polemics against Erasmuss enemies, to provide a theoretical grounding
for his friends broad vision and heterogeneous intellectual production. This
is one of the reasons (but not the only one) why this book concentrates to a
large extent on Erasmus and More.
Since the image of Erasmus, transmitted by his generation to posterity,
coincides with the modern image of the intellectual as the disinterested and
universal thinker,
4
there is a tendency to see Erasmuss as the purest form
of humanism, uncontaminated by foreign interests and ideologies. Much
of the modern scholarship takes this position, usually implicitly and almost
always without problematizing the issue. The autonomy of Erasmian human-
ism is therefore taken to be the natural position of the intellectual vis--vis
power. Even if the exceptional nature of Erasmian humanism, compared to
contemporary groups of humanists and literati, is notedindeed, especially
in this caseErasmus and More are seen as the true intellectuals.
The most notable exception to this attitude is to be found in Lisa Jardines
Erasmus, Man of Letters, which exposes the strategies used by Erasmus and his
circle in constructing the public image of the leader of the Republic of Letters
as an unbiased intellectual, as the educator of Europe. Employing their liter-
ary talents and their command of the new art of printing, these humanists
presented Erasmus as the true heir of Italian humanism of the quattrocento,
even if this entailed conscious distortions on their part. Erasmus would also
be the modern Jerome whose personal piety and critical and literary skills
were uniquely suited to the reform of Christianity.
5
The great merit in Jar-
dines approach is its resulting denaturalization of Erasmuss persona, which
is revealed to be constructed rather than naturally given. At the same time, her
methodology and rhetoric tend to overemphasize the manipulative dimen-
sion of this project. Jardine describes the invention of what she sees to be an
ultimately false and misleading image. This wholesale rejection of Erasmian
humanisms self-presentation is problematic if less than the uncritical em-
brace of the same. Moreover, there is a structural ambiguity within Jardines
argument: while she (correctly) assumes that social identities are constructed,
Introduction 3
the polemical tone of her study implicitly identifies the constructed with the
false and the inauthentic. The notion of social identity employed in the pres-
ent study, in contrast, evades this pitfall. Identity is taken to be as a social
construct, but this does not render it less real or authentic (even though
it may be riddled with ambiguities and internal strains).
The aim of the present work is to examine the autonomy of Erasmian hu-
manism in its intellectual and cultural context, to describe its construction
and to expose the problems it raised. My central thesis is that the Republic of
Letters, as an emblem of intellectual autonomy, both grew from and sustained
Erasmian humanism. But at the same time this autonomy was most problem-
atical, indeed impossible, within humanist discourse. From the Republic of
Letters the Erasmian humanists spoke to Christendom, and it rendered their
words and ideas meaningful. Citizenship in this republic provided the intel-
lectual resources and the symbolic capital these men needed to think through
and present their social and political criticism and their reform proposals. But
at the same time this citizenship opened a rift between their social being and
their intellectual commitments, for the very existence of a separate intellectual
realm contradicted the fundamental epistemological and ethical presupposi-
tions of humanist discourse.
Humanism as Form
Defining the term humanism has proved difficult enough to convince
some that the kind of argument I have proposed is untenable. The extensive
research on all aspects of Renaissance humanism done in the past few de-
cades has shown that humanism flourished in a variety of social and political
contexts. It has also demonstrated that the views of the humanists were often
mutually contradictory. Today it is agreed that humanism was not a coherent
body of knowledge or a set of shared views. Ultimately, humanist thought
cannot be defined in terms of its contents.
Humanist discourse can, however, be defined as a set of distinct, though
usually implicit, ontological and epistemological presuppositions, from which
emerged a characteristic attitude regarding the understanding and the rep-
resentation of human reality. Humanism rejected the metaphysical assump-
tionperhaps the most fundamental assumption of mainstream classical and
medieval intellectual traditionthat behind the diversity of phenomenal ap-
pearances stood intelligible and unchanging substance. Humanist discourse
consequently denied that the meaning of human realityhuman history,
social institutions, political eventswas contingent upon its subordination
to a transcendent realm. Instead the humanists presupposed that the human
4 Introduction
world was a world made by men.
6
Moreover, humanist discourse denied the
existence of an ontological gap between the linguistic and the social, between
the symbolic and the real. It perceived human reality as inherently symbolic
and social entitiesinstitutions, interactions, practicesas meaningful enti-
ties. Such ontological presuppositions had, of course, their epistemological
counterparts. Humanism rejected the assumption that the understanding
of human reality could be reduced to a set of universal categories arrived at
by abstract reasoning. For if the social and symbolic were inseparable, then
social activity was inherently performative, an activity of interpretation and
communication, and human beings were principally the producers and inter-
preters of meanings.
7
These presuppositions were rarely explicitly stated by the humanists, who
usually did not indulge in abstract discussions or theoretical reflections. But
in the writings of the more theoretically oriented humanists, particularly
when they were in a polemical mood, these notions were closer to the surface.
In my reconstruction of humanist discourse I discuss some such writings,
focusing on Mores long letter to the Louvain theologian Martin Dorp, one of
the most reflective and forceful attempts to give an epistemological grounding
to humanist thought and to provide a coherent alternative to the scholastic
organization of knowledge. I also demonstrate that these presuppositions
of humanist discourse were implied in the elaborations of central humanist
concepts and in the contributions they made to the various fields of knowl-
edge. Only by taking these into account can we understand the full range and
significance of humanist thought: humanist ethical discourse (in the broader
sense of the term) and the humanist image of the human being; humanist
educational thought, in particular the tenet that the main aim of education
was to fashion a moral agent and a responsible citizen; the humanist attack on
the traditional distinction between the vita activa and the vita contemplativa;
the importance the humanists attributed to rhetoric and to mans prudential
and deliberative faculties; and the humanist invention of textual criticism and
philology.
An understanding of the epistemological presuppositions also helps us
understand the role of the intellectual, or, to use a historically unexception-
able term, the litteratus, in humanist discourse. If knowledge is not scientific
knowledge in the Aristotelian and scholastic sensethat is, knowledge of
universally valid truths, based on evident axiomsbut knowledge of a con-
tingent, historically and culturally determined human society, and if, further-
more, the origin, the epistemological status and the purpose of knowledge
are inherently imbedded in society, then the litteratus claim to knowledge
could not be based on membership in a distinct intellectual or contempla-
tive sphere. On the contrary, the humanist litteratus was a producer and
Introduction 5
transmitter of knowledge only inasmuch as he was part of society and part
of the great tradition of human knowledge (effectively, the classical and the
Christian heritages as the humanists understood them). In other words, for
humanism there was no essential epistemological and ethical (as opposed to
professional) difference between intellectuals and other social subjects, and
there was no privileged Archimedean point outside and above society from
which knowledge could be produced.
The definition of humanist discourse as a way of understanding and rep-
resenting human reality also permits an accurate theoretical and historical
account of humanism in context. My definition of humanism does not entail
specific content, and leaves out any talk of inherently humanist social and
political views. The humanists could accommodate to a range of different
social and political realities. And humanism indeed flourished in republican
Florence, in aristocratic Venice, in theocratic Rome, in monarchical Naples,
in many Italian principalities and, later, in the great monarchies of northern
Europe.
8
No generalization regarding the social position of the humanists
may be made, for their cultural significance varied a great deal, as did their
social and political status. It would be safe to say, however, that wherever
a center of humanism emerged it was connected to the dominant political
establishment and the humanists usually adhered to and represented the he-
gemonic ideology.
The Erasmian Republic
The foregoing definition of humanist discourse as form rather than content
allows us to reconstruct Erasmian humanism as one distinct version of hu-
manism. Erasmian humanism was a more or less coherent body of knowledge,
values and attitudes, based on more or less coherent assumptions. Though it
inherited from preceding generations of humanists a specific idiom, imagery,
themes, a canonical corpus and scholarly techniques and methodologies,
its emphasis was distinctive and its proposals for religious, intellectual and
cultural reform differed in many respects from the notions elaborated and
propagated by other groups of humanists.
The most distinct characteristic of Erasmian humanism was, however, its
relative autonomy. I hope to substantiate this claim from two complementary
perspectives. From a social perspective, I shall analyze Erasmian humanism in
its social context, focusing on the construction of the identity of the autono-
mous intellectual and its social space, the Erasmian Republic of Letters. I exam-
ine first the patronage system, which determined the social place and the social
existence of intellectuals in the Renaissance, and to a large extent fashioned
6 Introduction
their thought. Once the multifaceted dependencieseconomic, social, political
but also symbolicof the humanists on their patrons have been uncovered it
becomes apparent why most humanists were in league with a political estab-
lishment and actively reproduced the ideology that went with it. Against this
social and cultural background it becomes clear that the establishment of the
Erasmian republic cannot be seen as a natural outgrowth of humanism, that the
autonomy of Erasmian humanism was not a given. The Republic of Letters was
rather an artificial construction, the response by a specific group of humanists
to specific social, political, professional and even personal circumstances.
To account for the creation of the humanist republic I look to the various
discursive and rhetorical strategies used by Erasmus and the humanists gath-
ered around him. I examine how through their engagement with scholastic
philosophy and the aristocratic ethos, the Erasmian humanists reshaped their
relation to their patrons and to the various social and political establishments
and gained the legitimacy and authority to speak as independent intellectuals.
I explore how they accumulated symbolic capital by appropriating the classical
heritage, by presenting their philological skills as the key to secular knowledge
and religious truth, by establishing the image of Erasmus as an impartial re-
former, whose only interest was the well-being of Christendom as a whole and
by representing the community of the humanists as a spiritual commonwealth
floating above chaotic political realities. Erasmuss vast correspondencein it-
self a collective monument of Erasmian humanismprovides us with a view of
the construction of the Republic of Letters and clearly reveals the central issues
involved: the patronage system, Erasmuss dissatisfaction with the careers and
social opportunities traditionally open to the humanist and the various strate-
gies he and his friends used in creating their own social space.
In contrast to Erasmus, Thomas More chose, of course, to enter royal
service, and it could be argued therefore that the humanist with perhaps the
most brilliant public career cannot be seen as a universal intellectual, a citizen
of a Republic of Letters. One possible response to this argument is to turn
Mores biography into a morality play, evaluating his alleged reluctance to
enter politics and his fatal confrontation with his sovereign as proofs of the
irresolvable conflict between the political world and the Erasmian Republic
of Letters.
9
Under my theoretical assumptions, however, the important point
is that regardless of Mores alleged ambivalence toward royal service and the
motives for ultimately choosing this career, there is a strict separation between
his works and the ideology of the establishment he served. My contention, in
other words, is that Mores humanist writings do not reflect the ideology of
any existing political establishment (least of all that of the English throne);
instead they resemble Erasmuss writings, namely they were the products of
the Erasmian humanist qua universal intellectual.
10
Introduction 7
From a different perspective, examining the writings of Erasmus and More,
I assert the notion of intellectual autonomy by analyzing Erasmian humanism
as an intellectual system. I argue that Erasmian humanism differed from other
humanisms because it stood apart from any concrete sociopolitical context,
by and large. In Erasmian humanism the city-state and the court ceased to
be points of reference. The Erasmian humanists, as universal intellectuals,
spoke on behalf of a not-yet-existent Christian and humanist commonwealth.
Erasmuss and Mores political and social writings clearly attest to this. The
Italian humanists sometimes criticized such social and political phenomena as
factionalism, the excessive accumulation of wealth and the use of mercenaries,
but they never challenged the existing social and political order. The same is
true of the great majority of northern humanists. As suggested above, most
humanists shared the basic values of the dominant social groups in their areas.
More and Erasmus, by contrast, not only criticized powerful establishments
and long-standing customs, but sometimes also questioned the very basis of
the existing order. Utopia is, of course, the best-known example. But Erasmus
almost equaled Mores nonconformity, what with his pacifist views, his rejec-
tion of the Churchs claims to temporal authority and especially his condem-
nationin one text after another, and often in the most strident languageof
court culture and the aristocratic ethos. The clearest expression of Erasmuss
autonomy is his success in elaborating and presenting a comprehensive reform
program that reflected only the values of Erasmian humanism.
The Republic of Letters of the beginning of the sixteenth century was the
conclusion of forces channeled and released by Erasmian humanism. It was
constituted as an autonomous social and intellectual space by the Erasmian
humanists, and it provided them a self-conscious distance from which to ad-
dress their readers and preach to the powerful.
It might be argued, however, that by attributing intellectual autonomy
to Erasmian humanism I fall into idealist reductionism, that I see Erasmian
humanism as a disembodied discourse hovering in an autonomous sphere
of ideas. But so long as I insist that intellectual autonomy was not given I
should be immune to such imputations. My theoretical assumption is that
intellectual autonomy is always a discursive construction: its constitution
and reproduction are part of the discourse. Consequently, while intellectual
autonomy, as I use the term, certainly created a critical distance between the
Erasmian humanists and their society, it did not provide them with a privi-
leged perspective. Indeed, one of my central arguments is that the identity
of the Erasmian humanist as universal intellectual was most problematic in
terms of humanist discourse itself.
Once the notion of intellectual autonomy is thus demystified, it becomes
clear that I am not arguing that Erasmian humanism was of necessity devoid
8 Introduction
of ideological meanings or lacking in ideological effects and consequences
(from my perspective the very notion of a perfect point of view impervious to
the taint of ideology is hardly possible). It is easy to demonstrate that in some
ways Erasmian humanism reflected the dominant ideology. At the most obvi-
ous level one may think of the scorn and fear inspired in the humanists by the
vulgar masses, which reflected, of course, the sentiments of the upper classes.
Also, Erasmian humanism certainly contained themes, images and views that
served the interests of specific social and religious groups and were conse-
quently assimilated into their ideologies. Erasmuss attacks on the ecclesiastical
establishment, on scholastic philosophy and on monasticism, for example, were
certainly exploited by the reformers; and by the same token, his blunt rejection
of the aristocratic ethos was easily assimilated into what may be impressionisti-
cally termed bourgeois ideologies. But as I do not defend any idealist notion
of autonomy, these affirmations should not affect my argument. My examina-
tion focuses on the identity of the Erasmian humanist, the status of Erasmian
discourse and the social space that sustained them. My central argument is that
the Erasmian humanists constructed the social space from which they could
conceive and present their views as their own views. This identity and social
space were exceptional and historically significant in the political and social
context of the sixteenth century. They were also highly problematical.
Some would contend that Erasmus and More enjoyed no monopoly on
intellectual autonomy. Important humanists, notably Petrarch and Valla,
avoided forming permanent alliances to specific political or religious estab-
lishments, and their writingsat least if we consider their complete works
demonstrate an attempt to guard their independence. Valla, however, for all
his prestige remained an isolated figure and in this sense his position was
very different from that of Erasmus. Petrarch was more similar to Erasmus,
and indeed Petrarchan humanism prefigured Erasmian humanism in many
respects. Like Erasmus, Petrarch created around himself, notably by means of
carefully constructed correspondence, a community of humanists. Neverthe-
less, even in this case there were significant differences. Erasmian humanism
was much more conclusive in its rejection of key medieval notions than
Petrarchan humanism. Erasmian humanism, for instance, emphatically af-
firmed the vita activaPetrarch and his followers were ambivalent concern-
ing the issueand could therefore elaborate a much more self-confident,
comprehensive and radical reform program.
11
The No-Place of Erasmian Humanism
A discrete set of images and discursive strategies were routinely rehearsed in
the construction and presentation of the identity of the universal intellectual,
Introduction 9
the citizen of the Republic of Letters. And yet the Erasmian humanists never
clearly defined, let alone legitimized, the notion of the autonomous intel-
lectual. In other words, they did not conceptualize a basic presupposition of
their discourse. One of the reasons for this silence may have been a lack of ap-
propriate terminology. And then there was the difficulty of integrating the no-
tion into contemporary prevailing ideology, which did not acknowledge the
autonomy of the intellectual. But given the remarkable intellectual resources
of the Erasmian humanists and given their social prestige, these explanations
are at best partial.
The failure of the Erasmian humanists to conceptualize the notion of the
universal intellectual must be considered a symptom of a deeper problem.
My contention is that this problem was inherent in Erasmian humanism
itself: the notion could not be legitimized within the humanist discourse
because it violated the basic epistemological and ethical presuppositions of
that discourse. The very existence of the Republic of Letters created a fissure
between the social existence of the Erasmian humanists and their intellectual
commitments.
Irresolvable, this contradiction was never discussed by the Erasmian hu-
manists. On the contrary, it was carefully disguised or, better still, repressed.
My aim is consequently to expose this contradiction when it becomes visible
in the texts of Erasmus and More. But this task demands a different set of her-
meneutic tools than those used in reconstructing the discourse of Erasmian
humanism. A different notion of text and different relation between text and
discourse must be assumed. The text, or rather some if its phenomena, should
be read as symptomatic of the discourses internal tensions. The text should
be read against its explicit assertions and argumentation in order to expose
the problems it hides and the contradictions it tries to resolve. This kind of
textual analysis focuses on the fissures between explicit content and literary
embodiment. These fissures and discontinuities may be expressed in various
ways: rhetorical excesses and logical or conceptual antinomies; contradictions
in the structure of the argument or paradoxes that stem from it; the introduc-
tion of figurative language to conceal conceptual problems; gaps between the
rhetorical or metaphoric aspects of the text and its content; literary aporias;
and the silences of the textsilences that have their own phenomenology.
This study thus requires different methods of reading texts and of relating texts
to discourse and context. First, by straightforward readings of works written by
Erasmian humanists this study reconstructs the content of Erasmian humanism:
the body of knowledge produced by and the views and values of the discourse.
This type of reading also brings to the fore the not always explicit or even con-
scious premises and presuppositions of Erasmian discourse. Secondly, this study
examines these works as instruments in a struggle for intellectual hegemony, and
in an effort to construct the identity of the Erasmian humanist as a universal
10 Introduction
intellectual whose vocation is to reform Christendom. Finally, it reads the same
texts as bearers of symptoms of internal tensions of Erasmian discourse and
through close textual analysis tries to decipher these symptoms. All these meth-
ods of reading are historicistin the broadest sense of the term, as opposed
to formalistas they assume that the literary work is imbedded in its context,
or more accurately various contexts, rather than belonging to an enclosed and
self-sufficient realm of literature or art. In the past few decades a good many
theoretical reasons for this attitude were elaborated in practically every discipline
of the human sciences. At any rate, formalist reading of the literary products
of humanism in general and of Erasmian humanism in particular verges upon
anachronism as these works had explicit social, political and religious references.
The Erasmian texts were indeed written with clear reforming zeal.
12
Contextual reading, at least as applied by this study, does not mean how-
ever that the context is taken to be a fixed objective background against which
texts are examined. Any contextfrom the most local configuration to social
reality or culture as a wholeis contested not only because it is pervaded with
conflicts and ambiguities, but ultimately because it is inherently given to di-
verse significations. The context, any context, consists of meaningful entities:
human actions, social interactions and institutions and texts. This insight blurs
the distinction between textor other cultural product or any social fact or
action for that matterand context. The text pervades the context even as it is
pervaded by it; it is produced within a context, but at the same time it partici-
pates in reproducing, interrogating, challenging and subverting it.
13
While the reconstruction of Erasmian humanism in the first part of the
present study proves the discursive necessity of the Republic of Letters as an au-
tonomous humanist space, the close textual analysis offered in the second part
exposes the republics problematic status. In the latter part I therefore concen-
trate on a limited number of works, written in the decade or so after 1514, when
Erasmian humanism was at its height. Since I want to expose the tensions within
Erasmian humanism as such, I have intentionally chosen works that vary in
genre and subject matter; they include the important political works of Erasmus,
Institutio principis christiani (The Education of a Christian Prince), the pacifistic
writings, those on the temporal authority of the Church, the utopian colloquy
Convivium religiosum (The Godly Feast), and the two major works More pro-
duced during this period, The History of Richard III and Utopia. In each case, my
reading brings to the fore a disguised and repressed meaning that contradicts
fundamental aspects of Erasmian humanism and violates basic presuppositions
of humanist discourse. These gaps and contradictions in the writings of Erasmus
and More, I argue, reflect the structural inability of Erasmian humanists to con-
trol their own discourse and ultimately demonstrate their inability to legitimize
the identity of universal intellectuals implied by their discourse.
Introduction 11
The major political writings of Erasmus make a suitable point of departure
since in the domain of political thought (narrowly defined), political and
ideological pressures may be expected to be stronger, the boundaries of the
Republic of Letters most fragile and the tensions within Erasmian humanism
closest to the surface.
Erasmuss political writings certainly demonstrate the considerable au-
tonomy of Erasmian humanism and the reality of the Republic of Letters. The
Erasmus of these writings is the universal intellectual who stands apart from,
or rather above, any social estate or political establishment. Preaching to the
powerful from a position of unquestioned moral and intellectual authority,
Erasmus presents only the political views and opinions of the independent
humanist, sternly criticizing the dominant classes, their culture and their ideol-
ogy. Erasmus, however, is unable to formulate a coherent political conception.
In The Education of a Christian Prince he moves uneasily between contradic-
tory arguments: from political evangelism to the classical inheritance (reduced
to a disembodied and ahistorical collection of moralistic imperatives), from
an egalitarian ethos to the image of the absolutist and omnipotent prince and
so on. Whenever he tries to endow his assertions with something more than
moralistic pathos, that is, when he tries to give his discussion a theoretical
grounding, we watch him tumble outside of the humanist discourse. More
importantly, the political writings undermine the fundamental notions of
Erasmian humanism. In Christian Prince the humanist notion of liberal educa-
tionthe education worthy of a free manis ultimately replaced by process
of indoctrination and compared with the taming of wild beasts. By the same
token, the pacifist writings subvert the basic humanist distinction between the
studia humanitatis and scholastic studies, and conclude with a condemnation
of learning as such. Ultimately, these writings locate the origin of war, and by
extension all other social and moral evils, in civilization itself. With the rejec-
tion of learning and civilizationperhaps the two most important principles
of Erasmian humanismthe Erasmian reform program falls apart.
When he found himself unable to elaborate a coherent political program
Erasmus created a utopia run according to humanist ideals: the rural estate
of Eusebius depicted in the Convivium religiosum. The colloquy is Erasmuss
grand attempt to appropriate and refashion nature and culture alike into
a distinctively humanist social order, though one devoid of politics. The
dialogue further presents the fundamental principles of Erasmian humanism
with clarity and succinctness and brings them to life in the most beautiful
and harmonious fashion. There is, however, a cleavage between the Erasmian
program as presented in the dialogue and its realization in the rural estate.
While the program ought to be applied to all of Christendom, the Erasmian
philosophers who inhabit the rural estate can exist only in a garden segregated
12 Introduction
from the rest of humanity. An analysis of the real and the metaphorical bor-
ders between the humanist utopia and the outside world soon shows that the
two different worlds cannot but be suspicious and hostile toward each other;
indeed they are incommensurable. The existence of the humanist garden
therefore cannot be justified in humanist terms, and the rural estate is con-
sequently located in the twilight zone between the human and the divinea
no-place in humanist discourse.
In the concluding chapters of this study I analyze Thomas Mores key
works, The History of Richard III and Utopia. Since More was the most theo-
retically sophisticated thinker among the Erasmian humanists, his writings are
of crucial importance in the reconstruction of Erasmian humanism. For the
same reason, the internal tensions and contradictions inherent in Erasmian
humanism heavily pervade his writings. For my purpose, it is their common
difficulties, even more than their basic proximity, that unite the leader of the
Republic of Letters and its most imaginative citizen.
The History of Richard III is an unruly text that demonstrates the disruptive
potential of Mores works. It describes the murderous events that brought
Richard, Duke of Gloucester, to the English throne; it depicts its main protag-
onist as a diabolical figure, almost the personification of evil. Not surprisingly,
Richard III has traditionally been read as a moralistic work, a condemnation of
unnatural evil. As such it was often seen as an example, albeit an idiosyncratic
one, of the didactic and moralistic characteristics of humanist historiography.
This reading ignores, however, the ambiguities and irony so evident through-
out the work. The alternative reading I suggest sees Mores history as the
description of a typical political event and therefore as a portrait of political
reality as such. According to such a reading, Richard III is a picture of politics
in general as an irredeemably corrupt realm. This conclusion contradicts the
humanist ethical and political discourse (in all of its variants), which assumed
that a sound and moral political order could be established. Moreover Richard
III undermines the key humanist notion of rhetoric. Within the theoretical
framework that rhetoric provided for humanist discourse, human reality
was apprehended as inherently symbolic and human activity was defined as
an interpretive and performative activity. Richard III strips rhetoric of these
functions. At the level of the books plot, rhetoric functions as an instrument
of dissimulation and distraction. Richard III therefore questions the humanist
ethical and political discourse that sees rhetoric as a means to establishing a
moral and rational political order and as a privileged means for the expression
of mans humanitas. Furthermore, in Mores work rhetoric is ridiculed, bro-
ken down, displaced and taken out of context by every possible literary device.
Ultimately, Richard III undermines the notion of rhetoric as an instrument
of communication and interpretation, and with it the very ontological and
Introduction 13
epistemological basis of humanist discourse. This explains the uncontrollable
centrifugal forces that operate in the text, which at crucial moments threaten
to transform Richard III from an exemplum of humanist historiography into
something more like a parody of it.
The bleak picture of the political world in Richard III may partly explain the
radical remedies offered in Utopia. Any attempt to present a new interpreta-
tion of such a familiar text may seem presumptuous. And yet it seems to me
that reading Utopia, alongside other works by More and Erasmus, as both a
product of the Republic of Letters and a symptom of its profound contradic-
tions, may provide a fertile perspective.
Utopia is the most remarkable product of the Republic of Letterstypi-
cal and unique at the same time. Indeed, the invention of the utopian genre
must be understood as a product of the Republic of Letters, the vehicle par
excellence for constructing and presenting the ideas and ideals of the univer-
sal intellectual. Specifically, Utopia is apparently the embodiment of an ideal
Erasmian social order, the realization of the Erasmian reform program. It is
a stable republic, ruled by virtuous scholars, who enjoy a popular mandate,
rather than an aristocracy. As an Erasmian society, Utopia assigns the highest
value to learning, and has in fact abolished the distinction between the vita
activa and the vita contemplativa. Most importantly, Utopia exists to promote
the material welfare and moral improvement of its citizens, whose character
and behavior reflect the ideals of Erasmian humanism. A careful reading re-
veals however that there is no room for the studia humanitatis in Utopia: this
is the key to the structure of the Utopian social order and its contradictions.
The humanist disciplines cannot exist in Utopia, and not only because their
public functions have no place in a social order devoid of politics and his-
tory. These disciplines, inherently concerned with production and interpre-
tation of signs, do not have a place in Utopia because the ideal state strives
to eliminate the very possibility of a social activity based on interpretation.
Ultimately, the Utopian social order is based on the abolition of significa-
tion as such. It is therefore a reified social order, meaningless in the literal
sense of the term: Utopian social institutions and practices exist as objective
entities outside the symbolic order. In spite of the explicit position of the
text, the ontology of Utopia contradicts the fundamental humanist presup-
position that the social is inherently symbolic and that political institutions
and interactions are meaningful ones. The inevitable failure of the attempt to
eliminate signification generates the totalitarian dynamic that operates within
Utopian society.
For all their differences, the texts that I analyze share one structural simi-
larity: all demonstrate that the withdrawal from concrete social and political
reality necessarily undermines humanist discourse. I believe that this insight
14 Introduction
indicates the paradoxical situation of Erasmian humanism. Erasmian human-
ism implied the identity of the universal intellectual, but at the same time
this notion contradicted the basic presuppositions of humanism. In human-
ist discourse knowledge was embedded in and inextricably connected to the
social. Knowledge was essentially knowledge of contingent historical, social
and political human reality, and was oriented toward social and political
aims. It was necessarily produced by those who were part of society, that is,
by those who actively participated in creating, reproducing and transform-
ing the human world. The notion of the universal intellectual threatened to
undermine precisely these premises. The universal intellectual, the citizen of
the Erasmian Republic of Letters, was detached from active social forces and
concrete social happenings, and this detachment infringed on the humanist
ethical commitment to the vita activa. More importantly, the social existence
of the universal intellectual was ultimately an epistemological problem for
Erasmian humanism. It meant that the intellectual activity of the Erasmian
humanist was conducted and his knowledge was produced in a disembodied
intellectual sphere. But this sphere, this privileged point outside social reality,
was not, under the premises of humanist discourse, a location for production
of knowledge. The Erasmian Republic of Letters was literally utopian, a hu-
manist no-place. For this reason, notwithstanding the independence of Eras-
mian humanism from external constraints and pressures, More and Erasmus
ultimately failed to provide a coherent humanist account of political reality,
to elaborate a coherent humanist political theory or to visualize a coherent
humanist utopia.
I
THE ERASMIAN REPUBLIC OF LETTERS
17
R
EFERRING TO HIS MANY JOURNEYS, the unrelenting traveler Erasmus stated
that, To Italy alone, I have journeyed of my own free will (Ep 809:
14243). The image of the French soldieries carrying humanism (along with
syphilis) northward, returning from their kings disastrous Italian adventures
had lost its popularity. But Italythe country where the very walls are more
scholarly and articulate than human beings are with us (Ep 118: 45)is
still the point of departure for the understanding of humanism, including
the thought of Erasmus, More and their fellow northern humanists. Today
this assertion is almost universally accepted, but it is perhaps the only such
affirmation concerning humanism. The various interpretations of humanism
differ not only regarding the overall evaluation of the social and cultural sig-
nificance of humanism but also regarding the very definition of the term.
In the following pages, I will attempt to define humanist discourse
discourse and not thought, as humanism cannot be defined as a homoge-
neous body of knowledge or shared views. It can, however, be defined as
a distinct attitude toward the understanding and representation of human
reality, based on usually implicit ontological and epistemological presupposi-
tions. This definition of humanism, as form rather than content, provides a
firm theoretical basis for acknowledging the great variety of humanist intel-
lectual and literary activity without dissolving the term humanism altogether.
It can account for the fact that different humanists held contradictory views,
some utterly conventional and some highly original and innovative, on a
range of subjectsall still distinctively humanist. The definition of humanist
discourse as an attitude toward human reality also provides a firm basis for
1
Humanism as Form
18 Chapter 1
the understanding of humanism in its social and political contexts. The lack
of a uniquely humanist comprehensive body of knowledge, in particular the
lack of distinctively humanist political theory, explains how humanism could
adapt itself to varying social, political and cultural contexts.
Any attempt to provide a comprehensive reconstruction of humanist
discourse inevitably involves constant movement between historical, histo-
riographical and theoretical levels. A critical reading of the two most influ-
ential interpretations of humanism in the English-speaking world, those of
Paul Oskar Kristeller and Hans Baron, serves as the point of departure of my
analysis. In my discussion I analyze several key humanist endeavors, nota-
bly the debate with scholastic philosophy. Throughout my reconstruction I
highlight the theoretical stakes in any definition of humanism, which most
clearly surface when the alleged modernity, secularity and rhetorical nature
of humanist discourse are discussed.
Literature and Politics
In numerous works, the first of which were published in the forties, Kristeller
argued that employing the nineteenth-century vague notion of humanism
as almost any kind of concern with human valuesfor understanding
Renaissance humanism is anachronistic and misleading.
1
Instead, Kristeller
begins by determining the meanings of terms related to humanismthe
term itself was not used in the Renaissancefor the humanists themselves
and for their contemporaries. He showed that the term humanista emerged
in the Italian universities as student slang denoting umanistalike jurista,
artista, legistaa teacher or student of the studia humanitatis. The term stu-
dia humanitatis was used by Cicero and his contemporaries as a name for the
disciplines that had comprised Roman liberal education, and the humanists
began to use it in this sense at the end of the fourteenth century. In the first
half of the fifteenth century, the meaning of the term stabilized as the general
name for a specific group of disciplinesgrammar, rhetoric, poetry, history
and moral philosophywhich were studied according to the canonic classi-
cal texts.
2
Kristeller thus arrived at the often-quoted definition of humanism:
Thus Renaissance humanism was not as such a philosophical tendency or
system, but rather a cultural and educational programs which emphasized
and developed an important but limited area of studies. This area had for its
center a group of subjects that was concerned essentially neither with the clas-
sics nor with philosophy, but might be roughly described as literature.
3
This definition enabled the refutation of erroneous conceptions concern-
ing humanism and the Renaissance in general. Kristeller convincingly argued,
Humanism as Form 19
for instance, that Italian humanism did not arise as a result of an eventually
successful struggle with the dominant scholastic philosophy. In Italy, both
intellectual traditions emerged in the fourteenth century and kept their vi-
tality and their social importance throughout the Renaissance and beyond.
4

According to Kristeller, this observation amounts to much more than a cor-
rection of a historical inaccuracy. The fact that humanism and scholasticism
existed side by side indicates, he argued, that the noisy polemics between
them lacked real substance. Humanism could not, and actually never tried to,
replace scholasticism, since the fields of interest of the two intellectual cur-
rents barely converged. The humanists had little to offer in disciplines such as
metaphysics, natural philosophy and astronomy.
5
Kristeller and Jerrold Seigel, who followed him, also emphasized the con-
tinuity between the Renaissance humanists and their medieval predecessors.
The humanists were the direct successors of the medieval notaries, epistles
writers and rhetoricians from both professional and social perspectives. Like
those who engaged in the medieval ars notaria, ars dictaminis, and ars aren-
gandi, the humanists occupied various public positions in the administrations
of the cities, in the Roman curia and in the courts of princes. The main differ-
ence between the two groups, according to Kristeller and Seigel, was that the
humanists adopted the classical rhetorical model in their struggle to enhance
their prestige and social status.
6
Kristeller thus toppled humanism from its position as the philosophy
of the Renaissance and showed it to be one among several contemporary
intellectual currents in a wider cultural context. His interpretation, however,
has several theoretical insufficiencies that hinder full understanding of some
important aspects of humanism.
The limitations of Kristellers interpretation are most conspicuously re-
vealed in his evaluation of the broad cultural significance of humanism.
Kristeller focused almost exclusively on the humanists role as disseminators
of classical Greek and Latin literature.
7
Even in this context, he does not ex-
amine the significance of making the classical heritage a normative ideal, but
rather concentrates on the revival of specific classical ideas, texts and authors.
In the last analysis, humanism only obliquely contributed to future intellec-
tual and cultural transformation. In making this point in the last paragraph of
The Humanist Movementarguably the article most referred to by schol-
ars of humanismKristeller slips into odd terminology and imagery:
Since the entire range of Greek philosophy and scientific literature was made
[by the humanists] more completely available to the West than it had been in
the Middle Ages or in Roman antiquity, there was a large store of new ideas and
notions that had to be tried out and appropriated until its lesson was finally
20 Chapter 1
exhausted, and it is this process of intellectual fermentation which characterizes
the period and which accounts at least in part for the difference between Thomas
Aquinas and Descartes. For only after this process had been completed, did the
seventeenth-century philosophy make its new beginning on the basis of early
physical science. . . .
8
The contribution of the humanists to this development was indirect in a
double sense. First, the revived Greek intellectual heritage led to further de-
velopment only in a negative sense: its termination at a dead end enabled the
new beginning of the seventeenth century. Secondly, Kristeller goes out of his
way to emphasize that it was not the humanistsat least not the humanists
qua humanistswho actually tried out and exhausted the Greek heritage;
they only transmitted it.
9
The key distinction in the passage is, of course, between humanism on the
one hand, and philosophy and science on the other; between mere transmit-
ters of preexisting ideas and notions and those who invent their own. Behind
this comparison lies Kristellers fundamental theoretical premise, namely the
dichotomy between philosophy and rhetoric, or in Kristellers definition:
between the rhetorician who offers to speak and write about everything
and the philosopher who tries to think about everything.
10
Philosophy and
sciencefrom their Greek beginnings through their medieval re-elaboration
to their seventeenth-century modernityare the core of Western intellectual
tradition, indeed of Western civilization. Their development was essentially
internal (including fresh beginnings after running into dead ends); they were
influenced by other cultural movements only through the external contingen-
cies of cultural transmission (which played an important role in determining
the availability of texts). Kristeller, moreover, measures rhetoric against the
standards of philosophy. Since the humanists were rhetoricians, he argues,
they were necessarily dilettantes regarding serious thought: They often seem
to lack not only originality, but also coherence, method, and substance, and
if we try to sum up their arguments and conclusions, leaving aside citations,
examples, and commonplaces, literary ornaments, and digression, we are
frequently left with nearly empty hands.
11
Significantly, Kristellers text itself cannot ultimately sustain the dichotomy
between humanism and philosophy. Notwithstanding this dichotomy, he does
try to expose the pervasive influence of humanism on all aspects of Renaissance
culture and especially on its philosophical thought and the important philo-
sophical implications and consequences of humanism (which, he repeats, in
its substance was not philosophical but rather a broad cultural and literary
movement).
12
Unsurprisingly, given Kristellers assumptions, this search does
not fare well. Thus, Kristeller mentions that the more prominent humanists
adhered to Ciceros ideal of the combination of wisdom and eloquence, and
Humanism as Form 21
concludes that they were able to add genuine wisdom to their eloquence.
13

He fails, however, to give any conceptual account for this achievement. What
was the nature of the humanists genuine wisdom? Was it immanently re-
lated to their humanism or was it imported from the field of philosophy? And
what was the precise nature of the addition operation? Did it affect wisdom
or eloquence or was it only an external relationship? Several paragraphs later
Kristeller argues that many Renaissance scientists and philosophers were influ-
enced by the humanists clear style and literary form, which was not always
or entirely a mere external feature, but he again fails to explain the nature of
this influence.
14
Kristellers inability to conceptually account for what he sees
as important contributions of humanism as well as his hesitant language attest
to the insufficiency of his theoretical framework.
15
I shall return to this crucial point later. At this stage, it is important to
stress that in one important respect Kristeller is certainly right: many, perhaps
most, humanists do agree with his description. The literary and intellectual
production of many humanists was quite conventional and rhetorical in the
pejorative sense of the word. Any different reconstruction of humanismone
that highlights the original contributions of some outstanding humanists
must account for this phenomenon.
The roots of the second important interpretation of humanism go back to
the thirties. In his research, Hans Baron placed the originality and historical
importance of humanism in a subcurrent of the movement that he termed
civic humanism. According to Baron, civic humanism emerged in Florence
at the end of the fourteenth century and the beginning of the fifteenth century
as a fusion of the Petrarchean humanism of the trecento with the civic tradi-
tion of the medieval Italian communes.
16
The change began to take place at
the end of the fourteenth century with Filippo Villani and Coluccio Salutati
and reached maturity in the first decades of the next century with the intel-
lectual activity of Leonardo Bruni, Matteo Palmieri, Giannozzo Manetti, Leon
Battista Alberti and their colleagues.
17
In The Crisis of the Early Italian Renais-
sance, Baron explained the emergence of civic humanism as a consequence of
the struggle between republican Florence and Milan under the Visconti dy-
nasty.
18
This thesis was justifiably criticized, on both empirical and theoretical
grounds, as one-dimensional and reductive.
19
For our purpose, however, this
issue is of minor importance. Much more consequential is Barons under-
standing of civic humanist thought against the background of the hegemonic
intellectual and cultural tradition of the Middle Ages.
20
According to Baron, Petrarchean humanism was a nostalgic classicist liter-
ary movement steeped in medieval notions, most notably adhering to the
ideal of the vita contemplativa. As such, the humanism of the trecento tended
to fetishize the classical heritage and could, at best, slavishly imitate the
22 Chapter 1
original. The synthesis of civic values and classicism in civic humanist thought
gave birth to a new approach. The civic humanists employed classical notions,
texts, and genres as instruments for confronting issues and problems endemic
to their own society. Their imitation of classical literature was, consequently,
critical and creative. Not surprisingly, the civic humanists, in contrast to other
humanists, developed a positive view of contemporary vernacular literature
and culture.
21
The new stance of the civic humanists regarding the classical heritage was
immanently connected to what Baron sees as comprehensive revolution in
their attitude toward human activity and social reality. An example in point
is the understanding of economic activity by civic humanism. Although
medieval intellectual traditions held diverse views on the subject, it would
be accurate to say that practically all of them looked, at the very least, with
suspicion on the pursuit of worldly goods. Furthermore, as Baron shows, in
trecento Italy, the view of economic activity, accepted by most humanists of
the period, was dominated by the attitude of the extreme wing of the Fran-
ciscan order and Stoic philosophy which regarded worldly riches with utter
contempt.
22
Against this background, the affirmation of economic activity by
the civic humanists takes on its full revolutionary significance. Initially, some
humanists, notably the Venetian Francesco Barbaro, employed pragmatic
reasoning, arguing that ownership of property is essential for mans familial
and social position.
23
Later, Bruni, who translated the pseudo-Aristotelian
Economics in 14201421, laid the philosophical groundwork for the affirma-
tion of the value of economic activity, by arguing that ownership of property
is a condition for the realization of mans humanity and his commitment
to society.
24
A similar revolutionary change characterized the attitude of the
civic humanists toward marriage and family life. In contrast to the medieval
ideals of the monk and the stoic sage, the humanists celebrated family life as
an immanent and essential part of human life.
25
Leon Battista Albertis Della
famiglia completed the shift of values, consolidating the humanist views con-
cerning both economic activity and family life.
26
These two new conceptions, the affirmation of the value of economic activ-
ity and of marriage and the family, Baron relates to the general civic human-
ists challenge to traditional ideals and values, most conspicuously manifested
in the rejection of the distinction between the vita contemplativa and the vita
activa. This distinction, and the precedence given to a life of contemplation
and prayer, based as it was on Christian as well as classical conceptions, was
central to medieval high culture. Petrarchs and even Salutatis ambivalence
regarding the vita activa, which stood in contrast to their unequivocal rejec-
tion of other common medieval ideas, demonstrates how entrenched this
attitude was. Again, the civic humanists of the quattrocento were those who,
Humanism as Form 23
by the assimilation of Cicero and Aristotle, succeeded in elaborating a theory,
which fused intellectual activity with the vita activa and unconditionally af-
firmed the vivere civile, that is, mans civic and political life. The basis of this
view lay in the notion of a human being, or rather of a free man, as a political
animal who can fully realize his humanitas only by means of activity in the
political body.
27
Baron further maintains that the civic humanists created the modern disci-
pline of history and, in fact, modern historical consciousness. Leonardo Brunis
path-breaking History of the Florentine People demonstrates a critical sensibility
as it demolishes the fabulous medieval historical tales and realistically evaluates
historical events.
28
In Barons analysis, beyond these characteristics lies the fun-
damental modern dimension of humanist historical thought: the refusal to sub-
ordinate history to theology and the consequent perception and representation
of the past in secular categories. This analysis made it possible to weave discrete
historical facts into a coherent narrative and link historical events by postulating
causal relationships between them. History was born as an organic concept, and
notions of historical distance and anachronism emerged.
29
Baron and those who sharpened his insights and developed his conceptual-
izations argue that these humanist attitudes and valueshistorical conscious-
ness, the affirmation of the vivere civile, and the nonfetishistic attitude toward
the classical heritagewere based on distinct presuppositions. The originality
and modernity of humanist discourse lay in its nonmetaphysical nature. It
understood and represented human reality by concrete, historical and prag-
matic categories. It thus rejected the perception of social and political reality as
being part of, or reflecting, a transcendentmetaphysical and divineorder of
things. Rather, humanist discourse assumed, though often only implicitly, that
human reality is a historical and contingent product of human actions, inten-
tions and desires.
30
The affirmation of the vivere civile makes sense under the
assumptions that political reality is changeable and that fashioning it is an activ-
ity worthy of man. If reality is perceived as essentially static, then the worthiest
human activity would be understanding and contemplating it, as was indeed
the assumption that lay behind the traditionalclassical and medievalsupe-
riority attributed to the vita contemplativa over the vita activa.
31
And the same
assumption may easily generate historical consciousness, that is, the perception
that there are essential differences between the past and the present.
32
By now we can also accurately account for humanisms secular character.
The once prevailing notion of the humanists as antireligious and of human-
ism as a revival of paganism is today rightly defunct. Numerous works have
demonstrated not only the sincere religiosity of most humanists, but also
great contributions of some of them to religious and theological thought.
33

Humanism was certainly not secular, if we use the term to mean atheistic or
24 Chapter 1
religiously indifferent. It can be seen as secular and as a secularizing phenom-
enon in the sense that it denied the subordination of disciplines and fields
of inquiry to religion. This is true to the humanist intellectual activity in the
areas we discussed above: economy, family life and history. Writing on these
issues the humanists used secular terms and categories rather than religious
ones. These fields of inquiry eventually obtained autonomous status, as they
acquired their own vocabulary, internal rules and discursive practices. This
was equally true of humanist political discourse. As already mentioned, the
humanists held different views and propagated diverse political theories.
These differences notwithstanding, the humanist political language was
secular in the sense defined above: it analyzed and represented politics in
nonreligious categories and thus assumed the autonomy of the political realm
vis--vis theology.
34
The change in artistic practices and, more importantly,
the emergence of the very conception of art during the Renaissance reveals the
same process. The secularization of Renaissance art was not primarily due to
the large number of nonreligious representations, nor to greater consumption
of art and patronage of artists by laymen in comparison to previous centuries.
Art was secularized in the Renaissance, because in this period it became a
distinct discipline with its own autonomous technical and aesthetic rules and
conventions, and later with its own sense of internal history.
35
Rhetoric: Literature as Politics
Their contradictory views notwithstanding, Kristeller and Baron agree on one
point. The former defines humanism as a literary and rhetorical movement,
and consequently denies its philosophical importance, reducing its cultural
and social significance. The latter does not deny that the humanists attrib-
uted great importance to rhetoric, but rejects the claim that civic humanism
was only a rhetorical and philological movement and states that he wants
to expose another facet of humanist thought.
36
A devaluation of rhetoric is
therefore the common denominator between the two central interpretations
of Italian humanism.
37
This agreement is not surprising, considering the theoretical approaches
that dominated the humanities when Baron and Kristeller elaborated their
interpretations. Since then the intellectual climate has changed. Most impor-
tantly, the theoretical insights of the linguistic turn in the human sciences
has enabled better understanding of the rhetorical and literary aspects of
humanist thought.
38
Perhaps the most convenient way to employ these insights is to approach
humanism through an analysis of its debate with scholastic philosophy. This
Humanism as Form 25
is true not only because scholasticism was a distinctively philosophical,
as opposed to rhetorical, manner of thought, but above all, because the
controversy with the scholastics played a major role in the construction of
the self-image of humanism as a cultural movement, and because it forced
some humanists to sharpen their arguments and to expose the presupposi-
tions of their discourse. Of course, we cannot regard scholastic philosophy
as a homogeneous discourse. It was riddled with internal divisions, notably
the famous controversy between the realists and the nominalists, concerning
the existence of universals. This, however, should not hinder a comparison
between humanism and scholasticism, first, because the humanists elaborated
their views against what they saw as the common characteristics of scholastic
philosophy. As far as the reconstruction of humanist thought is concerned,
the question of whether they were right or wrong is less consequential. Second
and more importantly, the great variety in scholastic philosophy notwith-
standing, we can identify some basic presuppositions shared by most currents
within this movement. Humanism assailed precisely these presuppositions.
It challenged not only the scholastic organization of knowledge, but also the
notion of Aristotelian science and indeed the perception of reality accepted in
mainstream Western philosophical tradition since Plato.
39
One of the fundamental assumptions of mainstream Western philosophy
was that behind phenomenal reality there was an intelligible and unchange-
able substance. Knowledge, consequently, was defined as knowledge of uni-
versal, eternal and logically valid truths. Perhaps the most distinct expression
of this assumption within medieval scholasticism was the universally accepted
assumptionontological and epistemological alikethat there was a corre-
spondence between the structure of reality, the structure of consciousness and
the structure of languagebetween the modi essendi, the modi intelligendi,
and the modi significandi in scholastic terminology.
40
This assumption was
implied by the definition as well as the scope of scholastic logic or dialec-
tic,
41
the discipline that provided the basis for the scholastic organization of
knowledge. In the words of Peter of Spain, the future Pope John XXI, at the
beginning of his Summulae logicales the most important textbook in me-
dieval universitiesdialectic was defined as the art of arts and the science
of sciences, possessing the way to the principles of all curriculum subjects.
42

Logic was the central, sometimes practically the only, discipline studied in the
medieval art faculties.
43
The meaning of the term logic in the Middle Ages was
much broader than its modern meaning; it included many subjects that today
belong to metaphysics, epistemology, philosophy of language, semantics and
linguistics. Aristotelian logic itself dealt, of course, with inferences of valid
conclusionsthat is, syllogismsbut it also provided the basis of Aristotelian
science in a much broader sense. It sought to provide the basic categories of
26 Chapter 1
objective reality and for understanding it, implying precisely the correspon-
dence between them.
44
Scholastic dialectic, known also as terminist logic,
went far beyond the Aristotelian logic. The main field of inquiry of medieval
logic, known as proprietates terminorum, illustrates the basic motivations
and preoccupations of scholastic philosophy. Within this field, the scholastic
philosophers tried to account for the equivocality of words due to different
meanings in different semantic contexts (such as the different meanings of
the word man in the sentences: Man runs, Man is a rational animal and
Man is a noun). This effort reflects the attempt to cancel the pragmatic and
contingent dimensions of language and consciousness, and to prove the exis-
tence of full correspondence between them and objective reality, consisting,
it was believed, of distinct universal entities.
45
The principles of scholastic grammar reflect the same motivations and per-
suasions. It is sufficient to quote the words of Gerhard Ztphen, the author
of a popular commentary on the Doctrinele of Alexander Villedieu: Who was
the first inventor of grammar? The first inventor of positive grammar was
a metaphysician and natural philosopher, because considering the diverse
properties, nature and modes of being of things, he imposed on these things
diverse names.
46
The concept of language as a nomenclature, as implied here,
is the traditional concept of Western philosophy. Ztphens words illustrate
how consistent and extreme were the scholastics in pursuing this concept.
Subordinating grammar directly to metaphysics and natural philosophy is
yet another indication of the scholastic denial of the very intelligibility of
the particular and the contingent. Indeed, the explicit aim of the speculative
scholastic grammarians, the modistae, was to find the universal structure of
language as such, beyond what was understood to be the superficial differ-
ences between natural languages.
47
Humanist discourse rejected these assumptions, but as most humanists
were not inclined toward, and lacked the talent for, abstract theoretical dis-
cussions, the presuppositions of humanist discourse were usually not stated
explicitly. Thomas Mores polemical letter to Martin Dorp is one of few
exceptions. It is one of the most profound and reflective attempts to epis-
temologically ground humanist discourse (MtD). More belongs therefore
to a small group of humanistsLorenzo Valla, Rudolf Agricola, Juan Luis
Vives, Petrus Ramus and Marius Nizolius are other prominent nameswho
did try to offer a comprehensive substitute for the scholastic organization of
knowledge. In the next chapter, I will discuss the context of this writing and
the other three humanist letters of More (MtL; MtM; MtO). It is worth
mentioning at this stage, however, that the impressive letter was written in the
context of a concrete polemic. Moreover, as the letter achieved its purposeit
put an end to Dorps attack on Erasmusit was never published by More.
Humanism as Form 27
These facts exemplify the general attitude of the humanists toward abstract
discussions: even a thinker with the reflective ability of More embarked on a
theoretical discussion only out of necessity.
In the letter More fiercely attacks scholastic philosophy.
48
He cites sev-
eral examples of common logical discussions from scholastic literature, for
instance, the dialecticians attempt to distinguish the different meanings of
the two sentences Vinum bibi bis (Wine I drank twice) and Bibi bis vinum
(I drank twice wine), or their attempt to discern the truth-conditions of the
statement Meritrix erit virgo (The whore will be a virgin).
49
According to More
these discussions are patently senseless, monstrous absurdities (27), and
as such they attest to the inanity of scholastic dialectics as a whole. Indeed,
scholastic dialectic is not dialectic at all: neither Antichrist nor the final day
of judgment itself could upset natures order as thoroughly as this dialectic
(33). In passing, More also attacks scholastic grammar and he significantly
discards precisely what the modistae saw as the great virtue of their enterprise.
Referring to a treatise by a certain Albert, More contemptuously complains
that the author, who professed to write a grammatical work, has presented
us instead with some sort of logic or metaphysics, or rather with out-and-out
drivel and nonsense (27).
Mores sarcasm and scorn echo more than 150 years of bitter humanist
polemics against scholasticism. But even this aspect of Mores text is more
theoretically oriented than the great majority of similar humanist works.
More does not dwell, for example, on the traditional humanist theme of the
barbarous scholastic Latin. Instead, he concentrates on what he sees as the
fundamental intellectual failures of scholastic logic, notably its solipsistic ten-
dency and its detachment from common experience and concrete reality:
I wonder, by Jove, how these petty adepts ever reached the conclusion that those
propositions should be understood in a way that no one on earth but themselves
understands them. Those words are not technical terms on which these men can
claim monopoly, as it were, so that anyone wishing to use them must go and ask
them for a loan. Such expressions are actually common language, though these
men do return some of them in a worse state than they were in when they were
appropriated from ordinary craftsmen. They have borrowed their words from
the public domain; they abuse public property. (35)
As dialectic formed the basis of scholastic enterprise, its rejection or de-
valuation by humanism had far-reaching implications concerning the orga-
nization of knowledge. In fact, it affected the very definition of knowledge.
Walter Ong succinctly describes the consequences of this assault: In terms
of the established pattern, humanism forced a crisis by proposing a program
which in effect challenged the primacy of dialectic and, in so doing, impugned
28 Chapter 1
the whole curricular organization and the teaching profession as such, and
thereby threatened the intelligibility of the whole universe.
50
The attempt to elaborate a humanist dialectic to substitute for scholastic
logic was one of the central aims of the theoretical humanist efforts from Valla
to Ramus and beyond.
51
While scholastic dialectic believed itself to be operat-
ing in the realm of eternal truths, the humanists sought to construct a system
of rules for deliberation and persuasion in the realm of probable truths and
opinions. A would-be humanist dialectic consequently placed less emphasis
on the faculty of abstract reasoning and more on the prudential and delibera-
tive faculties for dealing with concrete situations and specific circumstances.
As the realm of opinions and probable truths is not easily given to systematic
treatment, the humanist enterprise turned out to be most complicated. In
fact, the humanists never succeeded in elaborating a comprehensive substi-
tution for scholastic dialectics, and most of them remained to a large extent
within the boundaries of the Aristotelian logic.
52
Mores understanding of the issues at stake was sharper than that of most
other humanists, and more conducive to the elaboration of the basis of hu-
manist discourse. He avoids altogether the attempt to construct a comprehen-
sive humanist dialectic. Instead, he simply restricts the scope and significance
of the discipline. At the beginning of his discussion, he calmly states that
even a typical illiterate of average intelligence can master dialectic (17). He
repeatedly argues that dialectic is only an instrument of learning, verging on
a modern understanding of logic as a tool for deriving valid conclusions from
accepted assumptions: In dialectic . . . I should have thought it sufficient to
master the nature of words, the force of propositions, and the forms of syllo-
gisms, and at once to apply dialectic as a tool to the other branches of learning
(25). This is a radical assertion, since it undermines not only specific scholastic
assertions, but is also close to challenging the very Aristotelian concept of sci-
ence. As a precondition for its attempt to arrive at an adequate description of
objective reality, Aristotelian science needed access to the basic categories of
objective reality, and dialectic was believed to provide exactly these categories.
Mores argumentation leads to the emptying of dialectic of its substance: just
as dialectic elicits various species and numerous patterns of arguments from
the nature of things once it is known, even so when the things themselves
remain a mystery dialectic necessarily falls silent, of no use at all (73). More
denies, in other words, that dialectics can tell us something about reality, and
he thus demolishes the ontological and epistemological foundation of sci-
encescientiaas the term was understood from Aristotle onward.
The greatest importance of Mores letter lies, however, in its attempt to
provide a theoretical basis for a humanist organization of knowledge. In this
attempt, More gives the primacy to grammar. He follows here the main thrust
Humanism as Form 29
of the traditional humanist approach, which emphasized the importance of the
disciplines of signs, grammar and rhetoric, over those of things, natural
philosophy and metaphysics, or at least balanced the scholastic stress of the
latter. Nizolius, for example, stated that philosophy and rhetoric are not two
separate faculties but one composed of words and things just as living beings
are composed of body and soul.
53
Valla went further and tried to develop what
might be termed a linguistic dialectic by substituting three categories that
correspond to the basic linguistic categoriesnoun, verb and adjectivefor
the ten Aristotelian categories. Emphasizing actual linguistic usage as the basis
of reasoning, he could therefore have declared that sometimes even housewives
understand the meaning of words better than the great philosophers, since they
use them for a concrete purpose and not as a game.
54
The humanists, as Vallas words indicate, attributed great importance to
the pragmatic and contingent aspects of language. Their idealization of the
classical world and literature, however, often brought them to decree the
Latin of the canonical authors as the universal standard for correct language.
They thus clouded their theoretical linguistic insights with cultural mystifica-
tion. More would have none of this. He clearly and succinctly defines gram-
mar as a strictly empirical discipline, that is, a discipline that seeks to describe
the linguistic usage of a community of speakers: Grammar teaches the right
way to speak, and yet it invents no laws of speech in defiance of custom; in-
stead, it simply sees which constructions appear the most often in speech and
points these out to those who are unschooled in speech so that their speech
will not flout common usage (35). This definition is diametrically opposed
to the scholastic conception of a universal grammar. It sees language as a
contingent entity determined by the circumstances of a specific community,
or to use modern terminology, it sees language as determined by its historical,
cultural and social context.
According to More, grammar forms the basis for the organization of knowl-
edge, and hence any knowledge would have the same characteristics: it would be
bound to and imbedded in specific historical and social circumstances. Knowl-
edge would be knowledge of contingent human reality. Indeed, the reality to
which humanist knowledge is applied becomes, by definition, a human artifact
constructed by human motivations, desires and actions. Moreover, Mores
empirical definition of grammar implicitly denies the traditional concept of
language as nomenclature that reflects objective reality. The meaning of linguis-
tic terms, as implied by Mores notion of grammar, is not determined by their
correspondence to extralinguistic entities, but is insteadat least in partthe
product of language as a system of rules and conventions. This understanding
of language implies a different ontology from that assumed by scholastic philos-
ophy and mainstream Western philosophical thought in general. It denies the
30 Chapter 1
existence of an ontological gap between the linguistic and the real. Humanist
discourse thus perceived human reality as inherently symbolic, and the entities
that comprised itsocial institutions and interactions, political and historical
events and so onas meaningful entities.
These ontological presuppositions were not explicitly stated by More, or
any other humanist for that matter, but were implied by his conceptions of
dialectics and grammar. Their epistemological counterparts were, in contrast,
much more elaborated. They are most forcefully presented when More gives
the definition of the ideal grammarian. Answering Dorps pejorative label-
ing of Erasmus as only a grammarian, as opposed to a metaphysician or a
theologian, More says:
grammarian means precisely the same thing as man of letters [litteratus],
whose area of study extends across every variety of literature [omnes litterarum
species], that is, every discipline. For this reason, though anyone who has studied
dialectic may be called a dialectician, anyone who has studied arithmetic may be
called an arithmetician, and so on in the rest of the arts, no one, in my opinion
at least, may be styled a man of letters who has not pored through each and every
one of the sciences. (13)
Notwithstanding the use of the term science (scientia) and the nomination of
dialectic and arithmetic, the meaning of the passage is clear enough. The pro-
ducer and transmitter of knowledge is not the dialectician or metaphysician,
who seeks to know objective reality outside the symbolic realm, but rather
the litteratus, the person who masters every variety of literature, that is, the
literary heritage. Knowledge is essentially literary and interpretive. It is essen-
tially bounded by and imbedded in social reality in its origin and epistemo-
logical status, as well as in its orientation and purpose. The litteratusas the
term itself suggestsis essentially a producer and interpreter of meanings.
55
This understanding of knowledge and intellectual activity undermines
the distinction between the intellectual and the ordinary social subject.
A social distinction could, of course, be constructed, and the tendency to-
ward philological and literary specialization certainly characterized many
versions of humanism. We must not, however, confuse a social distinction
with an epistemological one. For the corollary of the perception of reality as
inherently symbolic is the definition of social activityjust like intellectual
activityas essentially involved with the interpretation and production of
meanings. Epistemologically, intellectual activity became a specific kind
of social activity. Ultimately, this insight lay behind the insistence of the
humanists that valid knowledge was practical and their affirmation of the
vivere civile. It also provided the justification of the humanists pursuance
of public careers.
Humanism as Form 31
Mores depiction of Erasmus, the ideal litteratus, clearly illustrates his
notion of intellectual activity. Throughout the letter to Dorp and the other
three humanist letters, More repeatedly emphasizes that Erasmuss aim is
not the acquisition of knowledge for its own sake, but rather the use of his
intellectual expertise for the reform of Christendom. Only in this context
does the erudition of Erasmus acquire its importance, indeed its meaning.
Erasmus, says More, is the man whom all Christendom cherishes, because
his unceasing exertions have done more to advance all students of sound
intellectual disciplines everywhere in both secular and sacred learning than
virtually anyone elses exertions for the last several centuries; he is the man
whom no material expense and no physical illness or danger could tear from
the virtuous labors which he was performing for the good of the entire world
(MtL 161, 167).
The Diversity of Humanism
Taking rhetoric seriously thus provides the key for uncovering the presuppo-
sitions of humanist discourse. It constitutes the basis for reconstructing this
discourse as a way of understanding reality rather than as a body of knowl-
edge or a set of shared views. This reconstruction, in turn, makes it possible
to give a theoretical account of the various possibilities that were inherent
in humanism. The realization of these possibilities depends on specific cir-
cumstances and particularly on the different cultural and political contexts
in which humanism flourished. The rest of the book is dedicated to a close
examination of one specific group of humanists in its distinct, and very pe-
culiar, context. I would like to begin, however, with a preliminary discussion,
designed to highlight some of the possibilities that were latent in humanist
discourse, particularly those that have direct bearing on the interpretations
already discussed above.
Barons analysis of the novel aspects of humanismthe affirmation of the
vivere civile, the nonfetishistic attitude toward the classical heritage, and the
emergence of historical consciousnessis by no means indifferent to the
rhetorical character of humanism. When seen as manifesting the premises of
humanist discourse, rhetoric grounds and unifies the intellectual contribu-
tions and innovations made by the humanists, for the rhetorical nature of
humanism meant that humanist discourse perceived human reality as an
inherently symbolic human artifact. Rhetoric thus undermines the notion of
human reality as a reflection of a metaphysical and divine order of things. It
provides, in other words, the theoretical basis for the antimetaphysical nature
of humanist discourse.
32 Chapter 1
This perspective allows us to more fully account for humanisms originality
and modernity. Humanisms refusal to subordinate human reality to a tran-
scendent order of Being brought about a break with high medieval intellectual
culture, indeed with mainstream Western intellectual tradition. Humanism
rejected the assumptions of a culture that positioned the universal above the
particular, the eternal above the temporal, the abstract above the concrete,
the transcendent above the worldly, and the contemplative above the active.
It elaborated a new theoretical language that could account for the temporal-
ity, contingency and mutability of the social and political order. It was able to
perceive the essential dissimilaritiesthe historical distancebetween differ-
ent periods of human endeavor. In employing this language, the humanists
were also able to affirm the power of human activity to transform reality. It
is not surprising therefore that humanism produced highly original thinkers.
Figures such as Petrarch, Salutati, Bruni, Valla, Lefvre dEtaples, Erasmus
and More elaborated original, and sometimes radical, ideas concerning intel-
lectual, religious and cultural issues.
More specifically, and crucial to Barons interpretation, is how humanist
discourse potentially posed a challenge to prevailing political values and social
visions. Medieval high culture perceived the social order as essentially hier-
archical, a hierarchy that reflected the order of Being. As such, human beings
were seen to be inherently unequal. Whats more, all human beings, including
the most powerful, were ultimately subordinated to an objective, unalterable
order of things. All men and women were ultimately subjects and not citizens.
Humanism undermined this vision. It thus presented a potential threat to the
social and political values that were derived from traditional thought. In other
words, humanism could theoretically view men as free citizens taking equal
part in fashioning the body politic and determining its course. The notions of
liberty and equality are consequently inscribed, if not always actually realized,
in the humanist discourse in a way that medieval thought and imagination
could never have done.
56
Such political potential was realized in the republican language of civic
humanism, as reconstructed by Baron and those who followed him.
57
Such
potential was also realized in humanist thought about education. This is
especially important since the humanists gained control over and reshaped
nonuniversity education in Italy during the fifteenth century and in north-
ern Europe during the following century.
58
The humanists believed that the
principal aim of education was not the acquisition of professional skills or of
knowledge for its own sake but, rather, the fashioning of a moral person and
a responsible and active citizen. As a consequence, the humanists who wrote
on education always insisted that liberal education was crucially important
for the vivere civile.
59
Pier Paolo Vergerio, for instance, draws a distinction be-
Humanism as Form 33
tween liberal education as the only education worthy of a free manindeed,
the only education that makes a man freeand the professional disciplines,
such as medicine, which are not suitable for the noble mind.
60
Most impor-
tantly for this discussion, humanist thought regarding education rested on
egalitarian assumptions. Liberal education was open, in principle, to everyone
as a universal means to acquire virtue. Vergerio, again: Everyone acquires for
himself the liberal arts and virtue itself, and these are the most desirable things
a person can seek. For wealth, glory, pleasuresthese are transitory and fleet-
ing. Character, however, and the fruits of the virtues endure undiminished
and last forever.
61
The humanists repeatedly explained that true nobility
did not depend on lineage or wealth but solely on an individuals virtue, that
is, his character and personality.
62
A humanist education was thus explicitly
made a means of social mobility.
63
When this egalitarian possibility within humanism is examined in its con-
crete contexts, however, a more complicated picture emerges. As Lauro Mar-
tines and John Najemy demonstrate, the republicanism of the civic human-
ists constituted the political ideology of the Florentine oligarchy, which was
busy consolidating its hold on power at the beginning of the quattrocento. In
creating the appearance of widespread political participation, republicanism
actually disguised the true nature of the Florentine oligarchic regime, making
it possible to attract the support of important segments of the public. Repub-
licanism, it turns out, was the ideological instrument in the defeat of tradi-
tional Florentine populism.
64
A critical examination of the actual social role
of humanist education may provoke similar conclusions. In their iconoclastic
study, From Humanism to the Humanities, Anthony Grafton and Lisa Jardine
argue that the humanist insistence on Ciceronian Latin and on a thoroughgo-
ing knowledge of the canonand, more generally, the normative status that
the humanists assigned to texts written in a foreign language and produced
by cultures different from their owngenerated an ideological mystifica-
tion. The egalitarian rhetoric of liberal education disguised the fact that this
education functioned as an instrument of social differentiation, distinguish-
ing between those who spoke the correct language and read the right
literature and those who did not. Liberal education became a status symbol
and a precondition for lucrative administrative employment and prestigious
positions at the courts. And since only the upper classes could usually afford
the great cost of such education, they were the ones who enjoyed its social,
economic and symbolic benefits.
65
In these contexts humanist discourse functioned, at least in part, as ideol-
ogy; it legitimized social inequalities and hierarchies by veiling them. It must
be emphasized that it is a distinctively modern form of legitimation, to be
contrasted to premodern discourses that, regardless of the various differences
34 Chapter 1
between them, generated legitimacy by presenting and celebrating existing
power relations. This difference can be easily accounted for. Premodern
discourses explicated and legitimized power relationspolitical and social
hierarchiesby anchoring them in an objective, that is, a natural, cosmic
or divine hierarchic order of things. The replacement of this vision with the
perception of political reality as a human artifact was a precondition for the
development of notions of liberty and equality. But when these notions actu-
ally came to prevail, the nature of the legitimizing discourse was necessarily
transformed. And in this case social and political inequalities needed to be
disguised. Even those humanist theories that did realize the liberating po-
tential of humanist discourse were therefore often caught in the distinctively
modern dialectic of liberation and domination.
66
In any event, by no means did all humanists actually realize the liberating
potential inherent in humanist discourse. The intellectual activity of many
humanists never extended beyond a technical preoccupation with the hu-
manist disciplines and routine educational and administrative occupations.
The professional, social and political pressures felt by the humanists often
strengthened these tendencies. Many humanists became the docile servants of
powerful patrons. An examination of the literary production and social posi-
tions of these humanists, clearly the majority of the humanists, provides the
basis of the interpretations of Kristeller and of Grafton and Jardine.
Moreover, the humanist enchantment with words and the manner of ex-
pression may easily lead to an emphasis on form at the expense of content and
to an immersion in stylistic and formalized literary enterprises, as emergence
of historical consciousness could lead to antiquarianism. Perhaps the most
distinct manifestation of this potential was the sixteenth-century court litera-
ture, of which Castigliones immensely popular book, Il libro del Cortigiano,
is the best example.
67
The courtly writings were, of course, closely related to
political absolutism. In contrast to the civic ideals of the quattrocento hu-
manists, the books for courtiers were obviously centered at court, revolving
as it did around the figure of the absolute prince and developing a fetishistic
attitude toward courtly manners and etiquette. The virtuoso replaced the
virtuous citizen as the human ideal.
68
My understanding of humanism as form rather than content therefore
accounts for its many faces. Its multifaceted nature also serves as the start-
ing point for examining the social position and social role of humanism. As
humanism was itself devoid of any intrinsic content, and particularly of any
intrinsic political views, humanists could consequently adapt themselves to
various political and social contexts. Furthermore, we have observed that
humanist discourse assumed that knowledge was socially embedded and
pragmatically oriented. The humanists actual intellectual activities thus
Humanism as Form 35
legitimately belonged to their specific milieus, traditions, interests and ide-
ologies. Such a notion of knowledge also constituted the theoretical basis for
the vita activa, which in turn served to legitimate the humanists pursuits of
public careers.
This reconstruction of humanist discourse makes it therefore easy to un-
derstand why so many humanists aspired to some sort of public career (which
offered, of course, other economic and social rewards). It also accounts for
humanisms success in establishing itself in practically every political and
cultural context in fifteenth-century Italy and sixteenth-century northern
Europe. It further explains why most humanists were associated with the rul-
ing establishment and the dominant classes. This association is particularly
evident when we note that humanist political thought served a specific polity,
and that the humanists political writings propagated the dominant ideology.
The historical scholarship of the past several decades, which has examined the
various centers of humanism within their distinct contexts, has clearly shown
that in this respect there was no difference between humanists in republican
Florence, aristocratic Venice, monarchic Naples, theocratic Rome or princely
Milan, to name just some of the important centers in Italy.
69
38 Chapter 2
professional opportunities traditionally open to humanists and his general
reflections on the social place of the humanist vis--vis the powerful.
The System of Patronage
Because of its crucial importance for the social position of the humanists
(and of literati and artists in general) in early modern Europe, our analysis
begins with the system of patronage. Since it was usually not conceptualized
by contemporaries, the significance of patronage has only recently been ac-
knowledged. In fact, patronage was a structural characteristic of life in early
modern Europe. It was a central sociological feature of the emerging absolut-
ist monarchies that replaced the feudal order in northern Europe and of the
Italian city-states.
1
From one perspective (an admittedly anachronistic one),
the system of patronage can be understood as a substitute for the lack of a
modern bureaucracy. Lacking a system of offices financed by the state budget,
the government of the early modern state relied on the members of political
classes for effective rule. The monarch had to reward the latter by various
means: through handouts of money or land, endowment of status symbols,
allotment of economic monopolies, the authorization of various economic
activities and the nomination to lucrative offices. Moreover, holders of of-
fices used their position to derive a private income, doing so by collecting
payments or presents from those in need of their services.
2
To complete the
picture, it should be emphasized that this same system was replicated farther
down the social structure as powerful nobles and churchmen maintained
their own large households and supported their clients by similar means.
3
According to Trevor-Roper, the patronage system was structurally flawed,
because it tended to put an ever-growing burden on the productive classes of
society. In the long term it was the cause of the general crisis of the seven-
teenth century.
4
Contemporaries, however, were not in a position to notice
such defects. For the members of the political classes and their clients, the
patronage system was an aspect of the normal social order. It shaped their
professional relations and their social behavior, as well as their image of so-
ciety. The social intercourse that rested on patronage was intensely personal,
anxious and insecure. It was characterized by incessant efforts to win and keep
patrons and by relentless struggles between peers over positions, favors and
status symbols.
5
The social status and professional identity of Renaissance literati and artists
were also determined by the patronage system. This meant that the livelihoods
of many humanists as well as their social position and public careers depended
on finding and developing their relations with patrons. To a great extent, the
The Construction of the Erasmian Republic of Letters 39
humanists were economically and socially dependent on an unmediated rela-
tionship with the powerful. In this respect there was a clear difference between
the humanists and the scholastic philosophers, whose professional identity was
based on a specific institution, namely the medieval university.
6
England at the beginning of the reign of Henry VIII serves as a typical
example of the kind of relations that existed between humanists and their
powerful patrons. Henry VII, despite his reputation as a narrow-minded
miser, was a generous patron of artists and literati.
7
But both he and his court
adhered to the Burgundian literary and artistic tradition, which meant that
humanists found meager support under his reign. The one notable exception
to this rule attests to Englands lag behind the new intellectual fashion. The
Italian humanist Polydore Vergil was hired by the king to write the first hu-
manist history of England with the aim of internationally strengthening the
insecure legitimacy of the new regime.
8
By contrast, Henry VIIs son, Prince Henry, was known for his taste for good
learning. His ascendancy to the throne in 1509 consequently provoked great
expectations among the English humanists. Thomas More composed several
laudatory, albeit not unequivocal, epigrams on behalf of Henry at the new
kings coronation.
9
Urgent letters from Erasmuss two most important English
patrons, the Archbishop of Canterbury, Cardinal William Warham, and the ed-
ucator of the new king, William Blount, Lord Mountjoy, rushed Erasmus back
to England from Italy (Epp 214, 215). For you are bound to repose the highest
of hopes in a prince whose exceptional and almost more than human talents
you know so well, says Mountjoy in a letter, whose real author was probably
Mountjoys Latin secretary and Erasmuss friend, Andrea Ammonio (Ep 215:
56). He continues to report on the mood among the English humanists:
Oh, Erasmus, if you could only see how happily excited everyone is here, and
how all are congratulating themselves on their princes greatness, and how they
pray above all for his long life, you would be bound to weep for joy! Heaven
smiles, earth rejoices; all is milk and honey and nectar. Tight-fistedness is well
and truly banished. Generosity scatters wealth with unstinting hand. Our kings
heart is set not upon gold or jewels or mines of ore, but upon virtue, reputation,
and eternal renown. (ibid.: 1320)
The text goes on to describe a recent conversation with the king. Henry had
told Mountjoy that he longed to be a more accomplished scholar. Mount-
joy, perhaps somewhat startled by the idea, did not forget his protg and
he dared to reply: We do not expect this of you; what we do expect is that
you should foster and encourage those who are scholars. To this the king
responded with the reassuring words: Of course, for without them we could
scarcely exist (ibid., 2024).
40 Chapter 2
And, indeed, humanism greatly advanced in England during the sec-
ond decade of the sixteenth century. In terms of jobs and honors, Henry
fulfilled the expectations of the humanists. Thomas Lincare, for instance,
was appointed royal physician. John Stokesley became a kings chaplain.
Richard Pace was nominated to be a royal secretary. Andrea Ammonio was
nominated as Henrys Latin secretary. And Cuthbert Tunstal became the
master of the rolls.
10
Thomas More participated in two commercial mis-
sionsin 1515 to Bruge and in 1517 to Calaisand in March 1518 was
appointed a royal councillor.
11
These appointments were matched by the
kings political support of humanism. On at least three separate occasions
from 1518 to 1520 Henry repelled attacks by church and Oxford conserva-
tives against humanism.
12
The kings position was shared by other powerful figures. The efforts of
supportive bishops, for instance, greatly advanced humanism in the two
English universities. John Fisher, the bishop of Rochester and the chancellor
of Cambridge, played the leading role in humanisms introduction into the
university. In 1511 Fisher arranged for Erasmus to be appointed as reader in
the university and in 1516 he was instrumental in the foundation of St. Johns
College, which advanced Greek and Hebrew studies. Similarly, the bishop
of Winchester, Richard Foxe, founded the humanistically oriented Corpus
Christi College in Oxford.
13
Even greater progress was made in the sphere of
nonuniversity education. Numerous humanist schools were established in
these years, the most famous of which was St. Paul in London. Such develop-
ments attest to the growing presence of humanist values in English society,
even liberal education was rapidly becoming the standard of the upper classes
and the vehicle for a public career.
14
These achievements, and the senior positions filled by a small number of
humanists such as More, should not cause us, however, to overestimate the
social standing and importance of most adherents of the bonae literae. The
majority of humanists could at most aspire to be educators, secretaries and
midranking administrators and diplomats. In a society dominated by an aris-
tocratic ethos, the status of humanists was never very high. Maria Dowlings
study has refuted earlier interpretations that attributed eminent political and
religious rank to English humanists. Dowling demonstrated that the great
majority of English humanists adapted their views to the fluctuating ideol-
ogy of the Crown. She suggests, furthermore, and as something of a paradox,
that their minor position in society helped the humanists to survive Henry
VIIIs cannibalistic reign in which more important personages and groups
were crushed and subsequently disappeared.
15
The need, and the willingness,
of humanist circles to serve their patrons may also explain why their literary
work was often rather conventional.
16
The Construction of the Erasmian Republic of Letters 41
Between Friends
How did the humanists perceive their low social standing in the northern
European aristocratic monarchies? How did they experience the inherent un-
certainty of the patronage system? These questions can be explored in the cor-
respondence between Erasmus and his friend Ammonio. Ammonio was born
in about 1478 into an old family in Lucca. After studying and teaching in Bo-
logna he moved to Rome and later to England, where he lived until his early
death from sweating sickness in 1517. In 1509 Ammonio was nominated to
be secretary to Lord Mountjoy. As mentioned, two years later he was made
secretary to Henry VIII. He was given two church incomes in England and in
1515 was appointed by Pope Leo X to be subcollector of papal taxes in that
country. Ammonio was with the king during the war against France in 1512.
In celebration of the occasion he composed a Panegyricus ad Henricum VIII,
which has been lost, as was an account of the war against the Scots, which he
may also have written. In fact, Ammonios only extant literary production is
a volume of poetry, published by Erasmus in Paris in 1511. All in all, Ammo-
nios biography is rather typical of a lesser humanist, hence its importance for
understanding the humanists position within the patronage system.
17
Erasmus met Ammonio in England in 1505. Both were probably guests in
Mores home from 1509 to 1511. During Erasmuss long stay in England from
1509 to 1514 Ammonio was his closest friend and confidant. The correspon-
dence between the two of them, particularly the exchanges between 1511 and
1512, when Erasmus was in Cambridge and Ammonio in London, is reveal-
ing of the human, quotidian and sometimes even petty sides of Erasmuss
characterErasmus in slippers, in Augustin Renaudets phrase.
18
The cor-
respondence also clearly exposes the problematical nature of the relationship
between humanists and their patrons and the social and professional anxieties
experienced by the former. The relationships of Erasmus and Ammonio to
their patrons occupy a central place in their letters. We learn, for example, that
the first dedication Ammonio wrote for his poems was excessively praising of
Mountjoy in a way that lessened his peers. As Erasmus predicted, knowing as
he did Mountjoys disposition well enough, the lord did not like the dedica-
tion and politely suggested that the work be published without it (Ep 218, 219).
Ammonio accepted Erasmuss advice and wrote a new dedication, authoriz-
ing his friendalready an expert in the fieldto make whatever changes he
deemed fit (Ep 221). The published dedication explicitly lays bare the nature of
the relationship between a humanist and his patron. Ammonio emphasizes the
generosity of Mountjoy, as well as that of numerous other unnamed English
patrons, in a clear response to his lords previous reservations. He adds that, as
his poverty prevents him from returning the favor, he entered upon the one
42 Chapter 2
way that lay open to him: I undertook to eulogize those to whom I thought
I owed the most. The relations of subordination are clear. Still, the humanists
service is not to be despised and Ammonio refers to Pliny the Younger when
reminding his patron and his readers that it was once so highly valued that
those who had written encomiums on men or cities were habitually decorated
with rewards of honour or money (Ep 220).
Ammonio was also involved in Erasmuss relationship with his actual and
prospective patrons, especially when the latter was away from London. Sev-
eral times, for instance, Erasmus asks him for information about the where-
abouts of Mountjoy (Ep 232, 233): It is not good to be, for too long, at such
a distance from my personal Jupiter (Ep 238). And he occasionally mentions
his relations with Warham and Fisher (e.g., Ep 240: 6061; 245: 4446).
Ammonios principal task, however, was to help Erasmus win the patron-
age of Foxe and Thomas Ruthall, the bishop of Durham. As such, Erasmus
asks Ammonio to pass on his letters to the bishops, as Foxe and Ruthall
are often referred to in the correspondence (Ep 234). Ammonio promises
to do that, as well as to add some words of his own (Ep 236). Erasmus asks
about the results of the effort (Ep 238) and Ammonio replies that the bishops
received the letters with utmost delight. However, Foxe complained that
Erasmus neglected him (to which Ammonio found no better answer than
to invoke his friends awkward shyness). In any event, the two were so oc-
cupied with other business that Ammonio decided that a delay was in order
before resuming his efforts (Ep 239: 2736). He reports to Erasmus on the
renewal of activity and we once more gain access to the concrete workings of
the patronage system, that is, the mechanisms behind the public orations and
formal dedications:
The bishop of Durham promises you his aid and keen support, while the bishop
of Winchester has said less in public but in a more friendly vein. He was under
the impression that you already held a benefice; I replied that you had been
given the expectation of a benefice but that none had yet been forthcoming. He
smiled and asked whether that particular hope was something you could use to
buy food. I smiled in turn, and said: Rather Erasmus has purchased these ex-
pectations by spending money and time. Thereupon he told me to speak to him
about this on another and more suitable occasion. (Ep 243: 4654)
As the correspondence evolves, questions about the position of the hu-
manist and about his relations with his patrons are discussed with increasing
personal intensity. Ammonio initiates and develops this discussion. Respond-
ing to Erasmuss vaguer-than-usual complaints about his situation (Ep 240:
1113), Ammonio refers to his friends fame and learning and concludes that
Erasmus cannot fail to find powerful patrons everywhere. Ammonio is
The Construction of the Erasmian Republic of Letters 43
less optimistic in regard to himself: But I, unless I can scrape together some
means to support my declining years among those whom I have given much
hard work, many years, and no little expense to oblige, know not where I can
take refuge, seeing that I have quite grown old in this Cimmerian darkness
(Ep 243: 2041). Erasmus initially seeks to avoid any direct communication
on the subject, resorting to clichs and generalizations. He continuously
complains about his own misfortunes; his reputation only holds a candle to
his misery and increases his embarrassment. Ammonio is better off than he.
True, Ammonio has not won a position commensurate to his talents. On the
basis of his gifts he ought to be the supreme pontiff. Nevertheless, he is the
luckiest of men considering his nationality, appearance, age, talents, charac-
ter, and the approval he has received from the best sort of people. Erasmus
goes on to predict that his friends lot will change for the better, and then tries
to end the conversation by jokingly suggesting that Ammonios fear of old age
has been provoked by the teasing of girls about his gray hair (Ep 248). But
Ammonio will not let Erasmus evade the painful subject. In his response he
gently scolds Erasmus for teasing him, adding that he discerns in his friends
words a touch of rhetorical embellishment. Nor is he interested in abstract
moral principles. I know that your advice to make the best of what we have is
sound, he remarks, but I should like you to advise me where to go, without
altogether playing the philosopher (Ep 249).
Erasmus responded four days later in a short letter. He assured Ammonio
that his previous discourse was sincere but nevertheless promised to speak
at that time without playing the philosopher too much. He then recom-
mended an aggressive policy of self-advancement. To begin with, put a bold
face on everything to avoid ever feeling shame. Next, intrude in all the affairs
of everyone; elbow people out of the way whenever possible. Do not love
or hate anyone sincerely, but measure everything by your own advantage;
let your whole course of behavior be directed to this one goal. Give nothing
unless you look for return, and agree with everyone about everything. But
this too was no more than a rhetorical exercise, a simple ironic inversion of
Erasmuss former philosophical attitude. The very abstract and exaggerated
nature of his new posture attests to as much: how could Ammonio suddenly
rid himself of those qualities, which Erasmus attributed to him, in order to
behave so brutally? Only in the following sentence is the rhetorical screen
raised as Erasmus offers his friend some concrete advice:
Come then, here is a piece of advice just made to order for you, since you wish
it; but, mind you, I whisper it confidentially. You are familiar with British jeal-
ousy; use it for your own profit. . . . Threaten to go away, and actually get ready
to go. Flourish letters in which you are tempted away by generous promises.
44 Chapter 2
Sometimes remove your presence deliberately in order that, when your society is
denied them, they may feel the need of you all the more keenly. (Ep 250)
There is something fascinating for the modern reader in this correspon-
dence. The great effort required of Ammonio in drawing Erasmus into a
sincerely intimate dialogue shows the extent that humanist literary conven-
tions determined the terms and realities of personal friendship. Still more
significant are the inherent tensions in humanist discourse evidenced here.
Faced with the possibility that he has wasted his life, Ammonio wishes to
suspend rhetorical embellishment, moral maxims, and, indeed, philosophy
itself. They all seem irrelevant to the harsh social and professional realities he
has to cope with. However, rhetoric and moral philosophy, and particularly
the kind of moral precepts Erasmus offered Ammonio, were the daily bread
of the humanists. This is what they had to offer to anyone who cared to lis-
ten. And they offered it precisely as a means for coping with those concrete
problems that individuals faced in the course of their social lives. Ammonios
words therefore attest to the limitations of humanist discourse, to the fact
that, in some cases at least, this discourse was not a guide for conduct but was
a means for disguising actual social practice.
Poets and Princes
This glance at the early modern system of patronage and the place the human-
ists found in it serves as the background for examining the construction of
the identity of the universal intellectual, the citizen of the Erasmian Republic
of Letters. This entails a study of Erasmuss relations with his patrons, his
reflections on those relations, and his conclusions concerning the actual and
the desirable place of the intellectual in society. I will also analyze how Eras-
mus managed, with the assistance of those humanists who followed him, to
reshape his relations with the powerful and create a unique place of Erasmian
humanism.
The period that concerns us can be schematically divided into two phases.
The first phase lasted from the moment an unknown Augustinian monk left
the monastery of Steyn in 1493 until he became the acknowledged leader of
the humanist Republic of Letters in about 1514. This was a period of home-
lessness as Erasmus was in constant movement from country to country, and
from house to house where he found temporary lodging as a guest. He had
several patrons and was disappointed with practically all of them. More sig-
nificantly, he became dissatisfied with the traditional relationship between the
humanist and his patron. He had no permanent position or occupation and
The Construction of the Erasmian Republic of Letters 45
he disliked any position he happened to hold temporarily. Most importantly,
he was dissatisfied with the professional possibilities open to humanists. Eras-
mus was out of place, both literally and metaphorically.
During the second phase, in the decade or so that witnessed the ascendancy
of Erasmian humanism before its marginalization by the Reformations strug-
gles, Erasmus found his place.
19
He continued to move all the time albeit less
errantly than before. He continued to rely on patrons and to complain about
them. However, he managed to restructure and, to a certain extent, invert the
traditional relationship between the humanist and his patrons. He did this by
situating himself in a position of clear moral superiority. He still avoided the
traditional occupations of humanists but now he transformed this detach-
ment into a virtue. He became a full-time intellectual whose place was in
the Republic of Letters.
Erasmuss years as a student in Paris were a period of scarcity and uncer-
tainty, but from a later perspective he referred to France as the country who
gave me my freedom (Ep 194: 21). That remark clearly reflects Erasmuss
loathing of monastic life, which he succeeded in leaving at age twenty-seven
only after he found himself a patron-employer.
20
Hendrik van Bergen, bishop
of Cambrai, required a secretary for a journey to Rome, for which Erasmus
qualified because of his proficiency in classical Latin. The trip never took place
since the bishops hopes to be made cardinal were thwarted. Instead Erasmus
traveled for several months in the Low Countries with van Bergens entou-
rage. This is when he became acquainted with Jacob Batt, who was to be one
of his closest friends until the latters death in 1502. Apparently, Batt, through
his connections with the van Bergen family, was instrumental in convincing
the bishop to send Erasmus to study theology in Paris in 1495. A scholastic
education, let alone a scholastic career, was never a part of Erasmuss plans for
his future and he never completed a university degree.
21
In his Compendium
vitae Erasmus summarizes his studies in one ironic sentence: Theology re-
pelled him, for he felt himself not disposed to undermine all its foundations
with the prospects of being branded as a heretic (Ep 1437: 35860). A similar
irony characterizes Erasmuss only direct reference to his studies during his
student years. In a letter from August 1497 to his pupil Thomas Grey he jok-
ingly described his transformation into a Scotist theologian: So I am trying
with might and main to say nothing in good Latin, or elegantly, or wittily;
and I seem to be making progress (Ep 64: 8789). Intellectually, Erasmus
found his way at an early age. This much is attested to by his first important
work, Antibarbarorum liber, which he began before he was twenty years old.
22

Not surprisingly, instead of attending university classes,
23
Erasmus associated
himself in Paris with the small circle of humanists gathered around Robert
Gaguin. His closest associate was the Italian humanist Fausto Anderlini. This
46 Chapter 2
was the period in which Erasmus published the first edition of the Adagia
(1500) and the Enchiridion militis christiani (1501) and when he wrote the
first drafts of important educational works, including De ratione studii, De
copia, and several of the dialogues of the Colloquia.
In stark contrast to such intellectual self-confidence was Erasmuss lack of
proper place. In the decade or so following his departure from the monastery
Erasmus moved about restlessly, mostly between Paris and the Low Coun-
tries, including an extended stay in England. After a first, nightmarish year
at Collge de Montaigu, he usually dwelled in the homes of friends, patrons
and employers. The search for lodging and the discords with his hosts are a
prominent feature in his correspondence from this period. Will he stay in
Paris or depart for the Low Countries (Ep 80: 918)? To where will he flee the
plague, Flanders or Orlans (Ep 129: 221)? Will he return to England or visit
Italy (Ep 159: 5971)? Erasmus also lacked any definite social and professional
standing. His nominal position as a monk studying theology was, as we saw,
not to his liking. What is more, he rejected many of the professional avenues
that were open to humanists. In 1502, for example, as he recounted in a let-
ter to the prior of Steyn, that he turned down the responsibility of lecturing
publicly in Louvain, citing specific reasons which included most especially
a concern about hostile reactions (Ep 171). Erasmus did later accept the posi-
tion of lecturer in Cambridge in 1511, staying at the university until 1514. But
as he repeatedly testified, he had unwillingly accepted the appointment out of
acute economic need (e.g., Ep 241). And though the lectureship was created
for him and provided an excellent opportunity to deepen the presence of hu-
manism in the English academy, he left as soon as he felt he could.
Erasmuss distaste for teaching was not limited to the specific culture of the
university. Poverty in his student years had forced him to give private tutoring.
Later, in order to finance his desire to journey to Italy, he agreed to supervise the
education of the sons of the Italian physician of Henry VIII, Giovanni Battista
Boerio. But he never regarded teaching as anything other than a temporary con-
straint, abandoning it as soon as possible.
24
Erasmuss homelessness and lack of
a defined social position aroused a degree of uneasiness among those around
him. In a letter written in September 1500, for example, he mentions his wish
to live in the Low Countries, adding that at present my fellow countrymen at
home believe that I am glad to be away, in order to be free, while those who
reside in Paris suspect that I am not popular with my own nation and am living
here in a kind of enforced exile (Ep 129: 4346).
All this increased the pressure to find patrons. And, in fact, Erasmus dedi-
cated considerable time and energy in seeking the attention and favor of several
potential patrons, among them the bishop of Cambrai, Anna van Borssele, lady
of Veere, Batts patroness and employer and Lord Mountjoy, together with
The Construction of the Erasmian Republic of Letters 47
several prominent figures in the court of Philip the Fair, the duke of Burgundy.
Erasmuss experience with patrons was almost always unpleasant. It was charac-
terized by a recurring pattern of initial high hopes followed by disappointment.
The mold was already set with Erasmuss first patron, the bishop of Cambrai.
His principles are admirable but he gives nothing while promising much,
was Erasmuss repeated complaint (Ep 81: 1819). In due course he learned to
restrain his anger when the promises that he believed were made to him were
left unfulfilled (which they always were). But in the early stages of his career as
protg he often gave vent to his feelingsAnti-Maecenas, as he defined van
Bergen in a letter to Batt (Ep 135: 20). Feeling that he was not properly rewarded
after writing four epitaphs in honor of the late bishop he meanly remarked: so
as to keep up in death the character he had in life! (Ep 179: 56). Some of these
comments must have reached van Bergen, for in an interview held in the spring
of 1501 he accused Erasmus of ingratitude. Erasmus was forced to compose a
humble letter of apology in which he declared to the bishop: I have loved you
unreservedly, looked up to you, reverenced you, sung your praises, and not
forgotten you. To this very day I have not once said a mass without beseeching
immortal God to repay you with ample interest, since he alone can, for all that
you have given me (Ep 154: 2024). The text once again highlights the position
of the Renaissance literati vis--vis their patrons. It also demonstrates how the
system of patronage informed their perspective: God himself is represented as
the apex of the patronage pyramid.
Such debilitating feelings of dependence and uncertainty were immanent
to patronage relations. It would appear, however, that Erasmuss disap-
pointments were also due to his own ambivalence about patronage and his
dissatisfaction with the customary terms of these relations. From early on
he had a vision of the ideal patronage relationship, which he disclosed in his
correspondence with Batt. On becoming the tutor of the young Adolph of
Burgundy, the son of Anna van Borssele, Batt sought to direct the ladys fa-
vors toward Erasmus. At first things looked promising. Erasmus was warmly
received by van Borssele at her castle of Tournehem in February 1499 and
was loaded with her favors (Ep 88: 4656). But as usual, the situation
rapidly deteriorated. Erasmus gave vent to his despair in a letter to Batt writ-
ten in July 1500, complaining that my lady merely extends promises from
day to day (Ep 128: 1718). This was the background for his explication to
Batt several months later of the kind of support he believed necessary for his
career: Possibly you think I am well enough off if I can avoid beggary. But
my own attitude is this: either I must obtain, from whatever source, the es-
sential equipment of a scholars life, or else I must to abandon my studies
completely. And that essential equipment includes a way of living that is not
utterly poverty-stricken and miserable (Ep 139: 10711). In concrete terms,
48 Chapter 2
Erasmus demanded that Batt obtain from van Borssele at least two hundred
francs as an advance on next years salary. This would allow him to travel to
Italy and earn a doctorate there. He also wanted a beneficethe first choice
among a large number of livingsso that when I come back from Italy I
may have a literary retreat (ibid.: 3739, 5569). Erasmus instructed Batt to
promise van Borssele eternal fame in return:
Please explain to her how much greater is the glory she can acquire from me,
by my literary works, than from the other theologians in her patronage. They
merely deliver humdrum sermons; I am writing books that may last for ever.
Their uneducated nonsense finds an audience in perhaps a couple of churches;
my books will be read all over the world, in the Latin west and in the Greek east
and by every nation. Say that there is everywhere a huge supply of such unedu-
cated divines as these, while such one as I am is scarcely to be found in many
generations. . . . (Ep ibid.: 4148)
Erasmus evidently believed that economic independence was a precondition
for fulfilling his literary and cultural mission. He also believed that support
from patronsspecifically, the provision of benefices that ensured a fixed,
steady incomewas necessary for achieving this independence. Erasmus was
willing to return the debt with the standard humanist currency, namely by
conferring glory on his patrons. Ideally, however, he hoped that the patrons
reward would be inherent in the relations of patronage without making any
specific demands on the humanist. The mere association of the patrons name
with Erasmus should suffice. In such a case, of course, patronage relations
would remain external to literary activity and would not compromise in any
way his intellectual independence.
This vision of the patronage system is expressed in a letter to a trusted
friend. Other statements made by Erasmus on the subject suggest how much
he was aware that in reality conditions might not be so simple. During his
first visit to England, Erasmus was taken by Thomas More to Eltham Palace
to visit Prince Henry, the future Henry VIII. Several days later he sent the
eight-year-old prince a poem in praise of Britain and King Henry VII and the
royal children. In his dedicatory letter he reiterated the role of the litteratus,
in this case the poet, as the engineer of his patrons glory: Kings may indeed
earn such fame by their glorious deeds, but poets alone can confer it, in their
learned lays; for whereas waxen effigies, and portraits and genealogies, and
golden statues, and inscription on bronze, and pyramids laboriously reared,
decay one and all with the passing of long years, only the poets memorials
grow stronger in the lapse of time, which weakens all things else (Ep 104: 17
22). In writing a laudatory poem and a dedicatory letter Erasmus performed
the typical acts of a protg toward his patron. In this context, Erasmuss de-
The Construction of the Erasmian Republic of Letters 49
piction of the patronage relationship is slightly different from that expressed
in his letter to Batt. By composing laudatory poems and dedications, for
example, the humanist is expected to actively promote his patrons fame and
glory. This difference notwithstanding, the basic conception of patronage is
consistent. In particular, Erasmus continues to perceive his intellectual activ-
ity, on the one hand, and his relations with his patrons, on the other hand, as
two mutually exclusive spheres.
This is not, however, how his contemporaries understood the workings of
the patronage system and certainly not how most patrons perceived it. A far
more concrete, direct and continuous service was usually expected from the
humanist. Moreover, no separation was to characterize the humanists intel-
lectual activities and his service. On the contrary, he was precisely to employ
his literary and intellectual skills and talents on behalf of his patron (who was
expected, in turn, to support his protg by using his own capacities, namely
wealth and power). Erasmuss most revealing experience with patronage dur-
ing this period was indicative of his initial willingness to enter into such a
relationship, but was no less revealing of his deep dissatisfaction with it.
The remarriage of Anna van Borssele (worse than slavery, according to
Erasmus)
25
and Batts death (by poison, in Erasmuss paranoid judgment) put
an end to his hopes for support from that source (Ep 172). In the summer
of 1502 he traveled to Louvain, where he remained for two years. Through
his host, Jean Desmarez, and through Jrme de Busleyden, he became ac-
quainted with Nicolas Ruister, the bishop of Arras and the chancellor of the
University of Louvain, and one of the most powerful figures in the court of
Philip the Fair. In 1503 Erasmus dedicated to Ruister three orations of Liba-
nius, which he published with his Latin translation. The dedicatory letter was
a thinly disguised request for patronage (Ep 177). In a September 1503 letter
to Willem Hermans, a friend from the monastery, Erasmus was unusually
high spirited and optimistic, relating that Ruister had invited him to dinner,
offered him his help, and then given him ten gold pieces. He also wrote that
he was currently composing a panegyric for Philip the Fair, on the occasion
of his return from his journey to Spain, and that Busleyden promised him
that if the duke arrived safely Erasmuss fortune would be secured (Ep 178).
Erasmus delivered his panegyric in the court in Brussels in January 1504 and
the edited text was printed a month later by Theiry Martens in Antwerp.
On the whole, the Panegyricus ad Philippum Austriae ducem fits the formal
and thematic conventions of the genre of laudatory orations.
26
Erasmuss
praises are hyperbolic. At the beginning he declares:
I wished to give special fame and publicity to this day of all days, the brightest
and most auspicious for our country, and for any nation up to the present day
50 Chapter 2
and even in times to come, provided I can say something worthy to be recorded
for the future. I was also carried away, I could almost say intoxicated, by the
unbelievable joy with which your longed-for return has lifted the hearts of one
and all in a manner unprecedented . . . (Pan 8)
He continues by describing the paralyzing grief that took hold of Philips
subjects when he departed, the love with which he was received wherever he
visited, and the great joy caused by his return home. Philips undramatic jour-
ney is compared to the exploits of Hercules and Ulysses (28), and the virtues of
the twenty-six-year-old duke are judged to be superior to those of Solon, Scipio,
Julius Caesar and Augustus, among others (e.g., 12, 1920, 29). Indeed, there
has been no prince in living memory, and, may I say, in recorded history, who
has been loved by his country so warmly and sincerely, and who has loved his
people so earnestly in return (16). Moreover, Erasmuss panegyric is filled with
praises for aristocratic culture and the chivalric ethos, including its military as-
pects, which (as we shall amply see in the next chapter) he deeply loathed (e.g.,
10, 1920, 6064). To that extent, the Panegyricus is a generic product and typi-
cal expression of the relationship between humanist and patron in which the
literary activity of the former is subordinated to the aims of the latter.
Erasmus was dissatisfied with this kind of relationship. That much is clear
from the text itself, its accompanying letters, and additional statements made
by Erasmus. As Tracy notes, Erasmuss text is, in fact, a hybrid of two genres:
the Panegyricus and the advice book known as mirror for princes (specu-
lum principis).
27
The result is an uneasy blend of flattery and exhortation, of
courtly values and humanist moralistic discourse.
Somewhere toward the middle of the work Erasmus begins to describe the
correct behavior of the good prince but then hastens to ascribe it to Philip.
The prince should avoid falterers and Erasmus would have called Philip to do
thatif there was a need for such exhortation. The prince should act within
the boundaries of the law and reject the suggestions of courtiers that he can
do just as he wishes. Philip entirely discards such advice. The prince ought not
to overtax his subjects and, indeed, Philip spends his own money on behalf of
the public good (3945). This tension between exhortation and praise becomes
particularly acute in that section of the work dedicated to questions of war and
peace, an issue close to Erasmuss heart (as we shall learn in detail in the follow-
ing chapter). Erasmus begins with a discussion of the role of the litteratus:
We have described Philip up to now as peace-loving and fortunatemay he al-
ways be so. . . . This is what all of us desire, and above all, that chorus of learned
and eloquent men [doctorum & eloquentium nominum] which is even now ea-
gerly preparing to defend your glory against jealous oblivion. As this chorus has
always been the nursling of peace and flourishes only in happy times, it prefers
The Construction of the Erasmian Republic of Letters 51
festive celebrations to bloody triumphs, and would rather sing your praises in
odes of joy and panegyrics than with dismal tragedies. (50; LB 4: 534B)
Here, for the first and the last time in the text, the chorus of learned and
eloquent men assumes a position of its own. Erasmus the humanist con-
tinuously promises to enhance the princes eternal fame and glory, but he now
demandspolitely but unmistakablya certain mode of conduct from his
patron. Having established his position and authority, Erasmus embarks on a
long declamation concerning the benefits of peace and the horrors of war. This
includes many of the themes of his later pacifist writings, for instance, that the
worst peace is better than the most just war, and that the pursuit of peace is the
highest duty of the Christian prince (5060). The tone of his discourse is also
changed. The common hierarchy between patron and protg is suspended as
Erasmus addresses Philip from a position of moral authority. A Christian ruler
has a duty to be all-merciful, he lectures his sovereign and patron, adding: His
entire realm or even his own life ought not to mean so much to him that he
would be willing for a single innocent man to die on his account (55).
Such exhortations, in far more combative language, would later characterize
Erasmuss political writings. But in 1504 he still enjoyed limited independence,
which meant that he duly returned to the conventions of laudatory declamations
at the end of his oration. It is as if Erasmus suddenly awoke from his absorption
in the question of war and peace and remembered where he stood and to whom
he spoke. I did not mean, he abruptly states, to ignore Philips military skills,
and if war breaks out the prince will doubtless display them for all to see. For
who amongst the leading military men can rival you in fleetness of foot, agility
in leaping, or energy in wrestling. . . . Whom does the helmet with menacing
plume, the bronze breastplate, baldric, sword, and shield, in short the whole
panoply of war, suit so marvelously as you? (61). Erasmus goes on to laud
the military prowess of Philips forefathers, Burgundians and Habsburgs alike.
Thus, an aristocratic military ethos replaces Erasmuss humanist pacifism.
Erasmuss discontent with the Panegyricus is evident in the selection of letters
printed together with the text. In addition to the standard letter of dedication,
to Ruister in this case, Erasmus added an extended text, in fact, an apologia,
that was addressed to Desmarez. It explicitly rejoins accusations of flattery (Ep
180). Here Erasmus distances himself from the Panegyricus, arguing that it was
Desmarez who convinced him to overcome his reluctance and compose the
oration and then publish it (ibid.: 188203). He mentions that he lacked three
essential ingredients for the success of this assignment: subject-matter (that
is, precise information concerning Philipss journey), time and, significantly,
emotion. He actually describes his role as entirely technical: The orator . . .
is given certain facts; he does not invent them for himself (ibid.: 13568). The
52 Chapter 2
essence of his apologetics, however, is devoted to arguing that it is permissible
to tell a lie in order to do good. What appeared as flattery is, in fact, a disguised
exhortation. The portrait of the prince contained in the Panegyricus is actually a
depiction of the ideal prince. As such, it is intended to persuade its addressee to
emulate that ideal. The need for concealment is obvious: Do you really believe
that one could present kings, born in the purple and brought up as they are,
with the repellent teachings of Stoicism and the barking of the Cynics? Erasmus
does not avoid the logical conclusion of his line of argumentation, namely that
it would be most expedient to compose laudatory declamations even for tyrants
(ibid.: 4295, 11417). He is apparently unbothered by the nature of his conclu-
sion as a reductio ad absurdum. Nevertheless, he understands the implications of
his reasoning in relation to Duke Philip and thus finds himself forced to begin
again the circle of praise. His Panegyricus is by no means a disguised exhortation,
but a faithful depiction of reality. Duke Philip, his young age notwithstanding,
is already a shining example of great virtues (ibid.: 11725). Erasmuss expla-
nations notwithstanding, the apologia certainly attests to his dissatisfaction with
his role as the writer of laudatory declamation. This is indeed what he intimated
in a letter to John Colet: I was so reluctant to compose the Panegyricus that I do
not remember ever doing anything more unwillingly; for I saw that this kind of
thing could not be handled without some flattery (Ep 181: 6265).
The evidence thus far enables us to reconstruct Erasmuss attitude or,
rather, the absence of a coherent attitude on his part, toward patronage. Akin
to contemporaries, Erasmus considered those relations as given aspects of
the social order. Like most other humanists and literati, he actively sought
patrons. Explicit remarks, together with his consistent rejection of alterna-
tive routes opened to humanists, suggest how much he viewed the support of
patrons as a prerequisite for his literary and intellectual vocation. Erasmuss
indecision and vacillation were only directed toward the actual terms of his
relationship with patrons. Ideally, Erasmus sought support that would not
demand an active advancement of his patrons interests and ideology. He
knew however that, at this stage of his career, this was no more than a pipe
dream. Patronage as a social institution required substantial commitment
and effort on the part of the protg. The Panegyricus for Philip attests to
Erasmuss attempts to accommodate himself to this reality. The apologetic
character of his discourse is indicative of how much more difficult it was for
him than he expected. The principal problem did not lie in the praises he felt
obliged to bestow on Philip the Fair. As embarrassing as these praises may
seem for the modern reader, they caused only slight uneasiness in the cultural
context of the early sixteenth century. The real problem for Erasmus was
his discovery that the customary relations of patronage did not allow one to
separate service and intellectual activity. This was because writing laudatory
declamations meant to endow fame and glory necessarily tied Erasmus to the
The Construction of the Erasmian Republic of Letters 53
political interests and, of even greater significance for him, the cultural values
of patrons. In sixteenth-century northern Europe this meant, as the Panegyri-
cus amply shows, identifying oneself with the aristocratic ethos and the court
culture, which Erasmus considered to be contradictory to his own humanist
and Christian values.
Erasmus never again composed another laudatory oration for a patron. He
later wrote, in a line added to the dedicatory letter of the 1516 edition of the
Panegyricus, that Philip promised me the earth if I were willing to come to
court as a member of his household (Ep 179: 1920) but that he had declined
the offer of becoming a courtier.
28
In the same year he wrote the Panegyricus, a new aspect of Erasmuss at-
titude toward patronage emerged, one that would increase in importance
alongside his own increasing prominence. This dimension, what may be
called politicocultural patronage, was connected to the support required by
the humanists in pursuing their struggle for cultural hegemony. This support
was particularly important in relation to such sensitive issues as theology. For
Erasmus such requirements were obvious by 1504, when, in the summer of
that year, he found a manuscript of Lorenzo Vallas Adnotationes on the New
Testament in an abbey near Louvain and instantly recognized the vital role
textual criticism and philology could play in the study of scripture. Erasmus
published Vallas work in Paris the following spring. His introductory letter
to Christopher Fisher, an English churchman (and Erasmuss host in Paris),
reveals his awareness of the controversial nature of biblical philology and of
the need for backing if he was to pursue this enterprise. Erasmus correctly
anticipated many of the arguments to be employed by his opponents in their
future polemical attacks against the intolerable presumption of the gram-
marian to let his impertinent pen loose on Holy Scripture itself (Ep 182:
119226). Of most significance to the present discussion is Erasmuss convic-
tion that pursuing the enterprise of biblical philology required the support of
powerful patrons. As a consequence, he generouslytoo generously, one sus-
pectsassigned most of the responsibility for the decision to publish Vallas
work to Fisher, whom he defined as his patron and defender (ibid.: 19). It
was Fisher who not only lent his considerable support to Erasmuss decision
to publish the Adnotationes, but who actually deafened him with importu-
nities not to deprive countless students of the enormous advantage of
Vallas work (ibid.: 1115). Fisher was Vallas stout and tireless champion
(ibid.: 23). Indeed, it was Fisher rather than Erasmus who brought [Valla]
to public notice (ibid.: 232). Fisher emerges as the modest predecessor of
the popes and cardinals who Erasmus later enlisted in support of his religious
reform program, particularly his Novum Testamentum project.
Having refused to be Philip the Fairs courtier, Erasmus left Louvain at the
end of 1504 and traveled to Paris. He spent most of the next decade in England
54 Chapter 2
and Italy.
29
His intellectual activity continued unabated. In 1508, after months
of strenuous work in Aldo Manuzios printing house in Venice, he published
an enlarged edition of the Adagia, whose exposition of 3,260 proverbs became
an Erasmian version of the encyclopedia of classical inheritance.
30
In 1511 the
work destined to become Erasmuss most enduring achievement, the Moriae
encomium, was published by Bade in Paris. In the following year he published
two of his important literary-educational writings, De ratione studii, an expo-
sition of the various stages of liberal education, and De copia, a detailed expo-
sition of the rhetorical theory of writing. This partial list of activity shows just
how much Erasmuss declared abandonment of secular literature (Ep 189)
should not be taken literally. Erasmus did, however, dedicate a significant part
of his intellectual activity to religious works, especially to the New Testament
project and to editing of the writings of the Church father Jerome.
Erasmuss literal and metaphorical homelessness remained unchanged. He
continued to move from one place to another, circulating between the homes
of patrons, friends, and printers. He detested the two most important paid
positions he held during the period, supervising the education of Boerios
sons and lecturing in Cambridge. He continued to consider patronage as the
only route for pursuing an intellectual vocation. Immediately upon leaving
Louvain Erasmus sought, through Colet, to reingratiate himself with Lord
Mountjoy (Ep 181: 8791). Once he arrived in England by the latters invita-
tion, Erasmus invested great effort in winning additional patrons. His skills
at doing so were fast improving. The dialogues of Lucian that he translated
into Latin were the site of no less than seven letters of dedication to prospec-
tive patrons or to those who could assist him in finding a patron.
31
Mountjoy
and Warham, whom Erasmus correctly estimated as the most reliable patrons
for the long term, were treated with care. The Aldine edition of the Adagia
was rededicated to the lord (Ep 211) while the translation of two tragedies
of Euripides was dedicated to the cardinal (Epp 188, 208). Erasmuss style
also improved. The new dedications were shorter than the letters he had
written to his patrons in the Low Countries; the praises they contained were
more restrained. In 1501 he had begun his letter to Anna van Borssele with
a long, effusive comparison of his patroness to three classical and biblical
namesakesDidos sister, Samuels mother, and the Virgin Marys mother
(Ep 145: 340). In a letter of dedication to the bishop of Winchester five years
later, Erasmus calmly noted that Lucian was a suitable presentation from
a man of studies to a prelate who, though he has been richly endowed with
every advantage in Fortunes gift, infinitely prefers virtue, and virtues com-
panion, good letters (Ep 187: 1113).
Such efforts to win English patronage were at least partially successful. In
March 1512 Erasmus at last received a benefice from Warham, the living of
The Construction of the Erasmian Republic of Letters 55
Aldington, which he commuted to an annuity of slightly more than 20. In
a letter to his one-time friend and now the prior of Steyn, Servatius Rogerus,
written immediately after he left England in 1514, Erasmus recounted that
he had received an annual pension of a similar size from Mountjoy, and gifts
amounting to more than 165 from Warham and other English bishops (Ep
296: 12738).
32
It was not such a petty sum considering that Erasmus was
unmarried and that the annual income of an Oxford master mason probably
amounted to 5 15s.
33
How did Erasmus perceive his place in the patronage system during his years
in England? There is no clear-cut answer to this question since he changed his
mind in accordance to his changing situation and mood. He was, more often
than not, dissatisfied. His correspondence with Ammonio between 1511 and
1514, discussed above, clearly reveals his frustration. Other correspondents
were privy to the same grievances. In November 1511, for instance, Erasmus
bitterly complained to an English friend, Roger Wentford, that I am, so far
as promises of gold are concerned, unmistakably wealthy, apart from which I
live in stark hunger! (Ep 241). Sometimes, however, a different assessment is
in the offing. Three months after the letter to Wentford he wrote to Antoon
van Bergen, with whom he sought to resume his relationship, stating that he
was almost entirely transformed into an Englishman, so extremely kind have
many persons been to me (Ep 252). Several months later, however, his mood
again swung as he grumbled in a letter to Adolf of Burgundy about shattered
hopes for mountains of English gold (Ep 266). Approximately a year later,
at the end of 1513, he informed Ammonio of his plans to leave England, re-
peating the usual grievances and resentfully denouncing Mountjoy (without
mentioning his name) as having defrauded him with earlier promises (Epp
281, 283: 1737). But just four months later, once again, in another letter to
van Bergen, Erasmus suddenly recalled the great many friends he had made
in England and the generous support they had extended him. He explained
that his decision to leave the country was made only because of imminent war
with France, which brought about a sudden change in the character of this
island (Ep 288: 818).
How is this chronic indecision to be explained? It may reflect, in part,
Erasmuss ulterior motives. But it seems that his ambivalence runs deeper
than that. Two letters, one composed just before and the other just after leav-
ing England, provide a clue to the roots of his ambivalence. In the former
letter, written to van Bergen in March, Erasmus describes the generosity of his
patrons and then adds that there could be much more if I were in the slight-
est degree ready to beg (ibid.: 1617). In a more detailed letter written to
Servatius four months later Erasmus is more precise. Everyone is aware that I
should only have to spend a few months at court to heap upon myself as many
56 Chapter 2
benefices as I cared to have (Ep 296: 12426). He also recounts his rejection
of Queen Catherines offer to serve as her tutor, as well as of offers from both
English universities (ibid.: 12324, 14041). Erasmus had apparently begun
to appreciate that his disappointments were not solely due to the behavior of
patrons who reneged on earlier promises. He began to better understand his
contributionhis unwillingness to fulfill his patrons expectationsto the
frustration of his hopes.
Another indication of Erasmuss predicament is to be found a year later
in yet another account by him of his years in England, this time in a letter to
his most important Italian patron, Cardinal Raffaele Riario. The ambivalence
is still evident: I have in England a position of the middle sort, less than I
could wish and than my friends had promised, but more than I deserve (Ep
333: 1618). On the one hand, Erasmus mentions the support he enjoyed
from prominent English figures, notably the king himself, the rising man in
the court, Bishop Thomas Wolsey, and above all, Warham (ibid.: 1831).
On the other hand, he voices his usual complaints about empty promises of
mountains of gold, and more than gold. This time he is more specific than
usual, however. He left Italy and returned to England, he writes, only because
Mountjoy was making a definite offer and a very large one, coupled with
complete leisure and the freedom to choose my own way of life which I regard
as so necessary that, if deprived of that, I should think life not worth living
(ibid.: 4044). Erasmus was doubtless referring to Mountjoys letter from
May 1509 (Ep 215), which, as we have already seen, does paint Erasmuss
future in England in bright colors. Nevertheless, the actual promises made by
Mountjoy were a far cry from what Erasmus later described. In fact, besides
10 to cover his travel expenses, the only thing Mountjoy promised Erasmus
if he returned to England, doing so in Warhams name, was a benefice (ibid.:
7380). The cardinal kept this promise, albeit three years later. More impor-
tantly, Mountjoys letter makes absolutely no mention of complete leisure
or freedom to choose ones own way of life. It is most unlikely that any such
promises were made or that Warham, Mountjoy, or any other patron even
thought in these terms. Patronage, and certainly a permanent patronage re-
lationship, required service or at least some kind of commitment from the
protg. A letter sent from Warham to Erasmus, which was written under
the same circumstances as Mountjoys, is rather clear on this issue. In the
extant fragment of the letter the cardinal promises Erasmus 150 nobles on his
arrival in England, but then adds that it will be paid on condition only that
you agree to spend the rest of your life in England. The cardinals further
stipulations for allowing Erasmus, on suitable occasions, to revisit his na-
tive land, family and friends underlines the importance of the condition (Ep
214). Warham was an uncommonly generous and selfless patronhe actually
The Construction of the Erasmian Republic of Letters 57
continued to pay Erasmus the pension for which he commuted his benefice
even after the latter left England. But even Warham demanded a commitment
in return for his patronage. As the primate and the lord chancellor of England
he required in the very least that, by living in the realm, Erasmus would con-
tribute to its prestige.
By now Erasmuss unwillingness to beg or to spend a few months at
court had acquired a different meaning, one that he himself spelled out in a
concluding remark on the issue of patronage in his letter to Riario: Not but
what, if truth be told, it was that not so much that no position came my way
as that I would not live up to any position; such is my abhorrence of ordi-
nary business, and so far am I from ambition, so lazy if you like, that I need
a position such as Timotheus enjoyed, and success caught in my nets while I
sleep (Ep 333: 5357). This is Erasmuss most important statement concern-
ing his social and professional position in England, and his understanding of
the patronage relationship. As we have seen, Erasmus early on rejected most
of the professional options open to humanists, placing his hopes on direct
patronage. After his experience in the Burgundian court Erasmus also came
to reject the common terms of patronage. He simply refusedand publicly
stated so
34
any kind of service or commitment that would compromise his
leisure and freedom and that would interfere with his intellectual activity.
The Erasmian Republic of Letters
Erasmus left England in July 1514 for Basel, where he published over the next
several years those works he and his associates considered to be most impor-
tant, first and foremost the Novum Testamentum project. Erasmuss mood
was unusually optimistic during this period. His humanist reform program
seemed to be gathering steam, the opposition of scholastic theologians and
church conservatives notwithstanding. In February 1517 Erasmus wrote to
his disciple, Wolfgang Capito, that at this moment . . . I should almost be
willing to grow young again for a space, for this sole reason that I perceive
we may shortly behold the rise of a new kind of golden age (Ep 541: 1113).
His optimism rested on what Erasmus perceived to be the fervent support
for the reformed and genuine study of literature and the liberal disciplines
on the part of almost all of Europes rulers: Pope Leo X, the kings of France,
England, and Spain, the emperor and numerous other German princes and
bishops (ibid.: 1151). Perhaps the most striking feature of this letter when
compared to Erasmuss correspondence prior to 1514 is the complete identi-
fication of the writer and the cause of humanist reform. Erasmus assumes a
modest stanceI have been allotted, as was to be expected, a very humble
58 Chapter 2
part in this enterprise (ibid.: 8081)but this does not change the fact that
he was the one who enjoyed paving the way for others who had greater proj-
ect in hand (ibid.: 8687). Indeed, Erasmuss modesty, or feigned modesty,
cannot hide the fact that he became the arbiter of the state of the bonae literae
at least north to the Alps.
Another novel development, indicated in the letter to Capito, was Erasmuss
posture in relation to the powerful. Certainly, he continued to lavish praise on
European rulers. But he now did so in a different manner. He praised each
for his contribution to reform, which made Erasmus more of a judge than a
humble subject or protg. Thus, King Henry VIII is something of a scholar
himself, King Charles is a divinely gifted young man, and King Francis
seems as if born to this very purpose of propagating reform. By the time
Erasmus arrived at the Emperor Maximilian, whom he always felt a strong
distaste for,
35
he assumed an almost openly ironic and critical tone: in his old
age, wearied by so many wars, [Maximilian] has decided to relax in the arts
of peace, which will prove both more appropriate to his time of life and more
beneficial to the Christian world (ibid.: 3451).
The previously cited letter to Antoon van Bergen from March 1514 pro-
vides further insight into this transformation of Erasmuss status and posi-
tion. Van Bergen, abbot of St. Bertin at Saint-Omer and the brother of the
bishop of Cambrai, was one of Erasmuss patrons, or, rather, prospective
patrons, at the opening of the century. Erasmus renewed his correspondence
with van Bergen after more than a decade in an attempt to rebuild his pa-
tronage relations in the Low Countries. In the very first sentence of the letter
Erasmus informs van Bergen of his desire to be restored to my native coun-
try if I could but obtain from the prince a competence that might suffice to
sustain me in modest leisure (Ep 288: 68). However, both the style and the
content of this letter are strikingly different from that to be found in the previ-
ous correspondence addressed by Erasmus to van Bergen and other patrons.
We have already seen that, in contrast to his common complaints concerning
unfulfilled promises, Erasmus now makes an enumeration of his important
English patrons and attributes his decision to leave the country to its prepa-
ration for war against France. Indeed, most of the letterwhich served as a
draft for the famous adage Dulce bellum inexpertisis given over to a diatribe
against war. Erasmuss relationships with his patron are thus projected onto
a new plane. While in 1501 Erasmus wrote to van Bergen (who barely offered
him any assistance), declaring that his debt to his patron was so great that
even if I should auction off my very life he would not be able to repay it (Ep
143: 36), he now charged the abbot with responsibility for preventing war,
this to be achieved by applying his influence on Prince Charles and Emperor
Maximilian (Ep 288: 14452). The relations between the humanist and his
The Construction of the Erasmian Republic of Letters 59
patron were thus inverted. In 1501 Erasmus was a private litteratus asking
for the support of a powerful public figure; in 1514 Erasmus placed himself
in the position of guardian of the common good. He even did not hesitate
to invoke van Bergens private interests. You already know from experience
how expensive even ones friends can be in wartime, he reminds the abbot,
presumably alluding to the prospects of new taxes to be allayed for financing
the war, and concludes that it will thus also be in your own interest to en-
deavor to bring this war to an end; so you need not think you will undertake
this responsibility with no reward (ibid.: 14952).
In his letters to Capito and Van Bergen, Erasmus addresses the powerful,
including his patrons, from a position of ethical and intellectual superiority.
This is indicative of a significant change in his status, indeed his identity,
pointing to his standing as the educator and reformer of Christendom, the
unbiased intellectual who speaks on behalf of the common good. I want to
suggest that this position was unique. No humanist, perhaps no European
intellectual, had ever held it prior to Erasmus. Those who created the identity
of the universal intellectual, and promoted Erasmus as the embodiment of
the ideal reformer, will be defined in this study as Erasmian humanists. As
the definition makes clear, Erasmian humanism, in contrast to most other
types of humanism, has no geographical or political center. No city, court
or even kingdom served as the context of Erasmian humanism. Erasmian
humanists were spread all over northern Europe. Membership in the group
was continually changing. As Erasmuss prestige increaseddue, in large
part, to the efforts of the Erasmian humanists themselvesmany humanists
became eager to join him and move into his orbit. At the same time, others
left the Erasmian Republic of Letters, most notably to join the Reformation.
Erasmian humanism can, therefore, be studied at any point of time after the
middle of the second decade of the fifteenth century. I will focus on the years
of its inception and on the group of German humanists who played a central
role during this period. In an important sense, all later Erasmian humanists
simply mimicked this first group.
The symbiotic relationship that developed between Erasmus and the Ger-
man humanists in the second decade of the sixteenth century was due in part
to the situation of German humanism in this period. In the last decades of the
fifteenth century German humanism quickly passed its antiquarian phase,
its immersion in classical literature, and was already directing its energies
toward contemporary issues. This effort was principally devoted to promot-
ing national German culture, to establishing liberal education in the cities
and, above all else, to advancing religious reform. The practical, didactic and
moralistic nature of German humanism was a major factor in the rapid prog-
ress of the movement. German humanism established itself in both lay and
60 Chapter 2
ecclesiastical courts, in the cities and even in several universities after 1470,
reaching its height during the first two decades of the sixteenth century.
36
By
then German humanists were in need of a leader who would embody their
own sense of being a mature and confident movement reaching for cultural
hegemony. This was the context for the unconditional recognition on their
part of Erasmuss leadership even though he did not even hint at any inten-
tion of settling in Germany.
Indeed, the gap between Erasmus and the German humanists over the
national issue suggests that the choice of the Dutch humanist was an odd
one. From its beginnings in the first half of the fifteenth century, German
humanism had been struggling against what it considered to be Italian cul-
tural hegemony and Roman religious domination. The German humanists, in
contrast, sought to revive and develop a distinct German culture.
37
Erasmus
was certainly not the right choice to head such a project. Erasmuss rather
limited sense of patriotism was anchored in the Netherlands, which was a part
of the empire only because of the marital politics of the Habsburgs; indeed,
his views were distinctly cosmopolitan.
38
The Germans chose to ignore these
characteristics, and defined Erasmus as German. Save the occasional reference
to our Germany in his correspondence Erasmus, did nothing to accommo-
date himself to this spirit.
39
In any event, within German humanism the national question was sub-
ordinated to the religious one. Like the other humanists, the Germans also
detested scholastic theology and argued that the Church was corrupted and
badly in need of reform. They advocated a return to the sources, namely to
the works of the Church fathers and particularly to scripture itself through the
learning of Greek and Hebrew. In addition, they supported a general religious
reform based on the spiritual and ethical dimensions of Christianity whose
reinforcement would come at the expense of what they considered to be the
excessive emphasis on form and ritual.
40
According to Lewis Spitz, however,
their notion of religious enlightenment was vague and ill-defined.
41

Tracy observes that Erasmus was oblivious to the depth of religious unrest in
Germany.
42
These problems surfaced during the third decade of the sixteenth
century when the majority of the younger German humanists joined the
Reformation, often assuming important roles in Germany and Switzerland.
In 1514, however, this rift lay in the future. At this time German humanists
viewed Erasmus to be the one who would articulate their views and lead their
reform programs. This, in turn, enabled Erasmus to elaborate his noncon-
formist theology and sharpen his criticism of the Church.
43
Among the important centers of German humanism were Vienna, Heidel-
berg, Nrnberg, and Erfurt,
44
but for Erasmus the most important region of
all was that which he called Upper Germany (Ep 414). The symbiosis and
The Construction of the Erasmian Republic of Letters 61
collaboration between Erasmus and the humanists living and working in the
cities of the Upper Rhine, Strasbourg, Slestat, Freiburg, and especially Basel
(which was, of course, part of the Swiss confederation) were particularly sig-
nificant. In the second and third decades of the sixteenth century these cities
contained the highest number of humanists whose intellectual activity was
directly related to, and subordinated to, that of Erasmus.
Erasmuss interaction with these humanists who would define themselves
as Erasmians gave birth to that language which conceived of the humanist
as a universal intellectual, and of the Republic of Letters as an autonomous
sociointellectual space.
This was done, first of all, by assigning Erasmus the place as head of a uni-
fied movement. His journey to Basel in the summer of 1514 was a testimony
to his leadership. Humanists in city after city celebrated his arrival. In Stras-
bourg and Slestat he was even officially welcomed by the local magistrates.
We learn of these events from a letter written by the Strasbourg humanist
Jakob Wimpfeling to Erasmus after the latters visit to the city. The short cor-
respondence is a quasi-official one, written as it was on behalf of Strasbourgs
sodalitas literaria, conveying the best wishes of the members and urging him
to respond without delay. The existence of such literary societies in Stras-
bourg and elsewhere was part of German humanisms attempt to create
some kind of institutional structure for their shared identity.
45
Wimpfelings
concluding words, prefacing his enumeration of the societys members, at-
test to Erasmuss central place in German humanism: Our society as a body
presents its compliments to you and offers its devoted services, if there is
anything it can do for you (Ep 302). Less than two years later, in April 1516,
the German humanist Johann Witz opened a short letter to Erasmus with the
following words:
How right they are, the scholars of our native Germany, to love and respect
you, my dear Erasmus, most scholarly of men! You have always regarded them
with special affection, and your industry and learning contribute greatly to their
prosperity; and this is why the devotees of literature flock round you from the
whole Germany in their devotion.
Perhaps even more significant are the concluding words of this letter: Greet-
ing to Beatus Rhenanus and all the Erasmians (Ep 399). This first appearance
of the term Erasmians is a clear indication of the centrality of Erasmus in the
very self-definition of German humanism.
The attitude of the German humanists toward Erasmus as revealed in his cor-
respondence is a further testament to Erasmuss unique position. The language
employed in addressing Erasmus is closer to the language of a protg address-
ing a patron or a subject addressing his sovereign than it is to the language the
62 Chapter 2
humanists employed among themselves. Thus, in September 1514, Udalricus
Zasius, professor of law at the University of Freiburg and an imperial councillor,
introduced himself to Erasmus in a short letter pleading that he be enrolled as
a footman or sweeper for Erasmus, whom he considered to be the glory of the
world, if not, in fact, a god among mortals (Ep 303: 815). Ulrich Zwingli,
then a parish priest with humanist inclinations in Glarus, described how he en-
hanced his reputation by simply boasting of his meeting with Erasmus, the man
who has done so much for liberal studies and the mysteries of Holy Scripture,
and who is so filled with the love of God and men that he considers anything
done for the cause of the humanities as a personal service to himself (Ep 401:
2831). For Zwingli and for the German humanists in general, Erasmus was the
embodiment of humanism. He was the universal intellectual whose sole objec-
tive was the common good. Most telling in this respect is a letter from Georgius
Precellius, an otherwise anonymous priest from Ulm. Precellius reminds Eras-
mus in a letter dated April 1516 that he had claimed that the English human-
ist Richard Pace was about to publish a collection of classical metaphors. The
work did not appear and the lovers of literature who were badly in need of it
approached Precellius about the matter. Night and day their cry is Georgius
Precellius, why is your Erasmus (for I claim you entirely as my own, I love and
cherish and respect you as a father; whenever your name is mentioned, I exalt
you above the starry night)why, they say, is he so slow in bringing out this
little book of Notable Metaphors? (Ep 398: 1923). The humanist priest, who
probably never met Erasmus, had no hesitation in claiming Erasmus as his own.
He gave accurate expression to the common attitude of German humanism:
Erasmus belonged to the lovers of bonae literae, whoever they were.
46
The ongoing correspondence between Erasmus and his followers became
an instrument in constructing Erasmuss position. Most communications,
including those whose apparent sole purpose was personal aggrandizement
of Erasmus, were published in the various collections of Erasmuss corre-
spondence. Not coincidentally, these works began to appear right after 1514.
Johann Froben published the first such collection, which included only four
letters, in August 1515. By 1519 he and Martens in Louvain had published
another five ever-expanding collections.
47
Erasmus lent his name only to the
last of thesethe famous Frobens Farrago editionwhile distancing himself
from the others. Peter Giles, who edited the Martens collections, and Beatus
Rhenanus, who edited two of Frobens collections, both emphasized the un-
official character of their editions as well as Erasmuss personal reservations
regarding this kind of publicity.
48
But Giles and Rhenanus were two close as-
sociates of Erasmus, and Jardine has shown that their statements should not
be read for their literal meaning, but as a part of a strategy in constructing the
image of the leader of the Republic of Letters.
49
The Construction of the Erasmian Republic of Letters 63
Erasmus came to Basel in order to work with Froben, whose printing firm
was the epicenter of humanist activity in the city. The printing press is indeed
another context for the understanding of Erasmian humanism, more important
even than the humanist sodalities. The printing press played, of course, a cru-
cial role in the humanist enterprise as a whole. It was a central institution for
the humanist production and transmission of knowledge. It was instrumental
in the dissemination of the revival of classical literary heritage as well as the
humanists own notions of learning and education. The printing presses pro-
vided occupation for many humanists and, more importantly, they became a
site of collective humanist activities and therefore of intellectual fermentation.
In this respect the printing press can be seen as the humanist substitutiona
partial one to be sureof the scholastic university.
50
During his career Erasmus
closely collaborated with several printersManuzio, Martens and Froben were
already mentionedwho were crucial in propagating his vast literary output.
Moreover, Jardine argues that Erasmus and his friend skillfully employed their
command of the art of printing in order to project a carefully manufactured
image of the leader of the Republic of Letters.
51
Jardine seems to overlook,
however, the fundamental significance of the printing press to the Erasmian
Republic of Letters. As an institution the printing press represented an autono-
mous and cosmopolitan site for the production of knowledge free of lay and
ecclesiastical control. It was the social place of the disinterested universal intel-
lectual who labored for the reform of Christendom. In this respect, the printing
press provided for Erasmian humanism the context which the city-state or the
court provided for other groups of humanists. Already in 1508, referring to
Aldo Manuzio in his famous adage Festina lenta, Erasmus emphasized the social
role as well as the universal character of the printing press. Aldo, Erasmus says,
is building a library which knows no walls save those of the world itself.
52

Moreover, Manuzio, who used the emblem of Festina lente, was the true heir
of the few good Roman emperors who had also associated themselves with the
symbol. Nor do I think, Erasmus continues
this symbol was more illustrious then, when it was stamped on the imperial
coinage and suffered the wear and tear of circulation as it passed from one mer-
chant to another, than it is now, when in every nation, even outside the limits of
any Christian empire, it spreads and wins recognition, it is held fast and prized
in company with books of all kinds in both the ancient languages, by all who are
devoted to the cult of liberal studies.
53

The contrast between the political (and commercial) world and the Republic
of Letters cannot be sharper.
Among those active in Basel at the time of Erasmuss arrival were Rhena-
nus, Capito, Gerard Lyster, Heinrich Loriti (Glareanus), Ludwig Bear, and
64 Chapter 2
the Amerbach brothers. Erasmuss presence further attracted other young
humanists to Basel, including the future reformer of the city, Johannes Oeco-
lampadius, Nikolaus Gerbel and Conardus Pellicanus.
54
Erasmus at once
commenced a dizzying pace of work. Over the next several years old works,
including the Moria, De copia, the Enchiridion and an enlarged edition of the
Adagia, were republished. Some of Erasmuss most important writings were
published for the first time, including The Education of a Christian Prince,
Jeromes collected works, and, of course, the Novum Testamentum (initially
entitled Novum instrumentum).
These works, especially the great editing projects, could not have been ac-
complished without the participation of large numbers of individuals, and as
such they should be seen as collective undertakings of Erasmian humanism.
Jeromes collected works encompassing nine volumes, published in Septem-
ber 1516, was explicitly defined as such.
55
Other works that were attributed
solely to Erasmus were also collective efforts, to one extent or another.
56
This
was not only true of a massive project such as the Novum Testamentum, but
of Senecas Lucubrationes, for example, published in August 1515. Erasmuss
correspondence gives us insight into the crucial role played by his assistants
in this project, Rhenanus and Wilhelm Nesen, as well as into the relationship
between them and Erasmus. In the spring of 1515 Erasmus departed Basel
to visit England. He left behind a dedication letter for the Lucubrationes, ad-
dressed to Bishop Ruthall, in which he dramatically described his success in
correcting more than four thousand errors in Senecas text by himself (Ep
325). The work, however, was far from being finished and Erasmus left the
job to Rhenanus and Nesen. About a month after Erasmuss departure Nesen
wrote a deferential letter to London asking permission to cut out passages
from the text that Erasmus had marked as spurious (Ep 329). On the same
day, Rhenanus sent Erasmus an informative letter reporting on Nesens effi-
cient proofreading and detailing the numerous corrections he had made. An
undertone of uncertainty concerning the procedure of the work is discern-
able in his message. He mentions that the copy is still disfigured by many
mistakes and wonders aloud about the ways to complete the work. If only
we had an ancient copy, there is nothing I should enjoy more than to emend
this text in the places that are still left uncorrected, for by so doing I should
be of use to scholars and advance your reputation, although you do say in
your preface that you have removed most of the mistakes but not all (Ep
328: 235). Rhenanus was apparently surprised by the gap between Erasmuss
claims made in the dedication letter and the actual state of the text left in
Basel. He did not challenge Erasmuss claims, and certainly not his position.
On the contrary, as he himself states, his purpose was to enhance Erasmuss
reputation, which he identifies with the advancement of good learning.
The Construction of the Erasmian Republic of Letters 65
Not surprisingly, the edition of Seneca turned out to be full of errors. In
later years Erasmus denied any responsibility for the mess, placing the blame
on Nesen and even going so far as to accuse the latter of destroying a manu-
script in an effort to conceal his failures (Ep 1341A: 44963). The accusation
was most likely false, if only because in the years following Senecas publica-
tion Erasmus and Nesen enjoyed a warm relationship, the latter continuing
to edit Erasmuss works. In 1516, for example, he worked on a new edition of
De copia. Events surrounding this work reveal another layer in the relation-
ship between Erasmus and his young assistants. Erasmus had in September
sent Nesen, who was then at the Frankfurt Book Fair on Frobens behalf, the
dedication letter for the new edition. In that letter he offered high praise for
his assistant, even stating that De copia had become Nesens work rather than
his own (Ep 462). However, Nesen wrongly concluded that Erasmus intended
to formally dedicate the work to another. This misunderstanding triggered an
emotional outbreak. I am sorry, heartily sorry, that the immortality which
you alone would have been able to bestow has been pre-empted by some dis-
tinguished good-for-nothing, he opened his letter to Erasmus, adding: How
can it be mine, my dear Erasmus, when it does not acknowledge me, who am
a man of no account in the literary way, by any letter at the beginning? (Ep
469: 218). Learning upon his return to Basel that Erasmus had in fact dedi-
cated the work to him, Nesen was overjoyed: That you should have thought
of dedicating to me your notes on the ornate style, your Copia, fills my heart
with a pleasure and secret joy that I can hardly express. It is a wonderful thing,
a glory that will make my name immortal (Ep 473).
The relationship between Erasmus and Nesen was exceptional perhaps on
the level of its intensity and emotions. But it was also reflective of the gen-
eral character of the relationship between Erasmus and the humanists of the
Upper Rhine. It indicates the crucial contribution made by these humanists to
Erasmuss works, and demonstrates the extent to which they identified both
their own fortunes and the destiny of the humanist movement with Erasmuss
success. Erasmuss personal glory became synonymous with the success of
humanisms struggle for cultural hegemony. There is in this respect a clear
contrast between Erasmuss isolation in Cambridge, the friendship and admi-
ration of the English humanists and supporters of humanism notwithstand-
ing, and his standing in Basel at the head of a group determined to consolidate
his position as a leader of a Republic of Letters. It is important, therefore, to
examine how the German humanists perceived and defined themselves as a
distinct movement, how their self-definition informed Erasmuss position
and how they imagined their republic.
Erasmus often referred to the community of humanists as a spiritual com-
munity. In a letter of dedication to Giles from October 1514 he distinguished
66 Chapter 2
between friendship of the common and homespun sort, between people
attached to material things and intellectual friendship, which rests wholly
in a meeting of minds and the enjoyment of studies in common. While
friends of the former sort keep their friendship by exchanging material things,
the literati exchange tokens of a literary sort (Ep 312: 317). In a dedication
letter to Rhenanus several months later, Erasmus developed the distinction
between the ordinary and uneducated people and those who pursue
the humanities by superimposing on it another distinction. Referring to
Rhenanuss Christian name, he states that this name Beatus, blessed, recurs
so often in the mysteries of Scripture, and never do we find it given to a rich
man, never to monarchs, never to Sardanapalus and his like (Ep 327: 2330).
The fundamental distinction is, therefore, that between the humanists as
universal intellectuals and all the rest: the common, the rich and the power-
ful. The latter, regardless of their means and station in life, pursue material
and earthly things while the former direct their energies toward spiritual and
intellectual values.
This suspiciousness toward economic and political activity was certainly
reflective of Erasmuss biography. We have already examined his refusal to
pursue any of the professional routes open to the humanist. This was not the
case with most other humanists, not even those in Erasmuss circle, who often
aspired to public careers. But what is significant here is that the Erasmian hu-
manists perceived and presented Erasmuss choices as the right ones. His de-
tachment from power was understood and celebrated as the humanist ideal.
What defines the Erasmian humanists, in other words, was not necessarily
actual imitation of Erasmuss refusal to pursue a public career but, rather,
their belief that this represented the purest form of humanism.
The correspondence between Erasmus and Willibald Pirckheimer is illus-
trative of this point. Pirckheimer, the son of a Nrnberg patrician family, was
a prominent German humanist. He also enjoyed an extensive administrative
and diplomatic career in his native city and was a member of the imperial
council.
57
As keen as most German humanists to meet Erasmus, Pirckheimer
asked Rhenanus in December 1514 to arrange a meeting with the great man
(Ep 318). No meeting took place but Erasmus responded with a friendly let-
ter, saying that he had already developed a feeling of affection for Pirckheimer
by reading his works, praising him for his success in combining a distin-
guished position in the world and literary gifts (Ep 322: 28). Pirckheimer
in turn also addressed the relations between learning and a public career. He
had already noted in his letter to Rhenanus that he enjoyed the emperors
approval and was on good terms with various magnates. Nevertheless,
Erasmuss friendship would be valued above all else. He repeated this expres-
sion in successive letters to Erasmus (Ep 326A, 359). Eventually, he directly
The Construction of the Erasmian Republic of Letters 67
compared Erasmuss position with his own: You are indeed to be congratu-
lated, for your labors will win you the favor of God and of his saints, and of
the world. I on the other hand am obliged to follow the noise and bustle of
the law and the squabbles of princes, in which even to please God is perhaps
impossible; and how meanly Fortune treats those who immerse themselves in
public business, history has many examples to show. He implored Erasmus
to stay on his chosen course, ensuring him that he will ultimately earn a
name that will outlive riches and royalty (Ep 375).
Pirckheimers language is most significant. His public career was typical of
a successful humanist. Such a career was usually conceived of and presented
as a fulfillment of the humanist commitment to society. In fact, Erasmus
himself, adopting the common humanist terminology, described this choice
as a natural and praiseworthy one. And yet, in comparing himself to Erasmus,
Pirckheimer employed the language of Erasmian humanism to describe his
public activities as detrimental to his humanist vocation. Erasmus is the one
who represents humanism in its pure form, and that because he has distanced
himself from the courts of law and courts of princes. Such an attitude is what
leads us to define Pirckheimer and those who shared his viewsthat is, those
who created the social role of the universal intellectualas Erasmian human-
ists even though they themselves were to be found filling various public posi-
tions and roles.
The relationship between Erasmus and the powerful changed noticeably
after 1514, a change that attests to the success of Erasmian humanists in
constructing their Republic of Letters. A new tone can be discerned already
in Erasmuss letter, discussed above, to Strasbourgs literary society in the
summer of 1514. Erasmus writes of his intentions to take some days for pay-
ing my respects to the German princes and getting to know them (Ep 305:
23738). Erasmus almost sees himself as being a prince among princes. Per-
haps more revealing is the fact that the princes saw things in the same light.
In February 1516, for instance, Duke Ernest, the son of Duke Albert IV of
Bavaria, tried to attract Erasmus to the University of Ingolstadt. The approach
was indirect (for to write directly to so great a man as Erasmus was deemed
inappropriate). Urbanus Regius, a lecturer at the university, asked his fel-
low humanists, Johannes Fabri, the chancellor of the bishop of Basel and
Capito, to inquire whether Erasmus intended to accept the offer. The letter,
which lavished praises on Erasmusthe great scholar of Rotterdam, the
man of universal learning, the great champion of humane studiesoffered
generous conditions of employment, including an annual salary equivalent to
more than 34 and very lucrative benefices. Erasmus was not even expected
to teach, but was simply asked to be in attendance in Ingolstadt and by his
presence add luster to the university. In case the offer was not accepted, the
68 Chapter 2
admiring duke had another: a month-long visit, for which Erasmus would be
liberally compensated (Ep 386). Erasmus turned down both offers in a short
letter that noted how his loyalty was already divided between two countries
and two personages, that is, between his native Low Countries and its ruler
Prince Charles, and his adopted land, England, and his eminent English pa-
tron, the archbishop of Canterbury. He also made it a point to clarify that
these loyalties did not hamper his freedomIf my freedom is endangered, I
resign everythingand declared himself willing, if the plan of my journey
permits, to expend two or three days with the prince (Ep 392).
This chapter traced the creation of a unique version of humanism, differ-
ent from all other humanist groups and centers that flourished throughout
Europe. Erasmus overcame the social and professional pressures to associate
himself with a political establishment. He understood himself and was per-
ceived by many of his contemporaries as the educator of Europe, detached
from any particular interest and ideology and committed only to the well-
being of Christendom as a whole. Erasmus did not attain his position by him-
self. The activity of the circle of humanists gathered around him was crucial
in every respect. As we saw, the Erasmian humanists actively participated in
the great scholarly projects of Erasmus. Moreover, they created the identity
of the universal intellectual and the image of Erasmus as the embodiment of
this identity. They also crowned Erasmus as the head of a movement: not an
isolated prophet who highlights the unbridgeable gap between what is and
what ought to be, but rather the head of a movement which sought to harness
its intellectual resources and cultural capital for the reform of Christendom.
In the following chapter we will examine in detail how the construction of
identity of the autonomous intellectual, the citizen of the Republic of Letters,
fashioned the discourse of Erasmian humanism.
70 Chapter 3
the Erasmian project was at its height. It was now, before the Reformation
transformed the religious and political landscape, that Erasmian humanism
achieved a truly autonomous position.
Manners, Education and Civilization
Erasmuss guidebook of manners for children, De civilitate morum puerilium,
may serve as a point of departure for a reconstruction of the Erasmian world-
view and reform program. The apparently trivial subject of childrens manners
makes possible a deeper comprehension of a layer of Erasmian humanism that
is often neglected in studies addressing weightier and more controversial issues.
De civilitate presents a clear picture of Erasmuss conception of the civilized
individual and his vision of civilized society. In addition, the work reveals
Erasmuss self-understanding as an intellectual and reformer. Perhaps for these
reasons Norbert Elias, who put Erasmuss guidebook at the center of his study
of the civilizing process, succeeded in exploring a central dimension of Eras-
mian humanism that was relatively neglected in most other studies.
2
Erasmuss De civilitate is by no means the only work dedicated to polite be-
havior. Numerous guides to manners were written during the Middle Ages.
3

The genre only grew in elaboration and social importance in later centuries.
Works such as Giovanni Della Casas Galateo and Castigliones Il libro del
Cortegiano expressed the self-understanding and central values of aristocratic
culture in the second half of the sixteenth century and after.
4
A comparison
of Erasmuss work with those of his predecessors and successors thus provides
important insights for reconstructing Erasmian humanism.
There are obvious similarities between De civilitate and the medieval guide-
books. Many of Erasmuss rules of behavior are adopted from the medieval
writers.
5
The differences between Erasmus and his predecessors over the
authors position and relation to the text are, however, significant. The medi-
eval works were instruments for the transmission of a given collective tradi-
tion. Their usually anonymous authors simply and briefly listed the desired
rules of conduct without providing any reasoning or justifications. Erasmuss
authorship and personality, in contrast, are unmistakably present in his work.
It is obvious how carefully he observed those around him. His text is based on
personal impressions and attests to an intense personal involvement.
6
The ac-
curacy and insightfulness of his descriptions are testament to this. A persons
state of mind, Erasmus claims, is most strongly reflected in the face. The eyes
of a well-ordered mind should, therefore, be calm, respectful and steady: not
grim, which is a mark of truculence; not shameless, the hallmark of insolence;
not darting and rolling, a feature of insanity; nor furtive, like those of suspects
Erasmian Humanism 71
and plotters of treachery; nor gaping like those of idiots . . . (Civ 274). This
is also the source for the powerful psychological insights characteristic of
De civilitate. Erasmus observes, for instance, that some people eat or drink
without stopping not because they are hungry or thirsty but because they can-
not otherwise moderate their gestures, unless they scratch their head, or pick
their teeth, or gesticulate with their hands, or play with their dinner knife, or
cough, or clear their throat, or spit (284).
Erasmus, as his observations suggest, viewed society and tradition from a
distance. He did not accept the existing order of things as irrevocable. Con-
sequently, his aim is ultimately not to transmit an established tradition but
to transform society. This is why Erasmus also augments the medieval code
of manners. While medieval guides dealt almost exclusively with table man-
ners, De civilitate covers various aspects of human behavior in society.
7
For
Erasmus, tutoring polite behavior is just the beginning of a comprehensive
educational process, the more important stages of which are instruction in
the duties of life, instilling a love for, and a thorough knowledge of, the
liberal arts, and, most important, implanting the seeds of piety. Erasmus
perceived these varied teachings to all belong to a single objective, the task of
fashioning the young [formandi pueritiam] (273; LB 1: 1033B). His reform
program, therefore, is a unified one. His wish to reform manners and daily
conduct was integral to his vision of a humane, educated and truly Christian
society, a fully civilized Europe. This vision explains the decision of Europes
leading intellectual to busy himself with childrens manners, a subject usually
left to minor figures.
Erasmuss treatment of manners as part of his reform program determined
his very conception of polite behavior and had far-reaching social implica-
tions. Erasmuss uniqueness within the guidebook tradition is here especially
pronounced. The genre first appeared in Europe in the twelfth century, doing
so within clerical society. In the next century it spread in vernacular lan-
guages within feudal-aristocratic culture, directed as it was toward this social
estate.
8
From the sixteenth century onward, the class attributes of the code of
manners were even more marked in the courtly writings as the conventions
of conduct became the very essence of court society. When actual political
power became increasingly concentrated in the hands of a central government
at the expense of the nobles, it was the code of mannersas opposed to power
based on land ownership and military powerthat defined the position and
status of each person in the intricate court hierarchy.
9
The courtly discourse
of manners tended, therefore, to conventionalism as roles of behavior were
reified and fetishized. For this reason the courtly manners seem so mannerist:
artificial, affected, and inauthentic.
10
72 Chapter 3
This is indeed how Erasmus viewedand strongly deploredthe aristocratic
manners of his day. At the very beginning of De civilitate he is apprehensive
about the present climate of opinion (273) and his objections become more
accurately defined as the work progresses. He thus argues that things which are
useless to the function of an article of dress, for example, are in bad taste and
to make his point he refers specifically to long trains dragged behind the dress
(279). In the same vein he contends that grasping the bread in the palm of the
hand and breaking it with the fingertips is an affected practice which should
be left to certain courtiers (281). Erasmuss rejection of such mannerism is
the most outstanding characteristic of his guidebook. He argues instead that
proper behavior must accord with nature, and that consequently no imperative
of conduct should compromise health (275, 277). More importantly, he insists
that polite behavior ought to be anchored in ethics. He prohibits, for instance,
conceit over ones elegant dress, arguing that a measure of vanity is permitted
to the poor as a sort of compensation but is strictly forbidden to the rich (279).
The code of manners is meaningful only to the extent that it reflects universal
moral values. Indeed, The essence of good manners consists in freely pardon-
ing the shortcomings of others although nowhere falling short yourself: in hold-
ing a companion no less dear because his standards are less exacting. For there
are some who compensate with other gifts for their roughness of manners
(289). Erasmuss insistence on modesty, prudence, diligence, self-control, and
self-restraint issue, thus, from his general image of men and women in society.
Erasmuss insistence that ethics, as opposed to maniera, ought to be the basis
of polite behavior was therefore inherently antiaristocratic. It was universal and
egalitarian, and thus potentially undermined any attempt to construct social
distinctions and hierarchies on lineage or status. Any person can behave prop-
erly. Indeed, at the beginning of De civilitate, Erasmus states that his aim is to
instruct all boys (273). The fact that the text was dedicated to the eleven-year-
old Henry of Burgundy, son of a noble family that patronized the yet unknown
Erasmus at the beginning of the century, only underscores this point. At the basis
of Erasmuss egalitarianism lay his humanist assumptions, and in particular the
humanist notion of vera nobilitas: Now everyone who cultivates the mind in
liberal studies must be taken to be noble. Let others paint lions, eagles, bulls, and
leopards on their escutcheons; those who can display devices of the intellect
commensurate with their grasp of the liberal arts have a truer nobility (274).
This view is not original to Erasmus. We have seen that humanist educational
thought lay on egalitarian assumptions. For liberal education was open, in
principle, to everybody and thus was explicitly presented as a means for social
mobility. Furthermore, the Italian humanists often argued that vera nobilitas did
not depend on lineage or wealth but solely on the individuals virtue, his char-
acter and personality.
11
The social and cultural context of Erasmuss view was,
Erasmian Humanism 73
however, different. By the quattrocento the feudal nobility had long disappeared
from the city-states of central and northern Italy. New social groups and a new
sort of individualsrich merchant families, popolani, condottieriacquired and
struggled with each other for political power. Their political views were definitely
not aristocratic. Denunciations of the aristocratic ethos by the Italian humanists
thus actually served the interests and ideology of the ruling classes in the Italian
statesand in this respect there is not much difference between popular com-
munes, and many oligarchic republics and city-states ruled by new princes
devoid of dynastic legitimacyand corresponded to ruling ideas.
12
Erasmus, by
contrast, lived in northern Europe where monarchical and aristocratic political
ideology and cultural values were dominant. Against this background Erasmuss
rejection of the aristocratic ethos and ideology acquires its full meaning, and
becomes a true indication of the autonomy of Erasmian humanism.
13
Erasmus speaks in De civilitate from a position of unmistakable preemi-
nence and authority. The tone of his words and his manner of addressing his
audience attest to this as much as the content of his work. Here, for instance,
is the opening passage of De civilitate:
If on three separate occasions that illustrious man St. Paul was not averse to
becoming all things to all men so that he might benefit all, how much less ought
I be irked at repeatedly resuming the role of youth through a desire to help the
young. And so, just as in the past I adapted myself to the early youth of your
brother, Maximilian of Burgundy, while I was shaping the speech of the very
young, so now, my dearest Henry, I adapt myself to your boyhood so that I may
give instruction in manners appropriate to boys. (273)
Erasmus is the educator of Christendom whose views do not reflect any
particularistic ideology or interest but are rather the views of the humanist
qua universal intellectual. For Erasmus the city-state and the court cease to
function as points of reference, which they were for most other humanists. He
speaks in the name of civilization itselfthe as yet nonexistent Christian and
humanist civilization. In fact, as Elias mentions, the title of Erasmuss guide-
book for manners gave the French term civilit (civility in English, civilt in
Italian) its specific meaning of appropriate conduct in society from which the
modern term civilization emerged.
14
The concept of civilization enables us to understand the connection between
several themes and preoccupations in the writings of Erasmus that at first seem
unrelated. Even themes that appear to be entirely derived from his personal dis-
position and idiosyncrasies acquire new meaning when examined in the context
of a coherent discursive structure provided by this notion of civilization. Eras-
muss demand in De civilitate for respectability, politeness, self-restraint, and,
above all, regard for others may now be appended with a heightened hygienic
74 Chapter 3
sensibilityhis aversion to fish and putrid air, for example, which he reveals
at the outset of a theological discussion (FD 67780)his labeling of syphilis
as a mark of moral debauchery and social illness,
15
and his demand to isolate
patients suffering from contagious diseases (CR 206). As Elias clearly discerns,
Erasmuss satirical dialogue Diversoria (Inns) emphasizes many attributes of
what is considered today to be civilization: cleanliness, refinement, decency,
and, more significant, a heightened sense (compared to the Middle Ages) of
individuality and privacy and the consequent increase of prohibitions govern-
ing the sphere of interpersonal relations.
16
The Colloquies as a whole reflects
Erasmuss wish to reform European society in accordance with these views and
values. In the same context, but from a more abstract perspective, we should
also understand Erasmuss objection to any kind of excess, transgression, or loss
of self-control such as debauchery, gluttony, and drunkenness, and his con-
demnation of behavior related by the contemporary cultural code to aggression
such as hunting and chivalry tournaments.
17
Even more significant is Erasmuss
explicit contempt for physical education, which stood in stark contrast to the
classical and Italian humanist ethos (Puer 323).
18
Erasmuss notion of civiliza-
tion was, furthermore, inherently tied to his abhorrence of any kind of violence,
ranging from brutality in the schools to war between nations.
19
The perspective developed above also provides a framework for the recon-
struction of Erasmuss educational writings. Erasmuss educational thought
clearly belonged to the humanist tradition. He was, in fact, the greatest humanist
educational thinker, bringing that tradition to its apex. He probably wrote more
on education than all other important fifteenth-century humanists put together.
His treatment of the subject was, consequently, highly more detailed. While the
Italian humanists usually dedicated a single work to the subject, Erasmus wrote
separate works on each aspect. Some of these writings were among the most
popular used in European schools until well into the eighteenth century.
20
Eras-
muss pedagogical works reproduced the basic tenets of humanist educational
thought: the assumption that the aim of education is to fashion personality
rather than to endow professional skills; the emphasis on the social importance
of education; and the adherence to the classical rhetorical curriculum and, more
generally, to the literary character of education.
21
Most importantly, Erasmus,
like his predecessors, believed that human beings are potentially moral and re-
sponsible individuals and that this potential could be realized an adequatethat
is, humanisteducation. If you are negligent, Erasmus wrote in De pueris,
you will rear an animal; but if you apply yourself, you will fashion, if I may use
a such bold term, a godlike creature (Puer 305).
22
Erasmuss vision, however, did diverge from that of his predecessors, in
particular in regard to the social function of education. The various etymolo-
gies given for the adjectives liberal and humanist used to describe the proper
Erasmian Humanism 75
education and literature provide a first clue. In his important De moribus, the
Italian humanist Pier Paolo Vergerio stated that liberalis is derived from liber
(free) since liberal studies are the only form of education appropriate to
free man.
23
Erasmus, by contrast, argues somewhat tortuously that humanita-
tisin humanitatis literascomes from the ancients conviction that success
in study depended basically on a relationship of good will between student
and master (Puer 338; LB 1: 511A). A distinctively political connotation is
replaced by general human values. This is indicative of a significant difference
between Erasmus and his quattrocento predecessors. The Italian humanists
emphasized how the purpose of education was to fashion a virtuous and
responsible citizen. The polity was the obvious context of their discussion,
and their writings were consequently explicitly meant to prepare the pupil
for political activity and were rich in political connotations and allusions.
24

Erasmus by distinction defines humanist education less in terms of citizen-
ship and more in terms of humanity (humanitas) in general. Indeed, for him,
humanity itself is equated with education: man certainly is not born, but
made man. Primitive man, living a lawless, unschooled, promiscuous life in
the woods, was not human, but rather a wild animal (304); It is beyond
argument that a man who has never been instructed in philosophy or in any
branch of learning is a creature quite inferior to the brute animals (3045);
and lastly, a man without education has no humanity at all (298).
The Italian humanists sought to prepare the educated individualpracti-
cally upper- or middle-class manfor life in the Italian city-state. Erasmuss
educational thought is to a large extent abstracted from a concrete social
and political context. Erasmus wants to educate the citizens of a fully civilized
society that does not yet exist. This difference is intimately related to the di-
verging positions taken by most humanists, on the one hand, and by Erasmus,
on the other hand, vis--vis society. The former, Italians and northerners
alike, propagated the fundamental values of the dominant classes of their so-
ciety. Erasmus, as a citizen of the humanist Republic of Letters, perceived so-
ciety from a critical distance, from the perspective of the universal intellectual.
This was the source of his criticism of accepted institutions and customs.
25

Even more importantly, it was the source of his universal social vision.
And it was also the basis of the distinct humanness to be found in Eras-
mian humanism, which was by no means inherent in humanism as such.
Among the educational writings, the humanness of Erasmian humanism is
most salient in the long pedagogical discussions that are rife with psychologi-
cal insights. This is where Erasmuss thought is most clearly superior to that
of previous humanists as well as classical theoreticians of education. In De
pueris, for instance, Erasmus argues that the teacher must gain his pupils af-
fection as a prerequisite for learning (324). Small children, Erasmus observes,
76 Chapter 3
are incredibly active, yet not experiencing any weariness, for they think of
their activity as play rather than exertion. For this reason the teacher must
render learning as play (341). Even more significant is Erasmuss long denun-
ciation of physical punishment, a subject that hardly disturbed most of his
predecessors. His emotional involvement is clear in the text. He emphatically
condemns the brutality of contemporary teachers while recounting numerous
tales from his own experience (32534). This denouncement is the only oc-
casion on which Erasmus abandons the discussion of education proper and
criticizes the general brutality of the mentality and customs of his age. He
thus censures what he considered to be savage initiation rites practiced in the
universities (331) as well as the brutal treatment of slaves and the institution
of slavery as a whole (32728). His metaphors are often revealing. A violent
teacher, he states, fancies he has gained for himself a private little empire,
and it is shocking to see how this illusion of absolute power will lead him to
inflict acts of savagery, no, not upon wild beasts, as the author of the comic
stage has it, but upon a young generation that should be raised with gentle-
ness (325). The humanness of Erasmian humanism was related to identity of
the Erasmian humanist as a universal intellectual. The citizenship of the Re-
public of Letters created the distancethat is too often explained in psycho-
logical termsthat allowed Erasmus to apprehend the brutality and violence
of everyday life that was far less obvious to most of his contemporaries.
Perhaps the strongest expression of the humanness as well as the univer-
salism of Erasmian humanism is Erasmuss attitude toward the Turks. At
the beginning of the sixteenth century the Ottoman Empire posed a real
threat to Christian Europe and the Turks were perceived not only as infidels
but also as a barbarous and depraved race. As Nancy Bisaha demonstrated,
the Italian humanists of the quattrocento were those who transformed the
traditional Christian language of religious enmity toward them and created
the image of the Turks as Europes Other. The enemy of faith became the
political and cultural enemy, the uncivilized.
26
Erasmus, together with few
others, was an exception. True, he sometimes described the Turks as bar-
barous. But more often than not he explicitly rejected their demonization.
From his position of the universal intellectual critical toward his society, he
could argue for the similarity between the Turks and the Europeans. How
can we persuade the Turks to become Christians, he rhetorically asks, if
our noise and bustle, worse than any tyrants, give them a clear idea of our
ambition, if from our rapacity and lechery and oppression they learn how
greedy and profligate and cruel we are? For Erasmus, the Turks are at
least human beings (EtV 10).
27
Indeed they are in large part half-Christian
and perhaps nearer to true Christianity than most of our own folk (DB
43233).
Erasmian Humanism 77
In his Antibarbari, in a few moving sentences, Erasmus relates the vari-
ous dimensions of humanist learning we have discussed above: What is it
that leads those hard and boorish men towards a more humane type of life,
towards a kinder outlook and gentler ways? Is it not letters? It is they which
mould our character, quiet our passions, check our uncontrolled impulses,
give mildness to our minds in place of savagery? (AB 64).
Philosophia ChristiErasmuss Humanist Theology
As we have seen, Erasmus regards religious education as the most important
part of the task of fashioning the young (Civ 273). Religion certainly oc-
cupied a central place in Erasmuss thought. This is evident in his vast pro-
duction of religious works: writings of pietas and spiritualia, theological and
exegetical works, sermons and hymns, editions of the Fathers, paraphrases
of scripture, and, above all, the Novum Testamentum, the edited text of the
New Testament accompanied by thousands of critical annotations and a Latin
translation. Indeed, Erasmus did not hesitate to argue that I have such high
regard for theological learning that it is the only learning to which I normally
allow the name (Ep 337: 367). A reconstruction of Erasmian humanism con-
sequently requires a clear elucidation of Erasmuss religious thought.
But the reconstruction of humanist religious thought (not just that of Eras-
mus) proves to be a difficult task. The hardening of religious doctrines during
the Reformation and Counter-Reformation not only put an end to humanist
religious thought as a concrete historical option,
28
but may have also impeded
our understanding of the tradition that lost the battle. This is perhaps the
main reason for the misinterpretation of humanist religious thought that pre-
vailed in the past. Until a few decades ago, the image of humanists as atheists
and of humanism as a revival of paganism still circulated. Today such notions
are appropriately defunct, as many scholars have demonstrated not only the
deep personal religiosity of most humanists but their important contribution
to religious thought as well.
29
This is no less true of Erasmus. Anachronistic perspectives of the sub-
jectProtestant, post-Trendentine, and liberalhave been rejected over the
past several decades as Erasmuss theology has been reconstructed in its own
terms. By now, many studies have presented Erasmuss religious thought as
a humanist theology.
30
They demonstrate how Erasmus employed his philo-
logical and literary skills in an attempt to restore what he saw as the genuine
Christianity of the fathers, the apostles and Christ himself. They also showed
how he combined his classical and humanist ideals with Christian pietas.
They further demonstrated the role of the humanist disciplines of grammar
78 Chapter 3
and rhetoric in Erasmian theology, analyzing the central importance Erasmus
attributed to language as the medium between the profound and mysterious
divine essence of the Christian gospel and its concrete and never-ending pro-
cess of human interpretation and application in a specific social and cultural
context.
31
For the purposes of the present study the most significant dimension of
Erasmuss theology is its close link to his other important interests and enter-
prises. For Erasmus the reform of Christianitythrough the application of
his philosophia Christiwas the cornerstone of a general reform program for
Europe. Reformed Christianity was for Erasmus a civilizing religion. This no-
tion can be considered an organizing concept from which the specific tenets
of Erasmuss religious thought were derived: the affinities he saw as existing
between Christianity and the classical heritage; his emphasis on practical eth-
ics and the social dimension of religion; his opposition to what he considered
to be the excessive ceremonial and dogmatic characteristics of contemporary
religiosity; his positive evaluation of human nature and potential and the cor-
ollary lessening of the importance of original sin and so forth.
The aim of theology, Erasmus says, is to create a genuine race of Christians
. . . a people who would restore the philosophy of Christ not in ceremonies
alone and in syllogistic propositions but in the heart itself and in the whole
life. These words are taken from one of the clearest and most succinct
expressions of Erasmian theology, the Paraclesis, the preface to the Novum
Testamentum (P 99). The same ideasthe importance of internal belief and
the spiritual dimension of Christianity, and the way of life and of practical
ethicsappear in various formulations hundreds of times throughout the
writings of Erasmus. They are reflective of the humanist rejection of the dis-
tinction between the vita activa and the vita contemplativa, and, specifically, of
Erasmuss desire for reforming society and culture. These convictions also lay
at the basis of Erasmuss hostility toward scholastic theologians and monks.
Professional interests and even personal animosities played their share in
intensifying this attitude, but essentially Erasmus loathed scholasticism and
monasticism for representing what he saw as intellectualist, formalistic, dog-
matic, and sterile religiosity, detached from the concrete needs of Christians.
Monasticism further exemplified the assumption that life in the secular world
was incompatible with true religiosity. Erasmus, on his part, was convinced
that the good life is everybodys business, and Christ wished the way to it be
accessible to all men, as he expressed himself in the letter to Volz, another
vivid expression of his mature religious thought (EtV 9).
32
The simplification of doctrine, in fact, the devaluation of the dogmatic
dimension of Christianity, was a corollary of his notion of religiosity. What
concerns the faith should be set out clause by clause, as few as possible, writes
Erasmian Humanism 79
Erasmus, and adds: what relates to life should also be imparted in few words,
and those words so chosen as to make them understand that Christs yoke
is easy and comfortable and not harsh. . . . (EtV 11). In the famous debate
with Luther on the question of free will he was more specific. The question of
predestination, as well as issues like the nature of the Trinity, the double na-
ture of Christ, and the Virgins immaculate conception, Erasmus writes in De
libero arbitrio, are obscure, indeed otiose topics (FW 10). On such issues, he
argues, it is better to make as few assertions as possible, even to seek refuge in
Scepticism (7). Erasmus contrasts these dogmatic issues with the precepts
for a good life about which God is absolutely clear and thus which should
be learned by everyone (10).
This is the context for understanding Erasmuss elimination of the tradi-
tional boundaries and modes of theological discourse. Thus, for example,
Erasmus discusses theological questions in the Colloquies in nontechnical lan-
guage, using the voices of laypersons (including butchers and fishmongers)
and the low genre of satirical dialogue (FD). In the same vein, he famously
appeals for translations of the Bible into vernacular languages and its dissemi-
nation among all Christians (P 9697). Only this kind of religion, based on
a simple creed and oriented toward practical behavior, could function as the
vehicle for personal and social melioration.
And why shouldnt Christian doctrine be simple? Christianity, Erasmus
believes,
easily penetrates into the minds of all, an action in especial accord with human
nature. Moreover, what else is the philosophy of Christ, which He himself calls
a rebirth, than the restoration of human nature originally well formed? By the
same token, although no one has taught this more perfectly and more effectively
than Christ, nevertheless one may find in the books of the pagans very much
which does agree with His teaching. (100)
Some of the assumptions and implications of Erasmuss theology come close
to the surface here. Erasmuss sustained attempt, a central aspect of his reli-
gious and his intellectual activity throughout his life, to integrate Christianity
with secular wisdom, specifically with the classical heritage, is clearly argued.
33

At the very least, Erasmus insists on the compatibility of classical and Chris-
tian ethics.
Erasmus goes on to enumerate those classical philosophers whose teachings
resembled those of Christs. In fact, he finds a place in his list for all Greek
philosophical currents (101). No essential differences are noted in a text that,
we must remember, prefaced Erasmuss most important religious work, and
which served as a summary of his religious thought. This was only possible
because Erasmus almost exclusively emphasized general intellectual and
80 Chapter 3
ethical convictions and moral behaviorthat no one was wise unless he was
good, that nothing can be a delight for us . . . except virtue alone, and so
forthat the expense of dogmatic concerns.
Even closer affinities between Christianity and the classical heritage are to
be found in some of Erasmuss other writings. The Antibarbari is a clear ex-
ample. The work is a staunch defense of classical learning in which Erasmus
goes so far as to argue that we Christians have nothing we have not inherited
from the pagans (AB 57).
34
He then embarks on a radical apologetic strategy,
arguing that the classical golden age was part of a divine cosmic program.
The pagans brought human knowledge and culture to perfection, as a neces-
sary precondition for the advance and victory of true religion (5961). In this
respect, the classical heritage and Christianity become intrinsically related,
for the best religion should be adorned and supported by the finest studies.
Moreover: Everything in the pagan world that was valiantly done, brilliantly
said, ingeniously thought, diligently transmitted, had been prepared by Christ
for his society. He it was who supplied the intellect, who added the zest for
inquiry, and it was through him alone that they found what they sought (60).
The cultural and intellectual products of classical antiquity are thus almost
sanctified. Consequently, according to Erasmus, the divorce of Christianity
from classical literature and learning resulted in the decline of Christendom.
As Kathy Eden argues, Erasmuss attitude toward the classical heritage was
markedly different from the attitude that the church fathers bequeathed to
Latin Christianity: while Augustine and Jerome described the employment
of elements of the classical heritage as an appropriation of the enemys prop-
ertythe spoils of the Egyptians was their favorite metaphorErasmus saw
it as property shared by friends.
35
It is small wonder that sometimes Erasmus
went as far as arguing that being a philosopher is in practice the same as
being a Christian; only the terminology is different (IP 214).
Erasmuss emphasis on the similarities between the teachings of Christianity
and classical philosophy occasionally develops into a representation of Christ
and the apostles as model classical philosophers. This comparison is central
to the important adage, Sileni Alcibiadis, first published in the 1515 Froben
edition of the Adages. The Sileni of Alcibiades signify something that, at first,
appears worthless and contemptuous but, upon closer examination, turns out
to be precious and admirable (SA 262). According to Erasmus, such Sileni
were the Greek philosophers Antisthenes, Diogenes, Epictetus, and, above all,
Socrates, whose way of life was a reflection of their teachings and, in particular,
their rejection of worldly goods (26264). The prophets, John the Baptist, and
the apostles were similarly Sileni, and for essentially the same reasons, as was
Christ himself, who also rejected earthly power and wealth (26465). Erasmus
thus employs the same categories to describe Jesus and classical philosophers
Erasmian Humanism 81
who became proverbial for leading an ethical life. This is revealing of his
general attitude toward Christ, which focused on Jesuss human nature while
disregarding Christs divine nature, or at least not coherently integrating it into
his theology. Christs educational and moral mission is emphasized at the ex-
pense of his transcendent and metahistorical mission as the savior of human-
ity.
36
In the early Enchiridion, Christ is referred to time and again as model
(exemplum) and archetype (archetypus) (E 8486; LB 5, 39B, 40C). In the
Paraclesis, which is entirely constructed around the character of Jesus, Christs
death on the cross is not mentioned at all. Instead, Erasmus concentrates on
Jesus as a teacher and a model of moral behavior.
37
For example: The first step
. . . is to know what He taught; the next is to carry it into effect. Therefore, I
believe, anyone should not think himself to be Christian if he disputes about
instances, relations, quiddities, and formalities with an obscure and irksome
confusion of words, but rather if he holds and exhibits what Christ taught
and showed forth (P 101). Erasmuss disregard of the God on the crossthe
image that best encapsulates the entire conceptual and symbolic universe of
medieval Christianityis telling of his de-emphasis of those notions such an
image so forcefully conveys: the depraved nature of humanity that led to the
murder of God and salvation as an unmerited act of grace.
The positive image of human beings and the correlative devaluation of
primal sin are central aspects of Erasmian theology. In numerous works, in
various genres, and on different subjects, Erasmus insisted on the positive
potential inherent in men and women and on their ability to make moral de-
cisions and bear individual and social responsibility. Such convictions lay, of
course, at the heart of his famous debate with Luther over free will. They also
account for Erasmuss systematic softening and humanizing of the hard
Pauline doctrines in his paraphrases of the Pauline epistles. In his summary
of the Paraphrase on Romans, for instance, Erasmus unsurprisingly em-
phasizes the distinction between ceremonial Judaic law and Christian faith.
He almost completely evades, however, the theology that underpinned the
Pauline dichotomy. Indeed, he marginalizes Pauls fundamental theological
concepts, as the following citation clearly illustrates: In passing [Paul] puts
forth many and various doctrines: foreordination (or rather, predestination),
foreknowledge, the elect, grace and merit, free will, the divine plan inscrutable
to us, the law of nature, the law of Moses, the law of sin.
38
Such a setting aside
of the core issues of Pauline theology attests to Erasmuss uneasiness with
them. Sometimes Erasmus was even more creative in undermining notions
he disliked. In paraphrasing Pauls affirmation of predestination in Romans
9, for example, Erasmus does state that it is not by willing or by exertion
that salvation is attained, but by the mercy of God. But he qualifies himself
immediately afterward, arguing: Or rather, some part of it depends on our
82 Chapter 3
own will and effort, although this part is so minor that it seems like nothing
at all in comparison with the free kindness of God.
39
An even bolder inver-
sion appears in the Enchiridion: By yourself you are too weak; in him there
is nothing you cannot do. Accordingly, the outcome of our struggle is not
in doubt, because victory does not depend at all on chance but is entirely in
the hands of God and through him also in our hands. No one fails to win in
this battle except those who do not want to win. The goodness of our helper
has never failed anyone. If you see to it that you do not forsake his goodness,
you can be sure of victory (E 2930). The notion of predestination is thus
inverted.
40
Erasmuss anthropological optimism also explains his reservations
concerning Augustinian theology and his clear preference for other church
fathers, including the controversial Origen and above all Jerome.
41
These theological positions were essential to Erasmian humanism. With-
out assuming that humans are potentially good and are able to freely choose
between good and evil, the Erasmian reform program was not possible. This
is evident in any field and at any level of abstraction. Education, the main
instrument of the Erasmian reform program, is one example. Humanist
education, especially in its Erasmian version, assumed that men and women
can become moral individuals. This image suggested distinctive notions con-
cerning the essence and source of evil. True, in De pueris Erasmus seems to
waver in his discussion about human nature. He occasionally suggests that
men and women are more inclined to evil than to good, and he even invokes
original sin to explain this disposition (Puer 3089, 321). In other passages
he embraces the opposite view, namely that nature has implanted human-
ity with the desire to attain virtue (310). In yet other passages he strongly
argues that human nature is neutral at birth. The newborn is nothing but a
shapeless lump, but the material is still pliable, capable of assuming any form
(305). These contradictions may attest to the tension between the traditional
Christian anthropology and the classical one. However, only the latter anthro-
pology can be coherently integrated with Erasmuss discourse, as the notions
of human perfectibility and the force of education inform his discussion.
Whatever the natural human disposition may be, Erasmus unambiguously
argues, the mature character and personality of men and women depend on
their environment and education. In fact, even when he invokes original sin,
he hastens to add that the greater portion of this evil stems from corrupting
relationships and a misguided education (321).
The rejection of the Augustinian anthropology is tied up with the integra-
tion of the social visions of humanism and Christianity. Indeed, the theologi-
cal and social are often fused in Erasmuss writings. This is underscored in De
libero arbitrio, where Erasmus argues that rejecting freedom of the will would
have devastating moral and social consequences: If this were made known
Erasmian Humanism 83
to the masses, how wide this would open the door to godlessness in countless
mortals, especially given the extent of their dullness, inertia, wickedness, and
their incorrigible tendency to all manner of evil? Where is the weak man who
will keep up the unremitting and painful struggle against his flesh? (FW 13).
This argument, we may note, enraged Luther. The question of free will, he
answered, is concerned with an object solemn and essential which ought to
be defended if the whole world should not only be thrown into tumult and
set in arms thereby, but even if it should be hurled into chaos and reduced to
nothing.
42
The style is characteristic of Luther, as is the eagerness to follow
an argument to its logical, even if unpleasant, conclusion. But Luther repre-
sented the notion of theology consistent with mainstream Christian tradi-
tion. He argues, in effect, that theology is the branch of knowledge that dealt
only with what pertained to salvation. All other questions, including social
and moral considerations, were outside its scope. Thomas Aquinas makes
the same distinction when he serenely states in the very first question of the
Summa theologiae that theology deals with human acts only in so far as they
prepare men for that achieved knowledge of God on which their eternal bliss
reposes.
43
Erasmuss insistence that social reasons force us to assume the ex-
istence of free will therefore alters the very meaning of theology, enormously
broadening its scope and eroding its specificity, and fuses it with other fields
of knowledge and activity.
The implications of Erasmian theology are perhaps most clearly manifested
in Erasmuss pacifist writings. These writings best represent mature Erasmian
humanism as they complete his rehabilitation of human nature. In the famous
adage Dulce bellum inexpertis, for example, Erasmus depicts humans as natu-
rally peaceful, friendly and devoid of any inherent evil. Men and women are
born entirely for friendship, which is formed and cemented most effectively
by mutual assistance. All qualities that nature endowed man with attest to
his sociability. He is of mild and gentle appearance. And of all the animals,
he alone is endowed with the use of speech and reason, the thing that is able
above all else to create and nourish good will. In addition, nature gave man
friendly eyes, revealing the soul; she gave him arms that embrace; she gave
him the kiss, an experience in which souls touch and unite. Man alone she
endowed with laughter, the sign of merriment; man alone she endowed with
tears, the symbol of mercy and pity (DB 402). Most importantly, man was
created in the image of God and implanted with a divine spark that impels
him to selflessly help and serve others and to take pleasure in deserving well
of everyone (403).
It may be argued that Erasmuss depiction of human nature in the pacifist
writings was not part of his theological discourse and that, moreover, because
it was instrumental to his denunciation of war, it should not be considered
84 Chapter 3
representative of his ideas. However, this would miss the point on several
accounts. First, the image of the human being in Erasmuss nonreligious
writings might be more pronounced than in his theological works but it is es-
sentially similar to the latter. Moreover, the very distinction between religious
and nonreligious is anachronistic in regard to Erasmus, who repeatedly re-
jected making such a distinction by highlighting the interconnectedness of the
social and religious spheres, and the compatibility between Christianity and
secular reason. Finally, Erasmuss complaint of peace was certainly a genuine
concern and was integral to his reform program. Poetically and rhetorically
exaggerated as it may be, the image of humanity in the pacifist writings is
the one presupposed by the mature Erasmian discourse.
Erasmuss pacifism opposed mainstream Christian thought as elaborated
since the church fathers. This opposition issued from diverging theological
assumptions. The conceptual basis of the Christian doctrine of just war was
elaborated by Augustine and was accepted by the important thinkers of the
Middle Ages, from Albertus Magnus and Aquinas to the sixteenth-century
neoscholastics.
44
Augustines discussionand his religious thought as a
wholerests on the all-important distinction between the objective and sub-
jective, between the individuals external actions and his internal disposition.
In his famous letter to Marcellinus, a text repeatedly quoted in the discussion
of just war, Augustine explains that such Christian precepts as turning the
other cheek and returning good for evil are more relevant to the training of
the heart within than to our external activity.
45
According to this division,
we should always hold fast to the precepts of forbearance in the disposition
of our hearts; and in our will we should always have perfect benevolence in
case we return evil for evil. Regarding our external activity, however, we are
entitled, indeed, sometimes obliged, to exercise kind harshness, that is, to
use force and hurt others for their own benefit and interests and for secur-
ing a peaceful society that is pious and just. In this conceptual framework
even wars will be waged in a spirit of benevolence.
46
If the Christian wages
war in order to satisfy a desire (libido)to revenge or to dominatethen he
mortally sins (though the war in itself may be justified). If, on the other hand,
he loves his enemies even as he fights and kills them, then his righteousness
is left intact.
In his pacifist writings Erasmus verges on the rejection of the distinction
between the internal disposition of the heart and external activity. When
most intensely portrayed the Erasmian vision assumes that the gap between
internality and externality could be bridged, which would usher in a truly
Christian civilization on earth. Is it in vain that we pray as Christ taught us:
Thy will be done on earth, as it is in heaven? Erasmus asks rhetorically in
Dulce bellum, and then adds: In the heavenly city there is complete concord,
Erasmian Humanism 85
and Christ wanted his church to be no less than heavenly people on earth liv-
ing, as far as possible, in the image of that city . . . (DB 418). He thus inverts
the Augustinian imagery of the two cities. Augustine viewed the heavenly and
earthly cities as separate and incommensurable, perceiving of actual human
societies, including the nominal Christian ones, as reflections of the latter.
Erasmus collapses the distinction and implies that Christendom could be
modeled on the heavenly city. Indeed, creation of a heavenly citya fully civi-
lized humanist and Christian societywas the aim of the utopian Erasmian
reform program.
Erasmuss religious thought as well as the position from which he elaborated
and propagated his religious reform program shed light on the identity of the
Erasmian humanist as the universal intellectual. The perception of scripture as
a source of ongoing interpretation and adaptation for changing circumstances;
the emphasis on the ethical dimension of Christianity and its integration with
the ethical message of classical heritage; and the social orientation of the reli-
gious reform program, indeed the refusal to separate theological and social con-
siderations
47
all these attest to an identity very different from those occupied
by medieval religious thinkers and authorities. His personal status notwith-
standing, Erasmus certainly did not speak in behalf of the church as a mystical
institution. His (rather nominal) degree of theology notwithstanding, he did
not speak as a scholastic theologian, that is, he did not seek abstract theoretical
knowledge of eternal truths. Notwithstanding the centrality of religion to his
thought, Erasmus was therefore a lay intellectual. He was, in Thomas Mores
apt description, a litteratus, a man of letters, whose area of study extends
across every variety of literature (MtD 13). Erasmuss mastery of the literary
heritagereligious and secularand his aptitude to employ this treasure for
confronting the concrete problems of his age made him a humanist intellectual.
The universal scope of his reform program and his detachment from any dis-
tinct political establishment made him a universal intellectual.
The Politics of the Universal Intellectual
An examination of Erasmuss political writings may provide further insights
concerning the discourse of Erasmian humanism, for the universal, even uto-
pian, nature of the Erasmian reform programthe desire for a comprehen-
sive reform of Christendom as a whole, inspired by a vision of a fully civilized
societyis expected to be at odds with the eras reigning ideologies, both
secular and ecclesiastical.
This is certainly the case regarding Erasmuss views on the secular author-
ity of the church. This question occupied a central place in the late Middle
86 Chapter 3
Ages and, again, in the Reformation. This is partly due, of course, to the
many political struggles that took place between the church and the secular
authorities. More importantly, the issue of the churchs authority invariably
touched upon the very identity of Europe as a Christian society. Not surpris-
ingly, therefore, the ideological conflict between church and state drew some
of the best intellectuals, including Dante, William of Ockham, and Marsiglio
of Padua,
48
and was the occasion for the elaboration of the most original and
forceful medieval political theories.
At the same time, as Quentin Skinner notes, the issue hardly bothered most
of the humanists.
49
Lorenzo Valla was an exception.
50
Erasmus was another. His
unequivocal position concerning the place of the institutional church within the
secular world issued from his general ecclesiology and theology. Of the various
traditional definitions of the church, Erasmus clearly preferred the wider, seeing
the church as the community of all Christians. Attacking the view that stressed
the importance of the institutional church, he argued in Sileni Alcibiadis that
they give the name of the Church to priests, bishops and supreme pontiffs,
though they are in truth nothing but the Churchs servants. No, it is Christian
people who are the Church (SA 271). The implications of this position for
the institutional church are to be perceived in Erasmuss most comprehensive
statement on the subject in his letter to Volz.
51
Erasmus depicts the church as an
assembly of three concentric circles, at the center of which stands Christ. In the
innermost circle he places priests, bishops, cardinals, popes and those whose
business it is to follow the Lamb wherever he may lead them. The second circle
includes the lay princes, that is, secular authority, whose exclusive task is to
preserve peace and order (EtV 14). In the third and outermost circle there are
all other Christians, the common people all together, as the most earthly por-
tion of this world (15). Outside the third circle evil reigns. Everything there is
abominable, whenever and wherever it appears (16).
The Christian clergy has therefore a distinct place at the center of Chris-
tendom. But what are its duties and what authority does it enjoy? Erasmuss
positions turn out to be radically different from the official ecclesiology.
52
He
makes no mention of any institutional structure for the order of the priests.
His vision of the role of the clergy is purely spiritual and educational. They
should embrace the intense purity of the centre and pass on as much as they
can to those next to them, that is, to the lay princes. They should, in particu-
lar, work to mitigate the harsh realities of politics (14). In the letter to Volz he
does not explicitly address the issue of the temporal authority of the church.
The whole tenor of the discussion, however, posits a comparison of coercive
authority, attributed to secular power, and to spiritual and moral authority,
which is attributed to the denizens of the first circle. Erasmus likewise empha-
sizes Christs disdain of any involvement in worldly politics (1415).
53
Erasmian Humanism 87
In the polemical Sileni Alcibiadis Erasmus is explicit and outspoken. Denial
of the churchs temporal authority, and of any coercive power for that mat-
ter, is the central theme of the adage. Erasmus employs a wide range of argu-
ments. Some are narrowly pragmatic. He argues, for instance, that immersion
in political affairs consumes time and energy and would therefore come at the
expense of the priests true educational and spiritual mission. From a wider
ethical-political perspective, he argues that temporal power is corrupting and
ought therefore to be shunned by the church, even though it might offer some
advantages (SA 27879). Erasmuss main argument, however, is more general
and abstract, and its implications are much more far reaching. The religious and
the worldly, he claims, are inherently incompatible spheres. This means that
spiritual authority is inherently incompatible with temporal power. He often
employs imagery here that is reminiscent of the Augustinian two cities: In this
world there are, as it were, two worlds, which fight against each other in every
way, one gross and corporeal, the other heavenly and already practising with
all its might to become what it one day will be (276). In elaborating this argu-
ment, Erasmus forcefully uses the analogy between Christ and the churchthe
church as it should be. Christ could have been king of the world if he had so
chosen. But he decided to renounce temporal power, riches and pleasure (264,
272). Thus must the church do as well. Christ openly denied that His kingdom
was of this world, and can you think it proper for Christs successor not merely
to accept an earthly rule but even to seek it as desirable . . . (276). Time and
again, Erasmus declares that the church must renounce any and all temporal
power and assume its true essence as a noncoercive spiritual and educational
institution. He also condemns the ideology and actual practices of the church,
that is, its pursuit of riches and temporal power, which are the roots of its cor-
ruption (27177). When churchmen are bidden to array themselves in purple
and silk and are put on the level of Eastern potentates (271), it is little won-
der that Christendom has sunk to such a low point.
Such radical views of one of the central political issues of late medieval and
early modern Europe give rise to questions about Erasmuss social role and
identity; the place from which he speaks, the interests he represents, the ideol-
ogy he shares and so forth. In this context, the differences between Erasmus
and the great thinkers who opposed the churchs temporal ambitions in the
late Middle Ages are revealing. First, while Dante, Ockham and Marsiglio were
avowed political enemies of the church, Erasmus was during this periodthe
enmity of conservative circles notwithstandingthe churchs dear son, a
protg of popes and eminent cardinals. Secondly, while the fourteenth-
century thinkers opposing the church represented the secular authorities that
struggled with the popes, Erasmus conducted his struggle independently. This
difference should be further investigated.
88 Chapter 3
Dante, Ockham and Marsiglio politically allied themselves with the secular
authorities, especially with the emperors. They were ideologists of secular au-
thority: they elaborated systematic and coherent political philosophies at the
heart of which lay a positive evaluation of secular political authority.
54
This was
not a contingent characteristic of their positionthe result of the need to be
protected from the anger of the popes, for examplebut was rather conceptu-
ally built into their discourse. Within the framework of the discoursewhich
they shared with the ideologists of the churchultimate political authority
lay either in the secular or in the spiritual authority. Erasmuss rejection of
the churchs claims for temporal authority, by contrast, was not coupled with
a positive evaluation of secular power. On the contrary, his writings on the
church are also highly suspicious of secular authority, and most critical of
secular princes. The Sileni Alcibiadis, for example, condemns the established
political culture. In the current climate of ideas, Erasmus argues, the counselor
and friend of princes is one who corrupts them with misguided education,
infects them with foolish ideas, deludes them with adulation, eggs them on by
bad advice to incur the hatred of their subjects, and involves them in wars and
in the frenzy of civil discord (270). In the letter to Volz the alienation from the
political world is even more profound. Erasmus stresses in almost Augustinian
fashion that political authority is a necessary evil, devoid of any inherent moral
let alone religious value. Princes and lay magistrates handle a certain amount
of worldly business that has no part at all in Christian purity; and yet this must
not be criticized, because it is necessary for the conservation of society (EtV
15). Indeed, in his last words on the subject, he relegates the secular rulers from
the second to the third circle, that which is the most remote from Christ (16).
The denunciation of secular authority, at least in its past and contemporary
form, is the theme of another adage, Scarabeus aquilam quaerit (A dung-beetle
hunting an eagle) of the Froben utopian edition of 1515. The eagle, Erasmus
points out, is a traditional regal symbol (Scar 182).
55
Around this analogy be-
tween eagles and kingsall kings except perhaps one or two throughout his-
tory (184)Erasmus weaves his story, which does not leave any doubts about
his mind-set concerning kings. The kings, he says, are enveloped in a black
night of ignorance of all that is good, and have anything in mind but Christ
(18485). Their behavior reflects their character and beliefs: If these gods,
these famous men, these victors have any leisure left from dicing, drinking,
hunting, and whoring, they devote it to truly regal considerations. They have no
other thought but how they may organize laws, edicts, wars, treaties, alliances,
councils, and courts, ecclesiastical and lay, in such a way that they sweep the
whole wealth of the community into their own treasury . . . (185).
Erasmuss critical attitude toward the church is, therefore, not coupled with
a positive evaluation of secular authority; he is as critical of kings at least as he
Erasmian Humanism 89
is critical of popes. He does not reject the churchs claims for temporal author-
ity in the name of secular authority. He censures the churchas well as the
stateas an autonomous intellectual, who does not represent the ideology of a
specific establishment but only the common good as he sees it. Erasmus speaks
from the position of the universal intellectual, a position that did not exist for
the fourteenth-century political philosophers. As if to emphasize Erasmuss
independence of both secular and ecclesiastical authorities, Scarabeus and Sileni
Alcibiadis were published together in 1517 by Froben in a separate edition.
As the universal intellectual Erasmus does not speak on behalf of any other
political establishment or social class. On the contrary, he severely criticizes
any and all such groups. In Sileni Alcibiadis he spews his usual contempt for
the aristocracy, branding its emblems, Julius Caesar and Alexander the Great,
as great robbers (SA 276). The common people do not fare much better.
Labeled as the stupid multitude (267) and infected as they are by gross ple-
beian blessings (276), the common people lack any sense of moral judgment
and sound reason. This deep-rooted attitude actually subverts the logic of
the narrative of the Scarabaeus. The logic of the legend Erasmus relatesthe
deadly struggle between the eagle and the dung beetle, that is, between a cruel
and arbitrary powerful person and a weak but morally superior and resilient
onenaturally leads to a sympathetic stance toward those located at the
opposite end of kings on the social spectrum, namely the common people.
But in the concluding remarks of the adage Erasmus, without any notice-
able embarrassment, turns the lesson of the story on its head, condemning
inferior and mean little men, who make trouble for great men (Scar 214).
Distancing himself from the common people Erasmus suddenly transforms
the rapacious and oppressing tyrants he so vividly described throughout his
narrative into great men.
Nor, finally, can Erasmus be seen as representing the interests of a putative
bourgeoisie. His deep suspicion and alienation of mercantile and financial
activities is clearly revealed in yet another utopian adage, A mortuo tributum
exigere.
56
The proverb, which refers to obtaining money by foul means or by
exploiting the weak, provides Erasmus with yet another platform to condemn
the rapacious and oppressive behavior of both the secular rulers and the
church.
57
Here, however, princes and prelates are coupled with the mercantile
class: the usurers who enjoyed high esteem though their activity were rejected
by pagan philosophy and Christian religion alike, as well as this sordid class
of merchants who use tricks and falsehoods, fraud and misrepresentation, in
pursuit of profit from any source.
58
From the position of the universal intellectual, Erasmus condemns Euro-
pean culture as a whole. Contemporary society, he claims, inverts the proper
scale of values: Thus gold is more valued than sound learning, ancient lineage
90 Chapter 3
more than integrity, bodily endowments more than intellectual gifts; true reli-
gion takes second place to ceremonies, Christs commandments to the decrees
of men, the mask to the true face; shadow is preferred to substance, artificial
to natural, transient to solid, momentary to eternal (SA 269).
An analysis of Erasmuss most comprehensive political work, Institutio
principis christiani, is further revealing of the unique position of Erasmian
humanism in comparison to that of other intellectuals, including most hu-
manists, in the late Middle Ages and early modern Europe. The work was the
fruit of Erasmuss renewed relationship with the Low Countries, particularly
through the chancellor of Burgundy, Jean Sauvage. In the spring of 1515
Sauvage arranged for the nomination of Erasmus to the council of Prince
Charles, the future emperor Charles V. The Education of a Christian Prince
was Erasmuss payment for the appointmentthe only payment, as Erasmus
insisted that his freedom be preserved and that the nomination would be
only nominal (Ep 392).
59
Institutio principis belongs, at least partially, to the genre of guidebooks
for princes (speculum principis). The genre originated in classical Greece
and was extant throughout the Middle Ages. During the Renaissance it
was enthusiastically adopted by those humanists who served princes. The
genre was an expression of monarchical ideology throughout its history.
The authors of the various guidebooks either stated or assumed that one-
man rule was the best of possible regimes. Describing the qualities of a
good princeas opposed to a tyranteach of these texts also explicitly or
implicitly affirmed the authority and majesty of the specific ruler to whom
it was addressed.
60
To some extent, Erasmuss work, which was printed together with his
translation of Isocrates guidebook for princes, the first speculum principis,
shares these characteristics of the genre. In the opening sentence of his dedica-
tory letter Erasmus describes Charles as the greatest of princes (IP 203), and
goes on to declare that the prince had no need of any mans advice, least of
all mine, and that he only uses Charless name for setting forth the ideal or
perfect prince for the general good (204). Such typical dedicatory language
highlights the patronage relationship that existed between the prince and the
humanist, the latter putting himself in the service of the former. As a writer
of a guidebook for princes Erasmus participated in a ritual of legitimacy ad-
dressed to the ruler,
61
implicitly propagating the hegemonic political and
social ideology.
This is, however, only one side of the picture, for Erasmuss position vis-
-vis power as reflected in Christian Prince is very different from the position
of the other writers of mirrors for princes. Erasmus speaks from a position of
full moral and intellectual authority. Even his dedicatory letter, the platform
Erasmian Humanism 91
in which the humanists usually acknowledged in the strongest possible terms
their inferiority in relation to their patrons, is equivocal. Together with the
requisite praises, Erasmus does not shy away from mentioning that Charles
(who was fifteen years old at the time) is still very young and recently invested
with government, and so has not yet had the opportunity to do very much
that in other princes is matter for praise or blame. He even implies that the
future emperor ought to voluntarily hand over part of his vast dominions
(204). Erasmuss interpretation of the emblematic encounter between Alex-
ander the Great and Diogenes is indicative of his vision of the correct relation-
ship between intellectual and ruler. Noting Alexanders famous remark that,
if he were not himself, he would like to be Diogenes, Erasmus comments that
in fact, the more severe the storms that must be faced by great power, the
more he well might wish for the mind of a Diogenes (203).
62
These characteristics become all the more conspicuous in the body of the
text. Erasmus declares that he has arranged his work in aphorisms for the
readers convenience (204), and Richard Hardin convincingly argues that the
use of this literary genre was a mark of self-confidence and authority.
63
And
indeed, Christian Prince is read as a collection of moral imperatives, not to say
commands, that the prince himself, his parents, his educators, and Christians
generally ought to memorize and fulfill. One example will demonstrate the
tone of the work: Discipline yourself according to the rule of honour, and
judge yourself by that, Erasmus preaches to the prince, and adds: and if
there is nobody left for you to outdo, then compete with yourself, since the
finest contest of all, and one truly worthy of an invincible prince, is to struggle
daily to improve upon oneself (228).
Erasmuss work abounds with moral imperatives. The traditional distinc-
tion between a true king and a tyrantthe former rules for the general good
while the latter for his own benefitsfor example, is repeated in the text nu-
merous times.
64
The force of Erasmuss work lies, however, in its translation
of these abstract moral imperatives into concrete social observations and criti-
cism. In this manner Erasmus reviews the accepted artistic representations of
kings: There is a certain implicit flattery in portraits, statues, and inscrip-
tions. Thus Apelles flattered Alexander the Great by painting him brandishing
a thunderbolt; and Octavius enjoyed being painted in the likeness of Apollo.
He admits that this phenomenon may seem trivial to some people, but
insists that it is nevertheless of considerable importance, and that artists
should represent the prince in the dress and manner that is most worthy of
a wise and distinguished prince (248). The very attention of such customs
differs not only from the schematic and abstract nature of scholastic political
writings but from most humanist ones as well. In his chapter entitled The
business of princes in peacetime, Erasmus dwells on several princely duties.
92 Chapter 3
These include amending bad laws and customs, ridding his domain of rob-
bery and crime with the least possible bloodshed, enhancing his cities with
public buildings such as bridges, colonnades, churches, embankments and
aqueducts, diverting rivers, improving food supplies by ensuring that fields
are tilled and so on and so forth (28081). As always, the concrete discussion
is imbued with moral dimension. In concluding the list of the princes duties,
for instance, Erasmus states that there are a thousand similar tasks, whose
supervision is an admirable job for the prince, and even a pleasant one for the
good prince, so that he will never feel the need, bored by inactivity, to seek
war or to waste the night gambling (281).
The combination of Erasmuss position of moral superiority and his
concrete approach toward reality has a sharp critical edge. As Tracy notes,
Erasmus criticizes in Institutio principis a series of practices directly related to
Burgundian policy and the Habsburg dynasty.
65
Erasmus, for instance, cen-
sured the practice of taxing the population in order to finance foreign tours
(260) soon after Sauvage succeeded in receiving from the Estates of Brabant
and Flanders a grant to finance Charless journey to Austria. The most strik-
ing example of this type is Erasmuss censure of political marriages and his
insistence that a prince ought to marry within his realm. Indeed, the subject
seemed to him important enough to deserve a separate chapter in which he
argued that the mutual love that should exist between the prince and his sub-
jects depends on a common fatherland, similar characteristics of body and
mind, and a sort of national aura (277). It is indicative of Erasmuss standing
that he allowed himself to articulate such arguments in a work written for a
prince who stood to inherit a vast and nationally heterogeneous empire that
was procured to a large extent by the marriage strategy of his ancestors. The
issue of political marriage is also the occasion of a rare reflection on Erasmuss
part concerning his social isolation. I can see that this custom is too well
established for me to hope that it can be uprooted, he remarks, but then im-
mediately adds: but I thought it right to speak out, just in case things should
turn out contrary to my expectations (279).
Whether Erasmus had his royal patron in mind when he made these com-
ments is a matter of conjecture. The important point is that the practices he
condemned were part and parcel of contemporary political culture. Erasmuss
rejection of them is only one expression of the most salient characteristics of
Institutio principis, namely its condemnation of the aristocratic ethos and court
culture, which were the foundation of the social and political order in northern
Europe. His sweeping denunciation that addressed almost every aspect of the
aristocratic worldview and way of life is repeated throughout the text.
Erasmus reveals his distaste of hereditary monarchy and his preference for
an elected one in the opening sentences of the work. From the outset, this
Erasmian Humanism 93
position is related to his aversion to the aristocratic ideals. Kingdom ought
to be entrusted to a person with the qualities of a true king, says Erasmus.
Family trees, gold, and jewels are no more relevant to governing a state than
they are pertinent to a sea-captain in steering his ship, he adds in sharpen-
ing his point (206). The attacks on aristocracy, its values, and its way of life
become even more bitter and violent later on in the text. Explaining why the
education of the prince ought to begin at an early age, Erasmus gives clear
expression of his views concerning the nature of chivalric culture:
How can you expect anything but evil from a prince who, whatever his nature
at birth (and a good lineage does not guarantee a mind as it does a kingdom),
is subjected from the very cradle to the most stupid ideas and spends his boy-
hood among silly women and his youth among whores, degenerate comrades,
the most shameless flatterers, buffoons, street-players, drinkers, gamblers, and
pleasure-mongers as foolish as they are worthless. (209)
The censure of aristocratic culture is an all-pervading theme of Institutio
principis. Only when taking it into account can we understand, for instance,
the relation between Erasmuss rejection of political marriage and his criti-
cism of the reigning artistic representations of princes. The same assump-
tions informed his disapproval of the common honorary titles of High-
ness, Sacred Majesty and even the Invincible and the Famous, which
seem to him overly flattering. He prefers titles that remind the prince in
some way of his office. These include Most Wise, Most Merciful and
Most Temperate (248). Similarly, Erasmus utterly condemns sumptu-
ous consumption (268) and chivalric literature: the stories of Arthur and
Lancelot and other legends of that sort, which are not only tyrannical but
also utterly illiterate, foolish, and on the level of old wives tales (250).
Erasmus repeatedly attacks the cherished emblems of aristocracy, most
particularly the historical and mythological heroes embodying aristocratic
values. Achilles, Alexander the Great, Julius Caesar, and their likes are, for
Erasmus, raging bandits. Taking them as models of behavior is nothing
short of madness (216, 25052). However, the statement most revealing
of Erasmuss estrangement from aristocratic culture is a much less aggres-
sive one, namely his suggestion that the nobles instruct their sons in some
sedentary occupation. There is a twofold advantage in this idea he care-
fully elaborates. First, young men preoccupied with their studies will be
kept away from many temptations. Secondly, the vagaries of fortune may
make the acquired skill necessary (268). Erasmus does not understandor
perhaps pretends not to understandthat the nobilitys own self-under-
standing precludes occupation, being based, rather, on a natural quality
incommensurable with utilitarian considerations.
94 Chapter 3
Erasmuss rejection of the aristocratic ethos was based on the humanist
identification of nobilitas with virtus rather than with lineage. We have already
noted that, while the humanist conception of vera nobilitas was compatible
with the political ideology of most fifteenth-century Italian states in which
humanism flourished, it was obviously contrary to the hegemonic political
ideology in northern Europe. Most northern humanists, in contrast to Eras-
mus, sought to reconcile the tenets of humanist discourse with the dominant
ideology. One strategy was to formally retain the humanist notion of nobility
as virtue but to argue that virtue is usually to be found among the members
of the aristocracy.
66
This neutralized the egalitarian antiaristocratic dimension
of humanist discourse.
Such a strategy is employed, for example, by Thomas Elyot in his important
work, The Book Named the Governor.
67
Elyot, the most Erasmian of the
English humanists in the generation succeeding Erasmus,
68
was also a strong
supporter of dynastic monarchy and aristocratic values.
69
He subscribes to the
humanist position that virtue and humanist education are the precondition
for public service. Indeed, much of his book is dedicated to the propagation of
liberal education. At the same time, however, he seeks to restrict public service
to the upper classes. He therefore argues, for instance, that persons with stable
possessions can invest more in their childrens education and that, because
they have their own revenues, they are less likely to be desirous of lucre (dis-
guising, of course, the fact that these alleged advantages belong to the rich in
general, and not only owners of stable possessions). Elyots rhetoric clearly
reveals both the tensions between humanist and aristocratic values as well as
the authors determination to defuse them: it is of good congruence that they
which be superior in condition or haviour should have also pre-eminence in
administration. And Moreover where virtue is in a gentleman it is com-
monly mixed with more sufferance, more affability and mildness, than for the
more part it is in a person rural or of a very base lineage; and when it hap-
peneth otherwise, it is to be accounted loathsome and monstrous.
70
Erasmuss attitude toward the aristocratic ethos attests to his independence
vis--vis the dominant classes. In fact, the difference between Erasmus and
the other northern humanists in this respect is only one manifestation of
deeper differences concerning politics. Erasmuss identity as the universal in-
tellectual put him in a position to detect negative possibilities inherent in hu-
manist discourse that were ignored by other humanists and to challenge views
that were universally accepted by them. Most significant in this respect is
Erasmuss rejection in Institutio principis of any political virtue, imperative, or
even analytical concept that is not reducible to ethics. There is neither majesty
nor glory in Erasmuss vision of monarchy. Indeed, there is no place at all for
power in his vision of politics. Erasmus often employs evangelical language in
Erasmian Humanism 95
making this point. Always bear in mind, he reminds the prince, implicitly
referring to notions of evangelical freedom and equality, that the words do-
minion [dominium], imperial authority [imperium], kingdom [regnum],
majesty [majestatem], and power [potentiam] are pagan terms, not Chris-
tian. The true Christian prince is nothing more than an administrator who
dedicates all his time and energy to his subjects: the imperial authority of
Christians is nothing other than administration [administrationem], benefac-
tion [beneficentiam], and guardianship [custodiam] (IP 233; LB 4: 577D). It
is not surprising, in light of this conceptual framework, that Erasmus could
calmly recommend that the prince abdicate if he cannot defend his kingdom
without violating justice or causing bloodshed (217), and even if he simply
cannot be a good man, while being a good prince (243).
The insistence on reducing all politics to ethics separates Erasmuss politi-
cal discourse from that of most other humanists, Italian as well as northern-
ers, republican as well as monarchist. To be sure, humanist political writings
were heavily moralizing. Nevertheless, humanist political discourse endowed
at least some autonomy to politics in relation to ethics and religion. This was
not usually explicitly acknowledged; indeed it is not clear to what extent the
humanists were aware of it. But it was surely implied by the assumptions,
concepts and categories they employed to analyze and represent the political
realm. This can be seen when the distinct image of man that informed hu-
manist political discourse is considered. The humanists ideal was a man,
who, by his virt, overcomes all obstaclesall of Fortunas vagariesin
fashioning reality according to his will.
71
This was, of course, a central insight
of Burckhardt, who explored the various expressions of this virilevirt is
derived from the Latin vir, or mancreative and aggressive notion in Ital-
ian society, politics and culture.
72
The political manifestation of this ideal was
the perception of man as a political animal whose ultimate goal was to acquire
glory, honor and fame by excelling in an agonistic competition with others.
73

This ethos precludes the reduction of politics to ethics. It has at least a latent
aggressive dimension, one that could potentially provoke amoral and even
immoral conduct. These negative facets were usually sublimated or disguised
in humanist political discourse as most humanists argued that political virtues
were compatible with ethics. The Florentine civic humanists of the quat-
trocento, to take one example, believed that the striving of each individual
to achieve personal excellence in a free society would contribute to the well-
being of the republic as a whole.
74
In fact, even the civic humanists made an
explicit separation of politics from ethics in the field of foreign policy. Their
republicanism was overtly particularistic and imperialistic and they did not
feel the slightest embarrassment when denying conquered city-states the free-
doms they considered to be crucial to the individual and the collective.
75
96 Chapter 3
A comparison to Machiavelli enables us to precisely identify the unique na-
ture of Erasmuss position. Machiavelli spelled out the radical potential inher-
ent in humanist political discourse. He clearly presented, and dramatized, the
incompatibility between the Christian creed and the classical ethos. He clearly
also understood, and consented to, the implications of the autonomy given to
the political realm, namely the separation between political virtues and moral
ones and the consequent sanctioning of immoral actions in politics.
76
These
disturbing insights, together with the authors unequivocal choices, are the
source of the Florentines fame and notoriety.
Erasmus shares Machiavellis fundamental insights concerning the impli-
cations of perceiving the political realm as autonomous. Erasmuss choices,
though as clear as Machiavellis, were diametrically opposed to his. He denies
any autonomy to politics, and consequently rejects any value or conduct that
is not strictly compatible with ethics. Institutio principislike Il principe and
the Discorsi, but from an inverted perspectiveought thus to be read as an
implicit critique against the dogmatic assumptions of traditional human-
ist political thought. Erasmus, like Machiavelli, perceived what most other
humanists could not or would not, namely that the construction of an au-
tonomous political discourse disjoins politics from ethics. He also understood
that political discourse that is kept separate from ethics, even to the smallest
degree, is inherently prone to be appropriated by the powerful to legitimize
their rule and immoral policies.
It must be stressed that the difference between Erasmus and the other
humanists is related to their different social positions, indeed different iden-
tities. We have seen that most humanists were related to a specific establish-
ment, or at least to a specific political community. We have also seen that
humanist discourse perceived knowledge as practical and affirmed the vita
activa. The humanists political thought was consequently theoretically and
morally legitimately embedded in a particular political and ideological mi-
lieu. Indeed, most political works composed in the humanist tradition were
written on behalf of a specific polity, and the political theories elaborated
or propagated in them were reflective of the dominant ideologies. From this
perspective the humanists insistence on the compatibility between politi-
cal virtue and ethical values was linked to their adherence to the dominant
ideology (for ideology always tries to anchor politics in ethics and to present
the political order as a moral one). From the Republic of Letters Erasmus
could clearly perceive this ideological dimension of humanist political
thought. In response to this diagnosis and as an intellectual who does not
speak on behalf of any specific political community or ideology, but, rather,
on behalf of Christendom as a whole, Erasmus insists on the complete re-
duction of politics to ethics.
Erasmian Humanism 97
Erasmuss pacifist writings best exemplify his humanism. As distinctive
products of the Republic of Letters, they provide sharp insight into the Eras-
mian image of man and society and into his projects for social enlightenment
and melioration. They are also the clearest expression of Erasmuss position of
intellectual and moral superiority vis--vis Europes rules and dominant classes.
Erasmus was not alone in his distress over the continuous wars in Europe, which
escalated after 1494, when Italy became a battleground of the major European
powers. He was undoubtedly encouraged by the opposition of some of his Eng-
lish friendsnotably, Cardinal Warham and John Coletto Henry VIIIs war
against France in the second decade of the sixteenth century.
77
But Erasmus was
the most decisive and prominent pacifist among his contemporaries, publishing
his views in several works that enjoyed a wide circulation.
78
We have already seen how his pacifist writings gave expression to Erasmuss
rehabilitation of human nature, to his rejection of the Augustinian distinction
between internal disposition and external behavior and to his consequent
conviction that a fully civilized, Christian and humanist society could be es-
tablished, at least in principle, by human efforts. Erasmuss struggle against
the doctrine of just wara central issue in his pacifist writingsdemon-
strates additional aspects of Erasmian humanism, namely its independence
and opposition to the dominant ideology. In Dulce bellum he flatly rejects the
doctrine accepted by mainstream Christian thought after Augustine. Without
any hesitation, he censures the theologians (referring to the church fathers
and mentioning Bernard and Aquinas by name) who propagated the just war
doctrine and the popes who accepted it (DB 4267).
79
Erasmus does not argue that waging war is prohibited under any circum-
stances (a position difficult to defend indeed). Instead, like a good humanist,
he undercuts centuries of abstract discussion about just war by showing
that the notion, as it was elaborated by philosophers and theologians, is sim-
ply irrelevant to European reality in the sixteenth century:
If some claim or other seems to constitute a cause for war, then human affairs are
in such a confused state, and there have been so many changes, that there can be
no one who does not have a claim. What nation has not at some time both been
driven out of its homeland and driven others out? . . . How many times has there
been a transfer of power this way or that, either by chance or by treaty? (428)
The doctrine of just war, as actually practiced, is elastic enough to justify any
war: just, however, means any war declared in any way against anybody by any
prince (425). Claims about justice, Erasmus elaborates at length in numerous
occasions throughout his pacifist writings, are only a pretext for initiating wars,
the real causes of which are the personal ambitions of rulersthe desire for
power, glory and territoryand the flattery and hypocrisy of their counselors.
80
98 Chapter 3
It is not surprising, then, that the pacifist writings are such a forceful testa-
ment to Erasmuss opposition to the dominant establishments and ideologies.
Erasmus preaches to Christendom as a whole, and to its constituent social
estates and professional groups: I call on you, princes . . . I call on you, priests
. . . I call on you, theologians . . . I call on you, bishops . . . I call on you, nobles
and magistrates . . . I call on you all alike who are counted Christians . . .
(QP 32021). He formally avoids mentioning names, but often alludes un-
mistakably to specific persons. In the Querela pacis, for example, he states that
the wars of the past ten yearsthe wars of the League of Cambrai, the Holy
League, and the French invasion of Italy in 1515were caused by nothing but
the interests of the princes (305). He goes further and alludes to even more
personal causes undoubtedly recognized by contemporaries: One discovers
or invents some mouldering, obsolete title to support his claim. . . . Another
pleads some trifling omission in a treaty covering a hundred clauses, or has a
personal grievance against his neighbour over the interception of an intended
spouse or a careless word of slander (305).
81
Erasmuss unambiguous condemnation of the much-discussed holy war
against the Turks is an indication of his readiness to voice unpopular views.
82

At the beginning of the sixteenth century there was wide agreement in Eu-
rope about the need to fight the Ottoman Empire. Erasmus rejects both the
rhetoric of self-defense mobilized to justify the war, and the idea of converting
the Turks by means of holy war (DB 43134). As we saw, he goes so far as to
assert that most Turks are half-Christian and perhaps nearer to true Christi-
anity than most nominal christians (43233).
83
Unsurprisingly, the internal
dynamics of Erasmuss discussion result in an unequivocal attack against the
powerful, the secular, as well as ecclesiastical: The rumour of war with the
Turks has been put forward as an excuse for robbing the Christian popula-
tion, so that it is broken with every sort of oppression and therefore is more
servile to the tyranny of both sorts of princes (434). The very implausibility
of this conspiracy theory underscores the unique status of Erasmus.
Thomas Mores Erasmian Utopia
We have seen that Thomas Mores four humanist letters, particularly the
formidable letter to Dorp, sought to ground humanist discourse and present
it as a comprehensive substitute for the Aristotelian-scholastic organization
of knowledge.
84
These letters, it must be emphasized, were written for the
sole purpose of supporting Erasmuss reform program.
85
More vigorously
defended all aspects of his friends activity, sometimes more forcefully than
did Erasmus himself. While Erasmus was apologetic in responding to Dorps
Erasmian Humanism 99
censures of Praise of Folly, for example, More wholeheartedly defended the
work (Ep 337; MtD 10527).
86
As to be expected, the brunt of Mores efforts
was devoted to a defense of the most controversial aspect of the Erasmian
reform program, namely religious reform. Large parts of the four humanist
letters sought to vindicate Erasmuss Novum Testamentum project and the
humanist assumptions that underlie it.
Personal friendship apart, this exhibition of loyalty was based on shared be-
liefs, specifically, Mores view of Erasmus as the ideal intellectual, or litteratus
(MtD 13).
87
Indeed, according to More, Erasmus has done more to advance
all students of sound intellectual disciplines everywhere in both secular and
sacred learning than virtually anyone elses exertions for the last several cen-
turies (MtL 161). As a true man of letters in the humanist sense, Erasmus did
not pursue learning for its own sake. It was, rather, a means of cultural and
social melioration of Christendom. Like the sun, Erasmus spreads his bounty
all over the world (MtM 299). He is the man whom no material expense
and no physical illness or danger could tear from the virtuous labors which
he was performing for the good of the entire world (MtL 167). Mores per-
sonal commitment to Erasmus and intellectual commitment to the Erasmian
reform program, particularly during the period on which this study focuses,
are therefore clearly established.
88
Mores most famous work, Utopia, should be read as an Erasmian work.
89

Erasmian humanism is the framework for accounting for the radical criticism
of the European social and political order in book 1 of the work. The denun-
ciations of injustice and immorality, of the abuse of power and authority, of
the oppression of the poor and the weak, and of the self-serving behavior that
had begotten endless factionalism and war reproduce both the content and
the moral pathos of Erasmuss works. More attacks the same social groups as
Erasmus. Most importantly, Utopia, like Erasmuss writings, rejects in toto
the aristocratic ethos and court culture. When More speaks about the great
many noblemen who live idly like drones off the labour of others, their ten-
ants whom they bleed white by constantly raising their rents; when he depicts
the King of France, surrounded by all his most judicious councillors hard at
work devising a set of crafty machinations for capturing Italy and Burgundy;
when he describes typical councillors who recommend a hypothetical king
to increase the value of money when [he] pays his debts and to devalue it
when he collects his revenues or to set up make-believe war, so that money
can be raised under that pretexthis voice is hardly distinguishable from
Erasmuss (U 5759, 83, 89).
Similarly, the Utopian social organization, depicted in book 2, and the
philosophy that legitimizes it exemplify the ideas and values of Erasmian hu-
manism. The ultimate purpose of Utopian institutions is the material welfare
100 Chapter 3
of all citizens, as well as their moral and intellectual improvement. The chief
aim of their constitution is that, as far as public needs permit, all citizens
should be free to withdraw as much time as possible from the service of the
body and devote themselves to the freedom and culture of the mind [animi
libertatem cultumque]. For in that, they think, lies the happiness of life
(135). The Utopian order apparently realized these aims. Raphael Hythloday,
the traveler-philosopher who returned from Utopia, begins his descrip-
tion of the island by remarking that the Utopians suppress almost all other
peoples in their high level of culture and humanity [cultus humanitatisque]
(111). Utopias political structure embodies the Erasmian critique of Euro-
pean politics. The island is a true republic, respublica in the literal sense of the
term, in which no individual subverts the general interest for personal gain.
All holders of political office are elected in Utopia (12123, 231). However,
all the important officials are elected from a small, effectively self-perpetuat-
ing, group of three hundred scholars in each Utopian city (131). Utopia thus
solves the Erasmian worry of and distaste for hereditary monarchies and for
aristocratic culture in general. At the same time, Mores society faithfully
upholds the fundamental principle of humanist (and not only Erasmian)
political thought, namely the notion that political power should be based on
true nobility, or virtue. Utopia therefore unsurprisingly satisfies the basic
humanist ideals of a stable and harmonious state free of social conflicts and
political factionalism.
Utopia also assigns the highest importance to learning. Indeed, in intel-
lectual pursuits [the Utopians] are tireless (181). While only the small group
of scholars dedicates its time exclusively to the pursuit of knowledge, many
of the common citizens, both men and women, attend public lectures (127).
The Utopian scholars study all the branches of learning (155). Like the
humanists, the Utopians identify knowledge as practical knowledge. Their
readiness to learn is cited as the really important reason for their being
better governed and living more happily than [the Europeans] (107). All
Utopian children are sent to school where instruction in morality and virtue
is considered no less important than learning proper. They make every effort
to instil in the pupils minds, while they are still tender and pliable, principles
useful to the commonwealth (231). The content and imagery of this passage
faithfully evoke the educational ideal of the humanists, from Pietro Paolo
Vergerio to Erasmus. The central aim of education is not to teach professional
skills but to fashion a moral and responsible citizen.
But the real achievement of Utopia is not its political and institutional
structure, nor even its citizens love of learning, but the citizens themselves
and their way of life. They are the true focus of Hythlodays narrative, and
the clearest manifestation of the Erasmian nature of Utopian society. Love
Erasmian Humanism 101
of peace, industriousness, modesty, prudence, altruism, and the love of ones
neighborthe same qualities that characterize a truly Christian and humanist
society, according to Erasmusdistinguish the Utopians and are embedded
in the principal institutions and practices of society.
In Utopia More certainly transcends Erasmuss essentially moralistic at-
titudes toward politics and explores the structural, social and economic,
causes of Europes troubles and calls for comprehensive social changes. This
divergence informs the basis of Utopias originality and greatness. It does not
contradict, however, the ideals and aims of Erasmian humanism. Utopias
sociological and economic approach does not replace the moral one but
supplements it. The ethical aspect of UtopiaMores desire to construct a
moral social orderis central to the work. It leads, for instance, to bitter
condemnations of enclosure or of the English penal system. And it informs
Mores analysis of private property as the basis for a system which amounts
to a conspiracy of the rich, (245) and of pride as the source of all social evils
(247). In the last analysis, Utopias scientific aspect is clearly subordinated
to its ethical one: the Utopian order is conceived of and presented as being the
realization of the Erasmian reform program.
Such a conclusion provides a key for evaluating the place of Utopia within
Erasmian humanism. We have seen that More was a far more theoretically
oriented and reflective thinker than was Erasmus. It is no surprise, then, that
he sought to provide a more coherent expression of Erasmuss broad, and
at times haphazard, vision. It is also no surprise that he was aware of what
was missing in Erasmuss discourse: the gap between the desire for a radical
change and the conventionally moralistic perception of social and politi-
cal issues, between the sweeping condemnation of reigning institutions and
ideologies and the inability to imagine a social order without them. More
understood, in other words, that radical reform necessitates a far more radical
change than his friend imagined.
This perspective allows us to approach the thorny issues of Utopian com-
munism and religion.
90
Abolition of private property was certainly not typical
of humanist political and social thought. Most humanists accepted property
as part of the given order, while some actively championed economic activity,
which included the accumulation of wealth, against medieval idealizations of
poverty.
91
Erasmus, on the other hand, could regard communism in a positive
light, most notably in the adage Amicorum communia omnia, which he placed
as the opening piece of the Adages.
92
David Wootton has consequently argued
that Utopian communism was a central tenet of Erasmuss reform program.
93

This would seem to overstate Erasmuss commitment to communism. His in-
vocation of communism was more a literary flight of imagination than a care-
fully considered vision of social organization (although admittedly in humanist
102 Chapter 3
discourse the distinction was rather blurred). The more probable source of
Utopias communism is, again, Mores evaluation of the preconditions for the
Erasmian reform program, or, more specifically, his conclusion that without
the abolition of private propertytogether with the elimination or reduction of
other distinctions between citizens such as status and professiona moral and
sound social order is impossible. Be that as it may, Utopian communism does
not contradict the Erasmian reform program. In fact, in his prefatory letter to
Mores work, Guillaume Bud considers communism to be one of the funda-
mental features that make Utopia a truly Christian society (13).
The non-Christian nature of Utopian society proved to be an even more
vexing problem than its communism for the humanist interpretation of Uto-
pia. Given the central place of reformed Christianity in Erasmuss vision of
reformed Europe, a non-Christian society can hardly be considered an ideal
Erasmian society. This is certainly true, but we must ask whether the Utopian
social order is ideal even for Christians. In other words, would the acceptance
of Christianitys revealed truths require an essential change in the structure
of Utopian society? The answer, in my opinion, is negative, as evidenced as
well in the answers of Hythloday and the Utopians themselves. The former
identifies Utopian social organization and the way of life with the basic prin-
ciples of Christianity (24547). The latter were often disposed to convert
to Christianity, partly because they were much influenced by the fact that
Christ approved of his followers communal way of life, and that among the
truest groups of Christians the practice still prevails (221). We have seen that
Erasmus equated secular ethics and their social and political consequences
with the practical moral, social and political imperatives derived for Christi-
anity. The fact that Utopia is not Christian does not in itself then prevent it
from embodying the practical moral, political and social values of Erasmian
humanism.
94
In fact, from a more abstract perspective, Utopias non-Christian, as well
as nonmetaphysical, discourse firmly places the work within the framework
of humanist political thought. For we have seen that humanist political dis-
courseregardless of its many variants and the contradictory political views
and theories elaborated and propagated by different humanistswas essen-
tially secular and nonmetaphysical, in the sense that it perceived and repre-
sented the political order in secular, historical and concrete categories rather
than in theological or metaphysical ones. This attitude reflected the basic
ontological presupposition of humanist discourse, namely that the political
order was a human artifact rather than a part of a cosmic or divine order. Seen
in this light, Utopia as well as the invention of the utopian genre reflect the
basic assumptions of humanist political discourse. For Utopia, by virtue of its
utopian character, is precisely an attempt to overthrow the existing order of
Erasmian Humanism 103
things, including those customs and institutions that were perceived as part
of the natural order of things. This is the theoretical basis for the abolition of
private property and aristocracy, and for perhaps even more radicalgiven
contemporary mentalityabolition of the difference between town and
country and reduction of the differences between men and women (e.g.,
11315, 12527, 21113). All aspects of the Utopian order, conversely, are a
consciously constructed human artifact. This is as true for Utopian cities and
houses (11521) as for the Utopian political structure; for the Utopians daily
routine (12729) as for their sitting order in common dining halls (14143).
95

Indeed, the text goes out of its way to underscore the artificiality of Utopia.
We become aware of this at the very beginning of the description of the ideal
state: They say (and the appearance of the place confirms this) that their
land was not always surrounded by the sea. But Utopus, who conquered the
country and gave it his name (for it had previously been called Abraxa), and
who brought its rude, uncouth inhabitants to such a high level of culture and
humanity . . . also changed its geography (111). The construction of Utopia
involves changing the natural geography, the natural nomenclature and the
very nature of the natives.
96
Here also lies the fundamental difference between Utopia and ancient
depictions of ideal societies, of which Platos The Republic is, of course, the
prime example. The Platonic republic is oriented to and governed by a tran-
scendent realm of eternal truths.
97
Utopia, by contrast, is a wholly secular and
worldly society. Utopia has religion, indeed several religions, but far from
subordinating politics to religion, Utopia perceives religion as a social institu-
tion.
98
Moreover, Utopia tries to theoretically base the Utopian order on an
explicitly antimetaphysical naturalist philosophy of pleasure, notwithstand-
ing the insurmountable difficulties involved in this attempt (15979).
99
One
of the strongest manifestations of the difference between Mores work and
Platos is the contrast between the Platonic guardians and the Utopian schol-
ars. The ideal Platonic social order hinges on creating a segregated guardian
class, whose education and way of life are designed to remove the obstacles
separating the material world from the world of eternal ideas. Much of The
Republic is dedicated to this subject, and the text emphasizes again and again
the distinction between the guardians and the other classes. Utopia, by con-
trast, is governed by scholars, whose orientation, as we have seen, is clearly
practical and social. For this reason, Utopia attempts to narrow as much as
possible the disparity between the scholars and ordinary Utopians. Indeed,
it even tries to conceal those differences that do exist. As a consequence, the
crucial political role played by the scholars is not discussed at all in the chapter
dedicated to Utopias political structure. It is mentioned only later, and then
only in a single sentence (131). While both The Republic and Utopia depict
104 Chapter 3
ideal societies, the former is one of the most important expressions of West-
ern metaphysical tradition, and the latter best exemplifies the fundamentally
antimetaphysical humanist discourse.
100
The phrase De optimo reipublicae statu in the title of Utopia is, therefore, an
explicit indication of how the Utopian order is conceived as the best possible
Erasmian social and political order. This is indeed how the book was read by
Mores fellow humanists. In fact, the text, in its published form, can almost be
seen as a collective humanist work. The letters, testamentary verses, and maps
that appeared as prefaces and postscripts to the many editions of Utopia bore
the signatures of prominent northern humanists, including Erasmus, Bud,
Thomas Lupset, Rhenanus, Giles and Busleyden. They understood Utopia to
be a work that represented basic humanist values and principles, and recog-
nized Utopia to be an ideal state, finer even than Platos republic.
101
More than any of Erasmuss works, including his pacifist writings, Utopia
demonstrates the intellectual autonomy of Erasmian humanism. Utopia radi-
cally challenges the hegemonic ideology and the prevailing social imagination.
It explicitly rejects the foundations of the social and political order, abrogat-
ing, or at least radically qualifying, those dichotomies on which society rested.
The order offered as a substitution does not embody the ideology or interests
of any specific social group or political establishment, least of all the domi-
nant ones. It solely reflects the ideals and values of the Erasmian humanist as
universal intellectual. Indeed, also from this perspective, the utopian genre
can be seen as a product of the Erasmian Republic of Letters, for this genre
is the ideal vehicle for expressing the ideas of the humanist as autonomous
intellectual.
Utopia amply proves, in short, that the Erasmian humanists had the intel-
lectual resources to envision an order radically different from the existing one,
and enough symbolic capital to present it to Christendom.
107
T
HE FIRST PART OF THIS STUDY WAS DEDICATED to a reconstruction of Erasmian
humanism built around the notion of its sociointellectual autonomy.
The Erasmian humanists constructed the identity of the universal intellectual
and the semiautonomous space of the Republic of Letters. As citizens of the
Erasmian republic they could reject the foundation of the established social
and political order and the hegemonic ideology as well as challenge some of
the basic tenets of humanist political discourse itself. Their self-understand-
ingshared by many contemporariesas autonomous intellectuals allowed
them to elaborate and present their own reform program.
We have also seen that that there was nothing natural in this position. On
the contrary, most groups of humanists were connected to political or religious
establishments and identified themselves with the dominant ideology. Indeed,
many humanists aspired to a public career in court or city administration. This
attitude reflected the professional and social dependency of the humanists on
their patrons. The humanists symbiosis with the powers that be was also related
to a basic tenet of humanist discourse itself, namely the affirmation of the vita
activa. We have further seen that this conviction was not an isolated notion,
but was rather an expression of the fundamental presuppositions of humanist
discourse, namely that human reality was inherently symbolic, that knowledge
was inherently social and hence that human activityordinary social activity
as well as intellectual activitywas interpretive and performative.
1
And indeed we have examined the great efforts Erasmus and the humanists
gathered around him had to invest in order to construct their social position:
to restructure the relationship between the humanist and his patron, and to
4
The Politics of a Disembodied Humanist
108 Chapter 4
endow the former with moral and intellectual authority that compensated for
his social inferiority.
Against this background we have good reasons to suspect that the identity
of the universal intellectual was problematic from the perspective of humanist
discourse itself. There seems to be a tension between humanisms orientation
toward public activity and the Erasmian detachment from it. From this angle
it is hard to see how the Republic of Letters, the social place of Erasmian hu-
manists, could be legitimized in humanist discourse. The rest of this study will
be dedicated to substantiating this hypothesis, by uncovering and analyzing
the manifestations of the tension between the Erasmian humanists identity
and the premises of their discourse.
But how could this investigation be carried out? The supposed internal
tension within Erasmian humanism was never acknowledged, let alone
thematized, by the Erasmian humanists. It was repressed. Repressed con-
tradictions and tensions produce, however, disruptive effects. If therefore
my hypothesis is correct, the internal tensions in Erasmian discourse must
have left their traces, in the writings of the Erasmian humanists. In order
to uncover these traces, a method of reading different from those utilized
in the previous chapters must be employed. Now the text must be decon-
structed, that is, read against its explicit argumentation and rhetoric, in
order to expose its internal strains, gaps and aporias and to highlight the
textual moments that unsettle its apparent coherency and transparency.
This is essentially a symptomatic reading, as the textual disruptions have no
meaning in themselves. They may be said to have only a negative existence,
inasmuch as their only discernable effect is the undermining of the explicit
meaning of the text.
Using this methodology, I will closely reread in this chapter some of Eras-
muss political writings discussed in the previous chapter, together with one
utopian work. In the next two chapters I will read Thomas Mores History
of Richard III and Utopia.
Christian Prince and the Ambiguities of Humanist Education
We have examined Institutio principis christiani as a clear expression of
Erasmian humanism. In the text, Erasmus unmistakably assumes the posi-
tion of the universal intellectual. From this position he criticizes numerous
accepted customs and institutions and, most importantly, ridicules and
rejects the hegemonic aristocratic culture and chivalric values. But this
reconstruction is not exhaustive, as can be readily seen when the works in-
ability to elaborate a coherent political view, let alone theory, is highlighted.
The Politics of a Disembodied Humanist 109
Indeed, acknowledging this characteristic of the text, rather than attempting
to enforce on it a spurious consistency, is a precondition for understanding
its full significance.
2
Some of the internal tensions of Institutio principis are close to the surface
of the text. They are indicated already in Erasmuss inability to formulate a
coherent opinion concerning the preferable kind of government. A dynastic
monarchy was clearly not to his liking, and he was not shy to indicate it in the
opening sentences of the work dedicated to the Burgundian prince (IP 206).
3

Throughout the text his suspicion of one mans rule and his acute awareness
of the inevitable abuse of power inherent in it are evident. But this attitude
does not lead him to espouse a nonmonarchical regime. On the contrary, in
a passage strangely at odds with his diagnosis of the ills of monarchy Erasmus
argues that it is pretty well agreed among the philosophers that monarchy
is the most healthy form of government (231). Moreover, Erasmus is un-
able to translate his suspicion of power into a concrete program. Thus, not-
withstanding his perception of the corrupting nature of power and belief that
there would probably never be a prince complete with all the virtues (231),
he always falls back on the goodwill of the absolute monarch. Ultimately, it is
up to the prince to accept and implement the moral imperatives dictated by
the intellectual: The people are unruly by nature, and magistrates are easily
corrupted by avarice or ambition. The blameless character of the prince re-
mains, as it were, the sheet-anchor for the ship of the state (220). By the same
token, notwithstanding his conviction that monarchy should preferably be
checked and diluted with a mixture of aristocracy and democracy (231),
Erasmus cannot even envisage any concreteinstitutional or socialchecks
to the princes power.
Erasmuss ambivalences are reproduced in the texts imagery. As we have
seen, Erasmus reduces the prince to an administrator by denying him any
distinctively princely quality such as majesty or imperial authority (233).
4
His
similes and metaphors, on the other hand, tend to depict a different picture.
Throughout Christian Prince Erasmus repeatedly equates the prince to a cap-
tain, a shepherd, a doctor, the king of the bees, the sun, a father, the mind,
and above all to God (e.g., 22023, 233, 241, 244). To take one example: As
God set up a beautiful likeness of himself in the heavens, the sun, so he es-
tablished among men a tangible and living image of himself, the king (221).
What is conceptually taken from the king is figuratively given back to him
with interest.
Institutio principis is incoherent in a still deeper conceptual level, namely
in its inability to consistently ground its fundamental assertion: the un-
equivocal reduction of politics to ethics. Sometimes it seems that Erasmuss
political conceptualization is a form of political evangelism (understood
110 Chapter 4
here as a position that sees an unbridgeable gap between the ethical and
political Christian imperatives and those of secular philosophy and calls for
a literal implementation of the former). Erasmus repeatedly reminds the
prince that there is an essential difference between a Christian prince and
a non-Christian one: Whenever you think of yourself as a prince, always
remember the fact that you are a Christian prince! You should be as differ-
ent from even the noble pagan princes as a Christian is from a pagan (216).
Still more important is his use of evangelical language and his allusions to
the notions of evangelical liberty and equality. If it is the part of pagan
princes to dominate, domination is not the way for a Christian to rule, he
says at one point (228). Later he employs this notion for the condemnation
of any distinctively political concepts, that is, concepts not reducible to eth-
ics. Hence his condemnation of the basic vocabulary of contemporary po-
litical thoughtdominium, imperium, regnum, majestatem, potentiamas
pagan terms not Christian. This abrogates any autonomy of the political.
Indeed, correct political behavior is nothing but the evangelical service paid
by the prince to his subject: The imperial authority of Christians is noth-
ing other than administration [administrationem], benefaction [beneficen-
tiam], and guardianship [custodiam] (233; LB 4: 577D).
5
This strain of political evangelism in Christian Princebased as it is on
the assumption of incommensurability of Christianity and secular wisdom
stands in stark contradiction to Erasmuss fundamental conviction about the
compatibility between the moral imperatives of Christianity and of classical
thought.
6
The premises of this political evangelism tend to undermine the
fundamental humanist, and specifically Erasmian, premises about human
nature. Erasmus believed that human beings could recreate themselves and
their world, including their political world, by means of their natural reason
and natural faculties.

He usually enthusiastically shared these assumptions.
Indeed, his reform program was based upon them.
7
The evangelical con-
ceptualization subverts these assumptions. By its insistence on supernatural
revelation as crucial for the construction of just and sound political order, it
implies that human natural faculties are as inherently destructive or at least
radically insufficient.
Side by side with clear evangelical assertions, however, there are in Insti-
tutio principis contradictory statements, more in line with Erasmuss usual
views concerning human nature and the relationship between reason and
faith. In fact, often immediately before or after an uncompromising evangeli-
cal assertion, Erasmus mitigates and reinterprets it. Thus, after explaining to
the prince that domination, majesty and the like are pagan terms, he hastens
to add: But if these words are still to your liking, be sure to remember how
the pagan philosophers themselves understood and expounded them: that
The Politics of a Disembodied Humanist 111
the princes authority over a people is the same as that of the mind over the
body, and that therefore the minds control is exercised for the great ad-
vantage of the body rather than for its own. . . . (233). By the same token,
just before resorting to language resonating with the notion of evangelical lib-
ertywhat a mockery it is to regard as slaves those whom Christ redeemed
with the same blood as redeemed youErasmus argues that humans are
naturally free: nature created all men free and slavery was imposed upon
nature (a fact which even the laws of the pagans concede) (234). Erasmus
assumes here that the political imperatives derived from the Christian religion
and those derived from classical thought are identical. And indeed, he goes
so far as arguing that being a philosopher is in practice the same as being a
Christian; only the terminology is different (214). The evangelical language,
which distances Christianity and secular philosophy, is replaced by its oppo-
site, a language that abrogates the distinction altogether.
It might be argued that Christian Prince is a rhetorical rather than philo-
sophical workthat Erasmuss aim was to convince and exhort rather than
to present a coherent political theoryand that in this context the employ-
ment of contradictory arguments is explicable. This may be partially true. But
it must be remembered that effective persuasion also requires some measure
of coherency. Other writings of Erasmus, not less rhetorical than Christian
Princefor example, the educational works, notably De pueriswere basi-
cally coherent. In any case, humanisms rhetorical nature must not be auto-
matically invoked in order to explain away conceptual tensions. If the texts
tensions and disruptions have their own internal logicas, I suggest, is the
case with Institutio principisit must be assumed that they are symptoms of
an underlying problem.
And indeed, Christian Princes conceptual inconsistencies are reproduced in
the literary form of work. Erasmus defines his text as a collection of aphorisms
(204). This form suited Erasmuss moralizing attitude toward politics. It may
have also underlined his position of moral and intellectual superiority.
8
But at
the same time, at least in Institutio principis, it may also attest to the authors
inability to elaborate a coherent view. As any aphorism is a discrete unit only
loosely (if at all) associated with the preceding and succeeding ones, the text
as a whole lacks center and unity. The same is true for the second important
literary characteristic of the Christian Prince, namely the numerous, literally
hundreds, of citations of and references to classical authors: Plato, Aristotle,
Xenophon, Plutarch, Cicero, Seneca and others.
9
Erasmus, however, never
tries to present, even in a superficial manner, the thought of any classical
political thinker. On the contrary, his treatment of classical political literature
dissolves the distinctiveness and unity of any specific political theory and text.
The classical heritage is fragmented and recreated as a never-dried reservoir of
112 Chapter 4
moral maxims. This attitude is especially significant as it is strikingly different
from Erasmuss attitude toward the classical heritage in other fields. In his
works on education, for instance, Erasmus thoroughly and conceptually as-
similates the classical theories and bodies of knowledge and consequently uses
them as a basis for his own original and coherent contributions. The different
attitude toward the classical heritage is yet another indication of the problem,
even threat, which political thought posed for Erasmus.
Of even greater significance than the failure to elaborate a coherent po-
litical theory in Christian Prince is the texts undermining of key notions
of Erasmian humanism, namely learning and liberal education. At first
glance this affirmation may appear strange, as Christian Prince attributes an
extravagant importance to education. Indeed, education is presented at the
beginning of the work as politically crucial: in hereditary monarchies the
proper education of the prince is the only way to ensure good government.
When the prince is born to office, Erasmus claims, the main hope of get-
ting a good prince hangs on his proper education, which should be managed
all the more attentively, so that what has been lost with the right to vote is
made up for by the care given to his upbringing (206). Hence the name of
the work and the large part it dedicates to education.
10
But a close reading
reveals that this explicit attitude hides an antihumanist and anti-Erasmian
skepticism and suspicion concerning education. This disguised distrust
regards a whole spectrum of humanist concepts and beliefs, from specific
educational themes and methods to the appreciation of the importance of
learning to the fundamental notion of education as the means for fashion-
ing a moral and responsible individual.
The attitude of Institutio principis toward the discipline of history is one
example. It must be stressed at the outset that Erasmus did not share the un-
bounded enthusiasm of many humanists to this discipline, and did not pro-
duce any historical work.
11
His appreciation of history was rather bookish. In
his De ratione studii, for example, while reviewing the long list of disciplines
which a good educator ought to master, he refers to history in one short pas-
sage: Above all, however, history must be grasped. Its application is very
widespread and not confined to the poets (RS 675). And, as Peter Bietenholz
notes, Erasmus significantly mentions only one historian, the didactic col-
lector of exempla, Valerius Maximus.
12
In De copia, by the same token, the
treatment of history is utterly technical: for the humanist writer (for whom
Erasmus composed the work) history is a pool of positive and negative ex-
amples (Co 60810). In sum, Erasmus was usually rather indifferent toward
the discipline of history.
In Institutio principis, however, this attitude is changed. Nowfrom the
political perspectivethe discipline seems problematical and dangerous.
The Politics of a Disembodied Humanist 113
The defensive tone of Erasmuss first words on the subject proves that he
knew how different his views were from the traditional humanist convic-
tions. Now I would not deny, to be sure, that a considerable wisdom can be
gathered from reading the historians, he says, but immediately qualifies this
commonplace: but you will also take in the most destructive ideas from these
same writers unless you are forearmed and read selectively. He subsequently
disqualifies some classical writers: Both Herodotus and Xenophon were pa-
gans and very often depict the worst image of a prince, even if in doing so they
were writing history, whether telling an enjoyable story or painting a picture
of an outstanding leader. Other historians are only somewhat more posi-
tively evaluated: Much of what Sallust and Livy write is indeed admirable,
and, I would add, all of it scholarly, but they do not approve everything that
they recount and they approve of some things which should by no means be
approved of by a Christian prince (IP 251). Livy and Sallust were the most
appreciated historians by the humanists, and their moral values were unques-
tionable.
13
The fact that even they arouse such suspicions attests to a general
anxiety concerning history.
14
The misgivings concerning history are, moreover, only one manifestation
of skepticism toward learning in general. This suspicion is clearly implied by
the reading list that Erasmus prepares for the young prince. He recommends
several books from the Bible: the proverbs of Solomon, Ecclesiasticus, the
Book of Wisdom and the Gospels (250). Other parts of the scripture, par-
ticularly of the Old Testament, are felt to be dangerous and must be therefore
taught with caution: The prince must be forewarned not to think that he
should imitate straight away even what he reads in the Scripture. He should
learn that the battles and carnage of the Hebrews and their savage cruelty to
their enemies are to be interpreted allegorically; otherwise they make perni-
cious reading (252). Next comes classical literature, and here Erasmuss list is
surprisingly short. It includes, in fact, only Plutarchs Apophthegms and Mora-
lia, Seneca, Platos The Republic
15
(and its restatement in Ciceros The Laws)
and good many extracts from Aristotles Politics and Ciceros Offices. Thats
all. This list stands in stark contrast to Erasmuss usual humanist endorse-
ment of comprehensive learning, and especially of a thorough knowledge
of classical literature. To give one example, in his De ratione studii Erasmus
recommends for the first stage of learningthat is, the stage of learning the
classical languagesLucian, Demosthenes, Herodotus, Aristophanes, Homer
and Euripides for Greek, and Terence, selected comedies of Plautus, Virgil,
Horace, Cicero, Caesar and Sallust for Latin (RS 669). How different is this
calm nomination of canonical authors for the use of children at the very be-
ginning of their education from the diet recommended for the prince! Only
when education is presented within the framework of political discussion
114 Chapter 4
does Herodotuss paganism and his wont of depicting the worst image of a
prince disturb Erasmus. By the same token, while in Christian Prince, Cae-
sartogether with other classical historical and mythological heroes such as
Achilles, Xerxes and Cyrusis dubbed a raging bandit (IP 251), in De ratione
studii he is simply a model for good Latin style.
Over and beyond the different evaluations of this or that writer, there is a
profound difference between Institutio principis and Erasmuss educational
writings concerning the very conception of learning. The educational writings
unwaveringly perceive and present learning as good in itself and as the central
means for cultural renewal. Thus De ratione studii, for instance, cherishes
even the most marginal information to be found in classical writings on such
subjects as cooking, minerals and plants (RS 674). Its idealwhich could not
be achieved by any student, but should at least characterize the teacheris
encyclopedic knowledge. The teacher must range through the entire spec-
trum of writers so that he reads, in particular, all the best, but does not
fail to sample any author, no matter how pedestrian (672). The warnings,
restrictions and censorship in Christian Prince, on the other hand, disclose
an anxiety about learning. Knowledge suddenly appears dangerous and po-
tentially destructive, as it becomes clear that it could serve immoral purposes
just as easily as moral ones. This may seem a quite realistic appreciation, but
it certainly did not characterize mainstream humanist educational thought.
Most humanists, and Erasmus above all, believed that learning was a central
means for moral improvement. So entrenched was this assumption that it was
often simply taken for granted. In other cases, usually in response to criticism
from the opponents of humanism, it was explicitly defended. In De ratione
studii, for instance, Erasmus explicitly rejects the possibility of contradiction
between learning and ethics: if some passage is encountered which may cor-
rupt the young, he argues, the agility of the teacher would ensure that far
from its harming their morals it may in fact confer some benefit, namely by
concentrating their attention, partly on annotation of the passage, partly on
loftier thoughts (683).
The questioning of the moral efficacy of learning brings us closer to the
core issue of liberal education, namely the humanist conviction that educa-
tion can fashion the individual as moral Christian and responsible citizen. We
have seen that also in this respect Erasmus stands at the pinnacle of humanist
educational thought. His De pueris is perhaps the most forceful presenta-
tion of the notion of humanist education. Following his Italian predecessors
Erasmus argues that education is crucial for human happiness (Puer 301),
for achieving the good life of the individual (303) and for society as a whole
(307, 314). Even more than his predecessors Erasmus emphasizes that the
very humanitas of man is the product of humanist education: Man without
The Politics of a Disembodied Humanist 115
education has no humanity at all (298).
16
Education is perceived as a process
of the moral and intellectual fashioning of personality. It is a transformative
process in which the child gradually internalizes the Christian and humanist
moral values and becomes a humane and Christian individual.
This strong belief in the power of education and the presupposed assump-
tion concerning the positive potential inherent in men and women were often
conveyed in humanist educational writings by agricultural and nutritional
metaphors. Human beings are easily taught virtue, says Erasmus in De pueris,
since the seeds that nature has implanted in us to attain to this goal are burst-
ing with life; the only thing that is required, in addition to this natural inclina-
tion, is the effort of a dedicated teacher (310). And by the same token he calls
the father to carefully choose a teacher to whose care you may safely entrust
your son to receive the proper nourishment for his mind and to imbibe, as
it were, with the milk that he suckles, the nectar of education (299). This
organic imagery was common for the description of humanist education as it
clearly expressed two central and related humanist notions. First, it implied
that the educational process was a natural one, in the sense that men and
(in a different way) women were predisposed by nature toward the aims of
liberal education. The seeds, as Erasmus says, are already in the human soul,
and all the educator does is help them to run their natural course. Secondly,
it presents education as a process of internalization: the imparted values and
precepts of conduct become an immanent, organic part of the mature edu-
cated individual.
17
Similar metaphors appear also at the beginning of Institutio principis. The
mind of the future prince must be filled from the very cradle with healthy
thoughts, says Erasmus, and continues: And from then on the seeds of mo-
rality must be sown in the virgin soil of his infant soul so that, with age and
experience, they may gradually germinate and mature and, once they are set,
may be rooted in him throughout his whole life (IP 206). In other passages,
however, the organic imagery turns out to be more equivocal. The richer
the soil, the more readily it is invaded by useless grasses and weeds, Erasmus
discovers when he thinks about the upbringing of the prince: So it is with a
mans character: the more promising, the more noble, the more upright it is,
the more it is at the mercy of many shameful vices unless it is nourished by
wholesome teachings (211). In other places the organic imagery is replaced
by a different one, which betrays a very different attitude toward education.
The princes educator must encourage the future rulers good inclination
and fortify the young mind with healthy precepts against his bad ones,
Erasmus says, and adds: But it is not enough just to hand out the sorts of
maxims which warn him off evil things and summon him to the good. No,
they must be fixed [infigenda sunt] in his mind, pressed in [infulcienda sunt],
116 Chapter 4
and rammed [inculcanda sunt] home (210; LB 4: 563F). The assault on the
princes mind reveals a repressed skepticism concerning the efficacy of liberal
education. And the violent mechanical metaphors undermine the humanist
notion of education so beautifully expressed by the organic similes, namely
that the human mind is receptive to the fundamental moral values. The im-
ages of etching and pressing imply not a conscious and volitional transforma-
tion of personality, but rather its molding by external and alien force. Educa-
tion, in other words, becomes indoctrination. And indeed in Christian Prince,
Erasmus slides to an analogy between education and taming of wild animals:
For, given that there is no wild animal so fierce and savage that it cannot be
controlled by the persistent attention of a trainer, why should he think that
any human spirit is so hopelessly crude that it will not respond to painstaking
education? (210).
This ambiguitybetween conscious self-fashioning and coercive molding
from the outsidemay be immanent to liberal education, which aspires to
fashion the individuals character and personality. But from our perspective
the important point is the difference between Erasmuss general educational
writings and Institutio principis. While the former overwhelmingly represent
the notion of liberal education as a process of volitional internalization of val-
ues, the latter implies that education is a sort of indoctrination. I suggest that
what brings about the change is the specific political context of the discussion
of education in Christian Prince. Erasmus implicitly acknowledges this when he
says that no other time is so suitable for moulding and improving the prince
as when he does not yet understand that he is the prince (207). The education
of the prince, which Erasmus offers at the beginning of his work as the main
safeguard for just and sound political order in northern Europe, turns out to
be more and more problematic. Indeed, far from solving the political problem,
the discussion of the education of the prince subverts the fundamental as-
sumptions of humanist education itself. Its apparent simplicity notwithstand-
ing, Institutio principis turns out to be riddled with internal strains.
Pacifism and Primitivism
We have seen that Erasmuss pacifist writings are the distinctive manifestation
of Erasmian humanism. The author of these works is the universal intellec-
tual, the educator of Christendom. As such, Erasmuss condemnation of the
dominant classes, ideology and culture is most clear as his own vision of fully
civilized human beings and society.
18
In contrast to the incoherency and the
loose literary structure of Christian Prince, the pacifist writingsconcentrat-
ing on one issue, closest to the heart of Erasmussinglemindedly consistent.
The Politics of a Disembodied Humanist 117
For these reasons they are a particularly interesting test case for the examina-
tion of the internal tension within Erasmian humanism.
At the base of Erasmuss pacifism lies the conviction that human beings by
their nature and Christians by their creed could and should live in a state of
undisturbed peace, where peace is taken as the epitome of both the individu-
als ethical way of life and the moral and harmonious political order. If people
acted according to the imperatives of nature, reason and faith there would be
no war. But if this is the case a question arises: why, in fact, are human beings
in general and Christians in particular so often engaged in wars against each
other? Answering this question Erasmus concludes in Dulce bellum inexpertis
that it must have been a gradual process that led to the present situation: It
must have been by many stages that [man] descended to such an extraordi-
nary madness (DB 407). And he indeed resorts to two stories of the Fall:
from a primordial golden age and from the state of primitive Christianity.
The first, taken in its general lines from Ovids Metamorphoses, is a uni-
versal story concerning the decline of humanity as a whole.
19
Thus the story
begins: Long ago therefore when the first primitive men lived in the forests,
naked, without fortifications or homes, they were sometimes attacked by
savage beasts. It was with these that man first went to war (407). This first
bloodshed was the only one that was done solely for self-defense and was
therefore the only justified one. It was, however, a first step into a slope. Men
soon started to hunt animals for their skinsthe first murdersand later
for eating, an act that Erasmus likens to patricide, cannibalism and prostitu-
tion of virgins in religious rites (408). Habituating himself to killing, man
incited by anger, began to attack his own species with fists, clubs and stones.
However, this kind of barbarity remained for a long time a matter of fight-
ing between individuals. But with the passage of time, people started to
band together in groups of kin, neighbors and friends, and to conduct battles
with rival groups. The scope and the sophistication of these battles increased
with time. Moreover, a cultural code that sanctioned values of virility and
heroism, which in turn propagated war, came into being (409). The scope
of war became ever larger as cities and kingdoms began to make war with
each other. Yet even at this stage some inhibitions, traces of the humanity of
the earliest times, still remained, and Erasmus cites some classical war cus-
toms. Through constant war and bloodshed the great empires emerged, and
power had fallen into the hands of the most criminal sorts of mortals (410;
see also 42122). The situation continued to deteriorate until the madness
has reached such a point that life consists of nothing else. Now a situation
of continuous war of all against all prevails: race against race, people against
people, brother against brother and, worst of all, Christian against Christian.
And still worse, no one is surprised at this, no one denounces it (411).
118 Chapter 4
The most striking feature of the narrative is that it undermines the human-
ist, and particularly the Erasmian, image of man. Erasmus, who taught that
the very humanitas of humans is a product of culture, who confidently de-
clared in De pueris that primitive man, living a lawless, unschooled, promis-
cuous life in the woods, was not human, but rather a wild animal (Puer 304),
sees now primitive man as the apex of humanity. Unsurprisingly, however, he
cannot say anything positive about primitive man besides his peaceful nature.
Here the contrast between his golden age and that of the classical tradition is
most significant. In contrast to the classical writers, Erasmus does not dwell
on the bliss of life in nature without the shackles of civilization. For Ovid,
for example, the golden age was an age of eternal spring, of rivers of milk
and rivers of nectar, of supernatural abundance mirrored in a state of moral
perfection, in which faith and righteousness were cherished by men of their
own free will.
20
For Erasmus, the only thing that can be said about primitive
existence is that the first primitive men lived in the forests, naked, without
fortifications or homes (DB 407), and even this description appears in a sub-
ordinated clause of a sentence that actually relates the negative aspect of this
way of lifethe attacks of the savage beastswhich led in turn to civilization.
Primitivism simply cannot be defended in Erasmian discourse.
Ultimately, the disturbing conclusion of Erasmuss story is the immanent
connection it makes between war and civilization. His narrative depicts a
strict correlation between the civilizing process and the intensification of war
and violence. There was no war at the stage of primitive humanity, when men
and women wandered naked in the wilderness. Man became a political animal
when he began to war: a man was considered brave and a leader if he had
driven off attacking beasts from his fellow humans (4078). And from then
on, any development in social organization went hand in hand with intensifi-
cation of war. Indeed, Erasmus does not leave this link implicit: malice grew
gradually side by side with civilization [rerum cultu] (40910; LB 2: 956B).
While the Erasmian reform program was based on the notion of a process of
personal as well as social melioration, in the adage the process of civilization
is a story of linear, unqualified fall. Erasmuss own time becomes the ultimate
lunacy, an age beyond redemption. The inversion of the usual Erasmian no-
tions could hardly be more radical.
Erasmus returns to the same issue later in the adage, long after he finishes
relating the myth, and this time his discussion clearly reveals the problematic
nature of the story. The occasion is a comparison between the ancient kings
and heroes and the Christian ones. In line with the overall pessimistic percep-
tion of Dulce bellum, he argues that the former were much better than their
successors. Not that he liked Xerxes, Alexander the Great and their likes. On
the contrary, Erasmus dubs them raving bandits (421). The only ambition
The Politics of a Disembodied Humanist 119
of these pagan monarchs, he says, was achieving glory. But he hastens to add
that, in contrast to the Christian princes,
they took pleasure in increasing the prosperity of the provinces they had sub-
jugated in war; where rustic peoples were without education or law and living
like wild beasts, they brought refinement and the arts of civilization [civilibus
artibus]; they populated uncultivated regions by building towns; they fortified
unsafe places, and made mens lives easier by building bridges, wharves, em-
bankments, and a thousand other such amenities, so that it turned out beneficial
to be conquered. (423; LB 2: 962F)
Once again Erasmus associates war and civilization, and now the result is
ambiguous to its core: the golden age of primitive humanity is altogether
dropped. The usual humanist perspective is naturally taken: before the arts
of civilization were introduced, people were simply barbarous, indeed simi-
lar to wild animals. But again, civilization is immanently related to war. The
evaluation of civilization is therefore inherently equivocal: it brings with it
material advantages and prosperity as well as social and intellectual advance-
ment. And yet all these advantages are causally attributed to war. It was nec-
essary to be subdued by war and conqueredby raving bandits whose only
ambition was gloryin order to enjoy civilization. Civilization turns out to
be the source of both good and evil. Human history becomes a process of
melioration as well as degradation.
Dulce bellum also challenges the premises of humanist discourse concern-
ing the nature of social reality. Humanism assumed as we saw that the human
world was a human artifact, the product of human desires, decisions and ac-
tions. History was therefore understood and represented in secular categories,
rather than in theological or metaphysical ones. Erasmuss narrative, by con-
trast, is quasi-mythological. It describes the unfolding of a predestined fate in
accordance to objective, quasi-natural and certainly nonhuman, forces.
A similar paradox surfaces in Erasmuss second story of fall, which meant
to answer a narrower question than the first: how is it possible that Christians
make war? Also here Erasmus argues that war could have become acceptable
only by gradual process of decline. His views concerning the causes of this
process are, however, quite surprising, for Erasmus puts the blame on nothing
else but learning. The first Christians, he relates, dispensed with erudition al-
together. Whatever secular knowledge they acquired before becoming Chris-
tians they employed for pious uses. Learning and eloquence were intro-
duced into Christianity on the pretext of combating heresy and immediately
an ostentatious love for controversy crept in (419). With the passing of time
learning brought about the replacement of Christian values with contrary
pagan ideals, to the point that by Erasmuss time, the greater part of a lifetime
120 Chapter 4
is needed even to free oneself to investigate the sacred scriptures. And when
one seems to free himself, he is already inevitably so corrupted with all these
worldly ideas that the precepts of Christ either seem utterly repugnant or they
are distorted to fit the teachings of the pagans (420).
Dulce bellum thus undermines the fundamental conviction of Erasmian hu-
manism, namely the compatibility between secular learning and Christianity,
between eruditio and pietas.
21
The views put forward in the adage are diamet-
rically opposed to those propagated in other works of Erasmus. The depiction
of learnings subversion of Christian religion is read almost as a parody on
works like Antibarbari. In the latter work, Erasmianisms intellectual ratio-
nale and ideological manifesto all in one,
22
both the intrinsic value of classi-
cal literature and its compatibility with Christianity are celebrated in forceful
terms (AB 5964). The decline of classical learning is perceived as a calamity
that demands an explanation: what the disaster was that had swept away
the rich, flourishing, joyful fruits of the finest culture, and why a tragic and
terrible deluge had shamefully overwhelmed all the literature of the ancients
which used to be so pure (23). And the divorce of Christianity from secular
learning is understood as the principal cause of the decline of Christendom
(2324).
23
Indeed, apart from the sections about the origins of war, Dulce bel-
lum itself propagates the same ideas. Throughout the work war is condemned
equally on human and religious grounds and natures moral imperatives are
taken to be identical to Gods (e.g., DB 4067, 41618). Moreover, the adage
endows learning with its usual positive attributes. It unequivocally states that
the pursuit of learning and the desire for knowledge is the most effective
means of drawing the mind of man away from all savagery (402).
Hand in hand with the undermining of learning, Dulce bellum subverts
also humanist distinction between different types of learning. Unsurpris-
ingly, Erasmus uses his censure of learning for staging yet another assault
on scholasticism, attacking Aristotle and the Roman law: the former taught
Christians that human happiness is not complete without bodily comforts
and worldly goods and that a state in which all property is held in common
cannot flourish, while the latter taught them to meet force with force and
justified war and usury (41920). But not only Aristotle and the Roman law
are guilty of the perversion of the original Christian teaching: the teaching of
Christ is contaminated by the writings of pagan dialecticians, sophists, math-
ematicians, orators, poets, philosophers and lawyers (420). The distinction
between the scholastic quibbles and the bonae litterae, which the humanists
toiled to establish in numerous works written over more than a century and
a half, vanishes in one stroke. Orators and poets are now joined with the dia-
lectician and the sophists as the enemies of Christianity. Humanism is thus
implicitly put on the same plane as scholasticism.
The Politics of a Disembodied Humanist 121
While Erasmuss important political writings clearly demonstrate the
authors identity of the universal intellectual, they turn out to be highly
problematical from the perspective of Erasmian humanism itself. Erasmus is
unable to elaborate a coherent political theory. When he tries to conceptually
ground his convictions he slides out of humanist political language. Christian
Prince oscillates between incompatible positions. It employs the language
of political evangelismin itself foreign to the intellectual and religious as-
sumptions of Erasmian humanismonly to withdraw at the last moment and
take resort in the classical heritage, reduced to a reservoir of moralistic im-
peratives. Dulce bellum ends up by adopting a most un-Erasmian primitivism.
Moreover, Erasmuss political writings unwittingly highlight the weaknesses,
ambiguities and fragility of humanist discourse. They subvert the fundamen-
tal humanist notions of learning, the studia humanitatis and liberal education,
and thus undermine the Erasmian reform program.
It is the combination of these two conclusionsthe autonomy of Erasmus
expressed in his political writings and the internal strains in the same writ-
ingsthat is most surprising. For it might be expected that his independent
positiona position of immunity from direct external political and ideological
pressureswould make it easier for Erasmus to formulate his vision in the most
coherent manner. But this does not happen. Erasmus allowed himself to censure
kings and popes, to condemn the court culture and the aristocratic ethos and to
define the planned crusade against the Turks as a conspiracy of Europes rulers,
but his texts undermined the basic humanist notions. The inevitable conclusion
is that the strains in these writings are not effects of external pressures, but rather
symptoms of an internal problematic of Erasmian humanism.
Before trying to account for this problematic, let us examine yet another
worka utopian workof Erasmus.
The Enclosed Utopia of Erasmian Humanism
The colloquy Convivium religiosum is often portrayed as one of the most
beautiful expressions of Erasmian humanism. In particular the colloquy is
seen as an example of perfect integration of content and form. The ideas and
views the text elaborates, the means of this elaborationa conversation that
mainly consists of interpretation of scriptural passageand the setting of
dialoguea feast in a rural houseare organically interrelated. From any
angle scholars choose to look at The Godly Feast they find that it captures the
true spirit of Erasmian humanism. Craig Thompson, for instance, describes
The Godly Feast as in some ways the most typical of all the colloquies.
24
Ger-
aldine Thompson sees it as a compendium of almost all Erasmuss theories
122 Chapter 4
and preferences.
25
Johan Huizinga goes further, arguing that the dialogue is
an example of the Renaissance ideal of good life: a serious and tranquil con-
versation in a rural house, which realizes the dream of harmony, simplicity,
sincerity, truth and nature.
26
Walter M. Gordon also sees the text as represent-
ing Erasmuss notions of the good man and the good life in the secular world
(that is, outside the cloister).
27
Marjorie ORourke Boyle claims that the rural
estate is a realization of the Erasmian vision of a Christian society based on an
ongoing interpretation of scripture.
28
Eusebiuss villa, the setting of the dia-
logue, is, in her words, an earthly fiction of paradise.
29
Examining Erasmuss
educational thought, William Woodward argues that the dialogue has a triple
function: a Latin textbook, a model of humanist moral philosophy and an
illustration of the humanist ideal of universal eruditio.
30
Wayne Rebhorn,
who examines the humanist notion of education from a different perspec-
tive, claims that The Godly Feast constructs the ideal humanist educational
environment.
31
And Michel Jeanneret shows that the conversation between
the participants in the dialogue and their manners exemplify the Renaissance
ideals of moderation and decorum, of harmony and friendship.
32
The Convivium religiosum represents the Erasmian ideal, and so it appears
to be also from the perspective of the present study. We have seen in the
previous chapter that the Colloquia deals with all aspects of lifefrom theol-
ogy to prostitutionand addresses Christendom as a whole. The collection
clearly expresses Erasmuss belief in a civilizing process, a process of personal
education and social melioration. From this point of view, The Godly Feast
depicts the realization of the civilization process; it gives the reader a glimpse
of truly civilizedChristian and humanistindividuals and social relations.
The dialogue succinctly presents and dramatizes the central notions of the
Erasmian reform program. The philosophersas they define themselves
(CR 175)who participate in the dialogue are all married. And the sensitive
issue of lay as opposed to religious way of life is explicitly discussed. Anyone
can live a full Christian life even in the secular world: piety is sought after by
various modes of life. Some find the priesthood to their liking, some celibacy,
some marriage, some withdrawal from the world, some public affairs, accord-
ing to their different constitutions and temperaments (186). Eusebius the
host and the principal interlocutor goes even further, arguing that marriage is
preferable to celibacy (187). The conversation of these laymen revolves around
the interpretation of scripture, a further illustration of a tendency of Erasmian
humanism: anyone can participate in a theological discussion, indeed, as one
of the interlocutors asserts, scriptural exegesis is permissible even for sailors
(184). The dialogue also clearly expresses Erasmuss views concerning the
essential compatibility, even similarity, between the moral teachings of Chris-
tianity and of the classical heritage. Eusebius firmly expels a feigned doubt
The Politics of a Disembodied Humanist 123
concerning the use of profane writers in religious conversation: whatever is
devout and contributes to good morals should not be called profane, he states,
and goes on to compare the classical writers with the modern ones, conclud-
ing that he would much rather let all of Scotus and other of his sort perish
than the books of a single Cicero or Plutarch. He further relates his belief
that some of the classical authors were moved by some divine power (192),
while his friend Chrysoglottus intimates his hope that the souls of Vergil and
Horace are sanctified. And Nephalius sums up the Erasmian conviction with
the famous exclamation, St Socrates, pray for us (194). More generally, the
kind of religiosity the dialogue preaches for is quintessentially Erasmian. The
ceremonial and doctrinal dimensions of Christianity are devalued, while the
notions of the pure internal belief and its manifestation in moral behavior and
way of life are moved to the center. The true Christian is therefore the true civi-
lized individual. The Convivium religiosum thus focuses on a religious reform
as the key for a comprehensive cultural reform.
It touches also other issues related to Erasmuss civilizatory worldview.
Thus Eusebius suggests that those who suffer from contagious diseases should
be isolated (206). A longer discussion is dedicated to the question of poverty.
The literal interpretation of the evangelical imperative to give to everyone
who asks is carefully rejected (and unsurprisingly the issue is used as a plat-
form for yet another attack on the extravagant wealth of the church). Instead
a moderate and prudent generosity toward the poor is recommended. More-
over, poverty is seen as a social problem that needs a social care. The authori-
ties are enjoined to take care of the legitimate beggars, but not to tolerate
vagabonds roaming hither and yonparticularly the able-bodied ones, who
. . . need a job rather than a dole (199).
The great merit of the Convivium religiosum is, as mentioned, the way it
integrates the tenets of the Erasmian reform program with the literary form
of the text and the setting of the dialogue. The numerous Hebrew and Greek
inscriptions and pictorial emblems in the gardens of the villa illustrate the
humanist imperative ad fontes (177). The moral lessons taught by these means
are thoroughly Erasmian. The scorpion, entrapped by a poisonous plant, for
example, reminds the visitors in Greek that God hath found out the guilty
(181). The dialogue form of The Godly Feast is significant in itself. Many dia-
logues of the Colloquies are satirical, often bitingly so. They serve Erasmus to
condemn everything he did not like in contemporary culture. The Convivium
religiosum is very different. Here the dialogue is an interhumanist one. The
open-minded, noncontentious and consensus-oriented conversation demon-
strates the right way to interpret the divine word and illustrates the ideal social
relations. Much of the dialogue takes place during a meal Eusebius offers his
guests, and the conversation is intermingled with eating and drinking. Indeed
124 Chapter 4
reading and interpreting the Bible are explicitly compared to eating and di-
gesting the food. Christ himself is invited to mingle with all our food and
drink, so that everything may taste of him, but most of all may he penetrate
our hearts! (183).
33
This truly godly feast should be read also against the
background of humanist educational thought. The organic metaphors em-
ployed by the humanists for describing the progression of education conveys,
as we saw, the central notions of liberal education: the idea that humanist
education is natural to men and (differently) to women in the sense that
he is naturally predisposed to absorb the fundamental humanist values and
the idea that these values become an organic part of the mature personality.
The metaphors of ingestion and nutrition convey the same meanings, but
underline the active dimension of the practice of self-fashioning. It is the
mature humanistrather than a schoolboywho tastes, digests and absorbs
scripture and the classical canon in order to transform himself into a moral
person and a true Christian.
Closer reading reveals however that the literary brilliance and the placid
surface of the Convivium religiosum hide considerable internal strains. Some
of these strains come to the fore in the conversation of the interlocutors. The
discussion of human activity in the secular world is one example. The Godly
Feast clearly expresses the humanist affirmation of such activity, notably by
rejecting the traditional dichotomy between lay and religious ways of life. It is
somewhat surprising therefore to find in the text also the opposite attitude. It
is presented in an exegetical discussion of the famous verses from the Gospels:
No man can serve two masters: for either he will hate the one and love the
other, or else he will hold to the one and despise the other. Ye cannot serve
God and mammon. Therefore I say unto you: Take no thought for your life,
what ye shall eat, nor yet for your body, what ye shall put on. Is not the life
more than meat, and the body more than raiment? (Matt 6:2425; CR 200).
At first Timothy offers two complementary interpretations of the passage.
He suggests first that it should be read in its specific historical context: the
apostles dedicated themselves completely to the dissemination of Christianity
and therefore could not earn their living, especially when they knew no craft
but fishing (201). The literal meaning of the verses is therefore not valid to
contemporary reality and they must be understood metaphorically. He goes
on to explain this latter meaning, arguing that Christ did not forbid labour
but anxiety which derives one to immerse in work to the point of neglect-
ing everything else. Making a living is therefore permissible as long as it does
not interfere with the individuals obligations, especially the religious duties
(2012). These interpretations express of course the common humanist and
Erasmian notions; the first also exemplifies, albeit somewhat comically for the
modern reader, the humanist historical consciousness.
The Politics of a Disembodied Humanist 125
But Eusebius rejects his friends interpretation. You misrepresent Christs
meaning, he argues in the only case in the dialogue that an opinion of one of
the interlocutors is decisively discarded. Instead Eusebius offers a diametri-
cally opposed reading: What remains then but, using this world as though
we use it not, we turn our whole care and zeal to the love of heavenly things
and, utterly rejecting earthly riches together with Satan and all his wiles, with
a whole and fervent heart serve God alone, who will not forsake his children?
(202). Eusebius, who strongly endorsed the humanist affirmation of human
activity, now turns the tables, rejecting the world and underscoring the un-
bridgeable chasm between Christianity and secular thought. It is an indication
of the texts internal strains that in the next sentence he unconsciously under-
mines his new position: But meanwhile nobody touches the dessert. Surely
its permissible to enjoy this, which is produced for us at home without great
toil (202). Just after so resolutely repudiating all earthly things, specifically
the care for food, Eusebius unwittingly returns to it, highlighting of all things
the refined dessert and the mundane production of food.
A similar incoherency characterizes the Convivium religiosums attitude to-
ward the body. The setting of the dialogue, convivium or symposium, indicates a
positive value attributed to the bodily pleasures and particularly connects them
to intellectual activity. The associations the dialogue repeatedly makes between
eating and interpreting scripture strengthen of course this attitude.
34
Eusebius
explicitly formulates this position when he insists, Our bodies; arent they
partners of our minds? For I prefer partners to instruments or dwellings or
tombs (189). This rejection of the Platonist and Pauline dichotomy may be
seen as a radicalization of Erasmuss humanist critique against the traditional
Christian hierarchies between clergy and laity and between celibacy and mar-
riage.
35
But again The Godly Feast puts forward also the contrary view. Thus
Chrysoglottus approvingly cites Catos willingness (reported by Cicero) to de-
part from this life as from an inn, not from a home (192). In the conclusion
of the discussion the traditional dichotomy between body and soul is resolutely
formulated, as Nephalius paraphrases and interprets Phaedo:
The human soul is placed in this body as if in a garrison which it must not
abandon except by the commanders order, or remain in longer than suits him
who stationed it there. It is the more significant that Plato said garrison in-
stead of house, since we only inhabit a house; in a garrison we are assigned
some duty by our commander. Nor is this out of keeping with our Scriptures,
which tell us human life is sometimes a warfare, sometimes a battle. (194)
In this case the interlocutors do not notice the contradiction between the two
attitudes. They all seem to agree both that the body is partner rather than
dwelling of the soul and that it is a garrison rather than a house.
126 Chapter 4
In order to account for these tensions a further interpretive discussion
must be examined. In a key moment in the text, at the very beginning of the
meal, just after a tour of the rural house, Eusebius presents his guests with the
first interpretive assignment, asking them to explicate the famous first three
verses of Proverbs 21: The kings heart is in the hand of the Lord, as the riv-
ers of water: he turneth it whithersoever he will. Every way of a man is right
in his own eyes: but the Lord pondereth the hearts. To do justice and judg-
ment is more acceptable to the Lord than sacrifice (184). The second and
the third verses are expectedly understood to convey the common Erasmian
notions of the importance of internal belief and practical ethics as opposed to
external ceremonies. The first verse, however, raises a political question that
complicates the discussion. Eusebius himself opens the discussion: Other
mortals can be swayed by warnings, scoldings, laws, and threats; the kings
heart, if you oppose it, is annoyed rather, since it fears nobody. And there-
fore, whenever princes have their minds set on anything they should be left
to their whims, not because they always desire what is best but because God
sometimes uses their madness or wickedness to correct sinners (184). We
have already noted Erasmuss suspicion of monarchy. What is new here is the
frank admission that all the remedies against the princes unlimited power he
offered in Institutio principis and other political writings are worthless. That
Erasmus ambivalently slides to a theological solutionthe king is some-
times Gods rodhighlights his inability to account for politics in humanist
terms. The embracement surfaces again in even more heightened form when
he answers the question of what can be done after all against the unbridled
fury of wicked kings?:
The first, perhaps, will be not to receive the lion into the city. Next, by author-
ity of senate, magistrates, and people, to limit his power in such a way that he
may not easily break out into tyranny. But the best safeguard of all is to shape
his character by sacred teaching while hes still a boy and doesnt realize hes a
ruler. Petitions and admonitions help, provided they are polite and temperate.
Your last resort is to implore God without ceasing to incline the kings heart to
conduct worthy of a Christian prince. (185)
In the last words of the political discussion Eusebius moves uneasily between
contradictory positions and different fields of meaning. His inability to an-
swer the question indicates his failure to conceptualize the political world in
humanist terms, and indeed he ends up again in what may be termed political
fideism.
Against this background we must understand the deeper meaning of the
verse offered by Timothy. King, the latter argues, is the perfect man, who
completely controls his bodily passions; the man who is governed solely by
The Politics of a Disembodied Humanist 127
the power of the Holy Spirit. As such, this person is above any human law.
Instead he should be left to his Master, by whose spirit he is led; he is not to
be judged by those circumstances through which the weakness of feeble men
is drawn, in one way or another, to true godliness (185). The Convivium re-
ligiosum thus unwittingly ends up adopting the Augustinian (and Lutheran)
dichotomies between faith and reason, between internal purity and freedom
and external servitude within an irredeemably corrupt social world. These
dichotomies contradict of course the fundamental assumptions and purposes
of Erasmian humanism, which rejected the distinction between inner faith
and external behavior and argued for the compatibility of reason and faith.
The Erasmian reform program assumed a process of personal as well as social
melioration and advancement toward the horizon of the truly humane and
Christian society. It was to be achieved by human efforts, notably by educa-
tion, and assumed therefore that most Christiansindeed most men and
womencould become moral agents and responsible citizens.
The conclusion of the political discussion in The Godly Feast therefore
undermines Erasmian humanism. The discussion gives us however a further
clue concerning the internal tensions in the discourse of Erasmian humanism.
For the dichotomy between the two types of kings, or more precisely be-
tween the kings of the second kind and the rest of humanity, is superimposed
on another dichotomy, namely between Eusebiuss rural house and the exter-
nal world. The philosophers gathered in Eusebiuss villa are the kings of which
Timothy talks, and indeed Eusebius defines himself as king and his house as
kingdom (176, 183). Erasmusin contrast to Augustine and Lutherdoes
externalize, therefore, the Christian inner freedom and faith. His city of God
is fictionally realized: Eusebiuss rural house is the place in which social rela-
tions reflect the true Christian values.
This interpretation highlights the separation, and the opposition, between
the rural housethe Erasmian utopiaand the external world. This is indeed
one of the persistent themes of The Godly Feast. A close examination of the
precise relationship as well as the border between the two realms may there-
fore provide important insights. Already the short introductory part of the
dialogue focuses on the opposition between two worlds: the fresh and smil-
ing countryside and the smoky cities, where greedy merchants and monks
reside.
36
At this stage, the dichotomy is therefore between nature and culture
as seen from the perspective of the pastoral or even primitivist view. This view
was developed at length, as we saw, in Dulce bellum and led to a dead end.
The Godly Feast takes, however, a different route, as Timothy undermines
the dichotomy in its first form. Socrates, he reminds his friends, referring
to Phaedrus, preferred the city. For the archetypal philosopher was eager to
learn and cities afforded him means of learning. In the countryside, to be sure,
128 Chapter 4
were trees and gardens, springs and streams, to please the eye; but they have
nothing to say and therefore taught nothing. In his response Eusebius men-
tions that Nature . . . is not silent but speaks to us everywhere and teaches
the observant man many things, notably Gods wisdom and goodness. He
even more emphatically argues that the conversation between Socrates and
Phaedrus in the countryside is of the utmost philosophical importance (175).
His argumentation changes the original dichotomy. The rural house does not
stand for nature in the pastoral sense. It is a humanist utopia, whose character
we shall presently explore.
In any event, the second term of the dichotomy, the city, retains its original
negative significance. Eusebiuss estate is sharply separated from the city and
symbolically opposed to it. A strange conversation between the owner and
one of the guests illustrates the point:
TIMOTHY: Where does such a pretty stream finally bury itself?
EUSEBIUS: See how crude we are: after it has delighted our eyes here sufficiently,
it drains the kitchen and carries that waste along to the sewer.
TIMOTHY: Thats callous, so help me!
EUSEBIUS: Callous, unless the goodness of the eternal Will had made it for this
use. (17879)
The contact between such different realms cannot but be contaminating. The
invocation of Gods will also attests, however, to an uneasiness caused by this
separation and to the difficulty of legitimizing it.
Wayne Rebhorn sought to account for this separation between Eusebiuss
house and the external world. His account is based on the distinctive char-
acter of Erasmian humanism compared with other kinds of humanism.
According to Rebhorn, Erasmusin contrast to the Italian humanists of
the quattrocentowas an alienated intellectual. He was critical of the basic
values of his society and understood that he could not reform Christen-
dom.
37
This alienation was particularly strongly felt in the field of education,
as Erasmus and his friends concluded that their aim of fashioning a truly
moral Christian individual was bound to fail due to negative influences
of corrupt society.
38
The Convivium religiosum is, according to Rebhorn,
Erasmuss solution to this predicament. Eusebiuss rural estate should be
seen as an extension of the schoolroom into the adult world. It is a care-
fully shaped and controlled environment in which the humanist education
can operate without hindrance.
39
In the humanist enclave the contradic-
tion between ideal and reality vanishes.
40
In the terms of the present study,
the Erasmian garden was the place of the universal intellectual. Rebhorn
manages to see the strains beneath the surface of the dialogue only to be
enchanted in the end by its literary qualities. For how can the text solve
The Politics of a Disembodied Humanist 129
the very real problem of alienation of the Erasmian humanist? At best, the
dialogue may be said to provide a fictivebut ultimately deceptiverefuge
from the harsh truths about the impotency of Erasmian humanism. The
dichotomy between the rural villa and the external social world thus cor-
roborates our previous conclusion concerning the dialogues undermining
the prospects of the Erasmian reform program. It implicitly but necessarily
degrades the world outside the rural estate. Social reality outside the en-
closed garden is irredeemably fallen, the realm of the Pauline flesh and the
Platonic matter. And if this is the conclusion, it must be that the Erasmian
reform program is doomed to fail.
The precise meaning of this conclusion must however be further explored.
The inability to implement the Erasmian reform program and to transform
society might be seen as an external problem of Erasmian humanism: an
unpleasant fact about the world that has nothing to do with the discourse
of Erasmian humanism itself. In this case we would expect Eusebiuss rural
house to be a true Erasmian utopia. Protected from the damaging external
influences it would be able to at least fictively realize the values and ideals of
Erasmian humanism that cannot be realized in the world. This is indeed the
explicit position of the Convivium religiosum. If, however, it would turn out
that the text fails to construct a perfect place, it would indicate an inability of
the discourse to do so. In this case, the imperfections of the rural house would
attest to an internal problem of Erasmian discourse.
The problematical nature of the Erasmian utopia is most clearly revealed
when the questions concerning the ultimate foundationsand legitimiza-
tionof the rural estate is examined. Eusebiuss villa is a grandiose attempt
to appropriate and refashion nature and culture alike in order to create a
perfect place. Thus the rural house has lakes, rivers and seas, and it contains
numerous trees and animals. In fact it contains all the kinds of trees, birds and
fish (1801). The garden thus attempts to recreate the fullness and perfection
of creation. Perforce most plants and animals are represented by pictures and
statuettes. The employment of art is of course a solution to the technical
problem of gathering the entire natural realm. When asked why a real garden
was not good enough, Eusebius admits that One garden wasnt enough to
hold all kinds of plants. The rest of his answer leads, however, to a differ-
ent direction: Moreover, we are twice pleased when we see a painted flower
competing with a real one. In one we admire the cleverness of nature, in the
other the inventiveness of the painter, in each the goodness of God, who gives
all these things for our use and is equally wonderful and kind in everything
(179). Eusebius imparts a positive value to human inventiveness and even
to a competition between culture and nature. And indeed Eusebiuss villa
integrates nature with culture. Thus, besides the pictures of natural objects
130 Chapter 4
there are other representations, religious and secular alike. Biblical scenes,
including the Last Supper and the killing of John the Baptist, are set side by
side with moralistic pictures of historical events such as the meeting between
Cleopatra and Anthony and the slaying of Clitus by Alexander. Finally, the
library which contains the human literary heritage is at the heart of Eusebiuss
house (205). Moreover, already at the beginning of their visit the guests learn
that the Gardens plants and animal are full of life: nothing inactive, nothing
thats not doing or saying something, as one of the guests notes with marvel
(180). Some of them directly speak to the passerby and by means of maxims
and proverbs teach moral lessons. Others, the more interesting, appear as
emblems that the visitor must decipher, and thus they give rise to interpre-
tive practice (1801). The very nature of Eusebiuss house thus illustrates the
fundamental tenet of Erasmuss humanist theology, namely the notion of a
never-ending interpretive process of elucidatingbut never exhaustingthe
unfathomable Word of God.
41
But the Convivium religiosum also constitutes Eusebiuss house, particularly
its inner gardens, as paradise. The porter of the place is Peter himself, who
greets the callers in the three classical languages and invites them to repent
and to live by faith. Just to the side of the entrance there is a little shrine, with
a statue of Jesus on its altar. Christ looks to heaven whence his Father and the
Holy spirit look out, and he points to heaven with his right hand while with
his left he seems to beckon and invite the passer-by (177). A fountain nearby,
just beside the entrance to the inner more cultivated garden, completes the
picture. It symbolizes in a manner, the host explains, that unique fountain
which refreshes with its heavenly stream all those who labour and are heavy
laden, and for which the soul, wearied by the evils of this world, pants as, ac-
cording to the psalmist, does the thirsty hart after tasting the flesh of serpents
(178). The meaning of the symbols and images seems unequivocal: Stepping
into Eusebiuss house means leaving behind the fallen world and entering the
Garden of Eden. This reconstruction is consistent with the identification of
the inhabitants of the rural estate with Timothys kings, namely the perfect
men who are ruled solely by the Holy Spirit. Moreover, this interpretation
can also account for the texts ambivalence concerning the relation of body
and soul. The dichotomy between flesh and spirit disappears only to the
extent that Eusebiuss rural estate is indeed a paradisiacal place. In paradise
the body is under the total control of the soul, and the flesh does not tempt
the spirit. In paradise body and soul are indeed partners and bodily pleasures
are natural and positively valued.
42
Eusebiuss house, from this perspective, is
not a human artifact but rather paradise inhabited by the elect. The Erasmian
utopiathe truly reformed societyturns out to be paradise. The never-
ending play of signs and interpretations of the human garden is replaced by a
The Politics of a Disembodied Humanist 131
paradisiacal garden of fixed eternal meanings. The unfathomable depth and
eternal quest are replaced with transparency and fullness of meaning.
The Convivium religiosum is thus ambivalent about the nature of the per-
fect garden, the utopia, it constructs; it is undecided whether it is ultimately
divine or human.
43
Or more accurately, it fails to account for the ideal Eras-
mian social order in the terms of the Erasmian discourse. Eusebiuss estate
sees itself as a microcosm of the ideal Erasmian society. It transforms nature
and culture alike by removing and sublimating all their negative aspects and
by incorporating them into a perfect order of things. It is a fully Christian
and humanist society which integrates Christianity and the classical heritage,
pietas and eruditio. It is in contact with the divine by means of a continuous
process of interpretation and elaboration of the profound Word of God. Its
inhabitants are the Erasmian philosophers whose behavior and manners re-
flect their deep inner faith.
But ultimately the text cannot sustain this order of things. Particularly, in
order to legitimize the Erasmian utopia the Convivium religiosum resorts to
a religious language of the kind that contradicts the tenets of Erasmian hu-
manism. By employing the paradisiacal images the text wrests the rural house
from the human world and places it in the realm of the divine. It thus implies
that the Erasmian ideal cannot be constructed and sustained by human effort,
but only by divine intervention. The Erasmian philosophers convened in the
rural villa indeed interpret scripture and the canonical classical texts and dis-
tilled their religious and moral lessons. But the social realization of these les-
sons were ultimately achieved not by human effort. Indeed the philosophers,
who fashion themselves as moral agents and responsible individuals through
dialogical interpretation of scripture, are replaced by the perfect men, who are
directly ruled by the Holy Spirit.
Looked at from this angle it seems as if The Godly Feasts whole point was
to exclude the possibility of the Erasmian reform program. It divides human-
ity in two unequal parts, those in the rural house and those outside it. But
this division leaves no place precisely for the Erasmian reform program: the
outside world cannot be reformed at all while the ideal humanist garden is a
perfect place, a paradise, which does not need to be reformed. The Convivium
religiosum thus undermines Erasmian humanism. This is the repressed secret
of the text, its fundamental aporia that prevents a coherent closure and pro-
duces fractures and strains.
How can we account for the tensions and contradictions in Erasmuss politi-
cal writings: For Erasmuss inability to elaborate a coherent political program,
for his repeated tendency to slip out of humanist discourse when attempting
to conceptually ground his views, for his own subversion of the key notions
132 Chapter 4
in Erasmian discourse, and for his failure to construct a coherent utopia, and
for all this manifest in works that present a most forceful demonstration of
his independence from kings, nobles and prelates? Why, in other words, while
Erasmus was free to formulate his views, he nevertheless became entangled in
contradictions? The answer is to be found in the fact that the political discus-
sion actually brought to the fore a problematic dimension of the autonomy
of Erasmian humanism, that is, the problematic position of the universal in-
tellectual within the parameters of humanist discourse itself. The same social
position that allowed Erasmus to condemn the reigning ideology and present
Christendom with an independent reform program also served as the source
of conflict and contradiction within his work. In order to deepen our inves-
tigation of this dynamic we will turn in the following chapters to two works
by Thomas More.
134 Chapter 5
the literary canon and such an influence on popular folklore. This chapter
thematizes these issues by theoretically examining the ambivalence of Richard
III toward humanist discourse. It also accounts for this ambivalence against
the background of the problematical nature of the Erasmian Republic of Let-
ters, which we explored in the previous chapters.
A brief examination of the literature on Mores work will suggest the his-
torical and theoretical problems involved in this kind of reading. Until the
past few decades many scholars tended to read Richard III as a chronicle, and
they could not help pointing out the books many deficiencies as an example
of that genre. Richard III is littered with many factual errors: among others
there is the confusion of the Christian names of several individuals, the addi-
tion of thirteen years to the age of King Edward IV (in the opening sentence)
and the misidentification of Edwards alleged first wife.
4
The main com-
plaint against More the historian was, however, that his alleged Tudor sym-
pathies had led him to distort the character and deeds of Richard III.
5
Alison
Hanham has convincingly refuted this interpretation, together with the very
notion that there ever were Tudor historians.
6
In any case, this approach is
anachronistic since its conceptual categoriesits notion of historical truth
and its criteria for distinguishing fact from fiction, for exampleare foreign
to Mores work and to the contemporary understanding of the historical dis-
cipline in general.
More recent scholarship has abandoned this misleading and sterile approach.
During the past few decades most readers have underscored the literary and
dramatic qualities of Richard III, analyzing it as a literary fiction in the modern
sense of the word.
7
Many of these readings provide important insights, yet both
their methodology and their conclusions are problematic. By underscoring the
literary character of Richard IIIin the modern sense of literaturethey repro-
duced the anachronistic distinction between fiction and nonfiction constructed
by the historicists they sought to displace. Typically, they disregarded the fact
that More did write a history, or at the very least professed to having done so.
8

More generally, they refrained from examining Richard III as a humanist work.
In any case, most readings, their different approaches and specific interpreta-
tions notwithstanding, agree that Richard III is basically a moralistic work, an
unequivocal condemnation of the crimes of an evil tyrant.
9
Other readings insist on the centrifugal forces that operate within the text,
frustrating the attribution of a simple and unproblematic meaning. These
interpretations highlight the texts pervasive irony, those parodic and satiri-
cal effects which undermine the dramatic superstructure and challenge even
what seems at first glance to be an univocal message. Such insights necessarily
reopen the question of the generic classification of the work and also of its re-
lation to contemporary literary and scholarly disciplines. Though she believes
Mores Richard III 135
that Mores basic intention was to condemn tyranny, Hanham suggests that
the books internal literary dynamics turned its cutting edge in other direc-
tions: toward the popular folklore that transformed Richard into an inhuman
monster; toward the political propagandists who distorted history to please
their patrons; toward the humanist historians who purported to know the
motives and causes of historical events and so on. Richard III is thus, accord-
ing to Hanham, both history and a parody of history, something not very
far from a black comedy.
10
Daniel Kinney goes even further, concluding that
the work is immune to any generic classification or reductive interpretation.
Richard III, he argues, reveals the partial nature of any historical and politi-
cal work, and creates for the reader a space for reflection on political reality.
11

Hanham and Kinneys well-established insights regarding the uncontrollable
nature of the text, its self-reflexivity and its subversion of any facile clas-
sification, clearly illustrate the limitations of the moralistic interpretation.
However, neither of the authors places the text within a well-defined context.
Hanham refrains from any conceptualization, and bases her interpretation
on Mores idiosyncratic humor and fondness for Lucianic satire. Kinney
places Richard III in a vast intertextual space that includes all of the classical
and humanist works cited or alluded to by More, but provides no discursive
reconstruction of this space. Thus the question of what exactly Richard III
subverts remains unanswered.
Analyzing Richard III within the context of humanist discourse, I argue that
Mores work reproduces the presuppositions of humanist discourse and at
the same time challenges and subverts them.
12
The equivocal character of the
work explains why it could have been interpreted as both a very simple and a
very complicated text. It may also explain how the genre of humanist history
could produce such an extraordinary work. To explore the many dimensions
of this question, I shall proceed in three stages. First, I will analyze the con-
tent of the textits argumentation and its moral and political lessonsto
demonstrate that it may legitimately be read in two contradictory ways, one
that reiterates fundamental humanist convictions and another that under-
mines them. The same indeterminacy is reproduced on a second level of
analysis, which concentrates on the central metaphor of the text, namely
human life as a theater. In Richard III the theatrum mundi is made to stand for
both reality itself and for its misrepresentation. Finally, in order to account
for these ambiguities and explore their implications, I will examine the text
against the background of the conventions of the humanist genre of history,
demonstrating that it undermines the humanist notion of rhetoric and thus
subverts the basic epistemological presuppositions of humanist discourse.
Several notes about the text itself are appropriate. More wrote Richard III
concurrently in English and Latin, and never published the book. There is an
136 Chapter 5
essential difference between the Latin and the English versions. The former
ends with Richards usurpation of the throne, while the latter goes on to tell
the story of the murder of the two nephews and of the breach between Rich-
ard and the Duke of Buckingham, only to end quite abruptly in the middle
of a dialogue between the Duke and Bishop Morton. It appears that at some
stage More intended to write a complete history of the rise and fall of Richard
III, and he even mentions a plan to write the history of King Henry VII (R
8283). However, the section leading up to the usurpation of power is more
complete and coherent than later sections, from both a linguistic and a liter-
ary point of view. It may safely be concluded that Mores original intention
had been to write only the story of the usurpation, and that the other sections
were added at a later date.
13
These considerations invite both an analysis of
the first part as a finished narrative, and an examination of the differences
between the two parts.
Mores sources included two early chroniclesThe Chronicles of Fabyan and
The Great Chronicle of Londonthe oral tradition and possibly some legal
documents. Most importantly, Hanhan and Alistair Fox convincingly argue
that More was acquainted with Vergils account of the affair in his historia.
14
The
differences between Mores account and that of his sources, especially Vergils,
are of primary importance. For More did not seek to correct factual errors;
indeed sometimes the contrary is true. The changes he did make often provide
therefore strong clues concerning the meaning of his work.
The Lesson of Conspiracy
Richard III is circumscribed in terms of its duration, space and cast, begin-
ning with the death of King Edward IV on April 9, 1483, and ending (in the
Latin versions) with the seizure of the throne by his brother, Richard, duke
of Gloucester, on June 26 of the same year. The very framework of the narra-
tive, built around the dissimulations, betrayals and crimes of the protagonist,
naturally lends itself to a moralizing interpretation. Richard III has thus tradi-
tionally been interpreted as the condemnation of an unscrupulous tyrant who,
on his way to power, broke every divine and human law, violating the most
sacred traditions and institutions.
15
However, a more careful examination of
the text indicates that Richard III may be more than a portrayal of unique and
diabolical evil. Time and again More finds it necessary to describe past events.
Three long flashbacksdescribing the struggle between Richards father and
Henry VI, the speech of the dying Edward and Edwards marriage to Elizabeth
Woodvilletogether with numerous brief clues scattered throughout the nar-
rativestrongly suggest that the roots of the tragedy lie deep in the past. As
Mores Richard III 137
a result the gap between normal politics and the events of the spring of 1483
shrinks decidedly, foregrounding the structural causes of the tragedy.
To explore further this internal tension let us compare the representation
of the protagonist to those of the other characters in the drama. There is no
ambiguity regarding Richards character, which is famously mirrored by his
physique: little of stature, ill fetured of limmes, croke backed, his left shoulder
much higher then his right, hard fauoured of visage. Richards monstrosity is
inscribed already at his abnormal birth: hee came into the worlde with the feete
forwarde, as menne bee borne outwarde, and (as the fame runneth) also not vn-
tothed (7). The protagonists circumstances of birth presage his future crimes:
Richard al the bandes broken that binden manne and manne together, with-
oute anye respecte of Godde or the worlde, vnnaturallye contriued to bereue
[his nephews], not onelye their dignitie, but also their liuese (6). Both Richard
and his acts are transgressions of the divine and natural order of things. Richard
is thus posited as an alien evil, external to the normal order of things.
The text apparently highlights this at the very beginning of the work with a
description of Richards virtuous brother, and the state of the realm under his
reign. Edwards appearance, generosity, courage in battle and political wisdom
endear him to all his subjects, commoners and nobles alike (34). But mild
problems soon appear: the king was a handsome man, but in his latter dayes
wyth ouer liberall dyet, sommewhat corpulente and boorelye. Moreover, hee
was of youthe greatelye geuen to fleshlye wantonnesse. More seems willing
to overlook these flaws: they bothered no one, for neyther could any one
mans pleasure, stretch and extende to the dyspleasure of verye manye, and was
wythoute violence (4). But the excuses are equivocal. The king, we may safely
presume, had the means to satisfy his desires without resort to violence, and if
his subjects minded their own business this can hardly be described as a virtue.
In any event, Edwards petty vices and personal faults, apparently unimportant,
acquire a different significance once we learn their consequences. More hints
that Edwards unbridled gluttony hastened his death, leaving the young heirs
unprotected (8). And sexual dissipation led to his politically problematic mar-
riage to Elizabeth Woodville, which incited discontent among the nobility and
indirectly caused the ensuing tragedy (6065).
The description of Edward illustrates some of the unique qualities of
Richard III: the evasive language, the dark insinuations, the qualification of
any decisive statement and the underscoring of petty vices, especially sexual
ones. These devices tend to overdetermine the meaning of the text and to
undermine its apparent simplicity. In particular, by suggesting that Richards
much praised predecessor had been less than perfect, Mores text reveals its
reluctance to make Richard out to be uniquely immoralthis turns out to be
a salient feature of Mores narrative as a whole.
138 Chapter 5
More states that in order to understand his protagonists horrendous acts,
we must understand his character. In his next sentence, however, he begins
to narrate the family history (6). The meaning of this shift in focus is clear:
the tragedy can only be understood within a broader context, a political one
involving all of the kingdoms leading figures. These grim events further
mitigate the abnormality of Richards crimes. We learn, for instance, that
Richards father was impelled by a lust for power to rebel against his sover-
eign, Henry VI (68). Edwards reign is also shown from a less-than-forgiv-
ing perspective, and we discover that killing of relatives was not unknown in
the realm. When More describes the execution of George, Duke of Clarence,
the brother of Richard and Edward, he wields an obfuscatory technique used
repeatedly in the text. More withholds a decisive judgment on the question of
whether Clarence plotted against Edward or was falsely accused by the queen.
But he convinces us that both Clarence and the queen were capable of such
skullduggerythe very opacity that prevents a decisive condemnation of one
person implicates everyone. In any case, the final result is clear: Edward or-
dered his brother to be drowned in a barrel of sweet wine (78).
Richard III does not leave it to the reader to conclude that Richard and
his brothers had much in common: Al three as they wer great states of
birhte, soo were they greate and statelye of stomacke, gredye and ambicious
of authoritie, and impacient of parteners (6). Nor were these characteristics
unique to the House of York (a convenient idea for those who interpret Rich-
ard III as Tudor propaganda). All the participants in the drama share the same
vices: Edmund Shaa, mayor of London, and his brother John, who preached
against the late king and his sons in St. Paul; Catesby, who betrayed Hastings;
Radcliff, who executed the queens relatives; and Tyrrell, who murdered the
children, to mention only a few of the lesser characters. The picture becomes
bleaker as we climb toward the apex of political power. More suggests the
possibility, for example, that the Duke of Buckingham knew about Richards
conspiracy from the beginning, or even initiated it himself (4243). It is clear
in any case that the he played a crucial role in the plot, and was a full accom-
plice in its final stage. His rebellion against the new king simply adds a new
crime to old sins (9093).
Two of the most important participants in the drama, Lord Hastings and
Queen Elizabeth, are worth special attention since they seem at first reading
more complex than the other figures. Following the description of Hastingss
execution, More composes a short elegy to his memory, particularly empha-
sizing his good humor, his loyalty to Edward and the innocence that eventu-
ally led to his downfall (52). But there is a strong current of irony in the elegy,
especially in the Latin version. Hastingss popularity was due to a jovial
nature, but the only manifestation of this characteristic turns out to be the
Mores Richard III 139
lords somewhat loose living. Hastingss loyalty to his sovereign is conveyed
largely by being not unentertaining as a partner or confident in [the kings]
pleasures (RL 421). Similarly, he is praised for having refrained from court-
ing Edwards mistress while the king was alive, out of reuerence towarde hys
king, or els of a certaine kinde of fidelite to hys frende (R 48). Not exactly
high praise. Sexual promiscuity and high politics become intertwined, and
Hastingss loyalty and innocence begin to look ridiculous. Even more im-
portant, Hastings was already deeply involved in political intrigues during Ed-
wards reign, and was clearly an active partner in the plot against the queens
faction. To underline the point, Mores text reschedules the executions so that
the queens relatives and Hastings are put to death on the same day. Richard
III can thus claimcontrary to what actually happenedthat Hastings gave
his consent for the execution of innocent people, hastly without iugement,
processe, or maner of order (5758).
16
This invention of Moreswhich he
mentions not less than three times (4748, 52, 57)creates, of course, the
desired ironic effect. Added to what we already know about Hastingss deeds
and personality, it also renders Mores elegy equivocal at best.
The treatment of Queen Elizabeth is as equivocal as Hastingss. Again, at
first it seems most emphatic. Elizabeths defeat at the hands of Richard is
preordained. Consequently, in all the events that follow she is portrayed in
a tragic light. Imprisoned in the Westminster sanctuary, mourning the im-
minent doom of her relatives and conscious of the threat to her two sons, she
struggles proudly against the nobles sent by Richard to persuade her to leave
the sanctuary, and in a dialogue with the cardinal exposes both the protectors
plots and Buckinghams empty rhetoric (3740). But this presentation di-
verges sharply from the description More offers of the queens behavior while
in power. The long struggle between her faction and the old nobility set the
stage for the subsequent tragedy, and its traces appear throughout Richard
III. We have touched on her possible involvement in the Clarence affair, and
More also assigns her primary responsibility for the machinations against
Hastings (1011). In any event, it was her rash attempt, following the death
of her husband, to exploit her influence over the heir and see her opponents
toppled from power that enabled Richard to recruit his supporters (14).
Mores treatment of Elizabeths marriage to Edward is another instance of
the employment of both irony and ambiguity. Difference in rank made such
an alliance a gross political impropriety. A long dialogue between Edward
and his mother underlines this point, as the latter explains the grave conse-
quences bound to result from such a union (6162).
17
With the description of
the kings courtship of Elizabeth, the narrative slips a few notches below the
elevated plane of high politics. While the king had been smitten at first sight
by his future wife, he had not been particularly interested in marrying her.
140 Chapter 5
Elizabeths stubborn protection of her honor in the face of Edwards aggres-
sive advances had been widely admired by Mores contemporaries. The Italian
Dominic Mancini, who composed the first account of Richards usurpation,
praises the willingness of the future queen to die rather than live unchastely
with the king, and concludes with an edifying moral: Whereupon Edward
coveted her much more, and he judged the lady worthy to be a royal spouse.
. . .
18
Mores take is much more ambiguous. He does underline Elizabeths
virtuous refusals, but adds: But y
t
did she so wiseli, & with so good maner,
& wordes so wel set, that she rather kindled his desire then quenched it (61).
Mores account, in contrast to Mancinis, allows the possibility that Elizabeth
intentionally aroused Edwards desire. It is without any surprise at all that
the reader learns immediately afterward that after many a meting Elizabeth
herself may have planted the idea of marriage in the kings mind: she shewed
him plaine, y
t
as she wist herself to simple to be his wife, so thought she her
self to good to be his concubine (61).
It is not clear whether Richard III is endorses noble behavior or exposes
the cynical exploitation of human weakness. Both readings are possible, but
they cannot be harmonized. The contradictory readings correspond to two
different readings of the text as a whole. The first is the traditional moralistic
reading mentioned above, the reading that sets Richard apart from the other
protagonists, and thus sees the tragedy of 1483 as an overthrow of the natural
order of things by the intrusion of abnormal, even inhuman, evil. According
to the second reading, there is no qualitative difference between Richard and
the other political players. All of them are reduced to hollow puppets moved
by a single motive: a ruthless and unbounded lust for power.
19
No other mo-
tive for these actions is even mentioned.
20
Richards usurpation ceases to look
like a unique event. On the contrary, it is a normal event, completely explica-
ble by the logic of politics. Given the motivations, intentions and desires that
fashion political reality, the kind of tragedy described seems almost inevitable.
But if this is the case, if Richards usurpation is an archetypal event, the con-
clusion or the lesson of the work is that the political world is irredeemably
corrupt, that no moral and rational political order is possible, at least not one
based on mans natural reason and moral capacities.
21
We may now begin to evaluate, albeit in a preliminary manner, Richard III
against the background of humanist thought, or more specifically humanist
ethical and political thought. Humanism as such did not imply a distinctive
political position, let alone a coherent political theory. However, humanist
ethical and political discourseunderstood as the shared assumptions un-
derlying the various political views and theories elaborated and advocated by
the humanistspresupposed that a stable and just political order could be
established, at least in principle.
22
This formulation highlights the differences
Mores Richard III 141
between the two proposed readings of Richard III. If we read it as a descrip-
tion of the work of an abnormal and unique evil, as a condemnation of the
transgression of the natural order, then Mores work is in keeping with hu-
manist ethical and political thought. If Richard appears as an aberration, then
Richard III is an examplealbeit a rather idiosyncratic oneof the moralistic
and didactic humanist literature. If, on the other hand, Richards usurpation
of the throne is a typical political event in a thoroughly corrupt secular politi-
cal world, then the text contradicts, or at least challenges, a basic assumption
of humanist political thought. In order to substantiate this tentative conclu-
sion the literary characteristics of Richard III must be examined.
23
Kings Games
An examination of the meaning and function of the central metaphor in
Richard III, human life as a play, may provide us with a clearer insight into
the problematic of Mores text, first, as the theatrical metaphor is the central
literary device that organizes Richard III,
24
and second, as the meaning of this
metaphor bears directly on crucial questions of humanist discourse.
The significance of the topic is declared at the outset, when a description of
Richards physical monstrosity is followed by a paean to his theatrical talents:
He could adopt any role, then play it out to perfection, whether cheerful
or stern, whether sober or relaxed, just as expediency urged him to sustain
or abandon it (RL 325).
25
Richard is both an excellent actor and a peerless
director. The success of this distorted creature in seizing the throne without
resorting to open rebellion depended on his ability to enchant and deceive
allies and enemies alike, and indeed the conspiracy as a whole is described by
More as a succession of theatrical performances.
The description of Hastingss demise is one of the most elaborately theatri-
cal scenes in Mores Richard III. A dynamic tension arises as More contrasts
Hastingss total lack of understanding with Richards meticulous direction
and control of events. The scene opens with the protectors entrance to the
tower hall where the nobles were already assembled. After excusing himself
for being late and asking the Bishop of Elye to provide the nobles with the ex-
quisite strawberries he grows in his garden, Richard momentarily takes leave
(R 47). Here the Latin version emphasizes how pleased were the nobles with
the protectors mild mood (RL 407). Richard soon returns, but al changed
with a wonderful soure angrye countenaunce, knitting the browes, frowning
and froting and knawing on hys lippes, and so sat him downe, in hys place: al
the lordes much dismaied & sore merueiling of this maner of sodain chaunge,
and what thing should him aile (R 47). What punishment is due to those
142 Chapter 5
who conspire against the protector and attempt to kill him? Richard asks the
stunned nobles. At this stage everyone present senses that Richard has already
begun to plot the death of another hapless soul, and resolves to hold his
tongue. Everyone, that is, except Hastings, who typically displays irritation for
having been left out of the new intrigue. An ironic dialogue ensues. Richard
accuses the queen and Shores wifeEdwards former mistress and, accord-
ing to More, Hastingss paramour at the time of the dialogueof attempting
to cast a spell of death upon him. Hastings responds that if they have indeed
hatched such a plot, they deserved to be severely punished, and his use of the
conditional supplies the protector with the pretext he needs to implicate the
lord himself in the conspiracy. Several nobles are arrested, and Hastings is
ordered to prepare for a quick death, because, as Richard explains to him, by
saynt Poule . . . I wil not to dinner til I se thy had of (49).
26
What is the significance of the contrast between Richard the omnipotent
and Hastings the impotent? It might be argued that the lord has fallen as
divine punishment for his participation in the murderous plot against the
queens faction. But, as we saw, Richard III can hardly be interpreted as a
description of the providential direction of human history. Furthermore, the
text attributes Hastingss downfall not to his sins, but to his innocence, to his
being very faithful, & trusty ynough, trusting to much (52). But then again,
Hastingss crimes receive so much attention in the book that he can hardly be
described as innocent.
The theatrical metaphor may help us resolve this puzzle. If the politi-
cal world is a grand play, then political action is a theatrical behavior and
the skillful politician is the skillful actor. The basic dichotomy in the text
is therefore not between sinfulness and innocence, in the usual sense of
the terms, but rather between natural human behavior, both good and
bad, and theatrical, political, natural behavior. For this reason, Richard,
the most consummate political player, is never accused of natural sins,
and is, for example, never censured for the sexual debauchery that so con-
spicuously looms in the background of so many other characters. For the
same reason More insists that the protectors brutal acts usually arise not
out of anger, but rather from rational calculation (8). By now the contrast
between Richard and Hastings has come into focus. Being a trusting man,
Hastings does not see through the very good semblaunce of Richard and
Buckingham and the dissimulacion of Catesby (46). The lords demise is
therefore not a punishment of his sins, but rather the result of his lack of
theatricalthat is, politicalskills.
The contrast between the natural and the theatrical occupies a central place
in Richard III. In particular it explains the otherwise hardly explicable two
digressions in so concise a text.
Mores Richard III 143
More dedicates many pages to the stratagems employed to extract the
younger brother of the heir, the Duke of York, from the Westminster Sanc-
tuary (2642). This was, of course, a crucial stage in the conspiracy, but no
more important than other events described far more succinctly. Dedicating
roughly one-fifth of the text to the subject creates a literary imbalance, and
to what end? Since the account of the affair is made up largely of fabricated
speeches by Richard and Buckingham and of a fabricated dialogue between
the queen and the cardinal More was not motivated by a quest for factual
precision. In fact, Buckinghams long speech amounts to a dissertation upon
the general juridical aspects of the institution of the sanctuary, a strange ex-
ception in Mores compact narrative. The importance of the digression is due
to the paradigmatic role of the sanctuary as a sacred institution representing
the traditional, natural order of things. In his defense of sanctuary rights, the
cardinal stresses this point, mentioning that there never was so vndeuowte a
Kinge, that durst that sacred place violate, or so holye a Bishoppe that durste
it presume to consecrate (28). Against this background, when Buckingham
manages, in an elaborate rhetorical speech, to convince even the senior Eng-
lish clergy of the necessity of violating sanctuary we have seen the triumph of
theatricality.
The second textual imbalance occurs with the long digression on Shores
wife.
27
At first sight the motives for granting so much space to this story are
even more unclear than they were for the sanctuary affair. This is the story of
a woman who is only marginally relevant to the narrative, and it is the only
point along Mores narrative when he abandons the time of Richard and has-
tens forward into the present. As a result, the impact of the womans story is
much magnified.
28
It is Richard himself who first mentions Shores wife, describing her as an
accomplice to the queen in her attempt to cast a spell on him. After Hastings
has been executed the woman is arrested, but when Richard is frustrated in
his attempts to prove his absurd accusations, he decides to charge her with
the thing y
t
her self could not deny, namely that she was nought of her
body (54); the best he could do was subject her to a humiliating penance
procession. At this point More abandons the line of his narrative to relate the
womans story: her early and unhappy marriage, her position in the court as
Edwards concubine and later as Hastingss. He then describes the misery of
her present situation, an old beggar in the streets of London. Here the tone
of Mores narrative shifts: the sarcastic descriptions and the ironic exposure
of hidden dark motives are replaced by a sympathetic and moving portrait:
Proper she was & faire: nothing in her body y
t
you wold haue changed, but
if you would haue wished her somewhat higher. . . . [N]ow is she old lene,
withered, & dried vp, nothing left but ryuilde skin & hard bone. And yet being
144 Chapter 5
euen such: whoso wel aduise her visage, might gesse & deuise which partes
how filled, wold make it a faire face (5556). The digression on Shores wife
opens with a passage once labeled surely the most charming piece of prose
that had yet been written in England.
29
Here More describes her appearance
at the height of her humiliation: she went in countenance & pace demure
so womanly, & albeit she were out of al array saue her kyrtle only: yet went
she so fair & louely, namelye while the wondering of the people caste a comly
rud in her chekes (of whiche she before had most misse) that her great shame
wan her much praise . . . (5455). What is the meaning of this empathy and
saintly description? After all, sanctity has little enough to do with Jane Shores
behavior, which More does not try to attenuate.
Jane Shore is contrasted to all the characters in Richard III. More stresses the
womans distinguishing trait: she never misused her political power. On the
contrary, she neuer abused to any mans hurt, but to many a mans comfort &
relief: where the king toke displeasure, she would mitigate & appease his mind:
where men were out of fauour, she wold bring them in his grace. For many that
had highly offended, shee obtained pardon (56). Jane Shore never participated
in the play of politics. Her sins, the result of her seduction by the glimmer and
luxury of the court and the pleasure of royal attention, are qualitatively different
from the crimes of the other protagonists. They belong to the natural Christian
economy of sin, remorse and punishment. It is not innocence that makes her
the only human character in Richard III, but innocence from political crimes.
Now we can understand when and why other characters enjoy rare mo-
ments of grace. The queen in the sanctuary, Hastings after his execution and
King Edward on his deathbedall are suddenly bathed in a forgiving, Chris-
tian light, but only once they have exited the stage of politics. Now we can
also see why the bearers of political morality in Richard III are the common
Londoners. Being outside the theater of politics they can expose Richards
deceptions (though not prevent his victory).
30
Richard III itself offers, through the mouths of the common Londoners,
an explication for the theatrical metaphor. The occasion is the protectors
initial refusal, and subsequent reluctant acceptance, of the crown. Some
condemned the shameless pretense.
Howbeit somme excused that agayne, and sayde all must be done in good order
though. And menne must sommetime for the manner sake not bee a knowen
what they knowe. . . . And in a stage play all the people know right wel, that he
that playeth the sowdayne is percase a sowter. Yet if one should can so lyttle
good, to shewe out of seasonne what acquaintance he hath with him, and calle
him by his owne name whyle he standeth in his magestie, one of his tormentors
might hap to breake his head, and worthy for marring of the play. (8081)
Mores Richard III 145
The meaning of the theatrical metaphor turns out to be ambiguous to its core,
for in this passage, as in Richard III as a whole, it can be interpreted in two
contradictory ways. The theater and its conventions stand, as we have already
seen, for deception and dissimulation, for plain falsehood that could easily
be exposed (if not immediately, at least retrospectively by the historian). The
Londoners knew right well that the protectors initial refusal of the throne was
feigned. They simply argue that sometimes it is better not to show what one
knows. But at the same time the theater stands for reality as such. Political
reality is perceived as essentially theatrical, in the sense that there is no other,
objective reality beyond or beneath the social conventions and fictions.
31

This is one way to understand the Londoners insistence that things must
be done in good order. The example Londoners employ further illustrates
this fundamental ambiguity: For at the consecracion of a bishop, euery man
woteth well by the paying for his bulles, y
t
he purposeth to be one, & though
he paye for nothing elles. And yet must he bee twise asked whyther he wil be
bishop or no, and he muste twyse say naye, and at the third tyme take it as
compelled ther vnto by his owne wyll (80). The question is where the burden
of the example lies. If the knowledge of the transactions behind the scenes is
underscored, then the nomination ceremony of the bishop becomes a mere
theatrical performance, a disguise, which can and should be removed, of the
realities of power and money. If, by contrast, the focus is on the ceremony
itself, then the performative dimension of human activity and the symbolic
nature of reality are highlighted. The future bishops refusals to accept his
nomination are, after all, a necessary part of the sequence of actions that
actually makes him a bishop. Reality in this case is essentially and irreducibly
theatrical.
The significance of the ambiguity explored above becomes clearer if we ex-
amine it in the context of humanist discourse and against the background of
the traditional meaning of the theatrical metaphor. By Mores day, the depic-
tion of the human world as a stagefamously expressed by the emblem of the
theatrum mundihad become part of the symbolic code of Western culture.
Its stable kernel of meaning, transmitted from classical antiquity through
the Middle Ages to the Renaissance, is wonderfully presented in Erasmuss
Moriae encomium:
If anyone tries to take the masks off the actors when theyre playing a scene on the
stage and show their true, natural faces to the audience, hell certainly spoil the
whole play and deserve to be stoned and thrown out of the theater for a maniac.
. . . Now, what else is the whole life of a man but a sort of play? Actors come on
wearing their different masks and all play their parts until the producer orders
them off the stage, and he can often tell the same man to appear in different
146 Chapter 5
costume, so that now he plays a king in purple and now a humble slave in rags.
Its all a sort of pretense, but its the only way to act out this farce.
32
The emblem of the theatrum mundi underscored the vanity of material and
political success in particular and of any purposeful human activity in the
saeculum in general. It asserted that the destiny of human beings was deter-
mined by providence and that human history was meaningful only as part of
a divine plan beyond human comprehension. In other words, the traditional
theatrical metaphor was part of a cultural code that questioned the very pos-
sibility of a secular understanding and transformation of reality, but at the
same time assured that reality was ultimately meaningful.
33
Against this background, it is clear that Mores text appropriates the theatri-
cal metaphor to humanist discourse, for in Richard III the director of the play of
life is no longer divine Providence but rather man. The theatrical metaphor thus
presents political reality as a human artifact, a reality created by human inten-
tions and actions. The moral and political consequences of the theatricality of
the political world in Mores text, however, are hardly in accordance with the
accepted assumptions of humanist moral and political thought. The theatrical
performances served Richard and his allies and were essential for the success
of the protectors plot. They exclusively serve evil. In Richard III the theatrical
metaphor is associated with deception and devastation. The theatricality of the
political world is connected to its immanent corruption. Indeed, the corrup-
tion of the political world is a corollary of its theatrical nature. Most humanists
celebrated the possibility of purposeful human activity in a human-made world.
In Richard III, by contrast, the human nature of the political world is perceived
as intrinsically destructive. The Londoners drew the right conclusion from this
profoundly antihumanist insight: And so they said that these matters bee Kyn-
ges games, as it were stage playes, and for the more part plaied vpon scafoldes.
In which pore men be but y
e
lokers on. And thei y
t
wise be, wil medle no farther.
For they that sometyme step vp and playe w
t
them, when they cannot play their
partes, they disorder the play & do themself no good (81).
Moreover, in a deeper layer the equivocality of Richard III reflects an
ambiguity toward the basic presuppositions of humanist thought. One of
the possible interpretations of the theatrical metaphor in the text, that is,
the perception of the human world as essentially theatrical, squares with
the ontological and epistemological presuppositions of humanist discourse,
namely that human reality is inherently symbolic and that therefore human
activity is inherently interpretative and performative. The other interpreta-
tionthat is, that theatricality is simply a disguise of realitydenies the
symbolic dimension of social reality, and thus contradicts the presuppositions
of humanist discourse. Richard III is equivocal precisely on this matter, as
Mores Richard III 147
the theater stands both for reality as such and for realitys misrepresentation.
This irreducible ambiguity may lead to a paradoxical conclusion: reality is a
constructed human artifact, but constructed as deceptive and false. In order
to account for this ambiguity we must examine the precise relation of Richard
III to the genre of humanist history.
Richard III and the Subversion of Humanist History
Richard III is referred to by its author as this hystorye (9), and it was read
by later generations as such. Roger Ascham, for example, prominent among
the English humanists of the later sixteenth century, mentions Richard III as
a rare example of worthy history written by an Englishman.
34
Mores interest
in the genre is well documented. Thomas Stapleton, one of the early biog-
raphers, informs us that More studied with avidity all the historical works
he could find.
35
History was one of the studia humanitatis and the classical
historians provided the humanists model. Sylvester, who analyzed in detail
the relationship between Richard III and its classical models, demonstrated
that More drew on Sallust, Suetonius and especially Tacitus, and assimilated
into his own narrative some of their language, themes and literary techniques.
Richaqrd Sylvester argues, however, that More did not ape the Roman histori-
anshe derived from the classical discipline the general rules of the genre.
36
Classical and humanist historians considered historiography to be closely
related to rhetoric, and the fullest classical treatment of the historical disci-
pline appears in Ciceros De oratore.
37
The humanists believed that Cicero had
exhausted the subject. Most humanist historians did not discuss methodology
at all, and those who did, Vergil and Ascham for example, simply paraphrased
De oratore.
38
What was Ciceros understanding of the writing of history?
39
For him there
were two basic types of historical writings, differing in scope, content, style
and methodology. The first kind, the annales or chronicle form, was the basis
of the second, the historia as a truly humanist production. Annales were only
bare records of dates, personalities, places and events, and their composi-
tion did not require specific talents or qualifications.
40
The chroniclers only
commitment was to truth: he had to write the whole truth without bias or
prejudice.
41
The chronicle was considered unproblematic, since the classical
and humanist historians considered the status of the historical fact and the
historical event unproblematic. The chronicle provided the foundations
(fundamenta), the factual skeleton, on which the historian constructed the
rhetorical superstructure or exaedificatio.
42
It was the rhetorical superstructure
that set the historia apart from the chronicle and gave the work its quality.
148 Chapter 5
This rhetorical superstructure Cicero divides into two elements: content
(res) and style (verbum).
43
What Cicero meant by verbum is identical to
what we mean when we use the word style today in discussing writing, and
his remarks on this subject are of no interest for the present discussion. The
meaning of res, on the other hand, is not so simple, and we must try to grasp
it in order to understand the classical and humanist notion of history. It is
the content of the exaedificatio that transformed the dry chronicle into a
mimetic and credible narrative, in accordance with rhetorical criteria. Thus,
for example, Quintilian maintains, in an often-quoted passage, that the dry
factual statement The town was stormed must be replaced by a description
detailed and vivid enough to permit the reader to see in his minds eye houses
and temples in flames, panic-stricken inhabitants, looting conquerors and so
forth.
44
This example illustrates one of the most important characteristics of
the history practiced both by classical and humanist writers, namely the obli-
gation to add content to the facts. In this manner the historian is obliged
to explicate the actions of historical figures through credible psychological
descriptions of their personalities and motives, and to explain the causal rela-
tion between events and their possible implications. And finally, since history,
like all humanist disciplines, has an educational purpose, the historian has
to evaluate the behavior of the historical actors, praise the worthy, condemn
wrongdoers and draw the appropriate moral lessons.
45
As he composed the historical superstructure, the historian was not limited
to a bald recounting of facts; his descriptions were not true in the positivist
sense of the term. The description of the storming of a town did not need to
be based on the reports of eyewitnesses; common sense and general human
experience ought to be used to add details and to create the desired mimetic
effect. The same is true for causal and psychological inferences and judg-
ments. In technical terms, the historian was expected to rely on inventio,
that is, the discovery of valid or seemingly valid arguments to render ones
cause plausible.
46
This aspect of the rhetorical superstructure in classical and
humanist historiography appears most clearly in their characteristic reli-
ance upon lengthy speeches. Such fictional speeches not only render fateful
episodes dramatic and vivid, they serve as the means for presenting the per-
sonalities and motives of the leading characters and for explaining the causal
relations between events.
We have seen that in many crucial respects Renaissance humanism gave
birth to the modern historical discipline. Humanism rejected the subordina-
tion of history to theology and represented the past through secular catego-
ries. It developed critical philological methods that enabled refuting medieval
historical legends. The humanist historical writings wove together discrete
historical facts into a coherent narrative, by postulating causal relations
Mores Richard III 149
between historical events. Behind these characteristics lay the emergence of
historical consciousness itself. History was born as an organic concept and as
an autonomous discipline.
47
From our perspective, however, the characteristics of humanist history that
set it apart from nineteenth-century positivist historical theory are no less
important.
48
The reliance on inventio, far from being some sort of marginal
literary supplement to an otherwise scientific historical writing, is indica-
tive of the essential rhetorical self-understanding of humanist history. The
practical implications of this self-understanding can be seen in any aspect of
the humanist historical narratives.
First, for the humanists, history, like any other humanist discipline, had an
explicit and important ethical and political dimension: it existed to persuade
and to motivate men to action. That does not mean that humanist history
was necessarily mere propaganda (though some of it certainly was). Nancy
Struever has shown that, at its best, humanist historiography dissected his-
torical junctions, describing the confluence of forces in all of its complexity
and noting the alternative courses history might have taken. Such thorough
historical reconstruction did not hinder the historian from taking sides, but
it did prevent him from endowing one side with a monopoly on truth and
justice. Precisely because they provided all sides with the opportunity to air
their views, debates and orations were the humanist literary devices par excel-
lence.
49
In any case, whether the historian adopted a monocular and propa-
gandistic position or chose a more subtle and complex perspective, humanist
historical writings were politically involvedand invited the readers involve-
mentin the sense that they exposed and dramatized the ethical dimensions
of historical decisions and actions.
Secondly, humanist history expressed the antimetaphysical presupposi-
tions of humanist discourse. Against the prevailing notions of medieval cul-
ture and indeed of mainstream Western intellectual tradition, humanist his-
tory concerned itself exclusively with the phenomenal world of contingency
and flux. It thus rehabilitated the intelligibility of the particular and the tem-
poral. Furthermore, it represented political reality as a human creation, the
product of human desires, intentions and actions. Most important, humanist
history highlightedthough not explicitly statedthe symbolic dimension
of human reality. It presented social institutions, interactions and practices
as meaningful entities and human activity as interpretive and performative.
Also from this perspective it is clear why the fictive orationsand particularly
the antilogies, two consecutive orations of opponents who put forth opposed
points of viewwere the paradigmatic literary device for the humanists. They
underscored the fact that the very perception of realityof the political actors
as well as of the historianwas not objective but was rather a product of a
150 Chapter 5
specific representation. What Struever says about the humanist discipline of
history was true of all humanist enterprises: The humanists assumed that the
model for the structure of history is the structure of discourse.
50
Now we can return to Richard III and examine the work within the frame-
work of humanist history. At first glance, Mores history fulfills the criteria
established by classical and humanist historians. More grounds his history on
a solid base of facts, on a series of events with which his contemporaries were
already familiar and which they (as well as modern historians) had no reason
to doubt. On this foundation he constructs a detailed superstructure, employ-
ing a variety of rhetorical devices to make it appear convincing, to explain the
causal connection between the events and to reveal the hidden motives of the
protagonists. This exaedificatio is clearly fictitious, but that in no way distin-
guishes Richard III from other humanist histories.
However (as usual with Richard III), a closer reading reveals a more com-
plex picture. Mores text conforms to the rules of the humanist historical
genre, but at the same time undermines and subverts them. Consider, for
example, the question of psychological credibility. Following Ciceros im-
perative, More pledges at the beginning of his history to explicate Richards
behavior according to his character and personality (6). And as we saw,
he fulfills his promise, not only for his principal protagonist. The actions
of the books entire cast of characters are attributed to a single motive: an
unbounded lust for power. The explanation is complete and coherent, and
in this sense fulfills the formal criteria of the genre. And yet the reduction
of human behavior to one and only one motive contradicts the essential
humanist commitment to psychological credibility and realistic description.
Far from exposing the intricate considerations and motives involved in any
decision, the descriptions of the actors in Richard III verge on caricature.
Far from emphasizing the complexity of any concrete situation, Mores text
renders reality one-dimensional.
As it was the rhetorical character of the exaedificatio that made a humanist
history, it is important to examine more closely the meaning and function of
rhetoric in Richard III. In Mores history rhetoric is one of the most important
instruments exercised by Richard and his allies in their quest for power. The
eloquent and carefully organized orations given by the protector himself, by
John Shaa and especially by Buckingham occupy a large part of the work and
underscore the negative function of rhetoric. Far from being the means for
rational deliberation and ultimately the best way to express the individuals
humanitas, in Mores work rhetoric is almost exclusively placed in the service
of evil. We must be careful, however, in evaluating the meaning of this obser-
vation. The humanists never claimed that the good guys would always win,
and were certainly aware that rhetoric was vulnerable to abuses.
51
Mores Richard III 151
We must instead try to examine rhetoric in Richard III in light of the dis-
ciplines more fundamental epistemological meanings and functions. For this
purpose we can bracket rhetorics direct political function, that is, we can ignore
the questions of who employed rhetorical devices and what causes it served.
The speech given by the dying King Edward at the beginning of Richard
III may serve as a point of departure. As Edward urges the nobles to unite as
brothers, he not only iterates universally accepted moral values, he also ar-
ticulates, as the plot will show, the course of action that might have prevented
Richards triumph. It is strongly ironic, however, that so dubious a character
as Edward is preaching the gospel of Christian fraternity. Moreover, even if
it were possible to discount that irony, we cannot ignore the setting of the
oration, its circumstances and its theatricalization, and how these undermine
the speechs potential value. The dying king delivered his valedictory speech
to the nobles he had summoned to his deathbed. This places the speech in the
twilight zone between this world and the world to come, outside the realm of
political interests and desiresoutside the theater of politics. The precise set-
ting of the oration further underscores a complete detachment from political
realities, and threatens to turn the whole scene into a parody. At the begin-
ning of the scene, When these lordes with diuerse other of bothe the parties
were comme in presence, the kynge lifting vppe himselfe and vndersette with
pillowes, began speaking (11). At the end of his speech the king no longer
enduring to sitte vp, laide him down on his right side, his face towarde them.
The audience was apparently deeply touched: none was there peresnt y
t

coulde refraine from weping. The nobles, however, were simply following
the prescription that the Londoners would later state explicitly, namely they
reacted according to the standard conventions, when (as it after appeared by
their dedes) their herts, wer far a sonder (13).
The oration changed the course of events not at all. It did not even encour-
age rational and ethical behavior that might have shaped political reality.
More important still, rhetoric is presented as an empty theatrical device and
nothing more. Edwards oration was nothing but a meaningless show. The
theatricalization of rhetoric undermined its performative function.
Once we begin to take a closer look, we see that the text subverts rhetoric
whenever a rhetorical performance takes place, that is, at every key moment
of the narrative. Let us consider again the long scene in which the Duke of
York is extracted from the Westminster Sanctuary, focusing on the protec-
tors speech to the nobles and especially on the differences between Mores
version and Vergils Angelica Historia.
52
Addressing the nobles, Richard prom-
ises to accept their counsel; he complains about the harm the affair has done
to the kingdoms good name and to the authority of the nobles; he warns of
the possibility of sedition if the situation is not improved; and he offers to
152 Chapter 5
send a delegation to persuade the queen to leave the sanctuary with her son
(2527). In these respects his speech closely resembles that attributed to him
in Vergils narrative.

However, there are differences. First, in Mores version
the protector insistsand the nobles finally agreethat if the queen refuses
to let her son leave the sanctuary he must be forcibly taken from herthis
does not happen in Vergils account. Secondly, in Mores version, Richard
dwells at length upon one argument that does not appear in Vergils: without
a playmate will not the heir see his health suffer? And do not considerations
of rank and age make the princes younger brother the only suitable candidate
in the realm? In order to underscore the importance of this particular argu-
ment he even employs a rhetorical commonplace: And yf anye manne thinke
this consideracion light (whiche I thynke no manne thynketh that loueth the
Kynge) lette hym consyder that sommetime withoute saml thinges greatter
cannot stande (26).
What is the significance of these innovations? In Mores text the nobles
decide that the sanctuary is violable and then send a delegation to the queen.
But as the childs fate was decided beforehand, the ensuing long and elabo-
rate debate between the nobles and the queen clearly becomes superfluous.
More underscores this by giving the queen the upper hand in the dialogue
with the cardinal and, more explicitly, by inserting an internal monologue to
show that while the queen delivered up her son she did so only because she
was convinced that otherwise he would have been taken without her consent
(4041). Although the queen and the cardinal debate the issue for some time
and put forward several reasonable arguments, no consideration is truly given
to rational arguments, and nobody is persuaded. The exchange is a simula-
tion of a dialogue, a theatrical performance of a dialogue. The text presents
a well-constructed dialogue, but suggests that it is inane and vacuous, and
this combination underscores not a local rhetorical dysfunction but rather a
complete breakdown in the constructive capacities of rhetoric.
The second change is not less significant. The ridiculous argument about
the princes need for a playmate may be shown to ridicule the very idea of
rhetoric, especially when integrated with the protectors reasonable arguments.
Apparently the nobles and the prelates must have guessed the protectors true
intentions and simply chose to comply. Vergil, it should be noted, explicitly
rejects this possibility: the nobles suspectyd no subtyltie and agreed to the
protectors proposal because they deemed it both mete and honest.
53
We
ought not to be surprised by Mores bleak perception of the political world
and its actors. But by now rhetoric has come to be immanently implicated in
this depiction. Far from being an instrument of rational and moral negotia-
tion, rhetoric is presented as intrinsically corrupt and corrupting. Let us look
at two other examples.
Mores Richard III 153
The sermon John Shaa gives at St. Pauls, in which he argues that Edward as
well as his sons were born of adulterous relations and concludes that Richard
is the true heir to the crown, goes far in using rhetoric against itself. In order
to give the illusion of a sign from heaven, the protector and the preacher had
agreed that the former would enter St. Pauls at the precise moment when
the latter declared that Richard was the legal heir to the throne. The timing,
however, went awry, and by the time Richard made his entrance Shaa had
already exhausted the subject. In a desperate and far from inspired moment,
the preacher decides to repeat the relevant part of his speech word for word,
but completely out of context. The text lingers on this comic scene, and the
description highlights the failure of the rhetorical performance:
[When the protector entered, Shaa] sodainly lefte the matter, with which he was
in hand, and without ani deduccion therunto, out of al order, & oute of al frame,
began to repete those wordes again. . . . Whyle these wordes wer in speaking, y
e

protector accompanied w
t
the duke of Buckingham, went thorow y
e
people into
y
e
place where the doctors comonly stand in the vpper story, where he stode to
hearken the sermon. But the people wer so farre fro crying king Richard, y
t
thei
stode as thei had bene turned into stones, for wonder of this sermon. (68)
No more successful were Buckinghams speeches at the Guildhall, in which
he repeated the accusations of adultery, generally defamed King Edward and
demanded that the Londoners offer the crown to the protector. More pres-
ents us with an eloquent and elegantly articulated speech by Buckingham,
but the audiences reaction is far from enthusiastic: all was husht and mute,
and not one word aunswered therunto. The surprised duke is informed that
he had not been understood. He quickly gathers himself, and by somewhat
louder, he rehersed them the same matter againe in other order and other
wordes, so wel and ornately, & natheles so euidently and plaine, with voice
gesture and countenance so cumly and so conuenient. Alas, this speech too
was received with stony silence: not one woorde was there aunswered of
all the people that stode before, but al was as styl as y
e
midnight. Now the
duke is informed that the people were accustomed to hearing proposals only
through the official known as the recorder. The latter, new to his office and
quite terrified, is then forced to repeat the proclamation. He does so, but so
tempered his tale, that he shewed euery thing as the dukes wordes and no
part his owne (75). When this performance too fails to win an enthusiastic
response, an angry Buckingham declares that Richard would be king whether
the assembly approved it or not. At this moment the audiences silence is at
last broken, but not by words: from the audience comes a sound that was
neyther loude nor distincke, but as it were the sounde of a swarme of bees
(76).
154 Chapter 5
In the examples I have just reviewed rhetoric is located as far as possible from
the realm of authenticity, morality and rationality, and instead is intrinsically
associated with deception and evil. Furthermore, rhetoric is mangled, ridiculed,
displaced and taken out of context. All the rhetorical sins are committed in
order to undermine rhetorics fundamental capacity as a means of commu-
nication, persuasion and action. Rhetoric, and language in general, lose their
performative function. But this subverts the very ontological and epistemologi-
cal basis of humanist discourse, namely the presuppositions that the social and
the symbolic are inseparable and that human action is inherently performative.
Richard III questions, to use Struevers definition, the notion that the model
for the structure of history is the structure of discourse.
This analysis of the function of rhetoric in Richard III has led to the same
paradox we encountered in the analysis of the texts reliance on theatrical met-
aphors. The eloquent orations delivered by Richard and his allies were false
and were perceived as such, but by no means were they redundant (otherwise
why should More craft such lengthy speeches?). They were done in good
order and as such were essential to the construction of reality. Hence the
paradox: political reality is rhetorically constructed, but constructed as false.
This epistemological and political deadlock is best illustrated by the peoples
reactions to the speeches of Shaa and Buckingham. The paralyzed silences
thei stode as thei had bene turned into stones; all was husht and mute; al
was as styl as y
e
midnightand the inarticulate, inhuman soundsneyther
loude nor distincke, but as it were the sounde of a swarme of beesare the
only possible responses when reality becomes unintelligible.
Humanist Comedy
Richard III undermines the humanist notion of rhetoric rendering political
activity futile and threatening the very possibility of comprehending reality in
humanist terms. But if this is true, how could the writing of history be possible
at all? For rhetoric, as the term was explicated throughout this study, provided
the basis for the humanist intellectual enterprise generally and to the humanist
historiography in particular. We saw in fact that in humanist discourse political
and intellectual activity were conceived as epistemologically identical.
54
Under-
mining the former, therefore, means undermining also the latter. And indeed
Mores text questions accepted humanist assumptions concerning the writing
of history, casting doubt on the very possibility of the task.
We are tipped off by the convoluted style of Richard III, and by the re-
peated use of two obfuscatory techniques, namely reporting from rumor and
presenting two alternative versionsdark and darkerof events.
55
Had, for
Mores Richard III 155
example, Richard long contemplated a putsch, or had he simply exploited the
opportunity created by Edwards premature death? What had Buckinghams
part been? Had he instigated the plot, or only been let in on it at a later stage?
More does not presume to know the details, and invites us to share his doubts.
The events surrounding Clarences execution make up an even more pro-
nounced example. More does not even pretend to know whether it was a plot
or only a slanderous accusation. Any one of these gaps in Mores understand-
ing is not by itself problematicthe humanists did not purport to know all
the answersbut not so their accumulated impact. They create an impenetra-
ble wall between the historian and large segments of reality. Using Ciceronian
terminology, we can say that Richard III questions the very notion of inventio,
or more accurately the possibility of constructing a credible exaedificatio atop
factual fundamenta. The undermining of the humanist concept of historical
fact is the inevitable outcome of the texts ambiguity concerning the relation
between reality and theatricality, between performativity and dissimulation.
For this reason More allows himself even to tamper with the bare records
of dates, personalities, places and events of the affairnotably when he
reschedules the date of Hastingss execution to implicate him in the murder
of the queens relativesviolating the distinction between fundamenta and
exaedificatio and the humanist historians commitment to truth.
The subversion of the humanist discourse explains why the text cannot
control and contain the centrifugal forces that threaten to transform it into
a parody of humanist history. The most striking example of this is undoubt-
edly the description of the murder of the two princes, which wildly violates
the conventions of humanist historiography. The factual skeleton of the mur-
der story is straightforward enough: Richard, More tells us, first ordered the
constable of the Tower of London, Robert Brackenbury, to kill the children.
When Brackenbury flatly refused, the new king sent to London James Tyrrell,
who carried out the mission.
Clear as that basic outline may be, the exaedificatio built on this factual
platform includes an excess of marginal, senseless and highly improbable
details, which manage to transform the supposedly mimetic narrative into
a burlesque.
56
We learn, for instance, that the original order to Brackenbury
was sent in a written letter carried by a messenger. When he learned of Brack-
enburys refusal Richard summoned to his bathroomfor this communi-
cacion had he sitting at the draught, a conuenient carpet for such a consaile
(84)a secrete page. Taking the advice of the page, Richard decided on Tyr-
rell, personally woke him up and, after scolding him for daring to go to bed so
early, explained his errand. As Tyrrell founde . . . nothing strange in his in-
structions, he was sent to London with special written authorization to receive
all y
e
kayes of the Tower for one nyght, to y
e
ende he might there accomplish
156 Chapter 5
the kinges pleasure (84). Brackenbury appears to have found nothing strange
in these orders and he promptly admitted Tyrrell to the tower. More provides
an account of Tyrrells meticulous preparations, of the strangling of the sleep-
ing children and of their hasty burial at the stayre foote, metely depe in the
grounde vnder a great heape of stones (85).
Richards sudden metamorphosis also violates the rules of humanist histo-
riography. So different is the Richard who appears suddenly at the end of the
drama from the Richard we have come to know that all psychological verisi-
militude vanishes. The unveiling of psychological depths and sensitivities in
the person described from the beginning as the embodiment of pure ambition
overturns the narrative. The kings metamorphosis begins with a sober and
melancholic reflection on (of all subjects) loyalty, occasioned by Brackenburys
disobedience and directed at the secrete page of the bath: Ah whome shall a
man trust? those that I haue broughte vp my selfe, those that I had went would
most surely serue me, euen those fayle me, and at my commaundemente wyll do
nothyng for me (83). (These words evoke the fatal words attributed to Henry
II at the climax of the Becket affair: What sluggards, what cowards, have I
brought up in my court, who care nothing for their allegiance to their lord! Not
one will deliver me from this low-born priest!
57
This resemblancewhether
this is an intentional allusion is, of course, a matter of conjectureadds an
ironic touch to Richards reflection, as he assumes for himself the role of Henry
II and likens the murder of the helpless children to the struggle with the mighty
archbishop.) Later, after the murder, real pangs of remorse begin to assail the
king and he becomes obsessed with the burial place of his nephews: he allowed
not as I haue heard, y
e
burying in so vile a corner, saying that he woulde haue
them buried in a better place, because thei wer a kinges sonnes (86). And so,
thei say, a priestonly this man and the secrete page go unnamed in the
murder storyin the service of Brackenbury was sent to disinter the bodies and
rebury them in a secret place. Since the priest himself died soon thereafter no
one would ever learn the reburial site.
This parody of humanist history is the logical result of the subversion of
the epistemological and ethical presuppositions of humanist discourse. Per-
haps this may explain why the murder story does not appear in the version
done in Latin, that authoritative language of humanist history. It may even
explain why Mores text terminates abruptly soon after the murder, and
why the history as a whole was never completed. In any event, it is probably
no coincidence that the work commences with a reflection on the theme of
historical memory. We have already seen how the text ironically undermines
the idealizing description of Edward IV and his reign, but Richard III also
mediates upon the source of the rosy image. At the time of Edwards death,
More tells us,
Mores Richard III 157
the displeasure of those that bare him grudge, for kinge Henries sake the sixte,
whome he deposed, was well asswaged, and in effecte quenched, in that that
manye of them were dead in more than twentie yeares of his raigne, a great parte
of a longe lyfe. And many of them in the meane season growen into his fauoure,
of whiche he was neuer straunge. (4)
Historical memory, like political reality, is constituted by the powerful. The
skeleton of the history of Edward IV appears at the beginning of the work,
but this history, this humanist history, is not the true one, or at least not the
only one. The flashbacks and the allusions scattered among the episodes of the
history of Richard IIIthe king who did not reign long enough to consign his
crimes to oblivionassemble themselves into the skeleton of an alternative
history. But this history, like The History of King Richard III, could never be
a humanist history.
Richard III is a product of the Erasmian Republic of Letters. It is written by the
Erasmian humanist in the position of universal intellectual. Comparison with
other humanist histories confirms this claim. We have learned that humanist
historiographylike humanist intellectual activity in generalwas politically
engaged. Humanist history was explicitly written on behalf of a particular pol-
ity and political ideology. Leonardo Brunis Florentine Histories, as the first
example of a humanist history, thus embraces the dominant political ideology
in Florence, namely republicanism.
58
Closer to Mores work in time and subject
is Angelo Polizianos The Pazzi Conspiracy, which presents the failed conspiracy
against the Medici rulers from their perspective.
59
Still closer to More is Vergil,
who wrote his Anglica Historia for Henry VII, espousing Tudor interests as well
as the dominant aristocratic and monarchical ideology.
We have examined the relationship between the humanists and the ruling
establishment from complementary perspectives, that is, social and intellec-
tual.
60
The former point of view has underscored the economic and profes-
sional dependence of the humanists on the patronage of the powerful. Bruni
was accordingly integrated into the Florentine elite. Poliziano became a pro-
tg of the Medici. And Vergil wrote his history in the service of Henry VII.
61

An intellectual perspective allows us to understand how the alliance with the
political establishment issued from the humanist commitment to the vivere
civile, and ultimately from the humanist perception of knowledge as socially
embedded and practical.
Mores history, in contrast, was not written on behalf of the interests or
the ideology of any specific political group or social class. It was created by
the humanist as a universal intellectual, a citizen of the Republic of Letters,
from a position of conscious detachment from structures of political power.
62

This is the source of the critical weightand, arguably, the literary quality as
158 Chapter 5
wellof Mores work. Indeed, Richard III is a condemnation of the dominant
monarchical ideology. Furthermore, it denounces aristocratic culture for its
values, its false self-image, and for the violence and destruction that are in its
nature. Richard III, in other words, rejects the ideological foundation of the
social and political order of the European monarchies.
But Richard III should not just be read as a critique of the dominant mode
of political values and behavior. It challenges many aspects of humanist dis-
course as well. It raises questions about the humanist commitment to public
activity by arguing that political engagement is dangerous as well as futile. It
further challenges humanist political thought by doubting the possibility of a
morally legitimate political order. Rather than offering a solution to this bleak
diagnosis of the political reality, Richard III projects evil into the political
world as such. The text is, in this respect, as categoricaland problemati-
cal, from the point of view of humanist discourseas the more pessimistic
expressions found in Erasmuss political writings, such as defining learning
and civilization as the source of evil in Dulce bellum, or his depiction of king-
ship in Scarabeus aquilam quaerit. At a still deeper layer, More attacks here
the fundamental humanist notion of rhetoric, consequently undermining
the very foundation of humanist discourse and questioning the possibility of
comprehending reality, by either the ordinary social agent or the humanist
historian.
Richard III thus shares those same perplexing characteristics of Erasmuss
political writings. Mores work asserts the authors position as universal intel-
lectual, that which grants him immunity from external political and ideologi-
cal pressures. At the same time, however, it fails to exploit that position. Far
from elaborating a coherent Erasmian discourse, in fact, Richard III no less
than undermines this discourse. And so the identity of the universal intellec-
tual is revealed to be most problematic in terms of humanist discourse itself.
In accounting for this problem, we need to return, once more, to Utopia.
160 Chapter 6
one point of view while simultaneously undermining the credibility of each.
2

Utopias literary structure and its use of literary devices thus seem to frustrate
any attempt to assign the work a fixed meaning.
My aim is to conceptualize and account for these contradictions and para-
doxes from the perspective developed in this study. My central contention is
that while the explicit argumentation of Utopia provides a vision of the ideal
Erasmian social order, there is also a hidden level of meaning, one which con-
tradicts central notions of Erasmian humanism and subverts, moreover, the
premises of humanist discourse. This ambiguous character of Mores work,
I argue, reflects the fundamental tension immanent to Erasmian humanism
I have traced throughout this study, namely the contradiction between the
identity of the Erasmian humanist as an autonomous intellectual and the
ontological and epistemological presuppositions of humanist discourse. My
reading can resolve the debate over the works own attitude toward Utopia,
as well as explain why that debate has persisted for so long. For while Utopias
humanist perspective and rhetoric invite us to view Utopian society as an
ideal society, the text subverts its own explicit positions and consequently un-
dermines any attempt to capture an ideal. My reading also confers a measure
of coherence to many of the texts literary paradoxes and ambiguities as it re-
lates them to distinct tensions within the discourse of Erasmian humanism.
Erasmianism and Utopianism
Later I shall examine the gap between the argumentation of Utopia and the
Utopian reality it conjures up. It may be useful, though, to approach the sub-
ject indirectly by examining Utopias explicit challenge to an accepted human-
ist position found in what is known as the Dialogue of Counsel in book 1.
Public career, in court or in administration, was the aspiration of many,
perhaps most, humanists. We have seen that the pursuit of public career was
also related both to the humanists dependence on their patrons and to their
affirmation of the vita activa and their perception of knowledge as practical
and pragmatic. It is not surprising, therefore, that many humanists sought to
advance this position against the traditional medieval preference of the vita
contemplativa. In their works they rehearsed the arguments in favor of public
service: the humanist must sacrifice his own interests for those of society; he
must utilize his knowledge and intellectual expertise for the benefit of the
public; unable to make philosophers kings, at least he should try to make the
kings philosophers, and so forth.
3
Against this background the debate between Hythloday and Morus,
Mores fictional counterpart, in Utopia is of great significance. Peter Giles,
Utopia and the No-Place of the Erasmian Republic 161
cast here as the nave, opens the discussion by saying that any king would
gladly take Hythloday into his service, permitting him to promote his in-
terests and those of his relatives and friends. Hythloday easily sidesteps this
argument, emphasizing that he treasures his liberty above all other things
(U 51). Now Morus enters the discussion, bringing up the substantial argu-
ment: assuming a public career is certainly a personal sacrifice, nonetheless
it is one that must be accepted as a moral duty. The philosopher ought to
contribute to the general good, and his presence near the king, from whom
a peoples welfare or misery flows in a stream, is particularly important
(53). In response, Hythloday describes three situationsone actual and
two hypotheticalin which he serves as a counselor, among typical coun-
selors, to the powerful. In each of his stories he concentrates on destructive
aspects of the European social and political orderthe brutality of the penal
system and the causes of poverty, princely foreign policy and the causes of
wars and the corrupt fiscal policy of European rulersand offers remedies
drawn from the societies he came to know in his voyages. In all three cases,
the structure of Hythlodays argument and his conclusions are identical. He
demonstrates that the failure of the philosopher-as-counselor is an inevitable
result of the existing political order. Counsel, according to Hythloday, is im-
possible, for the simple reason that the fundamental assumptions and aims
of the philosopher and of the prince along with his benighted counselors are
incommensurable (5395).
But the debate does not end at this point. Morus accepts Hythlodays diag-
nosis of the existing state of things, but continues to adhere to the humanist
affirmation of public career, employing the full range of Ciceros canonical
arguments in De officiis.
4
He argues that the philosophers inability to offer
advice he knows for certain will not be listened to must not deter him
from attempting to improve things as much as possible by using indirect
approach. He thus rejects Hythlodays academic philosophy [Philosophia
scholastica] (95), recommending another philosophy, better suited for the
role of a citizen, that takes its cue, adapts itself to the drama in hand and
acts its part neatly and appropriately. Morus further employs the theatrical
metaphor in order to highlight the humanist notion of decorum and to refute
Hythlodays position:
Otherwise, when a comedy of Plautus is being played, and the household slaves
are cracking trivial jokes together, you come onstage in the grab of a philosopher
and repeat Senecas speech to Nero from the Octavia. Wouldnt it be better to
take a silent role than to say something inappropriate and thus turn the play into
tragicomedy? You pervert a play and ruin it when you add irrelevant speeches,
even if they are better than the play itself. So go through with the drama in hand
162 Chapter 6
as best as you can, and dont spoil it all just because you happen to think of a
play by someone else that might be more elegant. (97)
Hythloday is unmoved, however. On the contrary, he totally rejects Moruss
indirect approach and reformulates his criticism of European society in more
general and abstract terms. Instead of his former suggestions for limited
reforms, he now employs a clinical terminology in a new argument. Partial
legislative reforms, he says, may have as much effect as poultices continually
applied to sick bodies that are past cure. A real cure requires a structural
change of the social order and particularly the abolition of private property.
And this insight opens the way to the description of Utopia (103).
Can we determine which of the debaters has prevailed in the Dialogue of
Counsel? Some readers have noted that both sides present logically and con-
ceptually sound arguments and that neither side gives in, and concluded that
the debate ends without resolution.
5
Though this conclusion may be formally
correct, it seems that the text presents Hythlodays case in a more favorable
light. First, Hythloday argues at far greater length than Morus. Second, Morus
accepts most of Hythlodays arguments, and consequently his resort to the
indirect approach seems somewhat arbitrary. Third, the debate ends with
Hythlodays case for the abolition of private property, which he describes as
the only possible solution to the existing social ills, and Moruss practical ar-
guments against communism (1017). By implication, the result of the debate
on counsel hinges on whether or not a communist social order can work,
and its feasibility is taken up and proved by Hythloday in book 2.
6
Utopia
becomes the case study that validates Hythlodays position. Moreover, two
characteristics of the debate further strengthen Hythlodays case. First, only
he employs the humanist method by endowing his abstract reasoning with a
concrete dimension: he tells the stories and cites the examples from his trav-
els. This fact is particularly revealing, since More (in contrast to Morus) was
one of the humanists who brought this technique to perfection.
7
Hythlodays
use of the theatrical metaphor is no less significant. The metaphor was, as
we have seen, a central literary device in Mores History of Richard III, where
its employment flatly contradicts Moruss conclusions. The History demon-
strates that even the most brutal and criminal political events are nothing but
Kynges games . . . for the more part plaied vpon scafoldes, and concludes,
in a truly Hythlodayian spirit, that any intervention is not only futile but also
dangerous (R 81).
8
In any case, even if we deem the dialogue as a whole inconclusive, Utopia
at the very least strongly challenges a commonly held humanist view. What is
the significance of this criticism? Skinner evaluates it vis--vis one of the fun-
damental principles of the humanist political discourse, namely the postulate
Utopia and the No-Place of the Erasmian Republic 163
that the virtuous, rather than the rich and those of noble lineage, should rule.
This position obviously contradicted the political reality and political culture
of the northern European monarchies of the day. According to Skinner, the
basic conservatism of most humanists, combined with their dependency on
their patrons, led them to resolve this contradiction by identifying those who
belonged to the upper classes with the virtuous, thereby reaffirming the exist-
ing order. The originality of Utopia lies in its rejection of this dogmaticand
convenientposition. According to More, in an order based on the worst
human quality, namely pride, the less virtuous inevitably rule. He also drew
the logical conclusion from his analysis that pride will be abolished only once
all social distinctions have been abolished, and for distinctions to vanish,
private property must go. Thus, according to Skinner, Utopia is truly radical
because in it we see the humanist discourse put to use in a critique of long-
standing humanist positions. Utopia is a humanist critique of humanism.
9
Utopia, to cast Skinners interpretation in the terminology of this study,
does describe the ideal Erasmian society, but at the same time it questions the
Erasmian reform program, at least as Erasmus conceived it, as it demonstrates
that the problems of European society cannot be solved by means of education,
persuasion, and preaching. Skinner disregards, however, the full implications
of Mores critique of the Erasmian reform program. It is in fact easy to turn
his interpretation on its head, as indeed Fenlon does, simply by shifting the
focus of ones reading from the presentations of the Erasmian ideal to the ac-
knowledgment that it will never be realized. Utopia, Fenlon reminds us, no-
where exists; it is a pure fantasy, and as such it amounts to a clear admission
of the futility of Erasmian humanism.
10
The same interpretive components,
so to speak, lead to contradictory conclusions concerning the meaning of the
work. The question about the lesson of Utopia remains unsolved: is it the
textual realization of the Erasmian ideals or rather the impossibility of their
actual realization?
The same problem is posedand dramatizedby some of Utopias literary
features. One such feature is constant textual movement: drawing the ideal state
closer to the reader and then withdrawing. On the one hand, the text presents
Utopia as a real state, and therefore as a realizable social and political ideal. On
the other hand, it offers many indications that the ideal is bound to remain for-
ever on the horizon. The description of Utopia, for example, is fully integrated
into a realistic narrative that locates the ideal state in the temporal and geo-
graphical context of Europe and the New World at the beginning of the sixteenth
century as seen in the references to Mores own diplomatic mission to Flanders
and to the voyages of Amerigo Vespucci, which are now common reading
everywhere (U 45). Utopia, one of the many countries between America
and Ceylon, becomes no less real than England or Flanders. But even in this
164 Chapter 6
realistic description, a withdrawing motion appears when the return of Hyth-
loday from Utopia to Europe is defined as a strange good fortune and even
beyond all hope (51). In the prefatory letter addressed to Giles, the internal
tension is even more clearly revealed. There More states that the only thing he
had to do as the writer of Utopia was to relate accurately what he had heard
from Hythloday, but soon he is led to admit that the exact location of Utopia
is unknown. For it didnt occur to us to ask, nor to him [Hythloday] to say
(35), he complains, disclosing the imaginary nature of the no place.
11
The
nomenclature of Utopia provides further indication of the nowhereness of
Utopia. As is well known, Utopia means no place, and Hythlodays name
means learned in nonsense.
12
Another literary device with the same function involves the similarities and
differences between Utopia and England. The Utopian social order differs,
of course, markedly from the English one. But there are some similarities,
apparently insignificant, between Utopia and England: Utopia is an island
like England; Utopia consists of fifty-four cities, while England is made up of
fifty-three counties plus the city of London, and so on.
13
Indeed, already in the
notes provided by sixteenth-century editions we find the same attentiveness:
Just like the Thames in England (117), A People not so unlike the Swiss
(209), and so on.
These textual movements are readily translated into a conceptual problem-
atic. Since the Utopian social order is based on the intellectual and material
resources that then existed in Europe, it stands to reason that the ideal society
could be established by humanitythat is, without divine interventionat
that date. The book itself demonstrates that Mores contemporaries had the
necessary intellectual resources. And concerning the material resources, More
goes out of his way to prove that the Utopian order is economically viable
(12933). But there was no obvious way to pass from the existing condi-
tion to the Utopian one. More does not discuss the issue, and his analysis of
Europes social ills indicates that a utopian turn is, in fact, impossible. Not by
coincidence, it is precisely when More transcends the traditional humanist
discourse, adding economic and sociological dimensions to the conventional
ethical concerns, that the impossibility of revolutionizing Europe is most
evident. Pride and private property are, in his analysis, bound together in a
vicious circle: in the existing state of things pride is the precondition of pri-
vate property, and vice versa.
14
And indeed, in the very last sentence of Utopia
Morus acknowledges that the Utopian order is not realizable at all (249). Uto-
pia is therefore a vivid and concrete social and political ideal, but one destined
to remain forever on the horizon.
15
Utopias literary devices shed new light on the Dialogue on Counsel by
firmly anchoring it on the general question of the relationship between Eras-
Utopia and the No-Place of the Erasmian Republic 165
mianism and utopianism. We have seen that the utopian genre is an ideal
instrument for expressing the views of the Erasmian humanists qua universal
intellectuals, and that Mores Utopia fully exploits this potential.
16
But now we
see that the relationship is much more ambiguous. The very utopian criticism
of the existing order challenges the traditional means for the implementation
of the Erasmian gradual reform program, namely education and moral per-
suasion. At the same time, the distancing of Utopia indicates that also the uto-
pian turn is impossible. The Erasmian ideals, in other words, can be realized
neither by gradual reform nor by sweeping structural changethey cannot
be realized at all. Perhaps this conclusion explains why Erasmian humanism
produced only a single utopia.
The reaction of Mores fellow humanists corroborates this interpretation.
As we saw, Bud, Giles, Busleyden and their friends enthusiastically welcomed
the appearance of Utopia as an expression of their views.
17
They disregard,
however, the out-of-reach quality of Utopia, so conspicuous in Mores text.
The maps of the island, that represent the Utopian cities like those of Europe,
the Utopian alphabet and its phonetic translation into Latin, and the verses
in which Utopia declares in first person, Freely I impart my benefits; not
unwillingly I accept whatever is better (23)all these draw Utopia closer to
Europe. It therefore should not surprise us that the name of the workthe
clearest textual indication that Utopia nowhere existsbecame a target of
creative humanist reading. The prefatory poem suggests that Utopia was
called No-Place only because it was isolated, while its true name should be
Eutopia, The Good Land (18), and Bud transforms it in his preface into
Hagnopolis, Holy City (15). Given the reading abilities of the humanists,
this blindness provides more than circumstantial evidence for a resistance to
a threatening insight hidden in the text, namely the undermining of the pos-
sibility of the Erasmian reform program.
If there is an inherent tension between utopianism and humanism, the
constitution of humanist utopian society must be problematic in the extreme.
In order to explore this hypothesis we must return to Utopia armed with sus-
picion concerning the explicit argumentation and rhetoric of the text and the
self-presentation of Utopia. We must read the text against the grain of its ex-
plicit position and uncover the traces of repressed strains and contradictions.
Brutality, Supervision and Discipline
The self-image of Utopia is indeed misleading. Most obviously, many of the
ideal states practices are oppressive and brutal even by nonutopian standards.
The states attitude toward its enemies, external as well as internal, clearly
166 Chapter 6
exposes the dark side of Utopia.
18
Far from being a marginal topic, Utopian
warfare is the subject of one of the longest sections of the book. As with many
other issues, there is a wide gap between the rhetoric of the text and its con-
tent. The section on military affairs begins with an unequivocal statement
about the attitude of the Utopians toward war: They utterly despise war as
an activity fit only for beasts (201). And yet they find many reasons to go
to war. They are quick to assist, for example, dubious allies and friends,
in fact subordinated states. They may even initiate war not only to protect
their friends from present danger, but sometimes to repay and avenge previ-
ous injuries (203). In these cases, perforce, the border between the just and
the unjust is often blurred. Thus the Utopians waged war in behalf of the
Nephelogetes when, under pretext of right, a wrong (as they saw it) had been
inflicted on some Nephelogete traders. As if to stress the important point,
Hythloday hastens to add: Whatever the rights and wrongs of the quarrel, it
developed into a fierce war (203). The ideal state also conducts colonial wars.
As the population of the island is carefully regulated, the Utopians sometimes
establish new cities on the neighboring continent. The native population is
invited to join the new Utopian city; refusal invites warwhich the Uto-
pians consider perfectly justifiableand expulsion from their own lands
(13537, 203).
19
Utopian military practices are not less surprising. The Utopians reject
in Erasmian spirit both the feudal-aristocratic ethos and the republican
ethos, adhering to the view that there is nothing so inglorious as the glory
won in battle (201). They hold that true manliness and bravery consist
of overcoming the enemy by skill and cunning (205). And they indeed
implement this prescription. They try to leave fighting to generously paid
mercenaries and in the worst case to their allies, and even strive to avoid
war altogether by offering rewards for the assassination or extradition of
the enemys king and other high politicians (2057). There is, however, an
irrational kernel at the heart of the Utopian instrumental conception of war,
manifested in their attitude toward the Zapoletes. These rough, rude and
fierce people are Utopias best mercenaries (209). The Utopians exhibit
little gratitude. They intentionally thrust the Zapoletes into the positions
of greatest danger, arguing that they would deserve very well of mankind
if they could sweep from the face of the earth all the dreg of that vicious and
disgusting race (20911).
A similar attitudeinstrumentalism supplemented by irrational ex-
cessescan be seen in the treatment of the enemies ferreted out from within,
those citizens who transgress Utopias rigid rules. Enslavement or execution
were immediately meted out to those who committed any of the following
crimes: making plans about public matters outside the senate or the popular
Utopia and the No-Place of the Erasmian Republic 167
assembly (123), adultery and seduction (19193) and even leaving the city
twice without permission (145). Even the dead are punished in the ideal
state. Honest persons, it is said, ought to meet their ends serenely and cheer-
fully, and for this reason Utopian funerals are usually joyous events. Those
who exhibit fear and reluctance when their ends grow near are, by contrast,
grimly and silently buried (22527). And the bodies of suicidesexcept for
those who have suffered from terminal illnessare thrown into a marsh and
refused proper burial (18789).
Utopias treatment of its enemies is by no means the states only puzzling
feature. Several astute readings have exposed the quasi-totalitarian nature of
Utopian society, its rigid and coercive social structure and the regimentation
of its citizens daily life. Most important, these readings show that the unat-
tractive institutions and practices of Utopia are by no means accidental; they
are built into the very logic of the ideal state.
20
Utopian social order is actually based on discipline, control and supervi-
sion. One of the most striking manifestations of this is the radical uniformity
of the ideal state. Utopias fifty-four cities are exactly alike, except where
geography itself makes a difference (115), and so are the three-storied houses
the Utopians inhabit (119), and the clothes they wear except for the distinc-
tion between the sexes and between married and unmarried persons (125).
Since in Utopia there is no sumptuary consumption, the number of occupa-
tions is extremely limited: besides agriculture there is only wool working and
linen making (usually assigned for women), and masonry, metal working and
carpentry (usually for men) (12527). The full integration of women into the
Utopian economy is part of a broad attempt to reduce some of the differences
between the sexes. To be sure, in many respects Utopia is a patriarchal society
like the European society: wives serve their husbands (137) and are chastised
by them (193). In other respects, however, Utopia is egalitarian. Women
enjoy equal education (127, 155), for instance, and are even eligible for priest-
hood (231).
21
Efforts aimed at abolishing the differences between town and
country have been even more successful. Each Utopian city is located at the
middle of a rural farming zone, to which all Utopian citizens arrive in rotation
for two-year periods; agriculture is thus a shared occupation of all Utopians,
men and women alike (113). Many other examples could be cited, but those
mentioned are sufficient to prove that the elimination of private property and
aristocracy are only two elements, though the most radical, in a grand attempt
to dismantle social distinctions and differences.
This leveling followed, in part, from the prognosis of book 1. The identi-
fication of differences in wealth and status as the source of Europes social
ills leads directly to the elimination of private property and of aristocracy.
But Utopia goes further and tries to eliminate even those differences and
168 Chapter 6
distinctions between its citizens that are not directly related to recognized
social problems. Utopia prevents, for instance, its citizens even as much as
choosing the color of their garment. It generally prevents its citizens from
expressing their individuality. This insight is significant as it contradicts
the accepted humanist attitude and the rhetoric of Utopia itself. For Utopia
is committed to the happiness of its citizens and to enabling them fully to
realize their humanitas; to encourage them to devote themselves to the
freedom and culture of the mind (135).
The tension between common humanist views and convictions and Uto-
pian reality is even more salient when Utopias control and supervision of its
citizens is considered. The Utopian attitude toward travel may be taken as a
paradigmatic example:
Any individuals who want [desiderium ceperit] to visit friends living in another
city, or simply to see the place itself, can easily obtain permission from their
syphogrants and tranibors, unless there is some need for them at home. They
travel together in groups, taking a letter from the governor granting leave to
travel and fixing a day of return. . . . Wherever they go, though they take noth-
ing with them, they never lack for anything, because they are at home every-
where. If they stay more than a day in one place, each one practices his trade
there. . . . (14445)
As usual, the gap between the rhetoric of the text and the reality it depicts is
an indication of a repressed problem. The explicit policy stated at the outset
suggests a high degree of liberty. Reality turns out to be quite different. Evi-
dently, Utopia finds it hard to cope with an inexplicable desire to travel. Thus
although permission is easily obtainedthe request has to be transmitted
all the way up to the governorit is overloaded with many qualifications and
restrictions. Completing the picture, those who violate the rules and leave the
city zone without permission are severely punished for their first offense
and enslaved for the second (145).
Utopia is not happy, to say the least, with a disruption of the routine pat-
tern of life. And indeed, the ideal state regulates the most minute details of its
citizens lives: their free time (12729), the games they play (129), their sitting
place in the common dining halls (143) and so forth. The ultimate Utopian
means of control is the all-penetrating gaze, which renders Utopian reality
transparent.
22
The sitting arrangement in the common dining halls ensures
that nothing said or done at table can pass unnoticed by the old, who are
present on every side (143). As Utopian house doors are never locked, there
is nothing private anywhere (119). Outside the house the situation is no dif-
ferent. Nowhere on the island can one escape observation: Because they live
in the full view of all, they are bound to be either working at their usual trades
Utopia and the No-Place of the Erasmian Republic 169
or enjoying their leisure in a respectable way. Therefore, in Utopia there are
no wine-bars, or ale-houses, or brothels . . . no hiding places; no spots for se-
cret meetings (145). The supervising gaze is in principle everywhere. For this
reason there is no such thing as spots for secret meetings, however harmless
the meeting. And finally the gaze becomes a metaphysical entity in the guise
of religious belief. The Utopians believe the dead come frequently among the
living, to observe their words and acts . . . and the belief that their forefathers
are present keeps them from any secret dishonourable deed (227).
Utopias extreme means of control and supervision betray the fundamental
suspicion the ideal state harbors toward its citizens. As such, Utopia markedly
differs from its self-image as well as from the humanist image of the good
political body. The humanists, and even more so the Erasmian humanists,
emphasized that government should be founded on mutual understanding
between the rulers and subjects, based in turn on common values of reason and
morality. Within this framework a considerable measure of freedomat least
as the humanists understood the termfor the citizens could be guaranteed.
Hythloday formulates these ideas: a ruler is incompetent if he knows no other
way to reform his people than by depriving them of all lifes benefits. Indeed,
such a king openly confesses his incapacity to rule free men (93).
Who are the subjects constructed by the Utopian social order? A look at the
Utopian family, the central social institution that mediates between the private
and the public, provides a first indication.
23
The Utopian household is at first
sight similar to the European patriarchal family. But the similarity is only su-
perficial; or rather it holds mainly for the familys functions of supervision and
control. Although the household consisting generally of blood-relations, Uto-
pia does not hesitate to fragment the familys unit. In order to keep the numbers
within defined limitsbetween ten and sixteen adults per householdthe state
transfers people from one family to another (137). By the same token, if the son
is not enthusiastic about the traditional family occupation, in which he ought
to be trained by his father, he may easily transfer to another household (123).
As Harry Berger notes, the Utopian family does not take care of its sickUto-
pia has well-equipped hospitals (13941)and its members do not prepare
and eat their meals separately.
24
And Stephen Greenblatt convincingly argues
that the Utopian family lacks the cultural significance of the contemporaneous
European family; it does not inherit property and does not even own a house.
Though they are exactly alike, the Utopian houses are redistributed between the
families every ten years (119). The Utopian family lacks a name, a unique tradi-
tion, and a feeling of generational continuity and shared destiny.
25
A look at marriage may illustrate even more forcefully the nature of the
Utopian subject. The Utopians are strictly monogamous and do not generally
permit divorce (as mentioned, adultery is punished by slavery). This would
170 Chapter 6
appear to be evidence of their belief in the sanctity of marriage. But the pro-
hibition on divorce is not absolute. When husband and wife are not happy
together, if both manage to find a prospective spouse, the senate sometimes
permits them to divorce. The second condition is the interesting one: the
sanctity of marriage is not the reason for the prohibition on divorce; fears
about subversion of the rigid social order is. In an even more uncompromis-
ing spirit, the senate encourages a man and woman who have been betrayed
by their spouses to marry each other (191). The most remarkable custom
associated with Utopian matrimony is undoubtedly the nude inspection.
Before marriage every bride to be is exhibited naked to her future groom
by a responsible and respectable matron, and similarly the groom to be
is exhibited to his future bride by an honourable man. It is argued that
this practice reveals physical shortcomings, thereby avoiding a great risk
(189). The nude inspection is not different from the other Utopian means of
supervision. The supervising gaze cannot be avoided even in what is usually
considered a private and intimate matter. Once more, the force of Utopia is
revealed in its pursuit of its logic to the extreme, even when the conclusions
are most unattractive. But again, there is a contrast between the rhetoric of
the text and Utopian reality. While Utopia highlights the mutual love and
affection between the Utopiansindeed it depicts the island as a single
family (147)the nude inspection cannot but produce suspicion and mis-
anthropy.
26
The nude inspection is actually confronted in Utopia with a basic human-
ist notion, namely virtus. Not all people, say the Utopians, are so wise as
to concern themselves solely with character; and even the wise appreciate
the gifts of the body as a supplement to the virtues of the mind [animi vir-
tutes] (19091). The Utopian practice is presented as a supplement to the
traditional humanist emphasis on the importance of virtue. But this rhetoric
cannot disguise the internal tension. The nude inspection, but not the con-
siderations of virtues of the mind, is fully integrated with the institutional
structure of Utopia. The very redundancy of the last cited passage illustrates
that virtue is not immanently related to the Utopian institution of marriage,
and by extension that it is not relevant at all to the functioning of the Utopian
institutions or to the reproduction of the Utopian social order. This impor-
tant insight must not be misunderstood: that virtue as a disembodied qual-
ityquality propagated exclusively by persuasion and educationcannot be
the basis of a just and sound social order we already know from Hythlodays
implied rejection of the Erasmian reform program in book 1. But by now we
understand that the Utopian social order does not even necessarily produce
virtuous citizens. This conclusion contradicts the explicit position of Utopia,
which repeatedly depicts the Utopians as virtuous individuals, indeed as the
Utopia and the No-Place of the Erasmian Republic 171
most excellent people in the world (179). It also contradicts, of course, one
of the basic elements of humanist thought: the celebration of virtus both as a
means and as an end.
Indeed we can go farther and say the Utopians are not virtuous individu-
als, at least not in the common, and certainly not in the humanist, sense of
the term. The Utopian social order produces subjects devoid of individuality,
reflective capacity, and inwardness, subjects who exist only insofar as they
are part of the public realm.
27
The antithesis between the Utopian subject
and the humanist human ideal is clarified by juxtaposing Mores book with
any related humanist discussion. Humanist educational theory, for example,
was based on the premise that men and women could internalize morality
and become responsible individuals. The various political theories elaborated
or propagated by the humanists shared the notion of man as a potentially
rational and moral citizen. Likewise, humanist religious thought, while it
had many variants, always assumed that Christians could and should express
their internal faith through moral behavior. Stated more abstractly, we may
say that the humanist discourse presupposed a human potential to mold and
fashion itself. As we have seen, such qualities as rationality, responsibility and
morality cannot be attributed to the Utopian subject, a subject who has been
deprived of all interiority.
While Utopia sees itself as embodying the traits associated with an ideal
Erasmian society, many of its important institutions and practices are dis-
tinctly anti-Erasmian. The Utopians usually realize in their behavior the Eras-
mian ethics, but as their practices do not reflect any inner conviction, they
stand in diametrical opposition to the humanist human ideal.
Explanations
The contradiction between the explicit argumentation and rhetoric of Utopia
and Utopian reality is one of the main interpretive problems for readers of
Mores work. In order to illustrate further the profound structural tensions in
Utopia we shall critically examine the most significant attempts to solve this
problem. The discussion will also expose the theoretical issues provoked by
reading this work.
Some readers have simply passed over or brushed aside the tensions in
the text, paying no mind to the Utopians less attractive practices.
28
Others
read Utopia, or at least book 2, as a game, a jeu desprit, devoid of any seri-
ous philosophical and political content.
29
Another approach sees Utopia as a
serious work, but explains away the problematic parts of the text by dubbing
them satirical or idiosyncratic.
30
172 Chapter 6
Alistair Foxs account of the ambiguities of Utopia is more elaborated, and
has the further advantage of relating the textual aporias and contradictions
to humanist discourse.
31
Fox believes that, for More, humanist rationality
stood in contrast to the reality of human desire, or in other words the
rational law of nature can work directly against the law of human nature.
32

This produced a utopia inherently ambiguous, often closer to dystopia.
33
All
of this arose from an internal tension at the heart of the Christian-humanist
synthesis (exposed also in Erasmuss The Praise of Folly), that is, the con-
tradiction between the rational idealism of the pagan philosophers and the
Christian view of the world.
34
The humanist attempt to integrate Christianity
and secular wisdom, like other syntheses of this kind, was certainly riddled
with internal tensions. But by postulating an inherent contradiction between
humanist thought and the law of human nature or human desire, Fox
anachronistically attributes to humanism an inappropriate notion of ra-
tionalism. Indeed, attributing to More and Erasmus so negative an attitude
toward secular wisdom would amount to placing themnotwithstanding
their own explicit positions and any reasonable reconstruction of Erasmian
humanismat the extreme edge of Christian fundamentalism.
Foxs reading method is not less problematical. He believes that Mores
original intention was to describe an ideal, secular, humanist social order, but
that while writing Utopia he discovered the above-mentioned impediments to
the attempt, and that he subsequently decided to surrender his doubts to his
readers. It is hard to see what theoretical assumptions could justify so nave
a reading, and in any case, as George Logan demonstrates, the text itself does
not support the interpretation of gradual disillusionment.
35
However, there is
a still bigger problem: if, as Fox argues, More discovered that a synthesis of
Christianity and humanism was impossible, why did he continue to defend
and to elaborate this very synthesis in his later polemics against the enemies
of Erasmian humanism?
36
Like Foxs, the neo-Catholic interpretation of Utopia is based on the
distinction between Christianity and secular wisdom. According to this inter-
pretationfirst suggested by R. W. Chambers and subsequently elaborated in
great detail by Edward Surtzthe Utopian social order is the best that can be
constructed through the application of natural reason. But because it is based
only on that, and not based on revealed Christian truths, it is deeply flawed.
37

We are reminded by this interpretation that Erasmian humanism was far
from attributing to secular wisdom or natural reason the destructive effects
that Fox finds in Utopia. However, the opposition between Christian and
secular ethics that Surtz attributes to Erasmian humanism is anachronistic
in its own right. Erasmian humanism emphasized the similarity between the
practical ethics and its social and political consequences, of the classical heri-
Utopia and the No-Place of the Erasmian Republic 173
tage and of Christianity.
38
In his reconstruction of Erasmian humanism, Surtz
unwittingly adopts the argumentation and rhetoric of the sixteenth-century
enemies of humanism. The internal logical and conceptual difficulties of his
interpretation are indicative, and nowhere are they more apparent than when
Surtz deals with the problematical Utopian institutions and practices. As soon
as natural reason and revealed truth are juxtaposed, it becomes clear that
Utopia violates even some of the imperatives of the formerby permitting
divorce, euthanasia, and assassination, for exampleat least as they were un-
derstood at the time. Surtz is thus reduced to circular reasoning: these errors,
he argues, simply prove that natural reason needs the guidance of revelation
even in its own domain, and therefore the unguided Utopians are justified
and blameless in following their conscience even if in some few points it hap-
pens to be erroneous.
39
George Logan systematically elaborates what is perhaps the most com-
monsensical solution to the contradictions of Utopia. Like the neo-Catholics,
Logan takes the adjective optimus in the works title to mean not ideal or
perfect, but the best. He argues that what the best really means is the
best possible given some reasonable assumptions about external reality and
human nature, and concludes that the unattractive practices and institutions
described in Utopia are simply the price More felt obliged to pay for realizing
more important aims. Thus, the brutal foreign policy of Utopia seemed to
More a price worth paying for the security and self-sufficiency of the com-
monwealth; by the same token, for achieving the all-important goal of an
egalitarian as well as a stable social order, the freedom and even the individu-
ality of the citizens had to be compromised.
40
Here we encounter in its most acute form the basic problem shared by all
of the interpretations I have discussed: the assumption that Utopia reflects
the intentions of its author; that in the plentitude of Mores consciousness the
contradictions of the text are resolved.
41
This assumption has been exposed
as theoretically indefensible in practically every discipline of the human sci-
ences; there is no need to rehearse the arguments here. Concerning Utopia in
any case, one wonders: why does More never explicitly state the conclusions
attributed to him? Moreover, such an approach cannot account for the kind
of problems we identified in the work, namely the gaps and aporias that crop
up in the text itself, between the explicit positions of Utopia and the reality
it conjures. While Logan does identify the Utopian institutions and practices
that contradict the positions attributable to Thomas More as a humanist, as a
Christian and so on, he sets out to account for these contradictions through
the authors rational and conscious decisions. But his theoretical assumptions
blind him to an inescapable fact: far from presenting the unattractive aspects
of Utopia as compromises, the text tries to disguise their true nature.
174 Chapter 6
Still more important, neither Logan nor any of those who share his theo-
retical assumptions can account for those excesses of this best of states that
transgress the rationalization provided by the text: the excessive supervision
and limits, over and beyond rational calculation, that Utopia imposes on its
subjects, and the irruption of irrational violence against those perceived as
enemies. How can it be that the most excellent people in the world, who enjoy
an excellent education and the best of moral training (185), cannot so much
as choose the color of their garments or where they sit at meals? Why do the
Utopians consume much less than they produce? Why do not these people
simply bury suicides outside of consecrated ground, rather than toss their
bodies into the swamp? Why do they rejoice at the death of the Zapoletes,
their best mercenaries?
In order to answer these questions and to account for the contradictions of
Utopia and the unattractive features of Utopia we must abandon the attempt
to guess (and manipulate) Mores intentions, and instead ground our inter-
pretation in the logic of his discourse. Among the reconstructions of Utopia
that have built on this theoretical premise, three are of special interest.
Shlomo Avineri defines Utopia as a totalitarian society, because of its uto-
pian naturethat is, because it is the utmost attainable political ideal.
42

According to Utopian thinking, Avineri argues, human nature is intrinsically
evil and must be purified. But evil as such can never be completely destroyed;
it can only be exorcised and exiled from the utopian realm. Evil, in other
words, is a structural necessity of the utopian quest. The continual warfare
between Utopia and its enemies is therefore not a contingent characteristic of
the ideal state, but is built into its very logic. Moreover, this war is not a nor-
mal war waged over contingent interests and partial aims, but by definition a
holy war between Good and Evil. This explains the ruthlessness shown by the
Utopians against their external enemies as well as against the citizen who has
fallen from his state of earthly perfection into a state of sin.
43
Avineris interpretation provides important insights for the understanding
of Mores book, but in the last analysis it does not account for its basic prob-
lematics. Let us look at his principal assertions, that within the framework
of utopian thought human nature is intrinsically evil and that evil cannot be
eliminated. These are certainly not made explicit by More. Utopian moral
philosophy does not hold that human nature is intrinsically evil, or even that
men and women are more inclined to evil than to good. Hythloday, more-
over, explicitly denies this assumption, notably when he rejects the position
that criminals are driven by their innately evil natures (6371). Indeed, the
Utopian assumption is that pride, which lies at the root of evil, is extrinsic to
human nature, a product of a specific social organization. Avineri, however,
does not argue that the Utopians or More adhere to these assumptions; he
Utopia and the No-Place of the Erasmian Republic 175
claims only that they are implied by the Utopians attitude toward their en-
emies. But now we have come full circle and are again face to face with the
contradiction between the implicit assumptions of the Utopian social order
and the explicit argumentation of the text.
From a Marxist perspective, Richard Halpern sees Utopia as an ideological
critique of capitalist (and feudal) ideology. The texts internal tensions and
contradictions are in this view the result of its inability to account for its own
production (since the actual historical forces that could establish and sustain
a communist social order had yet to appear). For this reason, Halpern argues,
the reifying logic of capitalism is reproduced in Utopia at a hidden level of
signification, even though the text explicitly rejects capitalism.
44
Halperns
paradigmatic example is the Utopian attitude toward precious metals. The
debasement of gold is represented in the text as an illustration of adherence
to the logic of use value. Halpern convincingly argues, however, that this
reasoning is flawed, for the logic of use value cannot lead to degradation: in
a mode of production based on use value, gold might have little or no value,
but it cannot have a negative value. The ritualistic debasement of gold is
therefore a symptom of repressed desire. Gold is implicitly assigned an innate
value, subverting the Utopian social order, which is allegedly based on utility
alone. According to Halpern this repressed desire and fetishism of gold dem-
onstrates that Utopian society had unconsciously succumbed to the reifying
logic of capital.
45
Halpern acknowledges that this is a far-reaching conclusion, for while
the logic of reification is usually all inclusive to the point of obliterating use
value, Utopia succeeds in depicting a more or less coherent social order based
on utility. The strange mixture of consciously communistic vision and un-
consciously capitalistic reification, contends Halpern, resulted from Mores
confrontation with the aristocratic ethos. More was not a proto-Marxist after
all: he was a proto-Veblenite, and his employment of use value was opposed
not to capitalistic exchange value but to aristocratic sumptuary consumption.
Utopia thus seeks to anchor its mode of productionand consequently its
entire social organizationin what it sees as natural needs. This is why the
Utopians consume much less than they produce.
46
Of course, natural or primary needs are nothing but a myth. Any at-
tempt to define them merely underscores their origin: excess. They are always
already contaminated by wasteful expenditure, by the destruction of use value
in the name of symbolic value, by exchange value and so on. Nature, simply
stated, is always already contaminated by culture. The Utopian attempt to
overcome this is as doomed as any other, and Halpern demonstrates this by
exposing Utopias use of heightened rhetoric as a substitute for its inability to
prevent the eruption of excess, in the form of a quest for pride.
47
176 Chapter 6
Halperns analysis is impressive, but its final terms are problematic: how
can a proto-Veblenite critique of wasteful expenditure combined with ca-
pitulation to capitalist reification produce a communistic utopia? To make
his interpretation work, Halpern needs to assume that Utopias critique of
capitalism is conflated with or subordinated to its critique of feudalism. But
the text resists such a reading. In book 1, Hythloday carefully distinguishes
between his criticism of capitalism and his criticism of feudalism, and
the former receives more attentionnotably when the enclosure of land is
discussed (6365)than the latter. He does not use the term exchange value,
but he does state that in non-Utopian societies money is the measure of ev-
erything (101), and he even specifically censures the accumulation of riches
for its own sake (rather than for wasteful expenditure) (16971). In other
words, the perils of exchange value are far more evident to the Utopians than
Halpern cares to admit: otherwise, how could we explain the elimination of
private property?
Behind his problematic reading looms the Marxist bias of Halperns analy-
sis. He believes that if the Utopians could have imagined the socialization
of destructive expenditure, instead of its elimination, the pathologies of the
ideal state would have disappeared. In other words, he believes that the Marx-
ist concept of social use value is somehow exempt from the antinomies of
Utopias natural use value. But this is far from evident. Indeed, in view of the
enormous difficulties encountered by Marxist theorists in their attempts to
define use value, one would have wished for a more dialogical encounter with
the text.
48
In order to refute the Utopian notion of natural needs, Halpern
invokes Baudrillard and Bataille. But the theoretical insights of these thinkers
suggest that any notion of pure use valueUtopian or Marxist, natural or
socialis a myth.
49
Finally, Stephen Greenblatt, who sensitively uncovered the contradictions
and paradoxes of Utopia, interprets Mores work as an expression of internal
conflict. According to Greenblatt, More had an acute perception of the the-
atrical nature of reality, not only of the heavily theatricalized Tudor political
sphere, but of any role playing, even in the familial context. Even as he
himself played a variety of roles, More was aware of the dangers involved.
The result was a concealed wish for self-cancellation, a wish fully played out
in the fundamental characteristics of the Utopian social order and the Uto-
pian subject: here was a rigid, all-inclusive public sphere which prevented any
kind of role playing and reduced the scope of the ego and of individuality.
50

This analysis is ingenious, but not without its problems. First, as Greenblatts
evidence (apart from his reading of Utopia) shows, and as he himself some-
times suggests, More experienced the theatricalization of reality as a threat to
his inner self, which is to say his distinct private self as well as his humanist
Utopia and the No-Place of the Erasmian Republic 177
and Christian selvesthese he perceived as authentic, not just more roles to
play.
51
But on this account Mores postulated desire to obliterate his identity
is inexplicable.
52
Second, and more important, despite all of its sophistication,
Greenblatts interpretation is based on psychological reductionism.
53
Even if
we accept the contention that Utopia is an expression of internal drama, the
fact remains that it was acted out in the language of political theory, that is,
in terms that had shared public meanings very different from the ones they
had in Mores psyche. Greenblatt, however, cannot systematically account for
Utopias relation to any contemporary political discourse, and symptomati-
cally, his analysis ignores any distinct intellectual context.
Utopia, including its unattractive side, should be analyzed against the back-
ground of its own explicit argumentation and rhetoric. Having established
that evil cannot be entirely exiled from Utopia, that the Utopian social order
is reifying and unable to prevent eruptions of excess, and that the ideal state
effectively obliterates human individuality, I will try to account for these char-
acteristics against the background of Erasmian humanism and of humanist
discourse in general.
Utopia and the Destruction of Signification
A systematic analysis of the Utopian social order in light of humanist dis-
course may begin by examining the place of the studia humanitatis in the
ideal state, for these disciplinesgrammar, rhetoric, history, poetry and
moral philosophyprovided the basis for the humanist enterprise.
54
We
have already reviewed the importance assigned to learning in Utopia, and the
governing role played by a chosen group of three hundred scholars in each
Utopian city.
55
But what do these scholars actually study? Hythloday assures
us that they study all the branches of learning (155). As he gives more de-
tails, however, a different picture emerges. In music, dialectic, arithmetic and
geometry they have found out just about the same things as our great men of
the past, he says, and mentions also their astronomical expertise (157). The
humanist disciplines do not merit mention as a distinct group, and of the
seven liberal arts, the Utopian scholars study only the fivedialectic, arith-
metic, geometry, music and astronomythat traditionally belonged to the
scholastic sphere and ignore the two distinctively humanist ones, grammar
and rhetoric. The scholars of the ideal humanist state, resolute in pursuing the
advancement of learning and education, disregard the studia humanitatis.
The same picture emerges when we examine the placeor rather the
no-placeof the humanist disciplines within Utopian social reality. The Uto-
pian ethics is highly elaborated, but as we shall presently see it is a naturalistic
178 Chapter 6
ethics very different from humanist moral philosophy. As for the poetic arts,
what we know about the Utopian regimentation of daily life renders the
very idea of a Utopian poet absurd. The Utopians have diligently preserved
historical records for the past 1,760 years, but their historical writings are
explicitly defined as annales and not as historia (121).
56
Indeed, from a hu-
manist perspective, the very notion of a Utopian history is nonsensical. For
apart from the act of its foundationin itself an act more miraculous than
historicalUtopia has not known any development or change: the Utopians
have adopted the foundation of a commonwealth that is not only very happy
but also, so far as human prescience can tell, likely to last forever (247).
What of rhetoric, the most important of the humanist disciplines? Rhetoric
was often perceived by the humanists as an immanently political discipline
thanks to its presumed crucial role in public activity. This was clearly dem-
onstrated by the common humanist division of rhetoric into three types: de-
liberative, forensic and epideictic. As the bearer of these meanings and func-
tions, however, rhetoric cannot exist in Utopia. The Utopians have very few
laws and no lawyers at all, so that every citizen pleads his own cause (195).
This eliminates forensic rhetoric. The same is true of deliberative and epideic-
tic rhetoric, since the Utopians do not tolerate any controversy or debate. The
very few personal disputes that arise are quickly resolved by the tranibors
(123), and immoderate contentions about religious matters are forbidden
(22123). The Utopians are also anxious to prevent political controversies:
to solicit votes is illegal (195), and it is a capital offence to make plans about
public business outside the senate or the popular assembly (123).
But all this must not surprise us. Because of its very utopian nature, Utopia
is a place without politics. As always, Utopia follows its logic to the extreme:
the state not only forbids institutional change of any sort, but also reduces to
a minimum the need for concrete political decisions. Not by coincidence the
chapter entitled De magistratibus is the shortest in the book, and the de-
scription of Utopian political structure is much shorter than the descriptions
of common meals, for example, let alone of warfare. The book does not men-
tion concrete political decisions or events, projecting the image that the ideal
state is run by itself, without being governed in the usual sense of the term.
Unsurprisingly, the only Utopian politics is foreign policy, its dealings with
the non-Utopian world. This is why the chapter on military affairs is so long
and detailed, and this is why we find there a description of the only politi-
cal event in the whole book: the war that Utopia had waged a little before
[Hythlodays arrival] on behalf of the Nephelogetes against the Alaopolitans
(203). The Utopian ideal is a state without any regime at all. Because this ideal
obviously cannot be achieved, there is need for the class of Utopian scholars,
who are reminiscent of the Platonic class of guardians. But the leaders of Uto-
Utopia and the No-Place of the Erasmian Republic 179
pia differ from those of Platos republic, since they are no better than the least
harmful solution to the problem of governing, and consequently their actual
tasks are reduced to a minimum.
57
But more must be said about the absence of the humanist disciplines from
Utopia, for the significance of the studia humanitatis in humanist thought
transcended, of course, their political functions. As we have seen, they were
closely related to all aspects of humanist discourse as defined in this study. As
means for communication and persuasion, the studia humanitatis reflected
the humanist ethical convictions, namely the affirmation of the vivere civile
and of public activity. As branches of learning, the humanist disciplines ex-
pressed also humanisms perception as knowledge of contingent and change-
able historical and political reality rather than of eternal metaphysical truths.
Knowledge was thus understood to be practical and pragmatic, knowledge
that should be employed for social melioration. Bearing these meanings, the
humanist disciplines also reflected the humanist assumption that the human
historical and political world was a human creation. Moreover, as interpretive
disciplines, the studia humanitatis presupposed that human activity was in-
herently performative, that human beings were principally the producers and
interpreters of meanings and that social institutions and practices were mean-
ingful ones. The studia humanitatis thus ultimately reflected the fundamental
ontological and epistemological presuppositions of humanist discourse,
namely that the social and political world was an inherently symbolic human
artifact and that therefore the meaning of human reality was not contingent
upon their subordination to a transcendent realm.
58
We have further seen that More was one of the few humanists who tried
to theoretically ground humanist discourse. In his letter to Dorp he places
grammaras opposed to logicat the basis of the organization of knowl-
edge. He perceived grammar not as reflecting objective extralinguistic real-
ity, but rather as an empirical discipline reflecting the common usage of a
specific linguistic community: Grammar teaches the right way to speak, and
yet it invents no laws of speech in defiance of custom; instead, it simply sees
which constructions appear the most often in speech and points these out to
those who are unschooled in speech so that their speech will not flout com-
mon usage (MtD 35). Language, according to this notion, is the contingent
product of historical and social forces.
59
We can now return to Utopia. The Utopian language suggests the funda-
mental problematics of Utopia, for while the Utopians may not have poetry,
history or politics, language they certainly have. And yet it seems that the few
things we can glean about the Utopian perception of language contradict the
humanist notion of language implied in Mores treatment of grammar. A
language similar to the Utopian one is diffused through much of that part of
180 Chapter 6
the world, except that everywhere else it is corrupted to various degrees (U
15557). Admittedly, this is not much, but the general direction seems clear:
in the ideal state language must not change. The very perfection of Utopia
elevates its language to a transhistorical plane. This distinguishes Utopia from
its neighbors, whose fallen condition led to the corruption of their language.
A consideration of the use of signs in Utopia provides much more infor-
mation for understanding the nature of the internal strains of the ideal state.
The Utopians know how to manipulate signs. Book 2 begins with a short geo-
graphical description of the island that quickly focuses in on the grand bay.
This is the principal entryway to the state, and its many shallows and hidden
rocks make it treacherous: The channels are known only to the Utopians,
so hardly any strangers enter the bay without one of their pilots; and even
they themselves could not enter safely if they did not direct their course by
some landmarks on the coast. Should these landmarks be shifted about, the
Utopians could easily lure to destruction an enemy fleet, however big it was
(10911). The use of signslandmarks, in this caseis directed outward
against the enemies of Utopia.
The Utopians understand how to use signs for offensive ends as well. Im-
mediately following a declaration of war, Utopian secret agents simultane-
ously post many placards, each marked with their official seal, in the most
conspicuous places throughout enemy territory. In these proclamations
they promise immense rewards to anyone who will do away with the enemy
prince (205). Signs are also employed by the Utopians in their struggle
against internal enemies. Precious metals and jewels have little value in the
communist state, but in wartime they are useful, and for that reason they are
collected in large amounts. In peacetime gold and silver are used in Utopia
to make their chamber pots and all their humblest vessels, and pearls and
diamonds are given to children for toys. Precious metals are also used for the
chains and heavy shackles of slaves. And, to make the point clear, gold is
given an explicit stigmatizing function: Utopian criminals are forced to wear
golden rings in their ears and on their fingers, golden chains around their
necks, and even golden headbands (14951).
Signs are perceived in Utopia as connected to danger, and their effects,
always negative and potentially destructive, are directed outward at the en-
emies of the ideal state. Except for their use in stigmatizing criminals, signs
have been almost completely eliminated from internal use.
60
The destruction
of signification is the most consistent of all Utopian desires. It lies at the basis
of the Utopian order and confers coherence on seemingly heterogeneous in-
stitutions and practices.
The Utopian criticism of non-Utopian societies clearly exposes the concep-
tual basis of this attitude. The Utopians contend, for example, that anyone
Utopia and the No-Place of the Erasmian Republic 181
can see that the true value of gold and silver is lower than that of water, fire or
iron (149). In other words, the high value attributed to gold by foreign societ-
ies is a symbolic fiction. The Utopians therefore strive to eliminate completely
all symbolic fictions. But these fictions, they (rightly) argue, are nothing but
the product of the internal logic of systems of signs. Elsewhere, say the Utopi-
ans, individuals think themselves finer folk because they wear finer clothes.
Their mistake is twofold: they regard finer thread as a sign of a better coat
(although the true value of the coat, its utility, has nothing to do with the
fineness of its thread), and they regard a persons coat as a sign of the persons
quality (167).
61
The same is true of the empty, merely ceremonial honours
that pervade any social order based on distinctions between individuals. If
someone kneels before you bareheaded, well then, ask the Utopians, will the
creaks in your own knees be ceased thereby, or the madness in your head?
(169). Only by completely eliminating signs can the fundamental postulate of
the Utopian order be realized: the abolishment of all social differences. The
Utopian attitude toward law reveals the same belief: they consider the most
obvious interpretation of any law to be the fairest (197). Even in so essen-
tially hermeneutic a field, the Utopians have dramatically abridged, almost
abolished, the play of signs.
Utopian moral philosophy is based on the same assumptions, motivations
and anxieties. It is radically naturalistic ethics, which reduces happiness to
pleasure (159). This ethics seems at the outset singularly unsuited to Uto-
pia. How could a hedonistic philosophy of voluptas, with its affirmation of
sensual and bodily pleasures, serve the disciplined and restrained Utopians?
And, even more troubling, how could so individualistic a moral philosophy,
which approves egotism and self-interested behavior, legitimize the Utopian
collectivist social order? It cannot, and at the end of a tortuous discussion
the philosophy of pleasure is transformed, in contrast to the assertions of
the Utopians, into the strictest philosophy of virtue.
62
Why do the Utopians
insist on this naturalistic reductionism, though it entangles them in contra-
dictions and cannot be made to legitimate their social order? The answer lies
precisely in the Utopian desire to eliminate cultural fictions. The discussion
of non-Utopian beliefs and practices illustrates the Utopians preoccupations.
False pleasures, they argue, are unnatural or, more accurately, fictive. They
are defined as phantoms (169), groundless common opinions and perverse
habits of the mob (173). The Utopians believe that whatever men agree to
call delightful only by the emptiest of fictions (as if one could change the real
nature of things just by changing their names), do not . . . really make for happi-
ness (167, emphasis mine). The Utopians consequently want to anchor their
own moral philosophy on the objective realm of pleasure and pain. As usual,
they follow their logic to the extreme. In an effort to eliminate all symbolic
182 Chapter 6
meaning, they venture on a radical mechanistic reduction of pleasure itself,
which they define as a state or movement of body or mind in which we find
delight (167).
63
And finally, both private property and pride, those roots of all evil, amount
to cultural fictions, products of semiotic systemsor rather, autonomous
and wild systems of signs without any relation to reality. Private property
begets money, and money is, of course, the example par excellence of a fictive
symbolic system, for money has no objective value or use value at all, but only
a fictive symbolic value. In a social order based on private property, money
is the measure of all things (101). In other words, a social order based on
money is one in which signs reign without challenge, a social order in which
all signification is the effect of a closed system of signs. Pride, in Hythlodays
analysis, is the product of the same logic: Pride measures her prosperity not
by what she has but by what others lack. Pride would not deign even to be
made a goddess if there were no wretches for her to sneer at and domineer
over. Her good fortune is dazzling only by contrast with the miseries of oth-
ers; she displays her riches to torment and tantalise the poverty of others
(247; see also 139). Pride stems from a system of differences. Had individuals
only sought to maximize their own selfish utility by pursuing material goods
with objective value, pride would not have appeared. But this is impossible,
because this hypothetical practice, prideless as it is in itself, inevitably leads to
differences in material possessions. And these differences comprise a system
of internal valuesa system of signswith its own logic, which always al-
ready replaces the innocent quest for objective interests. In simple words, the
internal differentiation between more and less begets pride.
By eliminating all signscollapsing the signifier into the signifiedUtopia
eliminates all cultural fictions. This produces a transparent social orderand
explains the existence of the all-pervading gazebased on objective values
and facts uncontaminated by symbols; as a result, this order is immune from
interrogation, reinterpretation, negotiation and change. It is a reified order,
meaningless in the literal sense of the word. For this reason the studia hu-
manitatis, those disciplines inherently concerned with the production and
interpretation of signs, have no place in Utopia. But for the same reason, the
ontology of Utopia contradicts the ontology of humanist discourse, for hu-
manist discourse assumed, as we have seen, that the social and the symbolic
were inseparable, or in other words that social reality was a meaningful reality.
Here we arrive, I believe, at the basis of Utopias antinomies: the attempt to
construct an ideal humanist social order is ultimately based on distinctively
antihumanist presuppositions.
Now we can more fully account for the various paradoxes and contradictions
we encounter in Utopia. Let us look first at the totalitarian dynamics that
Utopia and the No-Place of the Erasmian Republic 183
operate in the ideal state. For that we must return once more to Utopian gold.
We have seen that in peacetime the Utopians use gold for making humble
vessels, for chaining slaves and for stigmatizing criminals. A simpler method
of storage is rejected: If in Utopia these metals were kept locked up in a tower,
it might be suspected that the governor and the senatefor such is the foolish
imagination of the common folk [ut est uulgi stulta sollertia]were deceiving
the people by the scheme and they themselves were deriving some benefit
therefrom.
64
The elimination of signs and meanings is not so simple after all.
Golds true value determined, or allegedly determined, the Utopian attitude
toward it, but fictive values and meanings can surface anywhere. So long as
human imagination existsMore uses the word sollertia, that is, human clev-
erness, inventiveness and ingenuityany institution or custom (anything at
all, in fact) can be integrated into a signifying system that produces meanings
through internal rules. This insight has two far-reaching consequences for our
understanding of the Utopian social order. First, Utopia must combat human
imagination and inventiveness; in keeping with the needs of the ideal state, it
must attempt to produce subjects lacking interpretive capacity. The ideal state,
in other words, must attempt to constitute subjects devoid of inwardness. We
already know this, but now we perceive that the erasure of the subject is not
an accidental by-product of the Utopian institutions of discipline and supervi-
sion. Nor does it stem from a mysterious, disguised wish for the cancellation
of identity, the projection of Mores internal psychological conflicts. It is sim-
ply a direct result of the ontology of Utopia.
Second, it is clear that Utopia never fully achieves this goal, or at least fears
that it has not achieved it. This inspires a constant struggle between state and
subject: the state must anticipate, identify and neutralize the imaginations and
inventions of its subjects. Here is the source of the suspicion that permeates,
as we have seen, the relations between the subjects and the state. This suspi-
cion verges on paranoia precisely because the total elimination of signification
turns out to be impossible. Therefore, in contrast to Utopias self-image, the
ideal state may not be, after all, completely static and stable. For even if we
ignore the internal dynamics of paranoia, foolish imagination is not eas-
ily preempted, and inventiveness is always capable of producing unexpected
meanings. There is no guarantee that Utopia will always have the upper hand
in the struggle against the interpretive capacity of its citizens. On the contrary,
it is reasonable to conclude that the struggle would be unending. This would
lead Utopia to intensify its efforts to erase the inwardness of its subjects by re-
inforcing its institutions of discipline and supervision. In other words, Utopia
is a totalitarian state not for the reason that Avineri citesthat it dogmati-
cally assumes that some human beings are irredeemably evilbut because its
internal logic necessarily produces subversive subjects.
184 Chapter 6
But if the Utopian social order is not static, we must revisit the question of
government. Who is it that conducts the Utopian struggle against the stulta
sollertia of the common people? Clearly someone must, and clearly the only
candidates are the Utopian scholars. The gulf between the scholars and the
common people widens, contradicting both to the egalitarian rhetoric of the
text and to the attempt to construct a society that is run by itself. After all, to
be able to anticipate the common people, the Utopian scholars must possess
capacities that they want to deny the common subjectsimagination, reflec-
tion and interpretive capacity. They cannot arise from the common social
order, but must stand above it and, like Platos guardians, manipulate it.
The Utopian nude inspection best exemplifies both the fundamental as-
sumptions of the Utopian social order and its internal contradictions. Because
of the inspection of his brides body, the Utopian man does not have to es-
timate her attractiveness from a mere handsbreadth of her person, the face
(189). Earlier I contended that in a society that seeks total transparency there
is nothing illogical about this procedure. But now we can see that the nude
inspection is grounded in an even deeper layer of the Utopian order: a subject
devoid of interpretive capacity simply cannot estimate the value of the whole
by considering a part. The face cannot serve as a sign for the whole body.
And yet the simile the Utopians employ in justifying their practice is rather
surprising. When men go to buy a colt, they say, where they are risking
only a little money, they are so cautious that, though the animal is almost
bare, they wont close the deal until saddle and blanket have been taken off,
lest there be a hidden sore underneath. Yet in a choice of a mate . . . men are
so careless . . . (189). The misanthropy inherent in the analogy should not
surprise us by now. But how is it that the Utopians know anything about buy-
ing and selling? While the practice of nude inspection is the most extreme and
uncompromising manifestation of the Utopian effort to eliminate signs and
to base social order on objective values, they justify this effort by referring to
the market, the semiological playing field par excellence. The construction of
an objective, meaningless social order is no simple task. Not only can mean-
ings spring up unexpectedly, undermining the meaninglessness of the order
of things, but the ultimate legitimation of this order is elusive, especially if we
seek it in the terrain of the humanists.
The No-Place of the Erasmian Universal Intellectual
Utopia envisages a utopian social order that expresses the values and ideals
of Erasmian humanism. And yet the ideal humanist state is revealed as es-
sentially anti-Erasmian and antihumanist. As evidenced in Erasmuss politi-
Utopia and the No-Place of the Erasmian Republic 185
cal writings and in Richard III, Utopia also fails to exploit its autonomy and
provide a coherent elaboration of the Erasmian humanist discourse. Indeed,
in the case of Utopia, the failure is particularly striking because the text creates
a utopian space which, by definition, suspends external political and ideologi-
cal pressures. More, for instance, calmly prohibited private property in his
ideal state, but he could not adopt the studia humanitatis. He could banish
aristocracy but not mold Utopian subjects into humanists. There is another
layer in this insight. On the one hand, Utopia can be read as a humanist work.
Indeed, it explicitly invites such a reading. Many of the Utopian institutions
and practices are presented as humanist institutions and practices, and the
Utopian subjects can be interpreted as embodying the humanist image of
man. On the other hand, when we view Utopia from the inside, this picture
is inverted. From the perspective of its subjects, the Utopian social order is
reified and devoid of meaning. It is an essentially antihumanist world.
We are now ready to fully account for the internal contradictions of Uto-
piaas well as Erasmuss and Mores other writings under examination in
this studyas inherent to the problematic identity of the universal intel-
lectual, the citizen of the Erasmian Republic of Letters. As we have seen this
identity was created by the Erasmian humanists, and it gave them a consider-
able measure of autonomy. It allowed them to formulate a reform program
free of the interests and ideologies of any political establishment or specific
social class. It made it possible to reject the ideological basis of existing politi-
cal and social order and to construct a utopian substitute.
And yet, at the same time, the identity of this universal intellectual discon-
nected the Erasmian humanists from the concrete social and political reality
and opened a rift between their social role on the one hand and the ethical
convictions and epistemological premises of their discourse on the other. Hu-
manist discourse presupposed that knowledge was embedded in social reality.
It saw knowledge as knowledge of meaningful human artifacts, such as texts
and social institutions, and as inherently practical. The explicitly pragmatic
orientation of humanist knowledge and the humanist affirmation of public
activity issued from these premises. In humanist discourse, thus, it was the
litteratus, and not the philosopher, who produced knowledge, the former
being at once immersed in social reality and inheriting the great cultural heri-
tage of humanity. The humanist intellectual was thus the man of letters who
employed his literary knowledge and skills for the benefit of society. But the
identity of the universal intellectual then detached the Erasmian humanist,
the citizen of the Republic of Letters, from the concrete forces active in soci-
ety. It thus violated the humanist commitment to the vita activa. More impor-
tantly, this separation became an epistemological problem, for it meant that
humanist intellectual activitythe production of knowledgetook place in a
186 Chapter 6
disembodied sphere. Such a privileged point of reference external to concrete
reality does not, in fact, exist in humanist discourse. It is certainly not a loca-
tion for the production of knowledge. Such quasi transcendence subverts, in
other words, the humanist view of knowledge as socially embedded, as well as
the perception of social reality as inherently symbolic and, consequently, of
human activity as inherently performative.
That is why Erasmus failed to elaborate a coherent political theory in The
Education of a Christian Prince, having to step outside the boundaries of hu-
manist discourse whenever he sought to ground his social and political vision
in theory. For the same reason, he could not sustain such fundamental notions
of Erasmian humanism as learning, liberal education, civilization, and reform
in his political writings. Nor could he lay the foundations for and legitimize
that ideal place so beautifully depicted in the Convivium religiosum. Mores
Richard III similarly undermined the basic premises of humanist discourse.
In this respect, Utopia emerges as the outstanding example of the invisible
truth about Erasmian humanism. More constructed an ideal Erasmian social
order out of the Republic of Letters. But since his privileged perspective does
not exist in humanist discourse, Utopia cannot sustain its explicit argumenta-
tion. Thus, what is presented as a utopia is often closer to being a dystopia.
Mores great work, in other words, shows that Utopia and the Republic of
Letterseach term paradoxicalare both located in the same place, a hu-
manist no-place.
188 Conclusion
outside of social and political reality. There were, certainly, disagreements of
an often furious and violent nature over who filled such a position. However,
the position itself was taken for granted.
This was particularly true of the scholastic philosophers-theologians with
whom the humanists vied for cultural hegemony. Unifying religious and
metaphysical discourses, the scholastics saw their activity as an elaboration
of logically valid knowledge of an objective and unchanging reality. In fact,
the scholastics were primarily oriented toward the transcendent realm. That
is why they attributed superiority to the vita contemplativa over the vita ac-
tiva. That is to say, their interest in social and political reality was derivative
and secondary. The moral and political instructions issued by the scholastic
philosopher were simply elucidations of what he believed to be religious
and philosophical truths. He could consequently ignoreas, in fact, most
scholastic political writings didquestions about the actual realization of his
discourse as a practical program. If nevertheless pressed to address this issue,
he would have probably responded that if concrete human reality refused to
fully accommodate itself to the divine and metaphysical imperatives, all the
worse for it. He would have certainly argued that the gap between the real and
the ideal was not the philosophers problem.
Humanism rejected the premodern vision of reality. It severed the con-
nection between human reality and the transcendent order of being, per-
ceiving social and political reality to be a human artifact. This ushered in the
modern condition, the modern sense of human empowerment and values
of liberty and equality, as well as the uncertainty and perplexities, includ-
ing most significantly doubts over the very possibility of providing a firm
theoretical basis for personal morality and the social order. Humanism also
created the conditions that gave birth to the modern intellectual. By de-
taching the human realm from an objective order of things, it undermined
the superiority of the vita contemplativa while orienting the activity of the
intellectual toward social and political realities. Moreover, the intellectuals
views and ideals were no longer grounded in eternal, metaphysical and reli-
gious truths. This widened the scope for the critique of existing institutions,
customs and beliefs. It also dramatically increased the intellectuals ability
to formulate new visions of social and political organization that sometimes
radically diverged from existing ones. At the same time, however, it pro-
voked difficult questions concerning the authority of the intellectual, the
theoretical basis of his or her teachings, and the very position from which
the intellectual addressed society. Equally serious questions arose over the
status of that knowledge which was produced by the intellectual, and over
its applicability to social life. In particular, the breach between theory and
praxis, between the ideal and the real (in the event that such a gap was no-
Conclusion 189
ticed), ceased to be an unpleasant aspect of external reality and emerged as
an immanent problem within the intellectual discourse itself.
Humanism actually produced the first modern intellectuals. The difference,
as we have noted throughout this study, between most humanists and Eras-
mian humanists is broadly representative of two different types of modern
intellectuals. The former subscribed to the dominant social values and served
to promote them. Whenever a significant center of humanism emerged, it was
related to a powerful establishment and advanced the dominant social and
political values. This was an entirely conscious mode of action, and humanist
discourse justified it, most notably by defining knowledge as socially embed-
ded and as practical, and by affirming the value of public activity.
Erasmian humanism was the exception. We have studied the strategies em-
ployed by Erasmian humanists in creating the universal intellectual, an iden-
tity that was unattached to the powers that be. The intellectual production of
Erasmus and More did not serve the specific interests of any political estab-
lishment or social estate but, rather, the well-being of society as a whole, as
they understood it. In their role as universal intellectuals, Erasmus and More
censured the powerful and condemned prevailing customs and institutions.
More importantly, they rejected the aristocratic worldview, which was the
ideological foundation of the contemporary social order in northern Europe.
They also offeredErasmus in his numerous writings and More in Utopiaa
comprehensive program of reform of Christendom. Their activity and their
literary products constituted a great accomplishment and pointed to the so-
cial significance of the figure of the modern universal intellectual. At the same
time, a close reading of their works reveals the fundamental ambiguity and
instability of this identity, one that proved to be problematic from the point of
view of the humanist discourse itself. The identity of the universal intellectual
no less than separated the Erasmian humanist from concrete social and politi-
cal forces and, in so doing, infringed on the humanist commitment to the vita
activa, that is, to the production of practical knowledge for the melioration
of society. Ultimately, the identity of the universal intellectual threatened to
lock the Erasmian humanist in a disembodied intellectual sphere, a literally
utopian location, which could not be legitimized in humanist terms.
192 Notes to Pages 46
as Practice: Ethical Inquiry in the Renaissance (Chicago: University of Chicago Press,
1992); Salvatore I. Camporeale, Lorenzo Valla: Umanesimo e teologia (Florence: Nella
sede dellIstituto, 1972); Marjorie ORourke Boyle, Erasmus on Language and Method
in Theology (Toronto: University of Toronto Press, 1977); Victoria Kahn, Rhetoric,
Prudence, and Skepticism in the Renaissance (Ithaca, N.Y.: Cornell University Press,
1985); idem, Machiavellian Rhetoric: From the Counter-Reformation to Milton (Princ-
eton, N.J.: Princeton University Press, 1994); Charles Trinkaus, Lorenzo Valla as
Instaurator of the Theory of Humanism, Hellas 7 (1996): 75101.
8. See, for example, Hans Baron, In Search of Florentine Civic Humanism: Essays
on the Transition from Medieval to Modern Thought, 2 vols. (Princeton, N.J.: Princeton
University Press, 1988); Lauro Martines, The Social World of the Florentine Human-
ists 13901460 (London: Routledge & Kegan Paul, 1963); Margaret King, Venetian
Humanism in an Age of Patrician Dominance (Princeton, N.J.: Princeton University
Press, 1986); Jerry Bentley, Politics and Culture in Renaissance Naples (Princeton, N.J.:
Princeton University Press, 1987); John DAmico, Renaissance Humanism in Papal
Rome (Baltimore: Johns Hopkins University Press, 1983); Gary Ianziti, Humanistic
Historiography under the Sforzas: Politics and Propaganda in Fifteenth-Century Milan
(Oxford: Clarendon Press, 1988).
9. The idea of Mores reluctance to enter royal service was conveyed by both
Erasmus and William Roper, Mores son-in-law and first biographer. See Ep 999:
23443, CWE 7 (here and in the body of the text, the reference to Erasmuss letters
includes the number of the epistle and, in case of long letters, the lines numbers);
William Roper, The Life of Sir Thomas More, in Two Early Tudor Lives, eds.
R. S. Sylvester and D. P. Harding (New Haven, Conn.: Yale University Press, 1962),
2001. However, Erasmuss and Ropers accounts cannot be uncritically accepted as
both had their own agendas: Erasmuss own dislike of political involvement (which I
shall examine in detail in chapter 2) and Ropers attempt to portray More as a saint.
Other evidence may tell a different story. Thus in a letter from February 1516 Andrea
Ammonio recounted to Erasmus the appointment of Henry VIIIs closest councilor,
the Archbishop of York, Thomas Wolsey, to chancellor, adding that More haunts
those smoky palace fires in my company. None bids my lord of York good morrow
earlier than he(Ep 389: 6470). As John Guy convincingly argues in Thomas More
(London: Arnold, 2000), At a minimum, Mores transition from legal and City
[of London] career to a political one was seamless (58). For obvious reasons (and
perhaps also some less obvious ones), More always aroused strong feelings, to which
many modern scholars proved far from immune. Mores personality is consequently
at the center of controversy, and is habitually either idealized or disparaged, often by
means of far-reaching speculations, psychological and otherwise. Against this back-
ground Guys critical autobiographical study, which critically and dispassionately ex-
amines the evidence relevant to the many controversies concerning Mores biography
and career, is refreshing and valuable.
10. This is not to say that More thought that realizing reforms was impossible.
Most likely, the belief that some reforms were possible was a reason for his decision in
favor of royal service. See ibid., 57. More, of course, dramatizes the issue in Book I of
Utopia, which I discuss in chapter 6.
Notes to Pages 821 193
11. W. Scott Blanchard thus argues in Petrarch and the Genealogy of Asceticism,
Journal of the History of Ideas 62 (2001): 40123, that Petrarchs construction of his
intellectual autonomy and critical position were conceptually related to the notions
of otium, asceticism and retreat from the world. Petrarch continued in this respect the
tradition of late medieval heterodox movements. From a different perspective Nancy
Struever argues that the Petrarchan enterprise was primarily an individual ethical
quest (Theory as Practice, esp. 4456).
12. It is not a coincidence that the approach known as new historicism is so
strongly related to Renaissance studies. See, for example, H. Aram Veeser, ed., The
New Historicism Reader (New York: Routledge, 1994); Catherine Gallagher and Ste-
phen Greenblatt, Practicing New Historicism (Chicago: University of Chicago Press,
2000).
13. These are the fundamental theoretical insights of the linguistic turn. They
were arrived at by numerous theories in various disciplines. The literature on the
subject is therefore huge and cannot be surveyed here. See, however, the two lucid ar-
ticles of Dominick LaCapra: Rethinking Intellectual History and Reading Texts, in
Rethinking Intellectual History: Texts, Contexts, Language (Ithaca, N.Y.: Cornell Uni-
versity Press, 1983), 2371; History, Language, and Reading: Waiting for Crillon,
American Historical Review 100 (1995): 799828. This is, of course, a very general and
abstract methodological statement. It is applicable to many diverse, often contradic-
tory, theories and methodologies. I leave it here at this level of generality as I do not
subscribe to any specific theory, but rather borrow throughout the study theoretical
insights and techniques from various theories.
Chapter 1
1. Kristellers enormously influential interpretation of humanism in its cultural
context is presented in the articles collected in Renaissance Thought and Its Sources
(New York: Columbia University Press, 1979), especially The Humanist Movement
(2132) and Humanism and Scholasticism in the Italian Renaissance (85105).
2. Ibid., 22, 99.
3. Ibid., 22.
4. Ibid., 85105.
5. Ibid., 91, 103.
6. Ibid., 2425, 9196, 24751; Jerrold E. Seigel, Rhetoric and Philosophy in Re-
naissance Humanism (Princeton, N.J.: Princeton University Press, 1968), 200225.
7. Kristeller, Renaissance Thought, 2532.
8. Ibid., 32.
9. Ibid., 2931.
10. Ibid., 24. Kristeller employs the adjectives literary, educational, cultural and
rhetorical more or less interchangeably.
11. Ibid., 28.
12. Ibid., 3031.
13. Ibid., 29.
194 Notes to Pages 2122
14. Ibid., 30.
15. Kristellers initial distinction between Renaissance humanism and modern
humanism also eventually collapses. He begins, as we saw, by warning that employing
the broad definition of humanism as a thinking concerning human values is anach-
ronistic and defines instead Renaissance humanism in terms of a distinct group of
disciplines (ibid., 2122). Evaluating the cultural significance of humanism, he con-
cludes, however, that the emphasis on man, on his dignity and privileged place in the
universe . . . was undoubtedly implied in, and connected with, the concept and pro-
gram of the studia humanitatis (ibid., 30). The two kinds of humanism are therefore
conceptually related after all. This tension in Kristellers interpretation is related to
his strained dichotomy between philosophy and rhetoric. Kristeller could not initially
accept the broad definition of humanism because it implies a distinct anthropology,
which in turn implies at least some distinct philosophical premises and implications.
From this perspective, his ultimately contradictory conclusion is yet another indica-
tion of his inability to sustain the dichotomy between philosophy and rhetoric.
16. Hans Baron, The Crisis of the Early Italian Renaissance, 2nd ed. (Princeton, N.J.:
Princeton University Press, 1966); idem, From Petrarch to Leonardo Bruni: Studies
in Humanistic and Political Literature (Chicago: University of Chicago Press, 1968);
idem, In Search of Florentine Civic Humanism: Essays on the Transition from Medieval
to Modern Thought, 2 vols. (Princeton, N.J.: Princeton University Press, 1988).
17. Baron, The Crisis, xxvxxviii, 311.
18. Ibid., 1246.
19. See Gennaro Sasso, Florentina libertas e rinascimento italiano nellopera di
Hans Baron, Rivista storica italiana 69 (1957): 25076; Albert Rabil, The Significance
of Civic Humanism in the Interpretation of the Italian Renaissance, in Renaissance
Humanism: Foundations, Forms, and Legacy, ed. A. Rabil, 3 vols. (Philadelphia: Univer-
sity of Pennsylvania Press, 1988), 1:15254, 1:16063; Denys Hay, The Place of Hans
Baron in Renaissance Historiography, in Renaissance Essays (London: Hambledon
Press, 1988), 13349. The reader of the first, dramatic, part of The Crisis immediately
recognizes the origin of the narrative framework and imagery: dynamic, ruthless and
expansionist dictatorship which overcomes its small neighbors by means of threats
and psychological terror; foreign powers which shortsightedly refrain from helping the
victims of aggression; and one democratic state which survives against all odds. Baron,
a Jewish refugee from Nazi Germany, was taken by a simplistic analogy (spelled out in
The Crisis, 40), which lent a somewhat anachronistic atmosphere to his book.
20. For this reason, for our discussion Barons more important works are the
articles collected in In Search of Florentine Civic Humanism. These articles are not
based on the problematical political reduction of The Crisis and therefore are more
interesting as far as the reconstruction of the wide cultural importance of humanism
is concerned. Many of the articles were originally written in the 1930s and revised in
the 1960s and 1970s. They thus represent Barons mature views of issues that engaged
him throughout his career.
21. Baron, The Crisis, 273353.
22. Hans Baron, Franciscan Poverty and Civic Wealth in the Shaping of Trecento
Humanistic Thought: The Role of Petrarch and Franciscan Poverty and Civic
Notes to Pages 2223 195
Wealth in the Shaping of Trecento Humanistic Thought: The Role of Florence, in In
Search, 1:15890 and 1:191225, respectively.
23. Francesco Barbaro, De re uxoria liber, in Prosatori latini del Quattrocento, ed.
Eugenio Garin (Milan: R. Ricciardi, 1951), 10436.
24. Hans Baron, Civic Wealth and the New Values of the Renaissance: The Spirit
of the Quattrocento, in In Search, 1:22657.
25. Ibid., 22630.
26. Leon Battista Alberti, Della famiglia, trans. Guido A. Guarino (Lewisburg, Pa.:
Bucknell University Press, 1971). In other respects, notably in his political views, Baron
finds Alberti ambivalent concerning the views of the civic humanists. See Leon Battista
Alberti as an Heir and Critic of Florentine Civic Humanism, in In Search, 1:25888.
27. See Hans Baron, The Memory of Ciceros Roman Civic Spirit in the Medieval
Centuries and the Florentine Renaissance and The Florentine Revival of the Phi-
losophy of the Active Political Life, in In Search, 1:94133 and 1:13457, respectively.
It must be emphasized that the civic humanists did not simply revivea theoreti-
cally problematical notion in any casethe philosophies of Cicero and Aristotle, but
integrated some of their notions in an elaboration of an original synthesis. First, the
humanist naturally chose several textsnotably Aristotles Ethics and Politics, and
Ciceros De officiis, De oratore and other worksfrom the complex and not always
coherent corpus of the two classical thinkers and practically ignored others, including
Aristotles metaphysical works and Ciceros stoic writings. Secondly, the humanists
interpreted, and in some cases misinterpreted, these texts. Thus, Richard Tuck dem-
onstrates in his Humanism and Political Thought, in The Impact of Humanism on
Western Europe, eds. A. Goodman and A. MacKay (London: Longman, 1990), 5155,
that in his translation of the Politics and the Ethics, Bruni employed a Ciceronian
terminology that systematically reduced the metaphysical dimensions of Aristotles
moral and political philosophy and gave it a distinctly practical and rhetorical twist.
By the same token, Baron shows in The Florentine Revival, 14247, that the civic
humanists utilized peripatetic notions in order to rehabilitate human emotions, ap-
petites and passions that had been degraded by Ciceros stoicism.
28. Leonardo Bruni, History of the Florentine People, 3 vols., ed. and trans. James H.
Hankins (Cambridge, Mass.: Harvard University Press, 20012007).
29. Hans Baron, New Historical and Psychological Ways of Thinking: From
Petrarch to Bruni and Machiavelli, The Changed Perspective of the Past in Brunis
Histories of the Florentine People and Brunis Histories as Expression of Modern
Thought, in In Search, 1:2442, 1:4367 and 1:6893, respectively.
30. See, for example, J. G. A. Pocock, The Machiavellian Moment: Florentine Politi-
cal Thought and the Atlantic Republican Tradition (Princeton, N.J.: Princeton Univer-
sity Press, 1975), 181; William J. Bouwsma, Venice and the Defense of Liberty: Renais-
sance Values in the Age of the Counter Reformation (Berkeley: University of California
Press, 1968), 151; Tuck, Humanism and Political Thought.
31. As Thomas Aquinas formulates it in The Order of Learning the Sciences,
in The Division and Methods of the Sciences, trans. Armand Maurer (Toronto: Pon-
tifical Institute of Mediaeval Studies, 1986), 100: The ultimate happiness that man
can have in this life must consist in the contemplation of the first causes; for the
196 Notes to Pages 2325
little that can be known about them is more loveable and excellent than everything
that can be known about lesser things. . . . And it is through the completion of this
knowledge in us after the present life that man is made perfectly happy. . . . Of
course, even Aristotle, notwithstanding his great interest in and appreciation of
political activity, taught that the contemplative way of life was the best. See Nico-
machean Ethics, trans. Christopher Rowe (Oxford: Oxford University Press, 2004),
25052 (1177a121179a33).
32. On these issues see also the works of Eugenio Garin, the third great scholar who
laid the foundation of the modern scholarship of humanism. See, for example, Italian
Humanism: Philosophy and Civic Life in the Renaissance, trans. Peter Munz (Oxford:
Blackwell, 1965); La cultura filosofica del Rinascimento italiano: Ricerche e documenti
(Florence: G. C. Sansoni 1961); Medioevo e Rinascimento: Studi e ricerche (Bari:
Laterza, 1961); Science and Civic Life in the Italian Renaissance, trans. Peter Munz
(Gloucester, Mass.: P. Smith, 1978). Garins interpretation is in many respects similar
to that of Baron. I will presently discuss the main difference between them.
33. The literature on the subject is vast. Two surveys of the historiography and
the current literature on the subject are John Jeffries Martin, Religion, in Palgrave
Advances in Renaissance Historiography, ed. Jonathan Woolfson (New York: Palgrave
Macmillan, 2005), 193209, and David Peterson, Out of the Margins: Religion and
the Church in Renaissance Italy, Renaissance Quarterly 53 (2000): 85379. I will fur-
ther discuss humanist religious thought in chapter 3.
34. It is highly significant that even the humanists who served the Roman curia
and propagated its political theory employed essentially secular language. As John F.
DAmico demonstrates in his Renaissance Humanism, 11543, the Roman humanists
highlighted what they saw as the cultural, particularly the linguistic, unity of papal
and classical Rome, and thus depicted the papacy as the true and legitimate heir of the
Roman Empire.
35. Albertis treatises on painting, sculpting and architecture and Vasaris history
of art (in the form of biographies of great artists) reflected and formed these processes.
See Leon Battista Alberti, On Painting and on Sculpture, trans. and ed. Cecil Grayson
(London: Phaidon, 1972); idem, On the Art of Building in Ten Books, trans. Joseph
Rykwert, Neil Leach and Robert Tavernor (Cambridge, Mass.: MIT Press, 1988);
Giorgio Vasari, The Lives of the Painters, Sculptors and Architects, ed. William Gaunt,
4 vols. (London: Dent, 1963).
36. Baron, A Defense of the View of the Quattrocento First Offered in The Crisis
of the Early Italian Renaissance, in In Search, 2:199200.
37. In his The Lost Italian Renaissance (Baltimore: Johns Hopkins University Press,
2004) Christopher Celenza compares the interpretations of Baron and Kristeller from
a different angle.
38. See the works cited in note 7 of the Introduction.
39. On the theoretical debates between the humanists and scholastics see, for ex-
ample, Salvatore I. Camporeale, Lorenzo Valla: Umanesimo e teologia (Florence: Nella
sede dellIstituto, 1972), 14971; Erika Rummel, The Humanist-Scholastic Debate
in the Renaissance and Reformation (Cambridge, Mass.: Harvard University Press,
1995); Lisa Jardine, Humanism and the Teaching of Logic, in The Cambridge His-
Notes to Pages 2527 197
tory of Later Medieval Philosophy, eds. Norman Kretzmann, Anthony Kenney and
Jan Pinborg (Cambridge: Cambridge University Press, 1982), 797807; Rita Guerlac,
Introduction, in Juan Luis Vives against the Pesudodialecticians, ed. Rita Guerlac
(Dordrecht: D. Reidel, 1979), 943; Walter J. Ong, Ramus: Method, and the Decay of
Dialogue: From the Art of Discourse to the Art of Reason (New York: Octagon Books,
1974); Richard Waswo, Language and Meaning in the Renaissance (Princeton, N.J.:
Princeton University Press, 1987), 48113.
40. See James H. Overfield, Humanism and Scholasticism in Late Medieval Ger-
many (Princeton, N.J.: Princeton University Press, 1984), 3839; L. M. de Rijk, The
Origins of the Theory of the Properties of Terms, in The Cambridge History of Later
Medieval Philosophy, 161; Jan Pinborg, Speculative Grammar, in ibid., 26266; G.
L. Bursill-Hall, Speculative Grammars of the Middle Ages: The Doctrine of Partes Ora-
tionis of the Modistae (The Hague: Mouton, 1971), 38. These assumptions were also
shared by William Ockham, the radical critic of Thomist realism. Ockham denied the
reality of universals, arguing that they were only abstractions of the human intellect.
Philotheus Boehner convincingly argues, however, that according to Ockham, the
universals represented a shared quality, in reality and not only in consciousness and
language, of the individual objects. He consequently defines Ockhams philosophy as
realistic conceptualism. See his The Realistic Conceptualism of William Ockham,
in Collected Articles on Ockham, ed. E. M. Buytaert (St. Bonaventure, N.Y.: Franciscan
Institute, 1958), 15674.
41. The two terms have been interchangeable at least since the time of Cicero. See
Geurlac, Introduction, 13.
42. Cited in Overfield, Humanism and Scholasticism, 30.
43. See ibid., 2835, 4344; Gordon Leff, The Trivium and the Three Philoso-
phies, in Universities in the Middle Ages, ed. Hilde de Ridder-Symoens (Cambridge:
Cambridge University Press, 1992), 3089.
44. Aristotle, Analytica posteriora, trans. G. R. G. Mure, in Introduction to Aristotle,
ed. R. McKeon (New York: Modern Library, 1947), 9109; David Ross, Aristotle, 5th
ed. (London: Methuen, 1964), 2061; John Marenbon, Later Medieval Philosophy
(11501350): An Introduction (London: Routledge & Kegan Paul, 1987), 4749.
45. De Rijk, The Origins, 16173; Overfield, Humanism and Scholasticism,
2835; Guerlac, Introduction, 39; Pinborg, Speculative Grammar, 266. From
the same perspective we should understand the second main effort of scholastic dia-
lectic: the attempt to solve the insolubilia, the reflexive paradoxes (the paradoxes that
are logically identical to the liars paradox). The encounter with indicative sentences
that are neither true nor false always produces bewilderment. However, the obsessive
scholastic occupation with the subjectwhose only outcome was, needless to say, the
discovery of more and more paradoxesproves that it contradicted their most cher-
ished belief, namely the assumption of the correspondence between words, concepts
and objects.
46. Cited in Overfield, Humanism and Scholasticism, 38.
47. See ibid., 3540.
48. On Mores Letter to Dorp see Daniel Kinney, Introduction, in CWM 15, xv
cxxxii; idem, Mores Letter to Dorp: Remapping the Trivium, Renaissance Quarterly
198 Notes to Pages 2732
34 (1981): 179210; Salvatore I. Camporeale, Da Lorenzo Valla a Tommaso Moro:
Lo statuto umanistico della teologia, Memorie dominicane n.s. 4 (1973): 9102.
49. About half of Mores examples are taken from Peter of Spains Summulae
logicales, and the other half from later scholastic literature (Kinney, Introduction,
liiiliv). The scholastic logicians were led into these awkward discussions precisely
because they were unable to resolve the fundamental problem of the field of propri-
etates terminorum, that is, they did not succeed in fully stabilizing the meaning of each
semantic unit. Considering the humanist critique of scholastic logic and grammar
(and the insights of Saussure and Wittgenstein), we have good reasons to believe that
this failure was inevitable.
50. Ong, Ramus, 166.
51. See Rummel, The Humanist-Scholastic Debate, 15392.
52. See ibid., 15354.
53. Quoted in ibid., 175.
54. See Camporeale, Lorenzo Valla, 14971; Waswo, Language and Meaning, 95.
55. The reconstruction offered here does not regard the classicism of humanism as
its defining feature. As such it is similar to most other important definitions of human-
ism and of the Renaissance, including those of Burckhardt, Garin and Baron (Kristeller
is ambivalent: as we saw he defines humanism as a literary movement not essentially
concerned with the classics, but he certainly sees the recovery of the classical heritage as
the humanists main intellectual activity and their main contribution to Western civili-
zation). See Robert Black, The Renaissance and Humanism: Definitions and Origins,
in Palgrave Advances in Renaissance Historiography, 97117. This is not to say, of course,
that the Renaissances admiration and imitation of classical antiquity were not impor-
tant. It is to say that these attitudes and practices must be examined and accounted for
within the framework of humanist discourse as defined here. The best interpretations of
the Renaissance in terms of its attitude toward classical antiquity, Erwin Panofsky, Re-
naissance and Renascences in Western Art (New York: Harper & Row, 1972) and Ronald
G. Witt, In the Footsteps of the Ancients: The Origins of Humanism from Lovato to Bruni
(Leiden: Brill, 2000), prove the point. At the basis of Panofskys reconstruction lies not
the admiration and imitation of classical heritage, but rather the awareness that the clas-
sical world is gone forever. His interpretation therefore brings to the fore the same no-
tions which emerged from the reconstruction offered here, namely temporality, change
and human agency. Witts uncompromising reconstruction of humanism in terms of
the imitation of the classical Latin style arrives at the same conclusions: the humanists
practices brought into relief the character of the humanists own world and reveal-
ing the historically contingent nature of both [contemporary ancient] societies. They
moreover rendered the classical writers more human and thus problematized their
authority, and this historical perspective pointed to a future replete with possibilities
and encouraged human effort at reform (ibid., 2223). See also Kenneth Gouwens,
Perceiving the Past: Renaissance Humanism after the Cognitive Turn, American
Historical Review 103 (1998): 5582.
56. See Bouwsma, Venice and the Defense of Liberty, 112 and my Florentine Civic
Humanism and the Emergence of Modern Ideology, History and Theory 46 (2007):
33035.
Notes to Pages 3234 199
57. Insistence on the crucial importance of the republicanism of the civic human-
ists is the main difference between Barons interpretation and Garins. The latter
also emphasized the humanists commitment to the vita activa, their historical con-
sciousness, and their creative emulation rather than slavish imitation of the classical
heritage. In Barons view, however, the republican commitmentthe adherence to
values of liberty and equalitywas a precondition for the maturation of those other
humanist innovations. This argument is what made Barons interpretation so fruitful
and suggestive, notwithstanding its reductive tendencies, Whiggish assumptions and
sometimes crude methodologies.
58. See, for example, Paul F. Grendler, Schooling in Renaissance Italy (Baltimore:
Johns Hopkins University Press, 1989), 13341; Maria Dowling, Humanism in the Age
of Henry VIII (London: Croom Helm, 1986), 11239.
59. See, for example, Pier Paolo Vergerio, The Character and Studies Befitting a
Free-Born Youth; Leonardo Bruni, The Study of Literature; Aneas Silvius Piccolomini,
The Education of Boys; Battista Guarino, A Program of Teaching and Learning. All four
works are reproduced with an English translation in Humanist Educational Treatises,
ed. and trans. Craig W. Kallendorf (Cambridge, Mass.: Harvard University Press,
2002). See also Grendler, Schooling in Renaissance Italy, 110271; Benjamin G. Kohl,
Humanism and Education, in Renaissance Humanism, 1:522; Eugenio Garin,
Leducazione in Europa, 14001600: Problemi e programmi (Bari: Laterza, 1957); Wil-
liam H. Woodward, Studies in Education during the Age of the Renaissance 14001600
(New York: Teachers College Press, 1967).
60. Vergerio, The Character, 29, 49, 55. See also Piccolomini, The Education, 247.
61. Vergerio, The Character, 7. See also Piccolomini, The Education, 129, 15759
and Guarino, A Program, 26165.
62. The paradigmatic works in the genre of vera nobilitas are Buonaccorso da Mon-
temagno, Treatise on Nobility, Poggio Bracciolini, On Nobility and Bartolomeo Sacci
(known as Il Platina), On True Nobility. Together with the other ten works dedicated
to the subject by fifteenth-century Italian humanists they are reprinted in English
translation in Knowledge, Goodness, and Power: The Debate over True Nobility among
Quattrocento Italian Humanists, ed. and trans. Albert Rabil (Binghamton, N.Y.: Medi-
eval & Renaissance Texts & Studies, 1991). See also Rabils Introduction.
63. See, for example, Vergerio, The Character, 5.
64. Lauro Martines, The Social World of the Florentine Humanists 13901460 (Lon-
don: Routledge & Kegan Paul, 1963), 27186; John Najemy, Civic Humanism and
Florentine Politics, in Renaissance Civic Humanism: Reappraisals and Reflections, ed.
James Hankins (Cambridge: Cambridge University Press, 2000), 3074. On the tradi-
tional political language of Florentine populism see idem, Corporatism and Consensus in
Florentine Politics, 12801400 (Chapel Hill: University of North Carolina Press, 1982).
65. Anthony Grafton and Lisa Jardine, From Humanism to the Humanities (Cam-
bridge, Mass.: Harvard University Press, 1986). See also Lauro Martines, Power and
Imagination: City-States in Renaissance Italy (New York: Knopf, 1979), 191217.
66. See my Florentine Civic Humanism, 33542. This analysis makes clear why
Barons Whiggish conception of modernity blinded him to important aspects of the
thought as well as the social role of civic humanism.
200 Notes to Pages 3438
67. Baldesar Castiglione, Il libro del Cortigiano, ed. Walter Barberis (Turin: Ein-
audi, 1998). The different interpretations of the relationship between Castiglione
and humanism reflect the different potentials inherent in humanist discourse. Thus
Arthur F. Kinney, who analyzes in his Continental Humanist Poetics (Amherst: Uni-
versity of Massachusetts Press, 1989), 87134 the poetics of Il Cortigiano, sees Cas-
tiglione as humanist pure and simple. Wayne A. Rebhorn, who reads in his Courtly
Performances: Masking and Festivity in Castigliones Book of the Courtier (Detroit:
Wayne State University Press, 1978), 2628 the work from the general perspective of
court culture, is more cautious. He points out the humanist dimensions in Castiglio-
nes book, but also the essential differences. On court society, see Norbert Elias, The
Court Society, trans. Edmund Jephcott (Oxford: Blackwell, 1983).
68. The discussion may provide a fruitful angle to evaluate mannerism. Mannerist
art was characterized by qualities its adherents described as grace, variety and difficulty,
while its opponents evaluated it as preference for form over content, excessive styliza-
tion, artificiality, and affectation. See John Shearman, Mannerism (London: Penguin,
1990). See also Margaret D. Carroll, The Erotics of Absolutism: Rubens and the Mysti-
fication of Sexual Violence, Representations 25 (1989): 330; Charles Burroughs, The
Altar and the City: Botticellis Mannerism and the Reform of Sacred Art, Artibus et
historiae 36 (1997): 940, which stress mannerisms relationship to absolutism.
69. See the works cited in note 8 of the Introduction.
Chapter 2
1. See, for example, Dale Kent, The Rise of the Medici: Faction in Florence, 1424
1434 (Oxford: Oxford University Press, 1978); Werner L. Gundersheimer, Patronage
in the Renaissance: An Exploratory Approach, in Patronage in the Renaissance, eds.
G. F. Lytle and S. Orgel (Princeton, N.J.: Princeton University Press, 1981), 323; F.
W. Kent with Patricia Simons, Renaissance Patronage: An Introductory Essay, in
Patronage, Art, and Society in Renaissance Italy, eds. F. W. Kent and P. Simons with J.
C. Eade (Canberra: Humanities Research Centre, 1987), 121; Mary Hollingsworth,
Patronage in Renaissance Italy: From 1400 to the Early Sixteenth Century (London: J.
Murray, 1994); David Howarth, Images of Rule: Art and Politics in the English Renais-
sance (Berkeley: University of California Press, 1997), 191260.
2. In order to understand how this system functioned we can examine Thomas
Mores income as undertreasurer of the exchequer during the first half of the 1520s.
Mores official salary was a little less than 174 while his total annual income was
between 400 and 500. The supplementary income came from various sources, all
of them directly dependent on Mores position and most deriving directly from the
Crown. Among other sources, More was granted a monopoly of money exchange in
London, a license to export one thousand woolen cloths, two land plots and three
wardships (two for minors, who eventually married Mores son and daughter, and
one for a lunatic). Besides that he received a pension from the king of France, Fran-
cis I, for his assistance in drafting the treaty of 1525 and an annual retainer from the
Earl of Northumberland. This rather large income was unusual only in that, unlike the
Notes to Pages 3839 201
vast majority of his contemporaries, More did not exploit his position to extort money
from those requiring his services. See John Guy, The Public Career of Sir Thomas More
(Brighton: Harvester Press, 1980), 2426.
3. This is, of course, only a schematic description. A more detailed analysis would
naturally expose important differences between the various monarchies and within
the same state during different periods. The following studies illustrate the gap be-
tween the theoretical and symbolic absolute power of the king and his dependence
on the political classes for the actual praxis of government: Hugh R. Trevor-Roper,
The General Crisis of the Seventeenth Century, in Crisis in Europe 15001600, ed.
T. Aston (London: Routledge & Kegan Paul, 1965), 5995; G. R. Elton, Reform and
Reformation: England 15091558 (London: E. Arnold, 1977), 1829; idem, England
under the Tudors (New York: G. P. Putnams Sons, 1954), 27; David Starkey, Court,
Council, and Nobility in Tudor England, in Princes, Patronage and the Nobility, eds.
R. G. Asch and A. M. Birke (Oxford: Oxford University Press, 1991), 175203; J. Rus-
sell Major, The French Renaissance Monarchy as Seen through the Estates General,
Studies in the Renaissance 9 (1962): 11325; idem, The Crown and the Aristocracy in
Renaissance France, American Historical Review 69 (1964): 63145; J. M. H. Salmon,
Society in Crisis: France in the Sixteenth Century (Cambridge: Cambridge University
Press, 1979), 1626, 5962, 92113.
4. Trevor-Roper, The General Crisis.
5. As the patronage system was hardly theorized by contemporaries, evidence for
its importance appears not in the Renaissance canonical historical and political writ-
ings but in relatively marginal works. The biography of Cardinal Wolsey, for example,
written by his protg George Cavendish, is attentive to the patronage system. See
George Cavendish, The Life and Death of Cardinal Wolsey, in Two Early Tudor Lives,
eds. R. S. Sylvester and D. P. Harding (New Haven, Conn.: Yale University Press,
1962). See, for example, Cavendishs description of Wolseys relationship with his first
patron, the Marquis of Dorset (ibid., 47). Perhaps the best source for understand-
ing the crucial role filled by the patronage system, as well as precise mechanisms, are
personal letters. The collection of Lisle letters is a wonderful example. Lord Arthur
Lisle, the bastard of Edward IV, was involved, in his capacity as governor of Calais
and against his own inclination, in the devious and dangerous English politics of the
1530s. His correspondence reveals how political standingand, during this period,
sometimes mere survivaldepended on relations of patronage. Indeed, creating
these relations and developing them were the focus of Lisles activity. Interminable
streams of gifts to permanent and occasional patrons and paid agents at the hubs of
power were his main instruments. See The Lisle Letters, ed. M. St. Clare Byrne, 6 vols.
(Chicago: University of Chicago Press, 1981). Trevor-Roper analyzes these aspects of
patronage. See Hugh Trevor-Roper, The Lisle Letters, in Renaissance Essays (Lon-
don: Secker & Warburg, 1985), 7693.
6. That is not to say that humanism did not establish itself in important institu-
tions. As mentioned, it dominated nonuniversity education and it firmly instituted
itself also in the universities. See, for example, Paul F. Grendler, The Universities of
the Italian Renaissance (Baltimore: Johns Hopkins University Press, 2002), 199248;
Charles G. Nauert, Humanist Infiltration into the Academic World: Some Studies of
202 Notes to Pages 3945
Northern Universities, Renaissance Quarterly 43 (1990): 799812; Maria Dowling,
Humanism in the Age of Henry VIII (London: Croom Helm, 1986), 75111; James
H. Overfield, Humanism and Scholasticism in Late Medieval Germany (Princeton,
N.J.: Princeton University Press, 1984), 298330. My contention is that none of these
institutions encompassed the full intellectual and social activities of humanism and
therefore did not define the identity of humanism in the way that the medieval uni-
versity defined the identity of scholasticism.
7. See Gordon Kipling, Henry VII and the Origins of Tudor Patronage, in Pa-
tronage in the Renaissance, 11764.
8. Polydore Vergil, The Anglica Historia of Polydore Vergil, A.D. 14851537, ed.
and trans. D. Hay (London: Offices of the Royal Historical Society, 1950); idem, Three
Books of Polydore Vergils English History, Comprising the Reigns of Henry VI, Edward
IV, and Richard III, ed. H. Ellis (New York: Johnson Reprint, 1968). See also Alistair
Fox, Politics and Literature in the Reigns of Henry VII and Henry VIII (Oxford: Black-
well, 1989), 1519.
9. Poems 1923, eds. Clarence H. Miller, Leicester Bradner, Charles A. Lynch and
Revilo P. Oliver, CWM 3, Part II. See Fox, Politics and Literature, 11416.
10. See Dowling, Humanism, 18.
11. In his Thomas More (London: Arnold, 2000), 4258, John Guy convincingly
argued that More was appointed to the royal council in March 1518. His arguments
should finally settle the controversy over this date.
12. See Dowling, Humanism, 22, 2832.
13. See James Kelsey McConica, English Humanists and Reformation Politics: Under
Henry VIII and Edward VI (Oxford: Clarendon Press, 1965), 76105; Dowling, Hu-
manism, 2333, 75111.
14. Ibid., 176218. The most famous English work to present liberal education as
the appropriate education for the upper classes is Thomas Elyot, The Book Named the
Governor, ed. S. E. Lehmberg (London: Dent, 1962).
15. Dowling, Humanism, 15.
16. See Fox, Politics and Literature, 2023.
17. See Clemente Pizzi, Un amico di Erasmo, lumanista Andrea Ammonio (Flor-
ence: F. Le Monnier, 1956).
18. Cited in H. C. Porter, Introduction, in Erasmus and Cambridge: The Cam-
bridge Letters of Erasmus, trans. D. F. S. Thomson (Toronto: University of Toronto
Press, 1963), 65.
19. The last event Erasmus recounts in his autobiographical sketch, the Compendium
vitae, written in 1524, is his honorific nomination to be councillor of Prince Charles in
1515. The rest is known to you, he adds to the addressee of the work, his friend Con-
rad Goclenius (CWE 4, 409). The autobiography seems to reflect a division between an
earlier period and a mature one when Erasmuss life became public and known.
20. Erasmuss date of birth is, of course, uncertain. Harry Verdevelds claim for
1466 seems to me to be the most convincing. See The Ages of Erasmus and the Year
of His Birth, Renaissance Quarterly 46 (1993): 754809.
21. He was, however, awarded a doctorate in theology from the University of Turin
in 1506.
Notes to Pages 4560 203
22. The work was first published, after numerous revisions and adventures, only
in 1520 (CWE 23, 26).
23. There are no indications that he attended classes after 1497. See James D. Tracy,
Erasmus: The Growth of a Mind (Geneva: Droz, 1972), 58.
24. See Cornelius Augustijn, Erasmus: His Life, Works, and Influence, trans. J. C.
Grayson (Toronto: University of Toronto Press, 1991), 36.
25. Erasmus made a clumsy attempt to dissuade van Borssele from marrying by
pointing out that he considered her not a widow but rather a virgin determined to
remain chaste (Ep 145: 16476).
26. Erasmuss specific model was Plinys panegyric of the emperor Trajan. See
Pliny, Panegyricus Plinii secondi dictus Traiano imp., in Letters and Panegyricus, 2 vols.,
trans. Betty Radice (London: W. Heinemann, 1969), 2:322547.
27. James D. Tracy, The Politics of Erasmus: A Pacifist Intellectual and His Political
Milieu (Toronto: University of Toronto Press, 1978), 1718.
28. Tracy, The Politics, 1819.
29. There is a famous lacuna in our knowledge of Erasmuss life, from the end of
1508 until April 1511. He most probably spent the bulk of this period in London,
most likely in Mores house. See J. K. Sowards, The Two Lost Years of Erasmus: Sum-
mary, Review, and Speculation, Studies in the Renaissance 9 (1962): 16186.
30. See Margaret Mann Phillips, The Adages of Erasmus: A Study with Translations
(Cambridge: Cambridge University Press, 1964), 7586.
31. Epp 187, 191, 192, 193, 197, 199, 205.
32. A similar though less detailed account is provided in a letter to Antoon van
Bergen (Ep 288).
33. See CWE 12, 639.
34. The letter to Riario was published about three months after it was written.
35. See Tracy, The Politics, 9294, 104.
36. See Lewis W. Spitz, The Course of German Humanism, in Itinerarium Ita-
licum: The Profile of the Italian Renaissance in the Mirror of Its European Transforma-
tions, eds. H. A. Oberman and T. A. Brady (Leiden: Brill, 1975), 371436; Humanism
in Germany, in The Impact of Humanism on Western Europe, eds. A. Goodman and
A. MacKay (London: Longman, 1990), 20219; Overfield, Humanism and Scholasti-
cism.
37. See Spitzs articles cited in the previous note.
38. See Istvn Bejczy, Erasmus Becomes a Netherlander, Sixteenth Century Jour-
nal 28 (1997): 38799; Tracy, The Politics, 67. In a letter to Latimer in June 1516
Erasmus describes the warm reception he enjoyed in Upper Germany and in his
own country, namely the Low Countries (Ep 417).
39. See James D. Tracy, Erasmus Becomes a German, Renaissance Quarterly 21
(1968): 28188.
40. See Lewis W. Spitz, The Religious Renaissance of the German Humanists (Cam-
bridge, Mass.: Harvard University Press, 1963).
41. Spitz, Humanism in Germany, 208.
42. Tracy, Erasmus Becomes a German, 286.
43. Ibid., 28788.
204 Notes to Pages 6069
44. Spitz, The Course, 40114.
45. See Spitz, Humanism in Germany, 206, 209.
46. There are odder examples. Thus, Pius Hieronymus Baldung, the dean of the
law faculty in Freiburg, wrote to Erasmus in April 1516 that he heard many things
about him which were remarkable, but true nonetheless. This fired his desire to
make himself somehow known to Erasmus (Ep 400).
47. See CWE 3, 34850.
48. See ibid., 35053.
49. Jardine, Erasmus, 14864.
50. See Elizabeth L. Eisenstein, The Printing Press as an Agent of Change: Com-
munication and Cultural Transformation in Early-Modern Europe, 2 vols. (Cambridge:
Cambridge University Press, 1979), 1:163302. I do not accept, however, Eisensteins
more extravagant claim that the printing press was a necessary precondition for the
emergence of central aspects of Renaissance worldview, notably its historical con-
sciousness.
51. This is one of the main themes of Jardines book. See Erasmus, 3948, 99128,
18087.
52. Erasmus, Make haste slowly, trans. R. A. B. Mynors, in Adages in CWE 33, 10.
53. Ibid., 9.
54. See Tracy, Erasmus Becomes a German, 28183; E. Hilgert, Johan Froben
and the Basel University Scholars 15131523, Library Quarterly 41 (1971): 14169.
55. In fact, Johannes Amerbach, Frobens predecessor as the head of the printing
press, initiated the project without Erasmuss knowledge already in 1507, investing
considerable resources in the collection of manuscripts and recruitment of scholars,
including Johann Reuchlin, Pellicanus, Johannes Kuno and Gregor Reisch. Erasmus,
who as early as 1500 decided to publish the letters of the Church father, enrolled
in the project and edited the first four volumes, which included, besides the letters,
several polemical writings, other texts, and a short biography of Jerome. The sons
of Johannes Amerbach, Bruno, Basilius and Bonifacius, were in charge of the other
five volumestheir education had been intended to prepare them for precisely such
projects (see Hilgert, Johan Froben, 145).
56. See Jardine, Erasmus, 2526.
57. See Overfield, Humanism and Scholasticism, 15158.
Chapter 3
1. The term, coined by Margaret Mann Phillips, appropriately indicates the first
appearance of several long adagesincluding One ought to be born a king or fool
(I iii 1); To exact tribute from the dead (I ix 12); Sparta is your portion; do your best
for her (II v 1); The Sileni of Alcibiades (III iii 1); A dung-beetle hunting an eagle
(III vii 1); and War is a treat for those who have not tried it (IV i 1)that expressed
Erasmuss utter dissatisfaction with the existing cultural, religious and political state
of things and his radical ideas of reform. See The Adages of Erasmus (Cambridge,
1964), 96.
Notes to Pages 7073 205
2. Elias, The Civilizing Process, 4267. Although my perspective and my conclu-
sions are different from Eliass, the following reading of De civilitate is greatly indebted
to his celebrated study.
3. Ibid., 4849.
4. Baldesar Castiglione, Il libro del Cortigiano, ed. Walter Barberis (Turin: Einaudi
1998); Giovanni della Casa, Galateo, ed. Stefano Prandi (Turin: Einaudi, 1994). See
Elias, The Civilizing Process, 6166; Wayne A. Rebhorn, Courtly Performances: Masking
and Festivity in Castigliones Book of the Courtier (Detroit: Wayne State University
Press, 1978); Daniel Javitch, Il Cortegiano and the Constraints of Despotism in Cas-
tiglione: The Ideal and the Real in Renaissance Culture, eds. Robert W. Hanning and
David Rosand (New Haven, Conn.: Yale University Press, 1983), 1728.
5. Elias, The Civilizing Process, 56.
6. Ibid., 5759.
7. Ibid., 63.
8. Ibid., 4850.
9. Norbert Elias, The Court Society, trans. E. Jephcott (Oxford: B. Blackwell, 1983)
provides the best theoretical model of court society.
10. For insightful analyses of these characteristics, see Elias, The Court Society,
78116; Michel Jeanneret, A Feast of Words: Banquets and Table Talk in the Renais-
sance, trans. Jeremy Whiteley and Emma Hughs (Chicago: University of Chicago
Press, 1991), 4549.
11. See above, 3233.
12. See Albert Rabil, Introduction, in Knowledge, Goodness, and Power: The
Debate over Nobility among Quattrocento Italian Humanists (Binghamton, N.Y.: Me-
dieval & Renaissance Texts & Studies, 1991), which he edited; Francesco Tateo, Tra-
dizione e realt nellUmanesimo italiano, 2nd ed. (Bari: Dedalo libri, 1974), 355421;
Lauro Martines, Power and Imagination: City-States in Renaissance Italy (New York:
Knopf, 1979), 21014.
13. Elias rightly attributes great importance to Erasmuss independence, which he
views as a characteristic of humanism in general. He argues that the humanists were
a class of intellectuals uncommitted to any specific social group.

In his analysis, this
independence was the result of a temporary dislocation of power born of the fact that
the feudal aristocracy was already in eclipse while the new absolutist aristocracy had
not yet fully come to power (The Civilizing Process, 5859). We have seen in the previ-
ous chapter that this description is not adequate of most humanists, whose intellectual
activity was closely tied to the interests and ideologies of the ruling social classes and
political establishments. It is true, however, of Erasmus and the circle of humanists
around him. (It is worthwhile mentioning that Elias does not refer to other humanists
besides Erasmus in this context.) What Elias considers to be a general characteristic
of humanism turns out to be a specific and quite exceptional feature of Erasmian
humanism. Humanisms autonomy, which Elias ascribes to external causesthe
social and political structureis, from my perspective, a result of specific dynamics
that distinguished just one version of humanism. In short, what Elias views as a fully
explained phenomenon is now seen as a problem.
14. Elias, The Civilizing Process, 4344.
206 Notes to Pages 7476
15. Erasmus refers to syphilis not less than three times in the improbable context
of a discussion of liberal education (Puer 307, 324, 325).
16. Erasmus, Inns, CWE 39, 36880; Elias, The Civilizing Process, 5758.
17. See, for example, Erasmus, Hunting, CWE 39, 10912.
18. For the attitude of the Italian humanists see, for example, Pier Paolo Verge-
rio, The Character and Studies Befitting a Free-Born Youth, in Humanist Educational
Treatises, ed. and trans. Craig W. Kallendorf (Cambridge, Mass.: Harvard University
Press, 2002), 6682.
19. It is perhaps worthwhile to note that my perspective diverges from Elias, from
whom many of the above observations and insights are taken. Elias emphasizes the
unmotivated and impersonal dimensions of a long civilizing process. He reads Eras-
muss works as expressions of this process. In my analysis the civilizing dimensions of
Erasmuss works are an integral part of an articulated worldview that constitutes the
basis for a program for reforming society.
20. Erasmuss numerous educational works include a general depiction of and ap-
peal for liberal education (Puer), a description of the methods of study and the cur-
riculum of liberal studies (RS), a full presentation of the rhetorical theory of writing
(Co), a description of the right way of writing letters (On the Writing of Letters, trans.
C. Fantazzi, CWE 25, 12254) and work on the correct Latin and Greek pronuncia-
tion (The Right Way of Speaking Latin and Greek: A Dialogue, trans. M. Pope, CWE
26, 365475). Many others of his works, the Colloquies for example, were written as
textbooks for schools. On Erasmuss educational thought see, for example, William
Harrison Woodward, Desiderius Erasmus concerning the Aim and Method of Education
(New York: Bureau of Publications, Teachers College, Columbia University, 1964);
James D. Tracy, Erasmus: The Growth of a Mind (Geneva: Droz, 1972), 5782; James
McConica, Erasmus (Oxford: Oxford University Press, 1991), 1829.
21. See above, 3233.
22. These words are, of course, reminiscent of Giovanni Pico della Mirandolas
famous Oration on the Dignity of Man, trans. Elizabeth Livermore Forbs, in The
Renaissance Philosophy of Man, eds. Ernst Cassirer, Paul Oskar Kristeller and John
Herman Randall (Chicago: University of Chicago Press, 1948), 22354. Picos image
of man, however, is drawn from a religious and metaphysical perspective, Erasmuss
from a practical and social one. This difference is indicative of the difference between
humanism (as I understand the term) and Renaissance Neoplatonism.
23. Vergerio, The Character, 2829.
24. See, for example, Vergerio, The Character, 5153. Aneas Silvius Piccolomini,
The Education of Boys (in Humanist Educational Treatises, 126259), was written for
Ladislas, King of Hungary and Bohemia, and is naturally explicit about the political
aims of education from the first page.
25. For a discussion of this subject in the context of Erasmuss educational writings
see Wayne A. Rebhorn, Erasmian Education and the Convivium religiosum, Studies
in Philology 38 (1972): 14041.
26. Nancy Bisaha, Creating East and West: Renaissance Humanists and the Ottoman
Turks (Philadelphia: University of Pennsylvania Press, 2004).
27. See ibid., 17475.
Notes to Pages 7778 207
28. See Erika Rummel, The Confessionalization of Humanism in Reformation Ger-
many (Oxford: Oxford University Press, 2000); Charles G. Nauert, Humanism and
the Culture of Renaissance Europe (Cambridge: Cambridge University Press, 1995),
16063.
29. See chapter 1, note 33 for articles that review the current literature. Among the
classical studies of humanist religious thought are Charles Trinkaus, In Our Image and
Likeness, 2 vols. (London: Constable, 1970); Salvatore I. Camporeale, Lorenzo Valla:
Umanesimo e Teologia (Florence: Nella sede dellIstituto, 1972); idem, Renaissance
Humanism and the Origins of Humanist Theology, in Humanity and Divinity in
Renaissance and Reformation, eds. J. W. OMalley, T. M. Izbicki and G. Christianson
(Leiden: Brill, 1993), 10124; Lewis W. Spitz, The Religious Renaissance of the German
Humanists (Cambridge, Mass.: Harvard University Press, 1963).
30. See, for example, James Kelsey McConica, English Humanists and Reformation
Politics: Under Henry VIII and Edward VI (Oxford: Clarendon Press, 1965), 1341;
Marjorie ORourke Boyle, Erasmus on Language and Method in Theology (Toronto:
University of Toronto Press, 1977); idem, Christening Pagan Mysteries: Erasmus in
Pursuit of Wisdom (Toronto: University of Toronto Press, 1981); idem, Rhetoric and
Reform: Erasmus Civil Dispute with Luther (Cambridge, Mass.: Harvard Univer-
sity Press, 1983); Jacques Chomarat, Grammaire et rhetorique chez Erasme, 2 vols.
(Paris: Belles Lettres, 1981), 1:3151, 587710; Brendan Bradshaw, The Christian
Humanism of Erasmus, Journal of Theological Studies, n.s. 33 (1982): 41147; Jerry
H. Bentley, Humanists and Holy Writ: New Testament Scholarship in the Renaissance
(Princeton, N.J.: Princeton University Press, 1983), 11293; Charles Trinkaus, Eras-
mus, Augustine and the Nominalists, in The Scope of Renaissance Humanism (Ann
Arbor: University of Michigan Press, 1983), 274301; Cornelis Augustijn, Erasmus:
His Life, Works, and Influence, trans. J. C. Grayson (Toronto: University of Toronto
Press, 1991), 71145; Manfred Hoffmann, Rhetoric and Theology: The Hermeneutic of
Erasmus (Toronto: University of Toronto Press, 1994); James D. Tracy, Erasmus of
the Low Countries (Berkeley: University of California Press, 1996), 53126; Mary Jane
Barnett, Erasmus and Hermeneutics of Linguistic Praxis, Renaissance Quarterly 49
(1996): 54272; Erika Rummel, Erasmus (London: Continuum, 2004), 73105.
31. These reconstructions, however, do not always fully appreciate the tensions
between Erasmuss humanist assumptions and conviction and traditional Christian
beliefs. At the structural level, there was a tension between humanisms historical
consciousness, which tended to expose central aspects of Christianitythe church,
the doctrine, and scripture itselfas human products, and Christianitys self-under-
standing as being divinely instituted. Humanist discourse, in other words, problema-
tized the distinction between the human and the divine. At a more concrete level,
we shall presently see, for example, a tension between the positive image of human
being of Erasmus (and of most other humanists) and the Pauline one. This does not
mean, of course, that Erasmus and the other humanists were not good Christians. On
the contrary, the fact that many humanists since Petrarch experienced these tensions
attests to their sincere Christian beliefs. Indeed, these tensions were fruitful and pro-
ductive, in the sense that engaging with them was a central motive for the continuous
re-elaboration of humanist religious thought.
208 Notes to Pages 7885
32. The letter became the preface to the revised edition of the Enchiridion first
published by Froben in 1518.
33. As Albert Rabil, Jr., argues, Erasmus succeeded beyond all others in combin-
ing the classical ideal of humanitas and the Christian ideal of Pietas (Desiderius
Erasmus, in Renaissance Humanism, 2:216).
34. See also Istvn Bejczy, Erasmus and the Middle Ages: The Historical Conscious-
ness of a Christian Humanist (Leiden: Brill, 2001), 812; Bradshaw, The Christian
Humanism of Erasmus, 41129.
35. Kathy Eden, Friends Hold All Things in Common: Tradition, Intellectual Prop-
erty, and the Adages of Erasmus (New Haven, Conn.: Yale University Press, 2001),
832.
36. See Boyle, Language and Method, 2526. Tracy, in Erasmus: The Growth of a
Mind, goes so far as to conclude that Erasmus readily accepted Christ as the supreme
teacher of wisdom, but had difficulty in believing the world to be so constituted that
man could be delivered from his own wickedness only by the death of Gods only
Son (236).
37. See also Bradshaw, The Christian Humanism of Erasmus, 425.
38. Erasmus, Paraphrase on Romans, trans. John B. Payne, Albert Rabil and Warren
S. Smith, CWE 42, 9.
39. Ibid., 55. In later editions the last sentence was replaced by a more ambiguous
one: However, it does not follow that God is unjust to anyone, but that he is merciful
towards many.
40. Robert Coogan, The Pharisee against the Hellenist: Edward Lee versus Eras-
mus, Renaissance Quarterly 39 (1986): 49293, demonstrates that Erasmuss central
notion of imitation was conceptually related to his Pelagian views appearing in his
interpretation of Romans 5:12 and 14. While the traditional interpretation of these
verses emphasized that Adams original sin is inherited, Erasmus argued that human
beings sin only inasmuch as they voluntarily imitate Adams disobedience.
41. See Tracy, Erasmus of the Low Countries, 7173.
42. Martin Luther, The Bondage of the Will, trans. Henry Cole (Grand Rapids,
Mich.: Baker Book House, 1976), 54.
43. Thomas Aquinas, Summa Theologiae, eds. T. Gilby et al. (London: Blackfriars,
1964), 1:1, 16 (1a1ae,1,4).
44. See Frederick H. Russell, The Just War in the Middle Ages (Cambridge: Cam-
bridge University Press, 1977), esp. 17, 25891.
45. Augustine, Political Writings, eds. E. M. Atkins and R. J. Dodaro (Cambridge:
Cambridge University Press, 2001), 37. Thomas Aquinas and the Spanish neoscho-
lastic Francisco de Vitoria are among those who cite this letter in their discussion of
just war. See Thomas Aquinas, Summa Theologiae, 35:8084 (2a2ae,40,1); Francisco
de Vitoria, On the Law of War, in Political Writings, eds. A. Pagden and J. Lawrence
(Cambridge: Cambridge University Press, 1991), 29598.
46. Augustine, Political Writings, 38.
47. Here lies the fundamental difference between my reconstruction of Erasmian
humanism and the reconstruction offered by Constance M. Furey in her Erasmus,
Contarini, and the Religious Republic of Letters (New York: Cambridge University
Notes to Pages 8590 209
Press, 2006). Furey argues that Erasmuss pervasive wish was to be part of a commu-
nity that was oriented toward the sacred rather than the profane (29). In my analysis
the orientation of the Erasmian Republic of Letters toward the sacred was inherently
related to its wish to reform Christendom.
48. All three elaborated the ideology of secular authority. The ideologists of the
church, including Giles of Rome and James of Viterbo, are less known. Whether it is
because of their intrinsic inferiority compared to their rivals or because the church
lost its battle is another question altogether.
49. Quentin Skinner, Visions of Politics (Cambridge: Cambridge University Press,
2002), 2:124.
50. See Lorenzo Valla, On the Donation of Constantine, trans. G. W. Bowersock
(Cambridge, Mass.: Harvard University Press, 2007).
51. See James McConica, Erasmus and the Grammar of Consent, in Scrinium
Erasmianum, ed. J. Coppens (Leiden: Brill, 1969), 2:7799.
52. This is also the conclusion of C. Augustijn, who systematically studied the
ecclesiology of Erasmus. See his The Ecclesiology of Erasmus, in Scrinium Erasmia-
num, 2:13940, 14351.
53. It is significant that in the letter to Volz Erasmus does not assign any sacra-
mental role to the clergy. To be sure, if pressed, Erasmus would have undoubtedly
presented a more orthodox view of the church, and would have interpreted the letter
in an orthodox fashion. It may be argued that Erasmus never denied, indeed sincerely
believed in, the sacramental role of the church. It is also true, however, that in a
general description of the churchsuch as the one offered in the letter to Volzhe
did not consider it necessary to mention the most fundamental dimension of the
churchs self-understanding. Nor is this omission an accidental one. On the contrary,
as we have already seen, his religious discourse tended to systematically devaluate the
sacramental, doctrinal and institutional aspects of Christianity.
54. Dante, Monarchy, trans. Prue Shaw (Cambridge: Cambridge University Press,
1996); Marsilius of Padua, The Defender of Peace, trans. Alan Gewirth (New York:
Columbia University Press, 1956); William of Ockham, A Short Discourse on Tyran-
nical Government, ed. Arthur Stephen McGrade (Cambridge: Cambridge University
Press, 1992).
55. Tracy notes that the eagle was the distinct symbol of the empire, and concludes
that the adage was an expression of Erasmuss animosity toward the emperor Maxi-
milian. See James D. Tracy, The Politics of Erasmus: A Pacifist Intellectual and His Po-
litical Milieu (Toronto: Toronto University Press, 1978), 3739. This may be true, but
must not obscure the fact that the main target of Erasmuss text is kingship as such.
56. Erasmus, To exact tribute from the dead, trans. R. A. B. Mynors, CWE 32,
18387.
57. Ibid., 18586.
58. Ibid., 18485.
59. See Tracy, The Politics of Erasmus, 5153.
60. Among the important Italian humanists who produced mirrors for princes
are Petrarch and Pontano. See Francesco Petrarca, How a Ruler Ought to Govern
His State, trans. Benjamin G. Kohl, in The Earthly Republic: Italian Humanists on
210 Notes to Pages 9095
Government and Society, eds. Benjamin G. Kohl and Ronald G. Witt (Philadel-
phia: University of Pennsylvania Press, 1978), 3578; and Giovanni Pontano, Ad
Alfonsum Calabriae ducem de principe liber, in Prosatori latini del quattrocento, ed.
Eugenio Garin (Milan: R. Ricciardi, 1952), 102363. See also Lester Born, Intro-
duction, in Erasmus, The Education of a Christian Prince (New York: W. W. Nor-
ton, 1936), 94130; Quentin Skinner, The Foundations of Modern Political Thought
(Cambridge: Cambridge University Press, 1978), 1:11328.
61. In fact, more than one, as Christian Prince played a part in subsequent episodes
of patronageor, rather, hopes of patronageconcerning Henry VIII in 1517 (Ep
657) and Prince Ferdinand in 1518 (Ep 853). About the English episode see Cecil H.
Clough, Erasmus and the Pursuit of English Royal Patronage in 1517 and 1518,
Erasmus of Rotterdam Society Yearbook 1 (1981): 12640.
62. See also Eden, Friends, 15455.
63. Richard F. Hardin, The Literary Conventions of Erasmus Education of a
Christian Prince: Advice and Aphorism, Renaissance Quarterly 35 (1982): 15657.
64. For example, IP 206, 208, 222, 224, 232, 278, 284.
65. Tracy, The Politics, 58.
66. See Skinner, The Foundations, 1:23641.
67. Thomas Elyot, The Book Named the Governor, ed. S. E. Lehmberg (London:
Dent, 1962).
68. See Alistair Fox, Sir Thomas Elyot and the Humanist Dilemma, in Alistair
Fox and John Guy, Reassessing the Hentician Age: Humanism, Politics and Reform
(Oxford: Blackwell, 1986), 5273.
69. Elyot, The Book Named the Governor, 112.
70. Ibid., 14.
71. Leon Battista Albertis preface to Della Famiglia, trans. Guido A. Guarino
(Lewisburg, Pa.: Bucknell University Press, 1971), 2734, is one of the canonical ex-
pressions of this ethos.
72. Jacob Burckhardt, The Civilization of the Renaissance in Italy, trans. S. G. C.
Middlemore (London: Phaidon, 1944).
73. The perception of fame and glory as the highest human end to be achieved in
the public arena appears practically on every other page of Albertis Della Famiglia
(e.g., 13849, 15355, 18288, 30507). See also Eugenio Garin, Italian Humanism,
trans. Peter Munz (Oxford: Blackwell, 1965), 4546; Skinner, The Foundations, 1:80,
99101, 11821.
74. See, for example, Leonardo Bruni, Oration for the Funeral of Nanni Strozzi,
in The Humanism of Leonardo Bruni, eds. Gordon Griffiths, James Hankins and
Davis Thompson (Binghamton, N.Y.: Medieval & Renaissance Texts & Studies,
1987), 12127; idem, Panegyric to the City of Florence, trans. Benjamin G. Kohl, in
The Earthly Republic: Italian Humanists on Government and Society, eds. Benjamin
G. Kohl and Ronald G. Witt, 13575. See also Hans Baron, The Crisis of the Early
Italian Renaissance, 2nd ed. (Princeton, N.J.: Princeton University Press, 1966),
199211, 41239; Skinner, The Foundations, 1:7784; idem, Visions of Politics,
2:13034. The humanists serving the princely regimes naturally employed a differ-
ent strategy. Ignoring the subjects, they concentrated on the political virtus of the
Notes to Pages 9597 211
prince and his majesty, which they presented as compatible with the Christian and
cardinal virtues. See, for example, Elyot, The Book Named the Governor and Pon-
tano, Ad Alfonsum. See also Skinner, The Foundations, 1:11821; idem, Visions of
Politics, 2:12123, 13637.
75. Bruni, Oration, 124; idem, Panegyric, 150. See also Mikael Hrnqvist, The Two
Myths of Civic Humanism, in Renaissance Civic Humanism: Reappraisals and Reflec-
tions, ed. James Hankins (Cambridge: Cambridge University Press, 2000), 10542.
76. See, for example, Niccol Machiavelli, Discourses on Livy, trans. Harvey C.
Mansfield and Nathan Tarcov (Chicago: University of Chicago Press, 1996), I.9,
I.2627, II.2, III.41 (2830, 6163, 12933, 30001); idem, The Prince, eds. Quentin
Skinner and Russell Price (Cambridge: Cambridge University Press, 1988), chaps.
1518 (5463). The literature on the subject is vast. See, for example, Isaiah Berlin,
The Originality of Machiavelli, in Against the Current (New York: Viking Press,
1980), 2579; Mark Hulliung, Citizen Machiavelli (Princeton, N.J.: Princeton Univer-
sity Press, 1983); Harvey C. Mansfield, Machiavellis Virtue (Chicago: University of
Chicago Press, 1996); Vickie B. Sullivan, Machiavellis Three Romes: Religion, Human
Liberty, and Politics Reformed (DeKalb: Northern Illinois University Press, 1996), esp.
1555; Emanuele Cutinelli-Rndina, Chiesa e religione in Machiavelli (Pisa: Istituti
editoriali e poligrafici internazionali, 1998).
77. See Robert P. Adams, The Better Part of Valor: More, Erasmus, Colet, and Vives,
on Humanism, War, and Peace, 14961535 (Seattle: University of Washington Press,
1962), 2428; Tracy, The Politics, 3233.
78. Clear expressions of Erasmuss staunch opposition to war appear in his early
writings, notably Panegyricus ad Philippum, discussed in the previous chapter. But
only after his return to the continent in 1514 did he publish several works exclusively
devoted to the subject. The first important composition is a long letter to Antoon
van Bergen (Ep 288). The letter served as a draft for the famous adage Dulce bellum
inexpertis, which was first published in the Froben edition of 1515 and was repub-
lished separately in dozens of editions in Latin and in translations into European
vernaculars (Phillips, The Adages, 29899). The same edition includes another paci-
fistic adage, Sparta is your portion; do your best for her, trans. R. A. B. Mynors, CWE
33, 23743, which includes Erasmuss obituary of his pupil and patron Alexander
Stewart, Archbishop of St. Andrews and the bastard son of James IV of Scotland, who
died at the age of twenty at the battle of Flodden. The last chapter of The Education of
a Christian Prince (IP 28288) is also dedicated to this subject. Finally, in December
1517, Erasmus published the Querela pacis (QP), one of the sharpest and most bitter
denunciations of war ever published. This work too enjoyed immediate success. More
than twelve editions appeared in the twelve years following its publication, and it was
translated into French, Spanish, Dutch, German, and English (CWE 27, 291).
79. On the religious basis of Erasmuss pacifism, see Hilmar M. Pabel, The Peace-
ful People of Christ: The Irenic Ecclesiology of Erasmus of Rotterdam, in Erasmus
Vision of the Church, ed. Hilmar M. Pabel (Kirksville, Mo.: Sixteenth Century Journal
Publishers, 1995), 5793.
80. See also Jose A. Fernandez, Erasmus on the Just War, Journal of the History
of Ideas 34 (1974): 20926; Rummel, Erasmus, 6367.
212 Notes to Pages 9899
81. The allusions are to the French claims of Milan and Naples, and to the com-
plaints of Maximilian against Charles VIII. The stolen bride is Anne of Bretagne,
who was engaged to the emperor but finally married the French king. It is interesting
to note that Erasmuss scholastic enemies tried to use his pacifism in order to vilify
him in the eyes of his royal patrons. See Erika Rummel, Erasmus and His Catholic
Critics (Nieuwkoop: De Graaf, 1989), 2:45.
82. See Ronald G. Musto, Just Wars and Evil Empires: Erasmus and the Turks,
in Renaissance Society and Culture: Essays in Honor of Eugene F. Rice, Jr., eds. John
Monfasani and Ronald G. Musto (New York: Italica Press, 1991), 197216.
83. Erasmus was criticized for his pacifist stance, particularly concerning the Turks,
and subsequentlyafter Mohcs and the siege of Viennahe published in 1530 De bello
Turcico, in which he reformulated his position. See A Most Useful Discussion Concerning
Proposals for War against the Turks, Including an Exposition of Psalm 28, trans. Michael
J. Heath, CWE 64, 21166. Here Erasmus explicitly rejects as absurd the position that
the right to make war is denied totally to Christians (233). He also argues that the right
to make war is logically derived from the magistrates right to punish offendersan
argument he explicitly rejected in Dulce bellum (427). The general attitude of the De
bello Turcico and its conclusions are, however, similar to Erasmuss earlier writings on
war. Erasmuss main argument in De bello Turcico is that the Turks were sent by God to
castigate Christendom for its sins (for example, 213, 220, 237, 241). He concludes there-
fore that the prospects of successful war are meager unless a complete and conspicuous
reformation of life takes place throughout Christendom (260), implying that in this
case Gods anger, the cause of the war in the first place, would vanish.
84. See above, 2631.
85. In fact, three of the lettersto Dorp (MtD), to Oxford (MtO), and to Edward
Lee (MtL)were not originally written for publication but to deter Erasmuss adver-
saries. On the background of these letters see Daniel Kinney, Introduction, CWM
15, xixxliv.
86. The same is true for Julius exclusus, the furious attack on the late Pope Julius
II. See Julius Excluded from Heaven: A Dialogue, trans. Michael J. Heath, CWE 27,
15597. Ever since the publication of Julius there has been a controversy concerning
Erasmuss authorship of the work. Be that as it may, like Erasmus himself, More never
admitted that his friend was the author of the work (although, perhaps in a lawyers
habit of referring to all possible arguments, he employed the somewhat incriminating
phrase, now suppose that he did write the book). More, however, did not express
any reservations about the books contents and even justified its composition under
the circumstances (MtM 263).
87. See above, 3031.
88. There are strongly conflicting interpretations concerning the intellectual (and
even the personal) relationship between More and Erasmus, the roots of which go
back to the sixteenth century. The interpretative line adopted here emphasizes the
affinities between Mores and Erasmuss thought. This was the view expressed by
Erasmus and More themselves: together with Mores humanist letters, Erasmuss
biographical portraits of his friend (Ep 999, 1233) strongly substantiate this view.
Reproduced in Frederic Seebohm, The Oxford Reformers of 1498: Being a History
Notes to Pages 99102 213
of the Fellow-Work of John Colet, Erasmus, and Thomas More (London: Longmans,
Green, 1867), the interpretation of More, and to a large extent of English humanism
as a whole, as essentially Erasmian became the mainstream view. Among the many
important studies that elaborated this view are R. W. Chambers, Thomas More (Lon-
don: J. Cape, 1938); McConica, English Humanists; E. E. Reynolds, Thomas More and
Erasmus (New York: Fordham University Press, 1965); Fritz Caspari, Humanism and
the Social Order in Tudor England (Chicago: University of Chicago Press, 1954); Mar-
tin Fleisher, Radical Reform and Political Persuasion in the Life and Writings of Thomas
More (Geneva: Droz, 1973). The opposing interpretation was first developed within
English Catholicism, and its primary source is the famous biography of More written
by his son-in-law, William Roper. This tradition emphasized Mores piety, orthodoxy
and loyalty to the church, and depicted his life as a journey toward his martyrdom.
Mores humanism and, in particular, his relationship with Erasmusregarded at least
with suspicion by the post-Trendentine churchwere downplayed and sometimes
misrepresented.

The interpretation that sets More apart from Erasmus was recently
revived, notably by Alistair Fox. See William Roper, The Life of Sir Thomas More, in
Two Early Tudor Lives, eds. R. S. Sylvester and D. P. Harding (New Haven, Conn.: Yale
University Press, 1962); Alistair Fox, Facts and Fallacies: Interpreting English Hu-
manism and English Humanism and the Body Politics, in Reassessing the Herician
Age, 933, 3451, respectively. See also Richard Marius, Thomas More: A Biography
(New York: Knopf, 1984), 82, 9197, 23738, 3025.
89. Among the readings of Utopia along this line, to which I am indebted, are
J. H. Hexter, Mores Utopia: The Biography of an Idea (Princeton, N.J.: Princeton
University Press, 1952) and his Introduction, CWM 4, xvcxxiv; David Wootton,
Friendship Portrayed: A New Account of Utopia, History Workshop Journal 45
(1998): 2947; idem, Introduction in his new translation of Utopia with Erasmuss
The sileni Alcibiadis (Indianapolis: Hackett, 1999); Dominic Baker-Smith, Mores
Utopia (Toronto: University of Toronto Press, 2000).
90. The following discussion assumes that Utopia affirms the abolition of private
property. Hexter convincingly demonstrated this point (Mores Utopia, 3348).
91. See above, 22.
92. Erasmus, Between friends all is common, trans. Margaret Mann Phillips, CWE
31, 2930.
93. Wootton, Friendship Portrayed.
94. Hexter goes further, underscoring the similarity between the practical ethics
of the Utopians and of Erasmus, and between the common creed of the Utopian
religionsbelief in divine providence, immortality of the soul, and judgment in
the afterlife (22325)and the Erasmian antidogmatic faith, he concludes that the
Utopians were true Christians even though they had not enjoyed the benefit of rev-
elation (Introduction, lxxivlxxvii). Hexter seems to identify the religious thought
of Erasmus with natural religion, something resembling the Enlightenments deism.
(How else could someone be a true Christian without revelation?) I argue that Eras-
mus integrated Christianity and classical learning and saw fundamental similarities
between them concerning practical ethics. But I do not claim that his religiosity can
be reduced to natural religion.
214 Notes to Pages 103109
95. See J. C. Davis, Utopia and the Ideal Society: A Study of English Utopian Writ-
ing 15161700 (Cambridge: Cambridge University Press, 1981), 4142; Dorothy F.
Donnelly, Patterns of Order and Utopia (New York: St. Martins, 1998), 6177; and my
The Humanist Critique of Metaphysics and the Foundation of the Political Order,
Utopian Studies 13 (2002): 119.
96. Against this background we should understand many of the Utopian customs.
The Utopians might decide, for instance, to uproot a whole forest and to move it to
another place (179). Utopian hens, by the same token, do not brood over their eggs,
but leave the task to farmers who keep the eggs alive and hatch them, maintaining
them at an even, warm temperature. And the outcome: As soon as they come out
of the shell, the chicks recognise the humans and follow them around instead of their
mothers (115). And in fact Utopian humans behave in the same manner: the Uto-
pian child regards its nurse as its natural mother (141).
97. Plato, The Republic, trans. Tom Griffith (Cambridge: Cambridge University
Press, 2000).
98. Notwithstanding their avowed religious tolerance, the Utopians enforce a reli-
gious creed of divine providence, immortality of the soul and reward and punishment
in the afterlife because they deem it socially necessary (161, 22325).
99. I shall return to this subject in chapter 6. See also my, The Humanist Critique
of Metaphysics.
100. This fundamental difference does not preclude an intertextual play with
Platos works. In fact, Utopia contains many explicit references and implicit allusions
to Plato and his works, particularly to The Republic and The Laws (e.g., 4345, 8183,
10103), as well as to other numerous classical authors and texts. Baker-Smith, Mores
Utopia, is particularly sensitive to this aspect (3855, 8893, 14143, 17379).
101. See Peter R. Allen, Utopia and European Humanism: The Function of the
Prefatory Letters and Verses, Studies in the Renaissance 10 (1963): 99107.
Chapter 4
1. See chapter 1.
2. Most readings of Christian Prince ignore or at least marginalize its incoherency
and internal tensions. See, for example, Tracy, The Politics of Erasmus: A Pacifist Intel-
lectual and His Political Milieu (Toronto: University of Toronto Press, 1978), 4969;
Margaret Mann Phillips, Erasmus and the Northern Renaissance, rev. ed. (Wood-
bridge, U.K.: Boydell Press, 1981), 90106; Richard F. Hardin, The Literary Conven-
tions of Erasmus Education of a Christian Prince: Advice and Aphorism, Renaissance
Quarterly 35 (1982): 15163. This kind of reading reflects, I believe, the dogmatic
assumption that a text is coherent or at least that it can be made coherent if the true
intentions of its author are discovered.
3. Erasmus alludes to the fact that the emperor was chosen by election. This cus-
tom has increasingly become, however, a mere formality as the Habsburg heir was
always elected (as Charles himself succeeded his grandfather Maximilian in 1519).
Notes to Pages 109117 215
4. See above, 9495.
5. Erasmuss political evangelism is diametrically opposed to the Pauline political
evangelism (propagated by Augustine and Luther, among others), according to which
political authorityany political authoritythough devoid of any moral value, is
ordained by God in order to prevent anarchy. Alluding to scriptural basis for this doc-
trine (e.g., Matthew 22:21, Romans 13:12) Erasmus explains to the prince: Do not
let it escape you that what is said in the Gospels or in the apostolic writings about the
need to endure masters, obey officials, do honour to the king, and pay taxes is to be
taken as referring to pagan princes, since at that time there were not yet any Christian
princes (IP 235).
6. See above, 7985.
7. See chapters 1 and 3.
8. See Hardin, The Literary Conventions, 15657.
9. The original Froben publication in 1516 of Christian Prince was printed with
Erasmuss translation of classical works: Isocrates To Nicocles and four essays of Plu-
tarch, including How to Distinguish a Friend from a Flatterer (CWE 27, 200).
10. The first chapter, entitled The birth and upbringing of a Christian prince, is
roughly as long as the other ten chapterswhich discuss the duties and behavior of
the princeput together.
11. See Peter G. Bietenholz, History and Biography in the Work of Erasmus of Rot-
terdam (Geneva: Droz, 1966); Myron P. Gilmore, Erasmus and History, in Human-
ists and Jurists: Six Studies in the Renaissance (Cambridge, Mass.: Belknap Press of
Harvard University Press, 1963), 93107.
12. Bietenholz, History and Biography, 1819.
13. See, for example, Felix Gilbert, Machiavelli and Guicciardini: Politics and His-
tory in Sixteenth-Century Florence (Princeton, N.J.: Princeton University Press, 1965),
2039; Eric Cochrane, Historians and Historiography in the Italian Renaissance (Chi-
cago: University of Chicago Press, 1985), 34, 26.
14. See also Tracy, The Politics, 6263.
15. The book is not nominated, and Erasmus refers only to Platos purer message
on politics.
16. See above, 7475.
17. See, for example, Pier Paolo Vergerio, The Character and Studies Befitting a
Free-Born Youth, in Humanist Educational Treatises, ed. and trans. Craig W. Kallen-
dorf (Cambridge, Mass.: Harvard University Press, 2002), 43; Aneas Silvius Piccolo-
mini, The Education of Boys, in ibid., 137. Thomas More employs the same metaphors.
Both men and women, he argues, are equally suited for the knowledge of learning
by which reason is cultivated, and like plowed land, germinates a crop when the seeds
of good precepts have been sown. St. Thomas More: Selected Letters, ed. Elizabeth
Frances Rogers (New Haven, Conn.: Yale University Press, 1961), 105.
18. See above, 8385, 9798.
19. The origins of the myth of the golden age in Western thought lie in the remote
past. Its first literary formulation appears in Hesiods Works and Days. It subsequently
recurred in works of several Greek and Latin authors, most influentially in Ovids
Metamorphoses. See Arthur O. Lovejoy and George Boas, Primitivism and Related
216 Notes to Pages 117128
Ideas in Antiquity (Baltimore: Johns Hopkins University Press, 1997), 2353; Robert
P. Adams, The Better Part of Valor: More, Erasmus, Colet, and Vives, on Humanism,
War, and Peace, 14961535 (Seattle: University of Washington Press, 1962), 57.
20. Cited in Lovejoy and Boas, Primitivism, 4647. This description of course
alludes to the Christian view concerning the existence in paradise before the Fall.
21. See above, 7980.
22. Brendan Bradshaws definition in The Christian Humanism of Erasmus,
Journal of Theological Studies, n.s., 33 (1982): 447.
23. See also Istvn Bejczy, Erasmus and the Middle Ages: The Historical Conscious-
ness of a Christian Humanist (Leiden: Brill, 2001), 812.
24. The Colloquies of Erasmus, trans. Craig R. Thompson (Chicago: University of
Chicago Press, 1965), 47. In most respects the Convivium religiosum is not typical at
all. It is much longer than most other dialogues, and it is devoid of the lighthearted,
satiric and often thorny tone of the others. It can be described as typical only in the
sense that it expresses the true spirit of Erasmian humanism.
25. Geraldine Thompson, Under the Pretext of Praise: Satire Mode in Erasmus Fic-
tion (Toronto: University of Toronto Press, 1973), 34.
26. Johan Huizinga, Erasmus and the Age of Reformation, trans. F. Hopman (New
York: Harper & Row, 1957), 104.
27. Walter M. Gordon, Humanist Play and Belief: The Seriocomic Art of Desiderius
Erasmus (Toronto: University of Toronto Press, 1990), 14752.
28. Marjorie ORourke Boyle, Erasmus on Language and Method in Theology (To-
ronto: University of Toronto Press, 1977), 12941.
29. Ibid., 131.
30. William Harrison Woodward, Desiderius Erasmus concerning the Aim and
Method of Education (New York: Bureau of Publications, Teachers College, Columbia
University, 1964), 226.
31. Wayne A. Rebhorn, Erasmian Education and the Convivium religiosum,
Studies in Philology 69 (1972): 13147.
32. Michel Jeanneret, A Feast of Words: Banquets and Table Talk in the Renaissance,
trans. Jeremy Whiteley and Emma Hughs (Chicago: University of Chicago Press,
1991), 179.
33. See also 184, 18687, 189, 196, 200. See Terence Cave, The Cornucopian Text:
Problems of Writing in the French Renaissance (Oxford: Clarendon Press, 1979), 1045.
34. See Jeanneret, A Feast of Words, 17273.
35. There are of course significant differences between the Platonic dichotomy of body
and soul and the Pauline dichotomy between flesh and spirit. However, as J. B. Payne
demonstrates in Toward the Hermeneutics of Erasmus, in Scrinium Erasmianum, ed. J.
Coppens (Leiden: Brill, 1969), 2:1920, Erasmus collapsed them into one dichotomy.
36. In the March 1522 edition this introductory part consisted of the whole dia-
logue. The dialogue in its present form (besides minor changes) was published later
in the year (CWE 39, 171).
37. Rebhorn, Erasmian Education, 14043.
38. Ibid., 13840.
39. Ibid., 14349.
Notes to Pages 128134 217
40. Ibid., 14347.
41. See above, 7778.
42. The canonical Christian elaboration of the topic is of course Augustine The
City of God against the Pagans, ed. and trans. R. W. Dyson (Cambridge, 1998).
43. Terence Cave, who sensitively analyzed the Convivium religiosums equivocal
attitude toward scriptural interpretation argued that it reflects a fundamental internal
tension within Erasmuss hermeneutics: contradiction between the explicit aim of
arriving at the one authentic meaning of the textespecially of the sacred text of
courseand the indeterminate, even uncontrollable nature of the practice of reading
that produces an ever growing number of contradictory interpretations (The Cornu-
copian Text, 1028). Cave however Lutheranizes Erasmus. The search for the one true
meaning of the text was not the aim of Erasmuss reading. Erasmus acknowledged and
positively regarded the unfathomable depth of scripture, which yields an indetermi-
nate number of new interpretations. As early as 1499 he held in a theological debate
with Colet that as I have occasionally and incidentally remarked, the mysteries of
scripture can yield different meanings because of their rich abundance, and we must
not reject any interpretation so long as it is probable and not contrary to the faith (Ep
111: 1619). See also Payne, Toward the Hermeneutics of Erasmus, 34, 47.
Chapter 5
1. F. J. Levy, Tudor Historical Thought (San Marino, Calif.: Huntington Library,
1967), 3378; Polydore Vergil, Three Books of Polydore Vergils English History, Com-
prising the Reigns of Henry VI, Edward IV, and Richard III, ed. H. Ellis (New York:
Johnson Reprint, 1968).
2. Levy, Tudor Historical Thought, 69.
3. See above, 2637, 9899.
4. See, for example, A. F. Pollard, Sir Thomas Mores Richard III, History, n.s.,
17 (1933): 32021.
5. Paul Murray Kendall is the twentieth centurys most prominent representative
of this approach. See his Richard the Third (London: G. Allen & Unwin, 1955), esp.
42125.
6. Alison Hanham, Richard III and His Early Historians, 14831535 (Oxford: Clar-
endon Press, 1975).
7. See, for example, Pollard, Sir Thomas Mores Richard III; Leonard F. Dean,
Literary Problems in Mores Richard III, PMLA 58 (1943): 22; A. R. Myers, The
Character of Richard III, History Today 4 (1954): 51121; Arthur N. Kincaid, The
Dramatic Structure of Sir Thomas Mores History of King Richard III, Studies in Eng-
lish Literature, 15001900 12 (1972): 22342.
8. See the pertinent remarks of Judith H. Anderson, in Biographical Truth: The
Representation of Historical Persons in Tudor-Stuart Writing (New Haven, Conn.: Yale
University Press, 1984), 7577.
9. In addition to the works cited in note 7, see R. W. Chambers, Thomas More
(London: J. Cape, 1938), 11517; Kendall, Richard the Third, 42125; Richard S.
218 Notes to Pages 134140
Sylvester, Introduction, in CWM, 2:xcviiiciii; Alistair Fox, Thomas More: History
and Providence (Oxford: Blackwell, 1982), 75107; Elizabeth Story Donno, Thomas
More and Richard III, Renaissance Quarterly 35 (1982): 40147; Richard Marius,
Thomas More: A Biography (New York: Knopf, 1984), 98122.
10. Hanham, Richard III, 15960, 195.
11. Daniel Kinney, Kings Tragicomedies: Generic Misrule in Mores History of
Richard III, Moreana 16 (1985): 12850.
12. In his Politics and Literature in the Reigns of Henry VII and Henry VIII (Oxford:
Blackwell, 1989), 10827, Alistair Fox reads Richard III as a critique of humanist
thought. Foxs definition of humanist thought is, however, rather limited, and con-
sequently his reading of Richard III exclusively focuses on the explicit moral lesson of
Mores work.
13. See Hanham, Richard III, 18589; Sylvester, Introduction, 2:li; Daniel Kin-
ney, Introduction, CWM 15, cxxxcxxxvi.
14. Hanham, Richard III, 16166; Fox, Politics and Literature, 11619; Sylvester,
Introduction, 2:lxvlxxx.
15. See the works cited in notes 7 and 9.
16. The queens relatives were actually executed at a later date (Hanham, Richard
III, 11, 13). The correct sequence of events appears, for example, in Vergils history
(Three Books, 17982).
17. More connects, without any historical justification, Warwicks rebellion against
Edward to Edwards marriage to Elizabeth (65). This obviously aggravates Edwards
error, underlining his wantonness and imprudence.
18. Dominic Mancini, The Usurpation of Richard the Third, ed. C. A. J. Armstrong
(Gloucester: A. Sutton, 1984), 61. Armstrong has shown that Mancinis description
reflects a widely shared attitude toward the future queen (61n10).
19. Some interpretations identify Bishop Morton, who incited the Duke of Buck-
ingham to rebel against Richard, as the bearer of the moral of Richard III. According to
such a reading Morton represents the moral order violated by Richard. See, for example,
Kincaid, The Dramatic Structure, 230; Fox, Thomas More, 9495; Sylvester, Intro-
duction, 2:cii. Elizabeth Story Donno convincingly demonstrates, however, that Mores
portrait of Morton is at best equivocal (Thomas More and Richard III, 43436).
20. When More, for example, explicitly states that the queen attempted to drive her
rivals from power, this is done only to blacken her character. In no way are the queens
actions presented to shed light on Richards motivations and considerations, and in no
way do they contribute to an understanding of his decisions. Richard uses the queens
actions only as a grounde for mobilizing Buckingham and Hastings (14). In other
words, More refrains from evaluating Richards deeds in the specific circumstances of
spring 1483. This refusal contrasts with the approaches of the other, earlier chroniclers.
See, for example, Mancini, The Usurpation, 6975. More also neglects to repeat Vergils
assertion that Edward named Richard protector in his will (Vergil, Three Books, 173).
21. In his Thomas More, Alistair Fox reads Richard III from this perspective. He
defines the story of Richards seizure of power as the repetition of an archetypal event,
even as a metaphor for the human condition in the saeculum, and proposes that the
intention of the work is to describe the work of the devil in this world. On a deeper
Notes to Pages 140145 219
level, however, he finds that the text accommodates even the most horrible events in
order to dramatize the ultimate goal of divine Providence. In Foxs interpretation,
Mores model was not classical-humanist history, but rather Augustines De civitate
Dei (Thomas More, 8596). It is, however, hard to imagine two more different books,
whether considered in terms of their style or their content, than The City of God and
Richard III. Moreover, no monograph, not even one that describes more fortuitous
times and events than those of Richard III, can demonstrate the work of Providence.
Only a universal history, such as Augustines, provides the scope within which are
revealed the providential powers that direct the history of mankind. In this respect
Richard III is distinctively humanist secular history: it depicts the political world as
fashioned by human intentions, motivations and actions.
22. See chapter 1.
23. Concentrating solely on the moral lessons of the text implies the reduction of
humanist discourse to ethics. This is the case with Alistair Foxs interpretation in his
Politics and Literature.
24. The importance to Richard III of theatrical allusions and similes and of actual
theatrical performances is universally acknowledged. Some were actually tempted to
read Mores work as a play. See, for example, Kincaid, The Dramatic Structure;
Dean, Literary Problems, 3234.
25. In many cases the Latin version is sharper in its use of theatrical tropes and
connotations, no doubt because of the readier allusions to the classical canon.
26. The association of food and death, already established when the Duke of Clar-
ence was drowned in a barrel of wine, marks the scenes preceding Hastingss down-
fall: the strawberries of the Bishop of Elye and, more grimly, Richards dinner. This
association contradicts the association universally made between food and plenitude,
fertility (the Dionysiac feast) and holiness (the Eucharist). As we saw in the previ-
ous chapter, Erasmuss Convivium religiosum beautifully exemplifies the traditional
symbolic values of food. The inversion of this symbolism is yet another indication of
Richard IIIs subversive nature.
27. Her Christian name is not given in the text. She was later known as Jane, but it
seems that her real name was Elizabeth (CWM 2, 21920, 314).
28. See James L. Harner, The Place of Shores Wife in Mores History of Richard III,
Moreana 74 (1982): 69. Shores wife is not mentioned at all in Vergils Historia. Hanham
argues that More invented her connection to Hastings, and concludes that the story was
included in Richard III for purely literary reasons (Richard III, 179).
29. Kendall, Richard III, 147n4.
30. See, for example, the ironic remarks of the schoolmaster and the merchant,
who exposed the fact that the proclamation concerning Hastingss alleged crimes and
conspiracy that was said to be written after his execution was prepared before (54). On
Mores positive attitude toward the common people, see Peter C. Herman, Henrician
Historiography and the Voice of the People: The Cases of More and Hall, Texas Stud-
ies in Literature and Language 39 (1997): 26070; Hanham, Richard III, 184.
31. Stephen Greenblatt emphasizes this aspect of Mores work in his Renaissance
Self-Fashioning: From More to Shakespeare (Chicago: University of Chicago Press,
1980), 1315.
220 Notes to Pages 146149
32. Erasmus, Praise of Folly, trans. B. Radice, CWE 27, 103.
33. On the theatrum mundi, see, for example, Ernst Robert Curtius, European
Literature and the Latin Middle Ages, trans. Willard R. Trask (New York: Pantheon
Books, 1953), 13844; Frances A. Yates, Theater of the World (London: Routledge &
Kegan Paul, 1969), 16268; Jean-Christophe Agnew, Worlds Apart: The Market and
the Theater in Anglo-American Thought, 15501750 (Cambridge: Cambridge Univer-
sity Press, 1986), 1416; Richard Bernheimer, Theatrum Mundi, Art Bulletin 38
(1956): 22547. The world as a stage is the central trope in Lucians dialogue Menip-
pus, which More translated into Latin. See Menippus siue Necromantia, CWM 3, part
I, 2443. See also R. Bracht Branham, Utopian Laughter: Lucian and Thomas More,
Moreana 86 (1985): 2831.
34. Roger Ascham, Report of the Affair and State of Germany, in English Works, ed.
William Aldis Wright (Cambridge: Cambridge University Press, 1970), 126.
35. Cited in Sylvester, Introduction, lxxxi.
36. Ibid., lxxxciv. Sallust, Suetonius and Tacitus are, of course, the classical au-
thorities on conspiracies, tyrannies, civil wars and the other less admirable faces of
politics. Not surprisingly, these authors also left their mark on Vergils treatment of
Richard III in Anglica Historia. See Thomas S. Freeman, From Catilina to Richard
III: The Influence of Classical Historians on Polydore Vergils Anglica Historia, in
Reconsidering the Renaissance, ed. Mario A. Cesare (Binghamton, N.Y.: Medieval &
Renaissance Texts & Studies, 1992), 191214. The important question, however, is
how and to what effect the two humanists used the classical tradition.
37. Cicero, De oratore, trans. E. W. Sutton and H. Rackham, 2 vols. (London: W.
Heinemann, 1942), 1:23545 (II.xii.51xv.63).
38. See Felix Gilbert, Machiavelli and Guicciardini: Politics and History in
Sixteenth-Century Florence (Princeton: Princeton University Press, 1965), 2056;
Ascham, Report, 12526; Vergils words are cited in Levy, Tudor Historical Thought,
6263.
39. See A. J. Woodman, Rhetoric in Classical Historiography: Four Studies (London:
Croom Helm, 1988), 7595.
40. Cicero, De oratore, 237 (II.xii.53).
41. Ibid., 4445 (II.xv.62).
42. Ibid., 245 (II.xv.63).
43. Ibid.
44. Quintilian, Institutio oratoria, trans. H. E. Butler, 4 vols. (London: W. Heine-
mann, 19201922), 3:249 (VIII.iii.6770). Erasmus quotes this passage in De copia
(Co 57778).
45. Cicero, De oratore, 245 (II.xii.63).
46. Cicero, De inventione, trans. H. M. Hubbel (London: W. Heinemann, 1949),
19 (I.vii.9). Emphases mine.
47. See above, 23. There is a vast literature on the historical consciousness of the
Renaissance and the modernity of humanist history. See, for example, Hans Barons
articles referred to in chapter 1, note 29; Erwin Panofsky, Renaissance and Renascences
in Western Art (New York: Harper & Row, 1972); J. G. A. Pocock, The Machiavellian
Notes to Pages 149157 221
Moment: Florentine Political Thought and the Atlantic Republican Tradition (Princ-
eton, N.J.: Princeton University Press, 1975), 3148; Peter Burke, The Renaissance
Sense of the Past (London: E. Arnold, 1968); Donald Kelley, Foundation of Modern
Historical Scholarship: Language, Law, and History in the French Renaissance (New
York: Columbia University Press, 1970).
48. I am referring to the self-understanding of positivist history. There are
many reasons to believe that nineteenth-century historiography was more liter-
ary and rhetorical than it cared to admit and indeed that literary and rhetorical
characteristics of the historical narrative cannot be suppressed at all. The seminal
statement to this effect is, of course, Hayden White, Metahistory: The Historical
Imagination in Nineteenth-Century Europe (Baltimore: Johns Hopkins University
Press, 1975).
49. Nancy S. Struever, The Language of History in the Renaissance: Rhetoric and His-
torical Consciousness in Florentine Humanism (Princeton, N.J.: Princeton University
Press, 1970), 539, 10143.
50. Ibid., 125.
51. Thus Struever emphasizes that in the histories of the Florentine civic human-
ists, rhetoric is skillfully used both by the Florentines and by their enemies (ibid.,
14041).
52. Vergil, Three Books, 17678.
53. Ibid., 178.
54. See above, 3031.
55. Story Donno sees these techniques as unique characteristics of Mores work
(Thomas More and Richard III, 418).
56. Kendall demonstrates the unintelligibility of the story (Richard the Third,
398406), and Hanham convincingly argues that More did not intend it to be read as
a factual report (Richard III, 18688).
57. See Alfred Duggan, Thomas Becket of Canterbury (London: Faber & Faber,
1967), 202.
58. Leonardo Bruni, History of the Florentine People, 3 vols., ed. and trans. James H
Hankins (Cambridge, Mass.: Harvard University Press, 20012007).
59. Angelo Poliziano, The Pazzi Conspiracy, trans. Rene Neu Watkins, in Human-
ism and Liberty: Writings on Freedom from Fifteenth-Century Florence, ed. Rene Neu
Watkins (Columbia: University of South Carolina Press, 1978), 17183.
60. See above, 3440.
61. See, for example, Lauro Martines, The Social World of the Florentine Human-
ists 13901460 (London: Routledge & Kegan Paul, 1963), esp. 11723, 26386; Peter
Godman, From Poliziano to Machiavelli: Florentine Humanism in the High Renais-
sance (Princeton, N.J.: Princeton University Press, 1998), 330; Levy, Tudor Historical
Thought, 55.
62. It is perhaps worthwhile repeating that the fact that when completing Richard
III More was already in the service of Henry VIII is beside the point. I argue only that
the history (as all other of Mores humanist works) was not written in behalf of the
crown and the dominant ideology.
222 Notes to Pages 159164
Chapter 6
1. See above, 99104.
2. See, for example, David M. Bevington, The Dialogue in Utopia: Two Sides
to the Question, Studies in Philology 58 (1961): 496509; Elizabeth McCutcheon,
Denying the Contrary: Mores Use of Litotes in the Utopia, Moreana 3132
(1971): 10721; Alan F. Nagel, Lies and Limitable Inane: Contradiction in Mores
Utopia, Renaissance Quarterly 26 (1973): 17380; William J. Kennedy, Rhetorical
Norms in Renaissance Literature (New Haven, Conn.: Yale University Press, 1978),
94105; Arthur F. Kinney, Humanist Poetics: Thought, Rhetoric, and Fiction in
Sixteenth-Century England (Amherst: University of Massachusetts Press, 1986),
5788; Louis Marin, Utopics: The Semiological Play of Textual Spaces, trans. Robert
A. Vollrath (Atlantic Highlands, N.J.: Humanities Press International, 1990); James
Romm, Mores Strategies of Naming in the Utopia, Sixteenth Century Journal 22
(1991): 17383.
3. See above, 2223, 3738. See also Quentin Skinner, The Foundations of Modern
Political Thought, 2 vols. (Cambridge: Cambridge University Press, 1978), 1:21622.
This is not to say that all humanists held this view. There were those who adhered
to the traditional view. See, for example, Skinners discussion of the issue in his new
reading of Utopia in Visions of Politics, 3 vols. (Cambridge: Cambridge University
Press, 2002), 2:21424. The evaluation of the relative weight of the two groups de-
pends on the precise definition of humanism. If the Florentine Neoplatonists are ex-
cluded, for example, and if Petrarchs generations ambivalence concerning the active
life is attributed to the incomplete character of its humanism, then the weight of the
second group decisively shrinks. In any event, my contention is that the affirmation
of the vita activa was conceptually derived from the premises of humanist discourse
as reconstructed in chapter 1.
4. Cicero, De Officiis, trans. Walter Miller (Cambridge, Mass.: Harvard University
Press, 1913), 7075, 11417 (I.xx.69xxii.73, I.xxxi.113114). See also Skinner, Vi-
sions of Politics, 2:21722.
5. See Bevington, The Dialogue in Utopia; John M. Perlette, Irresolution as
Solution: Rhetoric and the Unresolved Debate in Book 1 of Mores Utopia, Texas
Studies in Literature and Language 29 (1987): 2833.
6. See J. H. Hexter, Mores Utopia: The Biography of an Idea (Princeton, N.J.:
Princeton University Press, 1952), 3348.
7. Besides Hythlodays stories in Utopia see Mores artful use of anecdotes in his
Letter to Dorp, 5155, 6769.
8. See above, 14147.
9. Skinner, The Foundations, 1:23841.
10. D. B. Fenlon, England and Europe: Utopia and Its Aftermath, Transactions of
the Royal Historical Society 25 (1975): 11535.
11. In his prefatory letter to Jrme de Busleyden, Giles offers a more elaborated
explanation for failing to pinpoint Utopias location. There the surprising ignorance
is attributed to communication disturbances (27), a statement that might be read as a
metaphorical allusion to the incommensurability between Utopia and Europe.
Notes to Pages 164170 223
12. On Utopian nomenclature, see Ward Allen, Speculations on St. Thomas
Mores Use of Hesychius, Philological Quarterly 46 (1967): 15666.
13. See, for example, Nagel, Lies and Limitable Inane, 174.
14. Pride is the one single monster that prevents the abolition of private prop-
erty. But in its turn, pride is sustained by the difference of wealth produced by private
property (247).
15. See also Simon Morgan-Russell, St. Thomas Mores Utopia and the Descrip-
tion of Britain, Cahier lisabthains 61 (2002): 111.
16. See above, 1024.
17. See above, 102.
18. See Shlomo Avineri, War and Slavery in Mores Utopia, International Review
of Social History 7 (1962): 26064.
19. See also Jeffrey Knapp, An Empire Nowhere: England, America, and Literature
from Utopia to The Tempest (Berkeley: University of California Press, 1992),
1836.
20. See Avineri, War and Slavery; Richard Halpern, The Poetics of Primitive Ac-
cumulation: English Renaissance Culture and the Genealogy of Capital (Ithaca, N.Y.:
Cornell University Press, 1991), 13675; Harry Berger, Jr., Utopian Folly: Erasmus
and More on the Perils of Misanthropy, in Second World and Green World: Stud-
ies in Renaissance Fiction-Making (Berkeley: University of California Press, 1988),
22948; Amy Boesky, Founding Fictions: Utopias in Early Modern England (Ath-
ens: University of Georgia Press, 1996), 2355; Stephen Greenblatt, Renaissance
Self-Fashioning from More to Shakespeare (Chicago: University of Chicago Press,
1980), 3358. The following description of Utopian reality is greatly indebted to
Greenblatts insightful reading.
21. See Dominic Baker-Smith, Mores Utopia (Toronto: University of Toronto
Press, 2000), 16568. In her The Whole Island Like a Single Family: Positioning
Women in Utopian Patriarchy, in Rethinking the Henrician Era: Essays on Early
Tudor Texts and Contexts, ed. Peter C. Herman (Urbana: University of Illinois Press,
1994), 93122, Janel Mueller perceptively exposes the Utopian patriarchal ideology
and Utopias subordination of women to men. Mueller also demonstrates, however,
that the ultimate meaning and value of the ideal state is formulated in distinctively
feminine terms.
22. See Greenblatt, Renaissance Self-Fashioning, 4950.
23. The family is all the more important in Utopia, since the ideal state abolishes
other institutions mediating between the individual and the state, such as social estates,
guilds, corporations, fraternities and so on (see Hexter, Introduction, xlivxlv).
24. Berger, Utopian Folly, 240.
25. Greenblatt, Renaissance Self-Fashioning, 4144.
26. The nude inspection left its impression on future literature. About a hundred
years after Hythlodays voyage, a new ideal state was discovered during a literary voy-
age, New Atlantis. The only direct reference Francis Bacon makes to his predecessors
utopia involves the nude inspection. The inhabitants of New Atlantis dislike the Uto-
pian custom, for they think it a scorn to give a refusal after so familiar knowledge:
but because of many hidden defects in men and womens bodies, they have a more
224 Notes to Pages 170172
civil way; for they have near every town a couple of pools (which they call Adam
and Eves pools) where it is permitted to one of the friends of the man, and another
of the friends of the woman, to see them severally bathe naked. See Francis Bacon,
New Atlantis, in The Advancement of Learning and New Atlantis, ed. Arthur Johnson
(Oxford: Clarendon Press, 1974), 237. Faced with the same anatomical curiosity the
Utopians succumbed to, the Atlanteans also deal with it by gratifying it. But despite
their prudish moralizing, their practice manages to rid the Utopian practice of its
more misanthropic and ugly characteristics.
27. See Greenblatt, Renaissance Self-Fashioning, 3845.
28. In his first reading of Utopia Skinner responded to the regimentation of life
in Utopia by stating that More sometimes appears to be commending a remarkably
unimaginative way of life in a strangely solemn style (The Foundations, 1:256). In his
second reading (in Visions of Politics, vol. 2) he simply ignored the issue altogether.
29. See, for example, C. S. Lewis, English Literature in the Sixteenth Century:
Excluding Drama (Oxford: Clarendon Press, 1954), 16773. Needless to say, many
passages of Utopia are very funny, but this does not mean that they are not serious as
well. In contrast to some modern readers, the humanists simply did not recognize an
incommensurability between a light, ironic style and serious content. Indeed, part of
the original title of Utopia reads: A Truly Golden Handbook, No Less Beneficial than
Entertaining (3). See also the pertinent remarks of Bracht R. Branham in his Uto-
pian Laughter: Lucian and Thomas More, Moreana 86 (1985): 25. The combination
of seriousness and humor was a well-known characteristics of More, and John Guys
observation that More was most witty when least amused suggests a fruitful attitude
toward Utopias playfulness. See The Public Career of Sir Thomas More (Brighton, Sus-
sex: Harvester Press, 1980), 23.
30. See, for example, Karl Kautsky, Thomas More and His Utopia, trans. H. J.
Stenning (London: Lawrence and Wishart, 1979), 232; R. W. Chambers, Thomas More
(London: J. Cape, 1938), 14041.
31. Alistair Fox, Utopia: An Elusive Vision (New York: Twayne Publishers, 1993);
idem, Politics and Literature in the Reigns of Henry VII and Henry VIII (Oxford: Black-
well, 1989), 93107.
32. Ibid., 100, 102.
33. Ibid., 105; Fox, Utopia: An Elusive Vision, 63.
34. Fox, Politics and Literature, 105.
35. George M. Logan, Interpreting Utopia: Ten Recent Studies and the Modern
Critical Traditions, Moreana 118/119 (1994): 23031. For example, Hythlodays
most forceful defense of Utopia appears at the very end of the book.
36. The formidable Letter to Dorp (MtD) was written during the second half of
Mores embassy to Flanders in 1515, precisely at the same time as the composition
of book 2 of Utopia. The other three humanist lettersLetter to the University of
Oxford (MtO), Letter to Edward Lee (MtL) and Letter to a Monk (MtM)were
written later, in the second half of the decade. See Daniel Kinney, Introduction,
CWM 15:xixxlv.
37. Chambers, Thomas More, 128; Edward L. Surtz, The Praise of Wisdom: A Com-
mentary on the Religious and Moral Problems and Backgrounds of St. Thomas Mores
Notes to Pages 172177 225
Utopia (Chicago: Loyola University Press, 1957); idem, The Praise of Pleasure: Phi-
losophy, Education, and Communism in Mores Utopia (Cambridge, Mass.: Harvard
University Press, 1957).
38. See above, 7982.
39. Surtz, The Praise of Wisdom, 11.
40. George M. Logan, The Meaning of Mores Utopia (Princeton, N.J.: Princeton
University Press, 1983); idem, The Argument of Utopia, in Interpreting Thomas
Mores Utopia, ed. John C. Olin (New York: Fordham University Press, 1989),
735.
41. Fox distances himself from this approach in Utopia: An Elusive Vision,
2021. But the only difference between his interpretation and those of the others is
that he reads Utopia as a reflection of Mores conscious ambivalence rather than as a
reflection of a committed and coherent position. Fox does not make the crucial step
of differentiating between the text and the author. Indeed, as we just saw, his entire
argument hinges on speculation about Mores gradual disillusionment.
42. Avineri, War and Slavery, 287.
43. Avineri, War and Slavery, 28690 (citation in 288).
44. Halpern, The Poetics of Primitive Accumulation, 13675.
45. Ibid., 14448.
46. Ibid., 16263.
47. Ibid., 16869.
48. Halperns reading of Utopia is, however, preferable to most other Marxist
readings, the essence of which is exemplified by Fredric Jameson, Of Islands and
Trenches: Neutralization and the Production of Utopian Discourse, in The Ideolo-
gies of Theory: Essays, 19711986 (Minneapolis: University of Minnesota Press, 1988),
2:75102. These readings are based on an a priori distinction between the true utopian
kernel and the ideological shell of the utopian text (The Poetics of Primitive Accumu-
lation, 13641). They are therefore essentially circular: the positive qualities of the
utopia are seen as an expression of the pure utopian quest, postulated as immune
from historization, materialization and demystification, while the utopias negative
features, especially its rigidity and totalitarian tendencies, are automatically attributed
to the texts yielding to ideological pressures.
49. The journey of Jean Baudrillard from his still-Marxist For a Critique of the
Political Economy of the Sign, trans. C. Levin (St. Louis: Telos Press, 1981), on which
Halpern draws, to his critique of Marxism and of the notion of use value in particular,
in The Mirror of Production, trans. M. Foster (St. Louis: Telos Press, 1975), originally
published one year later, is most significant. On the impossibility of a pure use value,
see also Jacques Derrida, Specters of Marx: The State of the Debt, the Work of Mourn-
ing, and the New International, trans. Peggy Kamuf (New York: Routledge, 1994),
15962.
50. Greenblatt, Renaissance Self-Fashioning, 3358.
51. Ibid., 3132, 4547.
52. Commenting on a letter to Giles in which More unequivocally states that
learning is his true self, Greenblatt says: There is also, it seems, a real self
humanist scholar or monkburied or neglected, and Mores nature is such that one
226 Notes to Pages 177187
suspects that, had he pursued wholeheartedly one of these other identities, he would
have continued to feel the same way. For there is behind these shadowy selves still
another, darker shadow: the dream of cancellation of identity itself (ibid., 32). This
reading seems to me too impressionistic and speculative.
53. See Richard Strier, Resistant Structures: Particularity, Radicalism, and Renais-
sance Texts (Berkeley: University of California Press, 1995), 6779; Marina Leslie,
Renaissance Utopias and the Problem of History (Ithaca, N.Y.: Cornell University Press,
1998), 21.
54. See Paul Oskar Kristeller, Renaissance Thought and Its Sources (New York: Co-
lumbia University Press, 1979), 22 and the discussion in chapter 1.
55. See above, 100.
56. On the distinction, see above, 147.
57. See also the discussion above of the fundamental differences between Utopia
and The Republic (1034).
58. See above, 2431.
59. See above, 2830.
60. The only signs with positive value in Utopia are the statues the Utopians set up
to great men who have done conspicuous service to their country and the modest
distinctions granted the governor and the high priest of each city: a handful of grain
for the former and a wax candle for the latter (195).
61. The first part of the Utopian reasoning is patently falsethe fineness of the
thread is certainly related to the utility of the coat. This is yet another indication that
a desire exceeding rational considerations lies at the base of the Utopian order.
62. See Surtz, The Praise of Pleasure, 40. Logan tries to save the coherence of Uto-
pian moral philosophy (The Meaning of Mores Utopia, 14481). His reasoning is,
however, flawed, as he argues that natural reason leads both to a naturalistic ethics and
to its ultimate transcendence.
63. See also my The Humanist Critique of Metaphysics and the Foundation of the
Political Order, Utopian Studies 13 (2002): 815.
64. I use here the translation of CWM 4, 151. The original Latin reads: Ergo haec
metalla si apud eos in turrim aliquam abstruderentur. Princeps ac senatus in suspi-
cionem uenire posset (ut est uulgi stulta sollertia) ne deluso per technam populo, ipsi
aliquo inde commodo fruerentur.
Conclusion
1. There is a vast literature, written from various theoretical and ideological per-
spectives, on the modern intellectual and its problematic identity and social role. See,
for example, Julian Benda, The Betrayal of the Intellectuals, trans. Richard Aldington
(Boston: Beacon Press, 1955); Antonio Gramsci, Gli intelletuali e lorganizzazione della
cultura, 3rd ed. (Rome: Editori riuniti, 1996); Raymond Aron, The Opium of the Intel-
lectuals, trans. Terence Kilmartin (Garden City, N.Y.: Doubleday); Edward Shils, The
Intellectuals and the Powers and Other Essays (Chicago: University of Chicago Press,
Notes to Page 187 227
1972); Michel Foucault, Truth and Power, in The Foucault Reader, ed. Paul Rabinow
(New York: Pantheon Books, 1984), 5175; Pierre Bourdieu, The Corporatism of the
Universal: The Role of Intellectuals in the Modern World, Telos 81 (1989): 99110;
Michael Walzer, The Company of Critics: Social Criticism and Political Commitment
in the Twentieth Century (London: P. Halban, 1989); Shlomo Sand, Mirror, Mirror
on the Wall, Who Is the True Intellectual of Them All? Self-Images of the Intellectual
in France, in Intellectuals in Twentieth-Century France: Mandarins and Samurais, ed.
Jeremy Jennings (New York: St. Martins Press, 1993), 3358.
2. See Walzer, The Company of Critics, 38; S. N. Eisenstadt, Fundamentalism,
Sectarianism, and Revolution: The Jacobin Dimension of Modernity (Cambridge: Cam-
bridge University Press, 1999), 57.
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246 Index
Boas, George, 215n19
Boehner, Philotheus, 197n40
Boerio, Giovanni Battista, 46, 54
Boesky, Amy, 223n20
Born, Lester, 210n60
Borssele, Anna van, 4649, 54, 203n25
Bourdieu, Pierre, 227n1
Bouwsma, William, 195n30, 198n56
Boyle, Marjorie ORourke, 122, 192n7,
207n30, 208n36
Bracciolini, Poggio, 191n2, 199n62
Bradshaw, Brendan, 207n30, 208n34,
208n37, 216n22
Branham, R. Bracht, 220n33, 224n29
Bruni, Leonardo, 2123, 32, 157,
195nn27, 199n59, 210n74
Bud, Guillaume, 102, 104, 185
Buonaccorso, da Montemagno, 199n62
Burckhardt, Jacob, 95, 198n55
Burke, Peter, 221n47
Burroughs, Charles, 200n68
Bursill-Hall, G. L., 197n40
Busleyden, Jrme de, 49, 104, 165,
222n11
Camporeale, Salvatore, 192n7, 196n39,
198n54, 207n29
Capito, Wolfgang, 5759, 63, 67
Carroll, Margaret, 200n68
Caspari, Fritz, 213n88
Castiglione, Baldesar, 34, 70
Cave, Terence, 216n33, 217n43
Cavendish, George, 201n5
Celenza, Christopher, 196n37
Chambers, R. W., 172, 213n88, 217n9,
224n30
Charles V, 58, 68, 9091, 202n19, 214n3
Chomarat, Jacques, 207n30
Cicero, 18, 23, 111, 113, 123, 125, 147
48, 159, 195n27
civic humanism, 2124, 3234, 95
Clough, Cecil, 210n61
Cochrane, Eric, 215n13
Colet, John, 52, 54, 97, 217n43
Coogan, Robert, 208n40
court society, 34, 7071
Curtius, Ernst, 220n33
Cutinelli-Rndina, Emanuele, 211n76
DAmico, John, 192n8, 196n34
Dante, 8688
Davis, J. C., 214n95
Dean, Leonard, 217n7, 219n24
Della Casa, Giovanni, 70
Derrida, Jacques, 225n49
Desmarez, Jean, 49, 51
Donnelly, Dorothy, 214n95
Donno, Elizabeth, 218n9, 218n19,
221n55
Dorp, Martin, 26, 30, 9899
Dowling, Maria, 40, 199n58, 202n6,
202n10, 202nn1214
Duggan, Alfred, 221n57
Dulce bellum inexpertis, 58, 8385, 97
98, 11721, 127, 158; undermining of
the notion of civilization in, 117119;
and Erasmuss autonomy, 9798,
121; and Erasmuss theology, 8385;
undermining of humanist learning
in, 11921; rejection of just war
doctrine in, 84, 9798
Eden, Kathy, 80
Eisenstadt, S. N., 227n2
Eisenstein, Elizabeth, 204n50
Elias, Norbert, 70, 7374, 200n69,
205n3, 205nn510, 205n13, 206n19
Elton. G. R., 201n3
Elyot, Thomas, 94, 202n14, 211n74
Erasmian humanism: compared to
other types of humanism, 5, 78, 37,
7276, 86, 9496, 107, 189; internal
tensions of, 3, 814, 10821,
12432, 15758, 16065, 18486,
189; reform program of, 12, 78,
11, 13, 37, 57, 69104, 107, 110,
118, 12123, 12733, 16365, 170,
18486; and the Republic of Letters,
13, 514, 37, 4445, 5969, 7576,
9698, 104, 107108, 13334, 157
Index 247
59, 18486. See also Erasmus; More,
Thomas
Erasmus: and aristocratic culture, 78,
5051, 7173, 89, 9294, 121; in
Basel, 6365; civilizing humanism
of 7077, 123; and the court of
Burgundy, 4953, 68, 90, 92; on
education, 7477, 112, 120, 124; in
England, 3942, 4849, 5457; and
German humanism, 5967; humanist
theology of, 53, 7785, 12223;
humanness of, 7576; as the leader
of the Republic of Letters, 23, 6,
12, 37, 44, 5969; pacifism of, 7,
5051, 8385, 9798, 116117; and
patronage, 6, 3958; political thought
of, 8598; and scholastic philosophy,
2, 6, 8, 11, 45, 57, 78, 8485, 91, 120;
as a universal intellectual, 13, 514,
37, 5869, 7376, 85, 8994, 9798,
107108, 121, 128, 13132, 18486,
189; views of the church of, 78,
8588. See also Erasmian humanism
Erasmus, works: Adagia, 46, 54, 64,
69, 80, 101; A mortuo tributum
exigere, 89; Antibarbari, 77, 80,
120; Colloquies, 74, 79, 121, 123;
Convivium religiosum, 1112,
12132, 186; Copia, 46, 54, 6465,
112; De civilitate, 7073, 7779; De
libero arbitrio, 79, 8283; De ratione
studii, 46, 54, 11214; De pueris
instituendis, 7476, 82, 111, 11415,
118; Enchiridion, 46, 64, 8182;
Festina lente, 63, 204; A Fish Diet,
7374, 79; Inns, 74; Jeroms edition,
54, 64, 69, 204; Julius exclusus,
212n86; letter to Volz, 76, 7879,
86, 88; Novum Testamentum, 53,
57, 64, 69, 7778, 99; Panegyricus,
4953; Paraclesis, 7881; Paraphrase
on Romans, 8182; Praise of Folly, 54,
99, 14546, 172; Querela pacis, 98;
Scarabaeus aquilam quaerit, 8889;
Senecas Lucubrationes, 6465; Sileni
Alcibiadis, 8081, 8690. See also
Dulce bellum inexpertis; Institutio
principis christiani
Ernest, duke of Bavaria, 67
Fabri, Johannes, 67
Fenlon, D. B., 163
Fernandez, Jose, 211n80
Fisher, Christopher, 53
Fisher, John, 40, 42
Fleisher, Martin, 213n88
Foucault, Michel, 227n1
Fox, Alistair, 136, 172, 202nn89,
202n16, 210n68, 213n88, 218n9,
218n12, 218n19, 218n21, 219n23,
225n41
Foxe, Richard, 40, 42
Francis I, 58, 200n2
Freeman, Thomas, 220n36
Froben, Johann, and the Froben Press,
6263, 65, 80, 8889, 204n5, 208n32,
211n78, 215n9
Fumagalli Beonio Brocchieri,
Mariateresa, 191n3
Furey, Constance, 208n47
Gaguin, Robert, 45
Gallagher, Catherine, 193n12
Garin, Eugenio, 191n3, 196n32, 198n55,
198n57, 199n59, 210n73
Gerbel, Nikolaus, 64
Gilbert, Felix, 215n13, 220n38
Giles of Rome, 209n48
Giles, Peter, 62, 65, 104, 161, 16465,
222n11, 225n52
Gilmore, Myron, 215n11
Godman, Peter, 221n61
Gordon, Walter, 122
Gouwens, Kenneth, 198n55
Grafton, Anthony, 3334
Gramsci, Antonio, 226n1
Greenblatt, Stephen, 169, 17677,
193n12, 219n31, 223n20, 223n22,
224n27, 225n52
Grendler, Paul, 199nn5859, 201n6
248 Index
Grey, Thomas, 45
Guarino, Battista, 199n59, 199n61
Guerlac, Rita, 197n39, 197n45
Gundersheimer, Werner, 200n1
Guy, John, 192nn910, 201n2, 202n11,
224n29
Halpern, Richard, 17576, 223n20
Hanham, Alison, 13435, 218nn1314,
218n16, 219n28, 219n30, 221n56
Hardin, Richard, 91, 214n2, 215n8
Harner, James, 219n28
Hay, Denys, 194n19
Henry of Burgundy, 7273
Henry II, 156
Henry VI, 136, 138
Henry VII, 39, 48, 157
Henry VIII, 3941, 46, 48, 58, 97, 192n9,
210n61, 221n62
Herman, Peter, 219n30
Hermans, Willem, 49
Hexter, J. H., 213nn8990, 213n94,
222n6, 223n23
Hilgert, E., 204nn5455
History of King Richard III, 10, 1213,
69, 108, 13359, 162, 18586;
criticism of aristocratic culture in,
158; equivocal political lesson of,
13640; and Erasmian humanism,
15758; and humanist history, 133,
14757; and humanist political
thought, 11, 14041, 14647;
theatrical metaphor in, 14147;
undermining of the humanist
concept of rhetoric in, 1112, 15154
Hoffmann, Manfred, 207n30
Hollingsworth, Mary, 200n1
Hrnqvist, Mikael, 211n75
Howarth, Davis, 200n1
Huizinga, Johan, 122
Hulliung, Mark, 211n76
humanism: and affirmation of active
life, 4, 2223, 3233; and the classical
heritage, 1922, 29, 194n55; as a
coherent discourse, 35, 1718,
2631; concept of knowledge of, 45,
14, 3031; concept of true nobility
of, 33, 72, 94, 100, 199n62; and the
critique of metaphysics, 34, 2630,
102104; and education, 4, 3233,
7455, 115, 124; in England, 3940;
in Germany, 5961; and history, 23,
14750; and intellectual activity, 45,
3031; interpretations of, 1824,
191n7, 198nn557; and patronage,
56, 3839; and political thought,
3234, 95, 14142; and public
career, 3435, 160; and religion,
2324, 77; rhetorical characteristics
of, 18, 2021, 2435; and scholastic
philosophy, 4, 1819, 2430, 60, 63,
177; as a secular discourse, 18, 2324,
102103. See also civic humanism;
Erasmian humanism
Ianziti, Gary, 192n8
Institutio principis christiani, 1011,
64, 69, 9096, 10816, 121, 126,
186; and the classical heritage, 80,
11112; criticism of aristocratic
culture in, 9294, 108; and Erasmuss
autonomy, 11, 9092, 94, 108;
and humanist political thought,
9496; political evangelism in, 9495,
110111; undermining of humanist
education in, 11, 11216
James of Viterbo, 209n48
Jameson, Fredric, 225n48
Jardine, Lisa, 23, 3334, 6263, 196n39,
204n56
Javitch, Daniel, 205n4
Jeanneret, Michel, 122, 205n10, 216n34
Jerome, 2, 54, 64, 69, 80, 82
Kahn, Victoria, 192n7
Kautsky, Karl, 224n30
Kelley, Donald, 221n47
Kendall, Paul, 217n5, 217n9, 218n15,
219n29, 221n56
Index 249
Kennedy, William, 222n2
Kent, Dale, 200n1
Kincaid, Arthur, 217n7, 218n19, 219n24
King, Margaret, 192n8
Kinney, Arthur, 200n66, 222n2
Kinney, Daniel, 135, 197n49, 212n85,
218n13, 224n36
Kipling, Gordon, 202n7
Knapp, Jeffrey, 223n19
Kohl, Benjamin, 199n59
Kristeller, Paul Oskar, 1821, 24, 34,
194n15, 196n37, 198n55, 226n54
Kuno, Johannes, 204n55
LaCapra, Dominick, 193n13
Lefvre dEtaples, 32
Leff, Gordon, 197n43
Le Goff, Jacques, 191n3
Leo X, 41, 57
Leslie, Marina, 226n53
Levy, F. J., 133, 221n61
Lewis, C. S., 224n29
Lincare, Thomas, 40
Logan, George, 17274, 226n62
Loriti, Heinrich (Glareanus), 63
Lovejoy, Arthur, 215n19
Lucian and Lucianic satire, 54, 113, 135,
159, 220n33
Lupset, Thomas, 104
Luther, Martin, 79, 81, 83, 127, 215n5
Lyster, Gerard, 63
Machiavelli, Niccol, 96
Magnus, Albertus, 84
Major, J. Russell, 201n3
Mancini, Dominic, 140, 218n20
Manetti, Giannozzo, 21
Mansfield, Harvey, 211n76
Manuzio, Aldo, 54, 63
Marenbon, John, 197n44
Marin, Louis, 222n2
Marius, Richard, 213n88, 218n9
Marsiglio of Padua, 8688
Martens, Theirry, 49, 63
Martin, John, 196n33
Martines, Lauro, 33, 192n8, 199n65,
205n12, 221n60
Maximilian I, 58, 209n55, 212n81,
214n3
McConica, James, 202n13, 206n20,
207n30, 209n51, 213n88
More, Thomas: career of, 67, 3940,
200n2; on dialectic, 2728; and the
Erasmian reform program, 37, 69,
9899; on grammar, 2830; and
humanism, 3, 2632, 69; humanist
letters of, 26, 31, 69, 9899, 133;
letter to Dorp, 3, 2631, 85, 99,
179; on the litteratus, 3031, 85, 99,
18586; and scholastic philosophy, 4,
2631; as a universal intellectual, 2,
614, 104, 15759, 165, 18486, 189.
See also History of King Richard III;
Erasmian humanism; Utopia
Morgan-Russell, Simon, 223n15
Mountjoy (William Blount), 39, 4142,
5456
Mueller, Janel, 223n21
Musto, Ronald, 212n82
Myers, R., 217n7
Nagel, Alan, 222n2, 223n13
Najemy, John, 33
Nauert, Charles, 201n6, 207n28
Nesen, Wilhelm, 6465
Nizolius, Marius, 26, 29
Ockham, William, 8688, 197n40
Oecolampadius, Johannes, 64
Ong, Walter, 27, 197n39
Overfield, James, 197n40, 197n42,
197nn457, 202n6, 203n36, 204n57
Ovid, 1178
Pabel, Hilmar, 211n79
Pace, Richard, 40, 62
Palmieri, Matteo, 21
Panofsky, Erwin, 198n55, 220n47
patronage, 56, 24, 3840
Payne, J. B., 216n35, 217n43
250 Index
Pellicanus, Conardus, 64, 204n55
Perlette, John, 222n5
Peter of Spain, 25, 197n49
Peterson, David, 193n33
Petrarch and Petrarchean humanism, 8,
2122, 32, 193n11, 207n31, 209n60,
222n3
Philip the Fair, 47, 49, 53. See also
Erasmus, works: Panegyricus
Phillips, Margaret Mann, 203n30,
204n1, 211n78, 214n2
Piccolomini, Aneas Silvius, 199nn5961,
206n24, 215n17
Pico della Mirandola, Giovanni,
206n22
Pinborg, Jan, 197n40, 197n45
Pirckheimer, Willibald, 6667
Pizzi, Clemente, 202n17
Plato and Platonism, 25, 103104, 111,
113, 125, 129, 159, 17879, 184,
214n100, 215n15, 216n35
Pliny, 42
Pocock, J. G. A., 195n30, 220n47,
Pollard, F., 217n4, 217n7
Poliziano, Angelo, 157
Pontano, Giovanni, 209n60, 211n74
Porter, H. C., 202n18
Precellius, Georgius, 62
Protestant Reformation, 1, 45, 5960,
70, 77, 86
Quintilian, 148, 220n44
Rabil, Albert, 194n19, 199n62, 205n12,
208n33
Ramus, Petrus, 26, 28, 197n39, 198n50
Rebhorn, Wayne, 122, 128, 200n67,
205n4, 206n25
Regius, Urbanus, 67
Reisch, Gregor, 204n55
Renaissance art, 24, 196n35
Renaudet, Augustin, 41
Reuchlin, Johann, 204n55
Reynolds, E. E., 213n88
Rhenanus, Beatus, 6164, 66, 104
Riario, Raffaele, 5657, 203n34
Rijk, L. M. de, 197n40, 197n45
Rogerus, Servatius, 55
Romm, James, 222n2
Roper, William, 192n9, 213n88
Ross, David, 197n44
Ruister, Nicolas, 49, 51
Rummel, Erika, 196n39, 198nn5152,
207n28, 207n30, 211n80, 212n81
Russell, Frederick, 208n44
Ruthall, Thomas, 42, 64
Sacci, Bartolomeo (Il Platina), 199n62
Said, Edward, 191n4
Sallust, 113, 147, 220n36
Salmon, J. M. H., 201n3
Salutati, Coluccio, 21, 32
Sand, Shlomo, 227n1
Sasso, Gennaro, 194n19
scholastic philosophy and theology, 2, 4,
6, 8, 11, 1819, 2429, 39, 57, 60, 63,
78, 85, 91, 98, 177, 188
Seebohm, Frederic, 212n88
Seigel, Jerrold, 19
Seneca, 6465, 111, 113, 161
Shearman, John, 200n67
Shils, Edward, 226n1
Skinner, Quentin, 86, 16263, 210n60,
210n66, 210nn734, 222nn34,
224n28
Smalley, Beryl, 191n3
Sowards, J. K., 203n29
Spitz, Lewis, 60, 203nn3637, 203n40,
204nn4445, 207n29
Stapleton, Thomas, 147
Starkey, David, 201n3
Stokesley, John, 40
Strier, Richard, 226n53
Struever, Nancy, 14950, 154, 191n7,
193n11, 221n51
Suetonius, 147, 220n36
Sullivan, Vickie, 211n76
Surtz, Edward, 17273, 226n62
Sylvester, Richard, 147, 218n9,
218nn134, 218n19
Index 251
Tacitus, 147, 220n36
Tateo, Francesco, 205n12
Thompson, Craig, 121
Thompson, Geraldine, 121
Tracy, James, 50, 60, 92, 203n23,
203n28, 203n35, 203nn389, 204n54,
206n20, 207n30, 208n36, 208n41,
209n55, 209n59, 211n77, 214n2, 215,
n14
Trevor-Roper, Hugh, 38, 201nn35
Trinkaus, Charles, 192n7, 207nn2930
Tuck, Richard, 195n27, 195n30
Tunstal, Cuthbert, 40
Utopia, 7, 10, 1213, 69, 98104, 108,
15886, 189; brutal and repressive
characteristics of, 16571; criticism
of aristocracy in, 99100, 103,
16667; and Erasmian humanism,
7, 1113, 99104, 16065, 18486;
interpretations of, 15960, 163,
17177; and the problem of counsel,
16063; undermining of the premises
of humanism in, 17784
Valla, Lorenzo, 8, 26, 2829, 32, 53, 86,
209n50
Vasari, Giorgio, 196n35
Verdeveld, Harry, 202n20
Vergerio, Pier Paolo, 3233, 75, 100,
199n59, 199n63, 206n18, 206n24,
215n17
Vergil, Polydore, 39, 133, 136, 147, 151
55, 157, 218n16, 218n20, 219n28,
220n36
Villani, Filippo, 21
Villedieu, Alexander, 26
Vitoria, Francisco de, 208n45
Walzer. Michael, 227nn12
Waquet, Franoise, 191n2
Warham, William, 39, 42, 5455, 97
Waswo, Richard, 197n39, 198n54
White, Hayden, 221n48
Wimpfeling, Jakob, 61
Witt, Ronald, 198n55
Witz, Johann, 61
Wolsey, Thomas, 56, 192n9, 201n5
Woodward, William, 122, 199n59,
206n20
Wootton, David, 101, 213n89
Yates, Frances, 220n33
Yoran, Hanan, 214n95, 214n99
Zasius, Udalricus, 62
Ztphen, Gerhard, 26
Zwingli, Ulrich, 62