vey of these absurd abominations, one is apt to cry out, in the emphatical words of Lucretius, Quæ procul a NOBIS flectat Fortuna gubernans! But we may rest secure, if the observation of an acute writer be true, who says, "Europe will, perhaps, behold ages of a bad taste, but will never again relapse into barbarism. The sole invention of printing has forbidden that event." The only sparks of literature that then remained, were to be found among the Mahometans, and not the Christians. It was from the ARABIANS that we received astronomy, chemistry, medicine, algebra, and arithmetic. Albategni, a Saracen, some of whose manuscripts are now reposited in the Bodleian Library at Oxford, made astronomical observations in the year 880. Our Almanack, AL-MANAC, is an Arabic word. The great church at Cordova, in Spain, where the Saracens kept a magnificent court, is a monument of their skill in architecture. The game of chess, that admirable effort of the human mind, was by them invented; as were tilts and tournaments. Averroes translated, and commented upon, the greatest It part of Aristotle's works,* and was the introducer of that author's philosophy into the † west. was Gerbert, who, in the reign of Hugh Capet, is said to have introduced into France, the Arabian and Indian cypher: for the Arabians had borrowed from the Indians this manner of computing; and Gerbert learned it from the Saracens when he made a journey into Spain. Gerbert also undertook to make the first clock, the motion of which was regulated by a balance; which method was made use of till the year 1650, when they began to place a pendulum instead of the balance. "Can it be believed, (says Mr. Henault,) that there ever was so little intercourse between the provinces of France, that an abbot of Clugni, being invited by Bouchard, Count of Paris, to bring his Religious to St. Maurdes-Fossés, excused himself from making so long a jour ney, * I have seen a translation of his Comment on the Poetics, with this title, " AVERROYS Summa in Aristotelis Poeticam; ex Arabico sermone in Latinum traducta ab Hermano Alemano. Præmittitur Determinatio IBINROSDIN (another Arabian writer) in Poetria Aristotelis. Venetiis, apud Georgium Arrivabenum, 1515." + From Sadi, an Arabian Poet, Milton is said to have taken the grand idea of the bridge over chaos. ney, into a country UNKNOWN, and to which he was so much a STRANGER?" Charlemagne, indeed, two centuries before this last mentioned time, had endeavoured to bring civility and learning into France: he introduced the Gregorian chant; and established a school in his palace, where the famous Alcuin, whom he invited from England, instructed the youth. Each of the members of this academy took a particular name; and Charlemagne himself, who did it the honour to become one of its members, assumed that of David. This attempt to civilize his barbarous subjects, was as arduous, and worthy his great genius, as his noble project to open a communication between the Ocean and the Euxine by sea, and to join the Rhine to the Danube by a canal, 46. At length ERASMUS, that great, injur’d name, (The glory of the priesthood, and the shame!) And drove those holy Vandals off the stage.† VOL. I. N It *He is said to have founded the university of Paris. Twyne's Antiq. Acad. Oxon. Apolog. edit. 1608. pag. 158, et seq. + Ver. 693, It were to be wished our author had drawn a larger and fuller portrait of this wonderful man, of whom he appears to have been so fond, as to declare in the Letters, that he had some design of writing his life in Latin. I call Erasmus a wonderful man, not only on account of the variety, and classical purity, of his works, but of that penetration, that strong and acute sense, which enabled him to pierce through the absurdities of the times, and expose them with such poignant ridicule, and attic elegance. A work of humour, and of humour directed to expose the priests, in that age, was indeed a prodigy. The irony of the Encomium on Folly has never been excelled. Erasmus, though a commentator, had taste; and though a Catholic, had charity. His learning was enlivened with wit; and his orthodoxy was tempered with moderation. He was never dazzled with what was called ERUDITION; or misled by that blind and undistinguishing veneration which was naturally paid to the ancients on the first discovery of their writings. By his CICERONIANUS, he repressed the affectation of imitating Tully's manner of expression in every species * Vol. vii. p. 232. species of composition. In his ECCLESIASTES, very excellent rules are laid down for preaching. In his DIALOGUES, the superstitions of the Romish church are exposed with all the pleasantry of Lucian; an author to whom his genius bore great resemblance; and some of whose dialogues he has translated with their original spirit. Indeed, among the many translators of Greek authors who flourished at that time, Erasmus seems to have been in all respects the most eminent. To him was the restoration of literature principally owing. More than one prince solicited his friendship, and invited him to their courts. We see in a letter of Erasmus, written in the year 1516, that Francis I. who shared with Leo X. the glory of reviving sciences and arts in Europe, having declared to Petit, his confessor, that he intended to bring into France the most learned men he could find, Petit had charged Budæus, and Cop, the royal physician, to write to Erasmus, to engage him to settle in France: that Stephen Poncher, ambassador from the king at Brussels, pressed him still more; but that Erasmus made his excuses, because his Catholic Majesty Charles V. had retained him in the Low Countries. N 2 |