THE RULE OF HONEST LIVING.

(From Publications of the Early English Text Society, No. 32, p. 105.)

If thou desyre temperance, cut away all superfluitye, and brydle in thy desyres within thy mynde; consyder to thy selfe what nature req[u]yreth, and not what sensuall concupiscence appeteth.

Put a brydle & a measure to thy concupiscence, & cast away the things that draw thy mynde with secrete plea

sure.

Eate without surfet.

Drinke without dronkennesse.

Let thy lyuing be of light repaste; come not for wanton pleasure, but for desyre of meate; let hunger moue thy appetyte and not sauery sauces.

Think that all thing may be suffred but villany and dishonesty; abstayn euer from wordes of rybaudry, for a tongue euer lyberall nourisheth folly.

Loue rather wordes profytable than eloquent and plesaunte, right wordes then flattering.

Thou shalt sometyme mixe with sadnesse thy merry iestes, but temperately, and without hurt of thy dignitye and honesty; for laughing is reproueable if it be out of measure; if lyke a chylde, it is effuse and wanton; if lyke a woman, foolish.

If thou be a continent man, auoyde flattery, & let it be as paynefull to thee to be praysed of lewd and inhonest persons, as if thou be praysed for lewd and inhonest deedes.

Be more ioyous and glad when thou displeasest euill persons; and take the euill iudgements of them touching thee, as a true prayse of thee.

It is a very hard work of continence to repell the paynting glose of flatterings whose words resolue the hart with plesure.

Alure not the loue of any man by flattery, nor set not open the waye by that meane to get thee loue and friendshyp; thou shalte not be mad hardye, nor presumptyous ; submit thy selfe and stoope not to low, but keepe a meane grauity.

Be aduertised with good wil, and take rebuke paciently. If any man chyde thee with cause, be thou assured that he doeth profyte thee. If so be without thanke, that hee wylleth thy profyte.

Thou shalte not feare sharp words, but dread fayre wordes.

If thou be a continent man, regard the moouinges and afflictions of thy soule and body, that they be not out of order; nor therfore doe not set lighte by them, because they be vnknown, for it forceth not if no man see them, whan thou thy selfe seest them.

Be actiue and styrring, but not of light fashyon, constant, but not obstynate: let it not be vnknown nor greuous to thee thou hast not knowledge of any thing.

Cherish al that be thy Peeres; disdayne not thy inferyours by pryde; cast not away thy superiours that liues vpright.

In requyting a good tourne, shew not thy selfe negligent, nor contrarye: bee not an exactour of another man. Be lyberall to euery man.

To no man flattering.

Familier but to few.

Equall to all men.

Be not light of credens to new raysed tales, nor crymes, nor suspicious to maligne no man.

Slack and slow to yre.

Prone, inclyned to mercy.

Stable in aduersytye.

And hider of vertue, as other be of vice.

Be a dyspyser of vayne glorye, and no busy bragger of the vertues with the which thou art indued.

Despyse no man's follye and ignoraunce: be thou of fewe wordes, but suffer other to speake.

Be sharpe, but not cruell, nor despyse him that is

merry.

Be desyrous of wysedome, and apte to learne it.

Men learne when they teache.

Be content to departe to a man wylling to learne suche thinges as thou knowest, without arrogance and pride. Desyre to haue knowledge of suche thinges which thou knowest not, wythout concealement of thy ignoraunce.

He that spendeth much
and getteth nought,
He that oweth much

and hath nought,

He that looketh in his purse

and fyndeth nought,

He may be sorry

and say nought.

He that may and will not,
He then that would shall not,
He that would and cannot,
May repent and sighe not.

He that sweareth

tyll no man trust him, He that lyeth

tyll no man beleue him,

He that boroweth

tyll no man will lende him,

Let him go where no

man knoweth him.

He that hath a good Mayster
and cannot keepe him,
He that hath a good seruaunt
and not content with hym,
He that hath such condicions
that no man loueth hym,
May well know other,

but few men wyll knowe hym.

Thus endeth the Booke of Nurture or gouernaunce of Youth, with Stans Puer

ad mensam. Compyled by

Hugh Rhodes of the

Kinges Chap-
pell.

ERASMUS

(A. D. 1465 (?) -1536.)

ERASMUS, the most accomplished scholar and admired writer of the Reformation, was the son of parents whose sad story has been charmingly told, with close fidelity to fact, by Charles Reade, in his romance entitled "The Cloister and the Hearth." His father, Gerard, and his mother, Margaret, were betrothed by a solemn ceremony which they looked upon as marriage. The malice of some evil-disposed persons drove Gerard, soon afterwards, from his home (near Rotterdam, in Holland), to seek fortune, as an artist, elsewhere. He made his way to Rome, and prospered so well that he expected to return soon to his betrothed to his wife, as she was in his thoughts. Then a letter came to him, forged by the same malice that had driven him abroad announcing her death. In his grief he entered a monastery and took the irrevocable vows which made marriage forever impossible to him. Years afterwards, he returned to Holland and found Margaret living, faithful to his memory, and faithfully rearing a son who had been born to them. That son, thus born out of wedlock, was known in youth as Geert Geerts, or Gerhard Gerhards, that is, Geert's or Gerhard's son; but he afterwards assumed a name composed of the Latin and Greek equivalents of Gerhard, or Gerard Desiderius Eras

mus.

The birth of Erasmus occurred between 1465 and 1467 ·

the year is uncertain. He became an orphan in 1478, with some property, of which his guardians sought to defraud him. Their efforts were successful in forcing him to enter a monastery, though he shrank from the monastic life. Study was his delight, but the Church did not attract him. Though he became a priest in 1492, he does not seem to have ever performed priestly duties. He succeeded in living mostly the In 1506 he obtained from the

life of a scholar and teacher.