COLLOQUIES OF ERASMUS, The. The (Colloquies of Erasmus) (Erasmi Col loquia) has probably been the focus for more bitter criticism than any book of its size ever published, and it is by far the best known work of its famous scholar-author, the only one generally read down to our time. It was condemned by the Sorbonne as dangerous to morals in 1526; Luther in his 'Table Talk' declared, "If I die, I will forbid my children to read his 'Colloquies"; and Saint Ignatius of Loyola denounced it by name to his com munity. It was eventually placed on the Index by the Church. Yet its author was the dear personal friend of Sir Thomas More, .as also of Pope Hadrian VI, like himself a native of the Low Countries, and before his death he was offered the cardinalate by Pope Paul III, one of the great reforming popes, refusing it for reasons of health.
The Colloquia is a bitter satire on religious and other abuses, in which good and evil are sadly confused, and one is as likely to come in for condemnation as the other. It is brilliant but cynical; it is extremely clever, but utterly unsympathetic toward the mental and spiritual limitations of human nature. Like most pure satire, it was calculated to do ever so much more evil through embitterment than good through correction. It was a typical example of destructive criticism. A reflection on human nature worthy of Rochefoucauld is that in spite of all this the book was popular from the very beginning, though even its author deprecated "the caprice of fortune* which had made, as he confessed quite candidly in later years, "a book full of foolish things, bad Latin and Solecisms° so much read.
The :Colloquies' is one of the great humanistic contributions to the literature called out by the Reformation movement, and its vivid vigorous Latinity has made it the favorite handbook of many a teacher who utterly disliked its content. Erasmus wrote Latin not as a dead but as a living language. His satiric humor has done the rest. The 'Colloquies' remains one of the books that no educated man cares to confess that he does not know. As a mirror of the foolishness of mankind in many ways, it is too essentially true to nature ever to lack interest. While it satirizes man's credulity in matters religious, it does not fail to hold up for ridicule his over-anxious desire to make money which so often leads him into equally foolish credulity, and shows that the promise of the transmuta tion of base metal into catches his fancy and runs away with it just as does any other superstition. Psychic researches and spiritists are bitingly satirized. It is ever a commentary on the morning paper. Consult (Erasmiana' (University of Geneva Press, Geneva, 1897 1901) ; Seebolun, 'The Oxford Reformers, John Colet, Erasmus and Thomas More' (London 1887). A number of editions of the 'Collo quies' in English have been issued in England and America. Bailey's translation is usually chosen.