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lay before our readers the following extract from one of his
letters to Erasmus, which shows that he could occasionally unbend
and follow the suggestion of his eminent contemporary. It is
addressed to Erasmus, at that time suffering from his old
complaint, a fit of the stone. "My dear Erasmus, what have
you to do with rocks and stones in that small frame of yours1?
Or what is to be built on that rock? [An unarchiepiscopal and
somewhat profane allusion to the words of the New Testament.] You
are not going to erect magnificent houses, or anything of the
sort, I imagine. Since then calculi are not to your taste
[Erasmus was not a first-rate accountant], get rid of your
superfluous load as soon as you can. Pay money to have those
stones removed, as I am daily paying money to have stones removed
to my buildings [at Otford]." And more in the same strain,
which whoso wishes to follow to the close, may find in the
collection of Erasmus's Letters (Lond. fol. 1642).
Before closing these remarks, however, we are tempted
to extract a passage from one of Erasmus's letters to Warham, to
show the terms on which they lived. The latter might have
exclaimed, in the words of Sir John, "I am not only witty
myself, but the cause of wit in other men." And the genuine
humour of Erasmus may well be contrasted with the somewhat forced
conceits of his dignified correspondent. The Archbishop, it seems,
had sent him a horse, not unlike to that which carried Sterne's
Eugenius. No doubt, like other Archbishops, Warham had had
experience of many curates and their needs, and, in a fit of
abstraction apparently, to which great men and archbishops are
liable, had sent Erasmus a curate's horse. Our witty Rotterodamite
never having heard of our English proverb, thus writes to
acknowledge the gift:—"I have received a horse from you,
not so handsome as virtuous [our readers will |