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Sunday, April 29, 2018

Johannes Sturmius's Winding Path to Impress the English.


Johannes Sturmius was born “Johann Sturm,” to Wilhelm and Gertrude Sturm, on the 1st of October 1507.[1]  The family lived on the slopes of the Eifel Valley some 50 miles from the border with Belgium.  Wilhelm was the accountant for the Count de Manderscheidt.  Gertrude was likely a member of the wealthy bourgeois Huls family of Cologne.[2]  Young Johann himself lived a solidly bourgeois childhood and Wilhelm was able to support him financially during his college years and to provide the funds to launch him in his first business venture.

Beginning in 1521, Johann attended the Gymnase de Saint-Jérôme prep school, in Liège, Belgium.  The school had only a loose relationship to the Catholic orthodoxy at the time.  It believed in advanced curriculum and teaching methods.  Latin and Greek classics and mathematics were stressed. 

Three years later he attended the equally progressive Royal College at Louvain.  There he continued to increase his command of Latin and Greek and added Hebrew under the finest professors in each discipline.  There he joined the publishing business of the school’s Greek master, Rudiger Rescius.  He purchased his share with funds provided by his father.[3]

In 1528, Sturm moved to Strasbourg.  He may have chosen to do so because the town was beginning to have a reputation for exceptional professors in Protestant subjects.  The next year he relocated to Paris to act as the sales agent for the books he and Rescius were publishing.  In order to assure himself a sufficient living he took a degree in medicine.  It is not clear that he ever actively practiced as a professional.

What is clear is that he assured himself a living through his association with Guillaume and Jean du Bellay, friends and counselors of the French King Francis I, and many of the finest intellectuals of the day.  Jean du Bellay, in particular, had already been appointed Bishop of Bayonne by Francis.  Sturm’s own reputation as an intellectual — foremost as a Latinist —  was second to none.  For his part, he thought of himself equally as a professor of classical logic.

At the same time, the industrious Sturm was gaining a reputation as an intellectual leader of the Protestant movement.  He was in regular contact with Philip Melanchthon and Martin Bucer (the two greatest Protestant figures of the day after Luther).



After Francis I reacted with violence against the growing population of French Protestants, on two occasions during the 1530s, he found the strength of the backlash surprising.  The Protestant German princes had gathered together in the League of Smalcalde.  The French Protestants looked to them for allies and inspiration.  Creating an enemy simultaneously within and just across the French borders was clearly unwise.

Bishop du Bellay being among his most trusted advisors, the king accepted his nomination, in 1540, of Jean Sleidan and Sturmius as his agents to begin negotiations with the Protestants.[4]  While the two were Protestant and the Royal administration Catholic, du Bellay had absolute trust that his longtime friends would placate the Protestants and properly represent the Catholic’s interests. 

The state of the negotiations would fluctuate for years before Henry VIII and the Holy Roman Emperor, Charles V, signed a separate treaty that allowed the English king to invade France.  Francis I’s situation was rapidly deteriorating.  Henry, however, had limited funds and could not mount sufficient forces to win a war outright.  By the summer of 1545 England and France were at a stalemate.  Sleidan and Sturmius’s negotiations already having involved Charles V, and the Protestants hugely complicating the situations of both the Emperor and the French King, Du Bellay (now Bishop of both Bayonne and Paris and a Cardinal to boot), advised expanding the mission of the two agents.[5]  At this point Sturmius had been much the more impressive and he was given a French pension (i.e. salary) and acted de facto as France’s most trusted ambassador in spite of the fact that he was not French but a citizen of the free city of Strasbourg.

It is in this way that Johannes Sturmius first came to the attention of the English Court.  The English were begrudgingly impressed.  From the start, Sturmius dominated all other parties in the negotiation.

Thirty years later, Sturmius would be in their employ.  Many members of the English Court would avail themselves of the scholar’s hospitality as would Edward de Vere, the 17th Earl of Oxford.



[1] Schmidt, Charles, La Vie et Les Travaux de Jean Sturm (1855), 1.
[2] Manes Sturmiani siue Epicedia, scripta in obitum summi viri Ioan Sturmius… (1590). “matre, lectissi
mascemina Gertrudide Нulsana”, A1.  Schmidt, 2.
[3] Schmidt, 7.
[4] Ibid., 50.
[5] Ibid., 60.  “Les Etats désignèrent, pour être ambassadeurs auprès du roi de France , Christophe de Venningen , conseiller du duc de Wurtemberg , Jean Bruno de Nidbruk et Sturm , chargés en même temps d'intercéder en faveur des protestants français persécutés;…”.  Schmidt does not cite Sturm specifically as the head of the delegation but English state papers make the matter clear that he was such from the first.


  • Lord Burghley to John Sturmius, Sept. 15, 1572.  April 22, 2018.  "W. Ron Hess has suggested that Sturmius was a spy station-master and money launderer for the infamous spy network of Francis Walsingham and the Baron Burghley and that Edward de Vere's visit, in 1575, was a spy mission."
  • Bayle's Dictionary Entry on Johannes Sturmius.  April 15, 2018.  “Diligence makes clear that his reputation as a cloak-and-dagger English spy is without basis.  He did pass along information he thought might be of interest from his correspondence with many contacts throughout Europe to William Cecil and Francis Walsingham.”
  • Leonard Digges and the Shakespeare First Folio.  November 30, 2017.  "Upon receiving his baccalaureate, in 1606, Leonard briefly chose to reside in London. After that he went on an extended tour of the Continent which ended around the year that Shaksper died."
  • Edward de Vere's Memorial For His Son, Who Died at Birth May 1583.  July 5, 2017.  "The brief Viscount Bulbeck being the son of the renowned poet and playwright Edward de Vere, we might have hoped to have the text of the father’s own memorial poem.  As far as traditional literary history is concerned, no such poem has yet been discovered."




Friday, April 27, 2018

Bayle on Johannes Sturmius, Note D.

Note D from Bayle's Dictionary Entry on Johannes Sturmius [Link]:


It is said he abstained several years from the public exercises of religion.] Osiander laid it to his charge that he had never been at church for the twenty last years. Sturmius made him this answer[1]: If you should preach thirty years at Strasburgh I would never go to your sermons. During the last thirty years I would have constantly avoided to hear you preach, if I had been obliged to be silent, and to approve your invectives by my silence[2]. After I had been silent and kept off a long time from the sermons and disputes of your ministers, I was present at the last public disputation of Pappus; and because I said something, which might have removed the perplexity the opponent had reduced him to, I raised a storm against me, by which I have been almost overwhelmed: how then can you object to me that I have been twenty years without going to your sermons? Et mihi objicis viginti annorum neglectas condones i cum una disputatiuncula, cui vix interfui, me prope perdiderit? He mentions to him those, who in the primitive Church, put off receiving baptism till the last moment of their lives ; which shews that they were a long time without communicating. He alledges, James Sturmius, who had been several years without receiving the communion, and abstained from it, by reason of the dispute the ministers had raised about the Eucharist. 'Quis Jacobo Sturmio suit diligentior, in nostræ urbis religione, & Senatus autoritate defendenda? Quam multos annos ille vir ad mensam Domini non accessit? Quam quæso ob causam aliam, quam propter hoc Theologorum. diffidium? Id circone aut Ecclesiam, aut Senatus autoritatem contemsit[3].

[‘What man in this city was more active in supporting our religion, and the authority of the senate, than James Sturmius? Nevertheless he abstained many years from the holy communion, because of the difference of Divines upon this point. But did he for that despise either the Church, or the authority of the senate ?']

His other answers give ground to believe that Osiander accused him of hindering his wife, his servants, and his boarders, from going to church. He calls it a falsity, and defies his adversary to produce a witness of his accusation. ‘I married,’ says he, ‘my third wife seven years ago; I lived twenty years with the first[4], and as many years with the second[5]. No body can say that they have not constantly heard sermons, and received the communion, and been very careful to give alms. I shall set down in Latin what concerns his servants. 'Tot jam annos, tot scribas & famulos, tot ancillas, tantam familiam habui: ex his unum aliquem bonum compares, qui dicat, fe meo jam, aut me autore a concionibus, & a sacra mensa abfuisie[6].

[‘I have had for so many years such a numerous family of transcribers, footmen, and servant-maids. Now find one honest person among all these, who can say that he had my commands or authority, for not hearing sermons and receiving the sacrament.']


He names some of his boarders, and, among others, two grand-sons of a sister of Martin Luther, who, says he, will witness that I never reproved them for hearing sermons. Hitherto he has said nothing that contains a formal denial of what was objected to him, that he had been twenty years without hearing any sermon ; but afterwards he calls it a lie, as you may see in these words : 'At viginti jam annos nullas conciones audivisti: at si tu istud viginti annos affirmes, totos viginti annos mentieris, quod pace tua dictum velim. Quamobrem, inquis, non venis? tot jam annis. An non respondi? si tu tot annos conciones tales haberes, cujusmodi tu & Pappus sæpe habetis: tot ego te etiam deinceps, audire nequeam, & causam quaeris, quam tibi jam exposui[7]?

[‘But you say that I have heard no sermons for twenty years. If you insist upon its being twenty years, I must beg leave lo tell you that it is a gross falsehood. You ask why I have not come to church for so many years ? Have I not already answered you ? If you were to preach for so many years in the manner that you and Pappius do, just so long would I refuse to hear you, and yet you ask the reason, which I have already told you.']

To make this part of his answer coherent, we must suppose that he did not avoid all sorts of sermons in general; but only those of such rigid Lutherans as Pappus was.

Nevertheless it is certain that a Divine of the Confession of Augsburgh, has asserted that John Sturmius was above twenty years without going to church and receiving the sacrament, and that he used to play at chess in sermon-time. ‘Venerabile Ministerium Argentoratense non ignorat, Sturmium ultra 20 annos nec templum frequentasse, nec sacra coena usum. Retulit mihi M. Frideric. Rhodius, olim Superintendens Armstadi ens in Thuringia, gravis Theologus, quique multos per annos Sturmii fuerat domesticus convictor, sé illum vidisse nunquam in templo, sed plerumque ludo scachorum diebus Conradus Dominicis sub concionis tempus trivisse[8]. Mr Crenius, who affords me this curious passage, mentions another, which shews what John Pappus answered, being accused of never praying for the Reformed Churches of France. How could John Sturmius, says he, hear me pray for them I have served these ten years the church and university of Strasburgh, and he has never heard my lectures nor my sermons. Tu vero audiveris? Ecquam igitur scholam meam, aut concionem toto hoc decennió, quo in schola & Ecclesia jam ministro audivisii[9]? Afterwards Pappus tells him what he begs of God, not only for the Protestants of France, but also for all persecuted Churches. 1. That the errors which their miniſters teach them, be not imputed to them. 2. That God would be pleased to discover to them the truths they are ignorant of. 3. To strengthen them in their afflictions, and enable them to suffer them patiently, and not to relapse into Popish Idolatry. 4. To convert or restrain their persecutors. Atqui ego quotidie, & in Ecclesia, & domi Deum precor, non modo pro Gallicanis, sed pro omnibus afflictis & persecutionem patientibus Ecclesiis: & ne nescias, haec ipsis precor. 1. Ne Dominus ipsis errores, quibus inscientes imbuuntur a suis Doctoribus imputet, &c[10].

I must not forget that Sturmius was accused of flattering the Roman Catholics. If this accusation was grounded on his writing against them in a civil, and not in a passionate and injurious manner, it was very unjust. His moderation was very acceptable to his Popish adversaries; and Cardinal Sadolet, and John Cochlaeus writ very civilly against him[11]. He asked[12] whether they alledge as proof, a piece of poetry, wherein he had lately congratulated the Bishop of Strasburgh upon his coming to town, and his agreement with the magistrates; and he maintained that it would be a very wrong reason, seeing the friendship established between that prelate and the magistrates, was a very proper subject for a congratulation; and he adds a particular reason, grounded upon the family of that prelate. He was Count of Manderscheidt, related to those with whom our Sturmius had learned the Latin tongue.[13] He confessed that many illustrious persons of the Church of Rome had been his friends and his patrons, and he declared, that tho' we are displeased with the conduct of great men and princes in some respects, yet we ought to esteem their virtues and fine qualities[14]. ‘In magnis autem viris & in Principibus, etiami aliqua displiceant, tamen virtutes magnæ sunt confiderandae, ut in Sadoleto, Bembo, Julio Phlugio, aliis. que doćtissimis viris. In Carolo V pater tuus[15], si meministi, quid improbarit, nosti: non placebant in hoc Imperatore, ita non placebant, ut illi in ratione militari gloriam, & in victoriis aequitatem, & fortunam non adimeremus.

[‘Great men and princes, tho' they may displease us in some things, are nevertheless to be esteemed for their eminent virtues and good qualities; for example, Sadoletus, Bembo, Julius Phlugius, and other learned men. You remember, I suppose, what your father found fault with in Charles V: nevertheless; those things which did not please us in that emperor, displeased us in such a manner, that we did not seek to strip him of his glory in war, of his moderation in victory, and of his “good fortune.”’]

To this example of Charles V he adds that of the Guises, pretending that the French Protestants did not scruple to acknowledge their valour, their parts, &c. It must be confessed that those maxims are very reasonable; but they are little practised by men transported with zeal, or of a fiery temper.



[1] Sturmius, in IV Anti-Pappi, Part. iii, pag. 165.
[2] Id. ibid. pag. 166.
[3] Id. ibid.
[4] Joanna Ponderia. Id. ib. pag. 167. Melchior Adam, ubi supra, pag. 343 & 345, calls her Jubanna Pisonia which doubtless made Mr. Baillet, article lxxv, of the Anti call her Joanne le pois. Melchoir Adam, pag. 345, says she was a native of Paris, and that she died a few years after her husband had settled at Strasburgh. Which cannot be, since she lived twenty years with him.
[5] Margarita Wigandia: she was the daughter of the wife of John Sapidus, colleague of Sturmius: the only son she had by him died a child. Melch. Adam, ibid.
[6] Sturm. ubi supra, pag. 167.
[7] Id. ibid.
[8] Conradus Schlusseburg, in extrema, constant, christiana, necessaria, Responsione & Explicatione ad calumniosum Script. Christoph. Pelarei, apud Crenium, Animadvers. Philol. & Historic. Part. vi, pag. 142.
[9] Jo. Pappus, Defens. III, contra Sturmium, pag. 118, apud Crenium, ubi supra, pag. 140.
[10] Id. ibid. apud Crenium, ibid. pag. 141.
[11] Sturmius, in Part. iii, Anti-Pappi IV, pag. 150.
[12] Id. ibid. pag. 169.
[13] [Additional editor’s note]  Actually, Johannes’s father kept the accounts for the Count of Manderscheidt since before Johannes was born.  Bayle apparently was not aware of the fact. Schmidt, Charles. La vie et les travaux de Jean Sturm (1855).  “Jean Sturm était le fils de Guillaume Sturm, administrateur des revenus des comtes de Manderscheid, dont le magnifique château ruiné couronne encore aujourd'hui une des hauteurs de la vallée de l'Eifel.
[14] Sturmius, in Part. iii, Anti-Pappi IV, pag. 169.
[15] He speaks to Andrea Osiander, a divine of Tubingen.




Wednesday, April 25, 2018

Bayle on Johannes Sturmius, Note C.


He ran in debt, and grew poor for them.] Read these words of Melchior Adam. 'Cum domus illius optimo cuique dies ac noctes pateret, effetque velut commune quoddam exulum asylum, peregrinorum ac pauperum hospitium, quos omnes fovendo, alendo, foris domique juvando, sacultates haud exiguas absumflt : maxime Gallorum Evangelicorum sa lutem tuendo, in quam omnes fuas divitias impendit, ipseque cum suis egere maluit, quam commune causam deserere: animo laudabili & perpetuagratitudine digno[1].’

[‘His house was open day and night to every honest man, being as it were a common sanctuary for banished people, and a place of entertainment for the poor and strangers. He laid out very considerable sums of money in supporting, cherishing, and assisting those at home and abroad; particularly in providing for the welfare of the French Protestants; for upon this he spent his whole estate, chusing rather ' to be in want with his family than to desert the common cause: of such a commendable disposition was he, and so worthy of a perpetual gratitude.’]

Sturmius being called vespertilio, a bat, by Osiander, answered, that perhaps it was an allusion to the vespertilio in the proverb, to signify that he was very much in debt[2]. He does not deny that he was, but he maintains that he never absconded to cheat his creditors, and that his debts, contracted upon a glorious account, were prejudicial to no body[3]; that he was the only sufferer, and that for above sixteen years[4] that he groaned under that yoke, and exhausted himself, by paying large interests, and contracting new debts to pay the old ones, not one creditor be produced who had lost one farthing by him.  ‘Heus bone vir: quando ego unquam fraudationis causa latitavi?  vel potius, ego unquam causa latitavi?  vel creditorem nomina, vel indicem produc: qui me fraudationis causa latitasse dicat, & quando latitarim: & quo tempore; & propter quem creditorem. Creditorem unum nomina: qui annos jam sedecim uno nummo in hoc aere alieno fraudatum se a me vere possit dicere. Sedecim enim annos & eo amplius in hac miseria versor; unum creditorem produc, qui unius teruncii, mea causa, & meo nomine jacturam fecisse jure conqueratur, tametsi gravissimis usuris & versuris, tot jam annos exhauriar[5].

[‘Listen my good man: when have I ever hidden to defraud my creditors?  Or more, when have I ever hidden for any reason? or been cited by my creditors, or brought forth a legal action: say from who I have fraudulently hidden, & when I hid: & at what time; & from which creditor.  Name a single creditor: who can truly say that during these 16 years I have defrauded them of a single penny.  For 16 years & plunged in one misery after another; bring forth a single creditor, a single farthing, for my own sake justly complaining of me by name for the loss of that I have contracted, although usurious interest rates & constantly rolling over the loans have already drained me for many years.’]



Afterwards he declares that he has run in debt to maintain his Protestant brethren. Cur non istud potius cogitavit innocentia & caritas & simplicitas tua? Hic homo horum hominum Ecclesias defendit, propter quas est aere alieno oppressus, & propter quas omne aes suum, jam alienum est; & qui propter aes alienum in extremam egestatem dijectus est[6].’

[‘How is it are you not able to reflect with innocence & charity? With integrity?  The church, for the sake of whom one is placed in debt & for the sake of which one’s coffers are bare, & for which one is cast down in extreme poverty as a result of debt, defend us from such men as you.’]

I do not think Osiander alluded to that proverb. I believe he used the word vespertilio only to reflect upon Sturmius for being neither a professed Lutheran nor a professed Calvinist. Sturmius was sensible that it might be Osiander's meaning, and vindicated himself in that respect[7].



[1] Melch. Adam, ubi supra, pag. 345.
[2] Sturmius, in IV Anti-Pappi, Part. iii, pag. 148.
[3] Propter aes alienum nemini noxium vexor…. ob aes alienum honestissima de causa conflatum.  Id. ibid.
[4] He spoke so in the year 1580.
[5] Sturmius, ubi supra, pag. 149.
[6] Id. ibid.
[7] Id. ibid. and pag. 150.



Monday, April 23, 2018

Bayle on Johannes Sturmius, Note B.



He opened a school in 1538 which became famous.] This ought not to be so understood as if no publick lectures had been read in the city of Strasburgh, before that year. The contrary is true; for Sturmius says that when he arrived there Capito expounded the Bible, Hedio explained the Gospels, James Bedrot taught Greek, Michael Delius[1] Hebrew, Christian Herlin explained Euclid, Bucer, who was writing his retractation without any constraint put up on him, and correcting his Commentaries upon the Gospels, explained in his house Themistius's Paraphrases, and James Sturmius, Nicolas Cniepsius, and James Meyer were curators of the school[2]. The same Sturmius says, that when he made a journey from Louvain to Strasburgh in the year 1528, he found there a school[3], where Bucer read lectures upon the Psalms. What was done in the year 1538 is as follows. The college received an authentic form under the statutes drawn up after Sturmius's arrival, and began to be solemnly regulated according to the division of its several classes, and the functions assigned to each teacher and professor. Read this inscription, which is to be seen at Strasburgh[4]. 'Anno post millesimum 538, depositis armis, & pacata gravi inter CarolumV. Imperatorem Rom. & Franciscum I. Galliarum Regem, discordia, S. P. Argentin. juventuti Christianæ religione & liberalibus disciplinis instituendæ ludum literarium aperuit.

Praefecto primario Jacobo Sturmio,
Rectore Joan. Sturmio.’

['In the year 1538, the war being come to an end, and the great quarrel between the Emperor Charles V and Francis I, King of France, being made up, the Senate and people of Strasburgh erected a school for instructing the youth in Christianity and the liberal arts.

James Sturmius was super- intendant,
John Sturmius Rector.']



Those, who say that James Sturmius was Rector of the college of Strasburgh[5], would not have confounded that illustrious magistrate with our John Sturmius, if they had read that inscription. This confusion is to be found in a contrary sense in the Memorabilia Ecclesiastica of Andreas Carolus. That author stiles John Sturmius First Senator and Syndic of the city of Strasburgh. It is in that part of his work Adam, ubi supra, where he observes that the Academy of that place was not made an university till the year 1621. 'Anno superioris Centuriæ sexagesimo octavo[6] Gymnasium literarium Argentinense, a Johanne Sturmio fundatum, qui primarium Senatorem & Syndicum loci agebat, gratia Maximiliani secundi privilegia Academica accepit, & Sturmius, qui commodam rationem instituendæ juventutis monstraverat, perpetuus Rector creatus est; Sed hoc demum anno jus Universitatis ei Ferdinandus II impertiit, ac potestatem conferendi omnium Facultatum gradus honorarios dedit.’ Micræl. Hist. Eccles. 172[7]. 

['In the year 68 of the last century the school at Strasburgh, founded by John Sturmius, who was First Senator and Syndic of the place, received the privileges of an Academy by the favour of Maximilian II; and Sturmius, who had proposed a proper method for instructing the youth was created perpetual Rector. But it was not before the present year that Ferdinand II bestowed upon it the rights of an university, and the power of conferring degrees in all the different faculties.']

This writer, you see, quotes Micrælius, though the latter has not committed that fault; for he has very well distinguished the two Sturmius's: he says that James, a Senator and a Syndic, founded the college, and that John, who taught the scholars, was made Rector of it for life. Anno 1568, Argentinensis schola, quam jam ante XXX annos Jacobus Sturmius, senator primaries & syndicus, adornari curaverat, privilegia a Maximiliano II accepit, & Johannes Sturmius, qui rationem instituendae juventutis monstraverat', perpetuus Rector est creatus. Nostra demum aetate, A. 1621, jus universitatis a Ferdinando II acceptit[8].



[1] Note that he was married to Anne Mychsnera, who spoke Latin fluently.  Absque baetificatione latine cum domesticis loquens. Jo. Sturmius, Part, i, Anti-Pappi quarti, pag. m. 17.
[2] Ex Sturmio, ibid. p. 16, 17.
[3] Tum schola etiam constituta erat.  Id. Ibid. pag. 10.
[4] See Nathan Chytraeus, in Itinerum. In Itinerum Deliciis, pag. m. 430.
[5] See Melchior Adam, ubi supra, pag. 343.
[6] According to Melchior Adam, ubi supra, pag. 344, it was in 1566.
[7] Andr. Carolus Memorab. Eccles. Saeculi XVII, ad ann. 1621. pag. 526.
[8] Micrael.  Hist. Eccles. pag. 570.  Edit. 1699.





Sunday, April 22, 2018

Bayle on Johannes Sturmius, Note A.


Note A from Bayle's Dictionary Entry on Johannes Sturmius [Link]:

It is not true that he was familiary acquainted with Conrad Goclenius.] Melchior Adam expresses himself thus: “Ibidem (Lovanii) cum familiariter versaretur cum Rudgero Rescio, & Conrado Goclenio, Hominibus literatissimis utriusque linguae Graecae & Latinæ Lovanii tum Professoribus, &c.[1] As he was familiarly acquainted at the same place with Rudgerus Rescius and Conrad Goclenius, two very learned men, and at that time professors at Louvain of both the Greek and Latin languages, &c.’  These words are not clear enough : the plain meaning of them seems to be that Conrad Goclenius was professor of the Greek and Latin tongues, as well as Rudgerus Rescius; but it was not so. Goclenius was only professor of the Latin tongue, and Rescius of the Greek. The words I am going to quote out of John Sturmius will inform us of this distinction, and, besides, that he applied himself to Rescius, who had fallen out with Goclenius, and was little acquainted with the latter.

Memini ego, Hermanne princeps lllustrissime,’ So Sturmius speaks to the Archbishop of Cologne in the epistle dedicatory of the second volume of Cicero's Orations, ‘cum Lovanii ante annos quindecim essem, præclaram de Comite Schauemburgio, quem tu tibi adjutorem atque siiccessorem cooptasti, spem nobis omnibus datam esse. Audivit ille tum quotidie in Latina lingua doctorem, disertum hominem Conradum Goclenium: cum ego Rutgeri Rescii propter græcas literas, quas ille omnium optime tradebat, essem studiosus: ob eamque caustam minus ego Conrado familiaris qui a Rutgero dissentiebat. Sed de Schauemburgio consentientes nostri sensus erant, maximum aliquando ornamentum atque lumen in sua Repub. futurum, si eum curium studiorum, in quo tum erat, posset conficere.


[‘Most illustrious Prince Hermanns, I remember that about fifteen years ago, while I was at Louvain, we had conceived excellent hopes of Count Schauemburg, whom you chose for your assistant and successor. At that time he daily frequented the school of the eloquent Conrad Goclenius, professor of the Latin tongue; whereas I applied myself to Rudgerus Rescius, who taught the Greek language the best of any: and for this reason I was the less familiarly acquainted with Conrad, who was at variance with Rudgerus. Nevertheless we had all the same notion of Schauemburg, viz. that he would prove a shining light, and an exceeding great ornament to his country, if he could but finish the course of studies in which he was then engaged.']


I have said more than once, that it is a fault not to date Epistles Dedicatory and Prefaces, and I have been confirmed in this opinion as I was transcribing this passage of Sturmius; for as it is not laid in my edition, which is that of Strasburgh, apud Josiam Rihelium 1558, whether it be the second or the third, &c. I should have thought that it is the first, and consequently that Sturmius dedicated it in the year 1558 : but had I drawn such a consequence, I had been mistaken in several things; I had falsely believed that he studied at Louvain in 1543, and that Conrad Goclenius was then living. In order to avoid those mistakes I have been obliged to enquire into the true date of the first edition of Cicero's Orations, published by Sturmius, and I have found that it came out in 1540. Is it not a sad thing to lose one's time by the negligence of others? Is it reasonable that the omission of a thing, which required no more than a dash of a Pen[2] should expose many readers to a very great trouble.




[1] Melchior Adam, in Vitis Philosophor. pag 342.
[2] That is, the date of the letter.