us, and was the first fruit
of his press when he set it up in Paris in the year 1499. An English
translation of it was published in 1832. It is throughout adorned with
the gentle and elevated nature of the scholar, and derives a still
nobler lustre from the beneficent purpose to which the author destined
the literary relics which it was the enjoyment of his life to collect
and study. Being endowed with power and wealth, and putting to himself
the question, "What can I render to the Lord for all that he hath
conferred on me?" he found an answer in the determination of smoothing
the path of the poor and ardent student, by supplying him with the means
of study. "Behold," he says, "a herd of outcasts rather than of elect
scholars meets the view of our contemplations, in which God the
artificer, and nature his handmaid, have planted the roots of the best
morals and most celebrated sciences. But the penury of their private
affairs so oppresses them, being opposed by adverse fortune, that the
fruitful seeds of virtue, so productive in the unexhausted field of
youth, unmoistened by their wonted dews, are compelled to wither. Whence
it happens, as Boetius says, that bright virtue lies hid in obscurity,
and the burning lamp is not put under a bushel, but is utterly
extinguished for want of oil. Thus the flowery field in spring is
ploughed up before harvest; thus wheat gives way to tares, the vine
degenerates to woodbine, and the olive grows wild and unproductive."
Keenly alive to this want, he resolved to devote himself, not merely to
supply to the hungry the necessary food, but to impart to the poor and
ardent scholar the mental sustenance which might possibly enable him to
burst the bonds of circumstance, and, triumphing over his sordid lot,
freely communicate to mankind the blessings which it is the function of
cultivated genius to distribute.

The Bishop was a great and powerful man, for he went over Europe
commissioned as the spiritual adviser of the great conqueror, Edward
III. Wherever he went on public business--to Rome, France, or the other
states of Europe--"on tedious embassies and in perilous times," he
carried about with him "that fondness for books which many waters could
not extinguish," and gathered up all that his power, his wealth, and his
vigilance brought within his reach. In Paris he becomes quite ecstatic:
"Oh blessed God of gods in Zion! what a rush of the glow of pleasure
rejoiced our heart as often as we