The Anatomy of Melancholy

For some of these patrons take it as an axiom that keeping scholars poor will make them study. They must be put on a strict diet like horses before a race, not pampered: “They want them fed, not fattened, lest the little flame of the nobler mind be extinguished.” A fat bird will not sing; a fat dog cannot hunt. And so, because scholars are kept down in this way, some lack the means, others the will, and all lack encouragement, being almost abandoned and generally despised. “Let there be patrons like Maecenas, Flaccus, and Virgils will not be lacking” is an old saying, and it remains true.

Yet often—I cannot deny it—the chief fault lies in ourselves. Our university scholars too frequently go wrong by neglecting patrons, as Erasmus justly reproaches them, or by choosing them badly: “We neglect those who offer themselves, or embrace those who are unsuitable.” Or, if we obtain a good one, “we do not take pains to nourish his favour through services in return”: we do not attend and follow him as we should.

“The same thing happened to me as a young man,” says Erasmus, acknowledging his fault, “and I was very much to blame.” I too may say that I have offended in this, as perhaps many others have. We did not “respond to the favours of great men who had begun to embrace us”, or apply ourselves as readily as we should. Idleness, love of liberty—“an excessive love of liberty made me struggle long with treacherous friends”, as he confesses, “and stubborn poverty”—bashfulness, melancholy and timidity make many of us too hesitant and negligent.

Some therefore err at one extreme, but too many at the other. For the most part we are too forward, too importunate, too ambitious, too shameless. We commonly complain that “Maecenases are lacking”, that we lack encouragement and means, when the real defect is our own lack of merit, our inadequacy. Did Maecenas notice Horace or Virgil before they had proved themselves? And did Bavius and Mevius have any patrons?

“Let them give an excellent proof of themselves,” says Erasmus. Let them first show themselves worthy, sufficiently qualified in learning and conduct, before they presume to intrude shamelessly and thrust themselves upon great men, as too many do. They usually ingratiate themselves through such abject flattery, such parasitical coaxing, such extravagant praise that it is shameful to hear and see. “Excessive praises win resentment rather than praise.” Empty commendations detract from the truth, and in the end we think “no better of the person praised, and worse of the person praising”—ill of both, the praiser and the praised.

So we are at fault; but the chief fault lies in their harshness, in the failure of patrons. How beloved and respected Plato once was by Dionysius! How dear Aristotle was to Alexander, Demaratus to Philip, Solon to Croesus, Anaxarchus and Trebatius to Augustus, Cassius to Vespasian, Plutarch to Trajan, Seneca to Nero, Simonides to Hieron! How honoured!

But these things were long ago; now, laid away, They grow old in quiet.

Those days are gone: