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Examples Of The Violence With Which The Learned Have Contended About Trifles. From D'Lsraeli's "Curiosities Of Literature." Vol. Ii.
EXAMPLES OF THE VIOLENCE WITH WHICH THE LEARNED HAVE CONTENDED ABOUT TRIFLES . FROM D'lSRAELI'S "CURIOSITIES OF LITERATURE . " VOL . II .
ERASMUS produced a dialogue , in which he ridiculed those scholars who were servile imitators of Cicero ; so servile , that they would employ no expression but what was found in the works of that writer ; and even copied his faults . This dialogue is written with delicacy and fine humour , and composed in an exquisite style . Scaliger , the father , who was then unkown to the world , had been
long looking for some occasion to distinguish himself ; he now wrote a defence of Cicero , bnt which was in fact one continued invefctive against Erasmus : he there treats the latter as illiterate , a drunkard , an impostor , an apostate , a hangman , a demon just come from hell ! Schioppius was a worthy successor of the Scaligers : his favourite expression was , that he had trodden down his adversary .
Schioppius was a critic , as skilful as Salmasius or Scaliger , but still more learned in the language of abuse . lie was regarded as the Attil ' a of authors . He boasted that he had occasioned the deaths of Casaubon and Scaliger ; and such was the impudence of this cynic , that he attacked with repeated satires our James the first , who , as Arthur Wilson informs uscondemned his writings to be burnt in London .
, Detested and dreaded as the public scourge , Schioppius , at the close of his life , was fearful he should find no retreat in which he mi ght be secure . Fabretti , an Italian , wrote furiously against Gronovius , whom he
called Grunnovius : he compared him to all those animals whose voice was expressed by the word grunire , to grunt . This Gronovius was so malevolent a critic , that he was distinguished by the title of' Gram ^ matical Cur . ' When critics venture to attack the person as well as the perfornrance of an author , I recommend the salutary proceedings of Huberus , the writer of esteemed Universal
an History . He had been so roughly handled by Perizonius , that he obliged him to make the amettdi honorable in a court of justice . Certain authors may be distinguished by the title of LITERARY Bo-BADILS , or fighting authors . It is said of one of our own celebrated writers , that he drew his sword on a reviewer ; and another , when his farce condemned
was , offered to fi ght any of the audience who hissed . Scudery , brother of the celebrated Mademoiselle Scudery , was a true Parnassian bully . The first . publication which brought him into notice , was his edition of the works of his friend Theophile . He concludes the preface with these singular expressions . — "I do not hesitate to declare , that , amongst all the dead , and all the living , there is no person who has any thing to show that approaches the force of this vi gorous genius ; but if amongst the latter , any one were so ex-Voi ,, III . n u
Note: This text has been automatically extracted via Optical Character Recognition (OCR) software.
Examples Of The Violence With Which The Learned Have Contended About Trifles. From D'Lsraeli's "Curiosities Of Literature." Vol. Ii.
EXAMPLES OF THE VIOLENCE WITH WHICH THE LEARNED HAVE CONTENDED ABOUT TRIFLES . FROM D'lSRAELI'S "CURIOSITIES OF LITERATURE . " VOL . II .
ERASMUS produced a dialogue , in which he ridiculed those scholars who were servile imitators of Cicero ; so servile , that they would employ no expression but what was found in the works of that writer ; and even copied his faults . This dialogue is written with delicacy and fine humour , and composed in an exquisite style . Scaliger , the father , who was then unkown to the world , had been
long looking for some occasion to distinguish himself ; he now wrote a defence of Cicero , bnt which was in fact one continued invefctive against Erasmus : he there treats the latter as illiterate , a drunkard , an impostor , an apostate , a hangman , a demon just come from hell ! Schioppius was a worthy successor of the Scaligers : his favourite expression was , that he had trodden down his adversary .
Schioppius was a critic , as skilful as Salmasius or Scaliger , but still more learned in the language of abuse . lie was regarded as the Attil ' a of authors . He boasted that he had occasioned the deaths of Casaubon and Scaliger ; and such was the impudence of this cynic , that he attacked with repeated satires our James the first , who , as Arthur Wilson informs uscondemned his writings to be burnt in London .
, Detested and dreaded as the public scourge , Schioppius , at the close of his life , was fearful he should find no retreat in which he mi ght be secure . Fabretti , an Italian , wrote furiously against Gronovius , whom he
called Grunnovius : he compared him to all those animals whose voice was expressed by the word grunire , to grunt . This Gronovius was so malevolent a critic , that he was distinguished by the title of' Gram ^ matical Cur . ' When critics venture to attack the person as well as the perfornrance of an author , I recommend the salutary proceedings of Huberus , the writer of esteemed Universal
an History . He had been so roughly handled by Perizonius , that he obliged him to make the amettdi honorable in a court of justice . Certain authors may be distinguished by the title of LITERARY Bo-BADILS , or fighting authors . It is said of one of our own celebrated writers , that he drew his sword on a reviewer ; and another , when his farce condemned
was , offered to fi ght any of the audience who hissed . Scudery , brother of the celebrated Mademoiselle Scudery , was a true Parnassian bully . The first . publication which brought him into notice , was his edition of the works of his friend Theophile . He concludes the preface with these singular expressions . — "I do not hesitate to declare , that , amongst all the dead , and all the living , there is no person who has any thing to show that approaches the force of this vi gorous genius ; but if amongst the latter , any one were so ex-Voi ,, III . n u