ABSTRACT
B E F O R E Luther's fame had eclipsed that of all his contemporaries, the greatest figure in the republic of letters was Desiderius Erasmus of Rotterdam, who had attained to an acknowledged sovereignty like that later accorded to Voltaire. He combined great learning with a wonderful mastery of style, especially of the lighter kind, sparkling with wit. He was, moreover, inspired with a serious purpose of reform, in the service of which he used all his great and various talents. In his Praise of Folly ( l o l l ) he had written a cutting satire on the least admirable aspects of the mediaeval Church, and by his edition of the Greek Testament (1516) he had given an immense stimulus along with necessary means to a fruitful study of the Bible. He was the deadly enemy of superstition and obscurantism, and the bold champion of sound learning and free thought. His true greatness would be proved, if by nothing else, by the fact that two such opposite and such large men as Martin Luther and Francois Rabelais1 derived much of their inspiration from him.
