Tünger: FACETIAE LATINAE ET GERMANICAE (1486)

Augustinus Tünger de Enndingen, procurator curie constantiensis, illustri principi, domino Eberhardo, comiti Wirtenberg et Montispeligardi etc., seniori, domino suo gracioso s.p.d.

Augustine Tünger of Endingen, procurator of the Curia of Constance, to the illustrious prince, Lord Eberhard, count of Württemberg and Montbéliard, etc., the elder, his gracious lord, sends many greetings.

Prisci rerum gestarum scriptores, illustris princeps, soliti fuere principio laude eorum, ad quos scripserant, captare benivolentiam, quo homines legendis litteris suis redderent attentiores. Quod et ego facere statueram, nisi compertum haberem, te illud egre pati. Temperare igitur laudibus tuis pro nunc animus est; simul quod nolim in assentorum numero, quod genus hominum audio tibi in primis pro omnium bonorum more odio esse, haberi; simul quod et virtus et laus tua late nedum per nostram Germaniam, sed totam et Italiam et Galliam, ac pene ultimis terrarum oris satis cognita et perspecta est; simul quoque, quod ipsa eadem tua virtus supra meas vel litteras vel ingenium esse creditur.

The ancient writers of deeds, illustrious prince, were accustomed at the beginning to court by praise the benevolence of those to whom they had written, in order that men might be rendered more attentive to reading their letters. This I too had determined to do, did I not have it ascertained that you tolerate that poorly. Therefore for the present my mind is to temper myself in your praises; at the same time because I would not wish to be held in the number of assentators (flatterers), a kind of men which I hear is to you especially, after the custom of all good men, an object of hatred; at the same time also because both your virtue and your renown are widely, not only through our Germany, but through all Italy and Gaul, and almost to the farthest shores of the earth, sufficiently known and well seen-through; likewise also, because that same virtue of yours is believed to be above either my letters or my talent.

Nam quis perscribere posset divinam tuam et quasi innatam prudentiam, qua preditus es a deo optimo maximo, qua in consessu prestantissimi tui senatus sepenumero polles? Quis posset effari iusticiam tuam inclitam, qua tibi erga tuos subditos tantam queris caritatem, ut te fere omnes non domini, sed parentis loco ducant? Quis posset eloqui animi tui magnitudinem, qua inimicos tuos coherces et tuis iniuriam propulsas?

For who could write out in full your divine and, as it were, innate prudence, with which you are endowed by God, Best and Greatest, and with which in the assembly of your most outstanding senate you have so often excelled? Who could utter your renowned justice, by which you procure for yourself such affection on the part of your subjects that almost all regard you not in the place of a lord, but of a parent? Who could set forth the magnanimity of your spirit, by which you coerce your enemies and repulse wrongs from your own?

modestiam, clemenciam et pietatem in afflictis? constanciam, gravitatem, fidem in quosque alios? Que quidem et in numere aliæ tuæ virtutes, quas omnes iam silencio preterire statui, perlexere me et quasi quendam ardorem iniecerunt tibi gratificandi.

modesty, clemency and piety toward the afflicted? constancy, gravity, fidelity toward all others? Which indeed, and among the number your other virtues—all of which I have now resolved to pass over in silence—have thoroughly penetrated me and, as it were, infused a certain ardor for gratifying you.

Intermissum igitur litterarum studium iam pridem forensibus negociis intentum et aliorum obsequio obnoxium, nuper partim revocavi et aliquot facetias, quas a puero pene hausi queque occurrerunt memorie, non tamen dictu vel auditu obscœnas, litteris mandavi, quas tuo dico nomini. Que tametsi leves sunt et humiles, non tamen continuo sunt explodende, quod nedum perfectissimos oratores, sed et maximos imperatores salibus iocisque fuisse intentos, exploratum est. Medentur enim vel audite vel lecte affectibus oneratamque curis et sollicitudinibus mentem reficiunt.

Accordingly, the study of letters—long since interrupted, being bent upon forensic affairs and made subject to the service of others—I have lately in part recalled, and I have consigned to letters certain facetiae, which I had almost imbibed from boyhood and which occurred to memory, not, however, obscene to say or to hear, which I dedicate to your name. Although they are light and humble, they are not straightway to be exploded, since it has been ascertained that not only the most consummate orators, but even the greatest emperors, were intent upon sallies and jests. For whether heard or read, they minister to the affections and refresh a mind burdened with cares and solicitudes.

Quo autem audacius in tuum prodeant conspectum, ubi non nisi mundo et bene polito venire licet, quælibet aliqua pro hominum moribus doctrina, qua quasi aureo amiculo in tui presentia utetur, stipata erit. Accepimus autem, te linguæ latinæ fore exortem. Ne igitur interpretem desideres, ipsas vernacula quoque nostra ligua elaboratas accipias!

And in order that they may step forth more boldly into your sight, where it is permitted to come only clean and well-polished, they shall be attended by some doctrine in accordance with the manners of men, which, as with a little golden cloak, they will use in your presence. We have learned, moreover, that you are to be devoid of the Latin language. Therefore, lest you should desire an interpreter, receive these very pieces, wrought also in our vernacular tongue!

Ubi tamen non translatoris fungar officio, sed ex utriusque ligwæ, et latinæ et germanicæ more, usque dum ingenium sufficit, scribam. De obtrectatoribus ita decrevimus: si hec nostra lucubratio graciam sibi apud te quesierit, nequaquam adversum nos conari; sin minus, maiorem me incasso labore, quam ipsorum maledictis, iacturam facere. Nec mihi fluctuandum animo est, quin si hasce meas lucubraciones in tam bonam, quam a me processere, acceperis partem, et me et alios ad maiora excitaturus sis.

Where, however, I shall not discharge a translator’s office, but, according to the custom of both tongues, Latin and German, so long as my talent suffices, I will write. Concerning detractors we have thus determined: if this our lucubration shall have sought for itself and obtained favor with you, by no means to attempt anything against us; but if otherwise, that I sustain a greater loss from fruitless labor than from their maledictions. Nor ought my mind to waver, since I am assured that, if you shall have received these my lucubrations in as good a part as that in which they proceeded from me, you will rouse both me and others to greater things.

Ipsos autem obtrectatores suo sese morbo conficientes nihil acerbius adoriri posse.

The detractors themselves, destroying themselves by their own disease, are able to assail with nothing of greater acerbity.

1. Pauperem quendam claudum ab urbe Constantia rus petentem a longe quidam velocius solito sequebatur. Querentibus autem nonnullis, quid hec sibi vellet festinatio, claudum illum se antecedentem verberatum ire respondit. Et licet non deesset, qui commone-faceret, caveret, contra sententiam suam ipse verberibus oneratus rediret, ille nichilo tamen minus ad claudum accelerat.

1. A certain poor lame man, departing from the city of Constance and seeking the countryside, was being followed from afar by someone more swiftly than usual. But when some were asking what this haste might mean, he replied that that lame man going ahead of him was going to be flogged. And although there was no lack of someone to remind him to beware, lest he himself, contrary to his own sententia, return laden with beatings, nonetheless he hastens none the less toward the lame man.

Ubi ad eum ventum est, ferocius et increpando et maledicendo repertina incursione eam statim cedere nititur. Ille continuo suplex omnes pacis condicione subiturus. Quod ubi frustra esse visum est, nec aliqua spes fuge esset, quippe cuius unus pes suum debitum officium non faceret, se ad defensionem parat districtoque cultello, quo ad quottidianum usum accinctus erat, ictus alterius omnes illesus excipit, quoad alteri manum suam dexteram amputavit.

When he was come up with him, more ferociously, both by increpating and by malediction, with a sudden incursion he strives to make him yield at once. The other, straightway a suppliant, ready to submit to all on the condition of peace. When this seemed to be in vain, and there was no hope of flight—since one of whose feet did not perform its due service—he prepares himself for defense, and, having drawn a little knife with which he was girded for quotidian use, he receives all the other’s blows unhurt, until he amputated the other’s right hand.

Qui sic mancus non cum minore et damno et dolore, quam cum et pudore et dedecore, ab omnibus irrisus in urbem rediit.

Who, thus maimed, returned into the city, mocked by all, with no less loss and pain than with shame and disgrace.

Solet autem plerumque fortuna eorum esse talis, quorum animus vastus quosque alios despicit, non considerantes, eciam pauperem iniurie impacientem esse. Cui saltem constat, et racionem et mortalitatem sibi cum divite communem, hominesque nihil inter se differre, nisi quoad vel utuntur vel abutuntur racione. Adde quandam accidentalem fortunam, que nunc adesse, nunc abesse solet!

Moreover, for the most part the fortune of those is of such a sort whose mind is rampant and despises all others, not considering that even the poor man is impatient of injury. To him at least it is evident that both reason and mortality are common to himself with the rich man, and that men differ in nothing among themselves, except insofar as they use or abuse reason. Add a certain accidental fortune, which is wont now to be present, now to be absent!

Que quidem pauperi ea diligenti cogitacione complectenti cornua adversus superbos, potenti vero humanitatem cum bonis parit.

Which indeed, for the poor man who with diligent cogitation embraces these things, begets horns against the proud; but for the powerful it produces humanity together with goods.

2. Quidam ganeo mendicus, qui sacius ducebat ex aliorum, quam ex sua, vivere opera, quod labor sibi res ardua visa est, ocium vero et delectabile et iucundum, quadam intempesta nocte conscendit furcam publicam seu patibulum urbis Basilee, ubi cadaveris hominis illic pro delictis pendentis crus iam naturali humore evacuatum sustulit. Quod deinde altero crurium suorum abscondito taliter inter mendicandum in alterius cruris vicem ac patulo statuit, quod a pretereuntibus pro suo crure certo morbo sic exiccato habitum sit. Quo fretus scelere innumeras stipes ex hominibus levavit.

2. A certain tavern-loiterer beggar, who deemed it preferable to live by the work of others rather than by his own—since labor seemed to him a hard thing, but idleness indeed both delectable and pleasant—at a certain dead of night climbed the public gallows, or gibbet, of the city of Basel, where he took up the leg of a man’s cadaver hanging there for his crimes, already drained of its natural moisture. Then, with one of his own legs hidden, he so arranged this in begging as a substitute for the other leg, and set it openly displayed, that by passers-by it was taken for his own leg, thus dried up by a certain disease. Relying on this wickedness, he collected innumerable alms from people.

Quadam vero die ipso elemosinæ in ponte urbis Thuregii intento subitus quidam ventorum accidit turbo, adeo quod omnis homo ex ponte maturaret fugam in proximas ædes. Ipse quoque ganeo sub proxima tecta acceleravit furto crure suo post terga deserto. Quod statim a compluribus conspectum ad senatum thuricensem relatum est.

But on a certain day, while he himself, intent on alms, was on the bridge of the city of Zurich, a sudden whirlwind of winds occurred, to such a degree that every person hastened in flight from the bridge into the nearest houses. He too, the tavern-haunter, hurried beneath the nearest roofs, having left his stolen leg behind him. This, seen at once by several, was reported to the Zurich senate.

Ex cuius sentencia postridie laqueo strangulatus dignas factis suis penas invenit.

By whose sentence, on the next day he was strangled by the noose and found penalties worthy of his deeds.

Falluntur autem maiorem in modum, qui animum adiiciunt ad deceptiones aliorum hominum, statuentes secum huiuscemodi scelera astuciis suis sepulta sic silentio transitura, cum nihil tam opertum, nihil quoque tam fallaciis obrutum existat, quin tempore prodeat in lucem, et semper quotque delictum sua maneat pena.

They are, however, in a greater degree deceived, who set their mind to the deceptions of other men, supposing with themselves that crimes of this kind, buried by their own astuteness, will thus pass into silence, since nothing so covered, nor anything so overlaid by fallacies, exists but that in time it comes forth into the light, and always for each and every delict its own penalty remains.

3. Urbem Argentinam prespitero ex oppido Scutera quindecim millium passuum. a dicta urbe proficiscenti accidit comes scortum, forma sane liberali ac luculenta. Comitatis autem inter se in via utrinque verbis convenere, ut presbitero mulieris potiunde per noctem potestas esset.

3. For the priest, the city of Strasbourg was fifteen miles from the town of Scutera. As he was setting out from the said city, a harlot became his companion, of truly liberal and splendid form. And as they accompanied one another on the road they agreed mutually by words that the priest should have the power of enjoying the woman through the night.

Vento autem in urbem parataque ac sumpta cena oppipera aderat tempus una cubitum eundi. Cum mulier sese vestibus nudet in stuba, ne forte foras inter exuendum eum lederet frigus, sacerdoti persuadet. Nudus igitur mulierem cubile versus tendentem comitatur, usque dum ad posticam venere domus, ubi mulier, si quid natura ab ipso per vesicam exigeret, ibi locum esse.

But when they had come into the city and a sumptuous dinner had been prepared and taken, the time had arrived to go together to bed. When the woman, in the stove‑room, stripped herself of her garments, she persuades the priest, lest perhaps the cold outside might injure him while undressing. Naked, therefore, he accompanies the woman as she goes toward the couch, until they came to the postern of the house, where the woman (said) that, if nature should require anything from him through the bladder, there was the place.

Quia statim autem exiit, ipsa longius non morata, quin mox occlusa postica pessulum obdidit. Quod sacerdos primo ioci loco ducit, quod id temporis nullum tale facinus facile passurum esset. Porro Phœbo nunc capricornum petente aer per frigus cuncta minabatur mala.

Because he immediately went out, she herself, not delaying longer, but soon, the postern closed, shot the bolt. Which the priest at first takes in the place of a jest, since at that time no such wicked deed would easily be suffered. Moreover, with Phoebus now seeking Capricorn, the air, by reason of the cold, was menacing every ill.

Accedit igitur hostium, pulsat. Illa primo dissimulans silet. Tandem continuatis pulsacionibus in valvam irrumpit minabunda, quis ibi sub hoc noctis silentio suas pulsaret fores.

He therefore approaches the door and knocks. She, at first dissembling, is silent. At length, with the knockings continued, she rushes upon the door-leaf menacingly, demanding who there, under this silence of the night, was pounding her doors.

Si eum internosceret, ipsum haud impune laturum. Is autem, ubi se eum esse, qui una cenam sumpsisset, subnominavit. Addit, iam omnem cessare iocum, quod frigore nimis premeretur.

If she recognized him, he himself would not carry it off unpunished. He, however, when he specified that he was the one who had shared supper together, adds that now all joking ceases, because he is too much pressed by the cold.

Cepit illa, acrius in eum invehere et clamore, quod iam omnes vicini accurrebant et lapidibus a foribus abigere. Ille verecundia coactus in cuiusdam pauperis hortulani tugurio per noctem. latuit.

She began, to inveigh more sharply against him and, with clamor, since now all the neighbors were running up and to drive him from the doors with stones. He, compelled by verecundity, in the hut of a certain poor gardener for the night. He lay hidden.

Mane oriente luce nonnullis vestibus comodato acceptis, re cuius gratia venerat infecta, quod et peccunia nedum vestibus spoliatus erat, domum rediit.

In the morning, with the light rising, having received some garments on loan, the affair for the sake of which he had come left unfinished, since he had been despoiled of money, to say nothing of clothes, he returned home.

Est autem viro precipue molli difficile vitare versucias atque illecebras scortorum, ne dicam mulierum, que complures spectatissimos viros perdidere, prout longe lateque memorie proditum est. Proinde convenit, ut quisque voluptates et libidinem temperantia continentiaque pro virili sua parte frenare ac domare studeat, ne sese hac voracissima charybdi collidendum et absorbiendum prebeat. De honestis autem atque venerandis mulieribus hic nihil velim dictum, quarum decus, non iniuria, omne huius evi precium longe prestat.

It is, moreover, especially difficult for a particularly soft man to avoid the wiles and allurements of harlots— not to say of women— which have destroyed many most distinguished men, as has been handed down to memory far and wide. Therefore it is fitting that each one strive to bridle and tame pleasures and lust by temperance and continence, to the best of his manly power, lest he offer himself to be dashed and swallowed by this most voracious Charybdis. But concerning honest and venerable women I would wish nothing to be said here, whose honor, not unjustly, by far excels all the worth of this age.

4. Est huic fere simile, de quo aiunt in dicta urbe Argentina duos fuisse presbiteros, qui duobus scortis peccuniam in cenam sub noctem parandam ipsarum potiundarum gratia erogarunt. Sacerdotes autem, dum et cenam et noctem prestolantur, tardum ire queruntur diem, usque dum advesperascit. Tum leti optatum adesse tempus omni posthabita cura arbitrati sunt, cum subito duo lenones horum consiliorum ex ipsis mulieribus antea participes in edas irruunt, simulantes se mulierum maritos atque olfacere aliquos in edibus latere, qui conarentur sibi parare mechum.

4. This is almost similar to it: they say that in the said city of Strasbourg there were two presbyters, who disbursed money to two prostitutes for a dinner to be prepared toward night, for the sake of enjoying them. The priests, however, while they await both the dinner and the night, complain that the day goes slowly, until it grows toward evening. Then, happy, they judged the longed-for time to be at hand, with every care set aside, when suddenly two pimps—previously, from the women themselves, sharers in these counsels—burst into the house, pretending to be the women’s husbands and to sniff out that some men were lurking in the house, who were trying to procure for themselves a paramour.

Sacerdotes auditis illis mox trepidos subito pavore ingens cura illorum manus vitandi invasit. Atque tandem consilio mulierum eciam magnum metum simulantium per fenestras stube prolabuntur, cum non modico omnium gaudio, sacerdotibus, quod manus lenonum violentas evaserant, aliis autem, quod esurientes suum preter sumptum bene lautam cenam nacti erant, gaudentibus.

The priests, on hearing these things, at once, trembling with sudden fear, were seized by a great concern to avoid their hands. And at length, by the plan of the women—who likewise were simulating great fear—they slip down through the windows of the stove-room, with no small joy for all: the priests rejoicing that they had escaped the violent hands of the pimps, but the others rejoicing that, being hungry, they had obtained a well-sumptuous dinner at another’s expense.

Sepenumero autem decipiuntur, qui sibi cum animo suo aliquod gaudium in futurum proponunt, cum nihil fallacius, nihil incercius existat tempore. Quod quom letum aliquando affore creditur, sepe lachrymis abundat. Speranti lucrum affert damnum, petenti honorem ignominiam et probrum.

Very often, however, those are deceived who set before themselves in their mind some joy for the future, since nothing more fallacious, nothing more uncertain exists than time. What is believed will someday be joyful often abounds in tears. To one hoping for profit it brings loss, to one seeking honor, ignominy and opprobrium.

Quo fit, ut sepe horam, in quam maximum nobis constituimus gaudium, presentem maxime et exhorrescamus et detestemur. Refert ergo hominem presenti frui tempore neque breves hosce dies a deo nobis permissos luxu atque desidia terere, sed semper virtutibus innixos aliquo honesto negotio intentum gerere animum.

Whence it comes about that we often, the hour for which we have constituted the greatest joy for ourselves, when it is present, most of all both shudder at and detest. Therefore it is important that a man enjoy the present time and not spend these brief days granted to us by God in luxury and sloth, but, always leaning upon virtues, keep his mind intent on some honorable business.

5. Iacobus Grymm, iurisconsultus, curie constantiensis iudex ordinarius, quem officialem dicunt, instante iam fine vite regulam Aurelii Augustini canonicorum regularium appellatam in cenobium montis thuricensis vovit. Quo facto mox vitam cum morte commutavit. Monachi itaque dicti cenobii, de hoc facti cerciores, ad cadaver cum rebus suis tollendis festinarunt.

5. Jacobus Grymm, a jurisconsult, ordinary judge of the Curia of Constance, whom they call the official, with the end of life now pressing, vowed the Rule of Aurelius Augustine, called of the canons regular, in the cenobium of Mount Zurich. This having been done, soon he exchanged life with death. The monks, therefore, of the said cenobium, having been made certain of this, hastened to the corpse to carry it off together with his belongings.

Inter vehendum autem cadaver domum versus venere ad villam Mülhain, ab urbe Constantia forsan quinque millibus passuum, ubi unus antecedens villanos avisatos fecit, ut pro more, campanarum cantu funus significarent. Qui interrogatus de funere honoris gracia officialem nominavit. Cuius verbi mentio tantum subitum ipsis rusticis (quod tociens in dies per ipsius officialis censurarum litteras torquerentur) furorem iniecit, quod et cadaver laniari et reliquis mortem minari visi sunt.

While conveying the corpse homeward they came to the villa Mülhain, perhaps five miles from the city Constance, where one going ahead made the villagers aware, that according to custom they should signify the funeral by the ringing of the bells. He, asked about the funeral, named the official for honor’s sake. The mere mention of that word injected such sudden fury into those rustics (because so often day by day they were tormented by the letters of that official’s censures) that they seemed both about to rend the corpse and to threaten death to the rest.

Tum sese vindicandi sibi tempus oblatum credentes, adeo quoque invaluit ipsorum sevicies, quod auriga funus deserere atque domum repetere decreverat. Demum tamen funere grandi ere redempto processere. Queque vitantes tecta usquedum villam superiorem Winterthur, ab oppido Winterthur mille forsan passuum, pertingunt, ibique de funere interrogati respondere, id sincerissimi sui ordinis monachi esse, quippe qui tantam pre se gesserit sanctimoniam, quod regulam suam a tempore voti usque ad finem vite sue servasset inviolatam, fuisse quoque tante temperantiæ et continentiæ, quod ab omni mulierum commercio per ydem tempus habitus foret et liber et mundus.

T hen, believing that a time offered itself to avenge themselves, the savagery of those men so prevailed that the charioteer resolved to abandon the funeral and to return home. At length, however, with the funeral redeemed for a great sum of money, they proceeded. And avoiding the rooftops all the way until they reach the upper village Winterthur, perhaps a thousand paces from the town of Winterthur, they arrive; and there, asked about the funeral, they replied that it was of a monk of their most sincere order, who, indeed, had borne such sanctimony before himself that he had preserved his rule inviolate from the time of his vow to the end of his life; and that he had been moreover of such temperance and continence that from all commerce with women during that same time he had been held both free and clean.

Quibus verbis sibi tantum conflarunt favorem, quod nemo adesset, qui non animam eius ex animo iuberet salvere.

By these words they aroused such favor for themselves, that there was no one present who did not from the heart wish his soul well.

Licet igitur sapientis sit, singula rimari atque prospicere, nec committere, ut ut aliquando dicat «Non putaram», tamen, quia supra humanum ingenium est, omnes prestare casus, dinoscitur magnopere hominis esse remissi, illico, si quando aberratum aut in discrimen veutum sit, frangi atque prosterni animo, constantis autem atque sapientis viri, alia aggredi via, aliis ex tempore inniti, honestis tamen et iustis consiliis, dum rem et intentatam confitias et expetita potiare.

Therefore, although it is the part of a wise man to scrutinize each particular and to foresee, and not to allow that he should ever say «I had not thought», nevertheless, because it is beyond human ingenium to provide against all contingencies, it is recognized to be very much the mark of a remiss man, immediately, if ever there has been a wandering from the way or one has come into peril, to be broken and cast down in spirit; but of a constant and wise man, to attempt another way, to lean upon other means as the moment requires, yet upon honest and just counsels, so that you both acknowledge the thing as unattempted and obtain what was sought.

6. Conrado quondam tabernario ad Mauram urbis Constantiæ homini ioculari fuit uxor rei familiaris tenacissima. Supra tamen sue uxoris parsimoniam et tenacitatem longe fuit negligencia et remissio animi sui. Nam quadam vice sibi ab uxore porcum comparandi negocium datur, precio sibi ad hoc numerato.

6. Conrad, once a tavern-keeper at the Maura in the city of Constance, a jocular man, had a wife most tenacious of household property. Yet far beyond his wife's parsimony and tenacity was the negligence and remissness of his own spirit. For on a certain occasion a task was given to him by his wife of acquiring a pig, with the price counted out to him for this purpose.

Qui quia statim ab edibus discessit, totum sibi ab uxore æs commissum in aleatorum turbam incidens tesseris absorbiendum dedit. Tum domum rediens subtristis, nedum porco, verum etiam ere vacans iniurias uxoris incuriam suam indignantis vitabundus veniam orabat, asserens, rem aliter, atque ipse sperasset, cecidisse, quippe qui peccuniam suam non alia nisi alicuius insignis fœnoris spe taxillis credidisset, sperans exinde duplum emersurum iri; quod si evenisset, constituisse secum, duos comparare porcos, quo reditus suus in edes uxori extitisse hylarior.

Because he immediately departed from the house, and, falling into a throng of gamblers, he gave over to the dice to be swallowed up all the cash entrusted to him by his wife. Then, returning home somewhat sad, lacking not only the pig but even cash, shunning the reproaches of his wife, indignant at his negligence, he begged pardon, asserting that the affair had turned out otherwise than he himself had hoped, since he had entrusted his money to the dice with no other expectation than the hope of some notable usury, hoping therefrom that a double would emerge; and if that had happened, he had resolved with himself to buy two pigs, so that his return into the house to his wife might have been the more cheerful.

Qui igitur peccuniam suam in sortem exponunt, antea eam in amissis habeant, consultum est, ne deinde victi æris forsan alio erogandi desiderio torqueantur. Quod facere non est integrum, quibus inanis domi residet arca.

Therefore, those who expose their pecuniary to the lot should beforehand have it among the losses; it is prudent counsel, lest thereafter, defeated in coin, they perhaps be tormented by a desire to disburse other money. Which it is not permissible to do for those whose chest at home sits empty.

7. Heinricus Hemmerly, pontificii iuris sui ævi in primis peritus habitus, templi divorum Felicis et Regule urbis Thuregii canonicus, lacessitus forsan iniuria eiusque impaciens eum, qui lacesserat, non modica contumelia affecit. Cuius gratia vocatus in ius ac tandem evictus est per iudicem, qui contumeliosa verba, quibus existimacionem alterius leserat, pro templo revocaret diffinito. Accidit autem inter reclamandum, edituum eius templi, qui claudus erat, preterire.

7. Heinrich Hemmerli, held as among the foremost skilled in pontifical law of his age, a canon of the temple of the saints Felix and Regula of the city of Zurich, provoked perhaps by an injury and impatient of it, afflicted the one who had provoked him with no small contumely. On account of this he was called into court and at length was convicted by the judge, who by a definitive ruling ordered that he revoke, before the temple, the contumelious words by which he had wounded the estimation of the other. It happened, moreover, that during the recantation, the sacristan of that temple, who was lame, passed by.

Quem ut Heinricus vidit, habita reclamatione continuo addit: At quam vanum esset, si contenderem, edituum nostrum non fore claudum, cum tamen omnes compertum habeatis, eum claudicare!

When Heinricus saw him, having made his protest he immediately adds: "But how vain it would be, if I were to contend that our temple-warden would not be lame, since nevertheless you all know for certain that he limps!"

Est autem turpe, existimationem nostri, si quando in discrimen venerit, negligere precipue innocenti, cum omnes aliæ iacturæ famæ posthabendæ sint. Turpissimum autem omnium, vitam ducere delictis atque turpitudini obnoxiam, pium autem scelerum castigatorem iniquo ferre animo. Et quod tetrius est, ab eo penam expetere, quod labes infamie tuo flagitio contracta aliorum nec verbis nec factis aboleri potest.

It is, however, shameful to neglect our reputation, if ever it should come into peril, especially for the innocent man, since all other losses are to be set after reputation. Most shameful of all is to lead a life subject to crimes and turpitude, and to bear with an inequitable mind a pious chastiser of crimes. And, what is more foul, to exact a penalty from him on the ground that the stain of infamy contracted by your own scandal cannot be abolished by the words nor by the deeds of others.

Proinde vitet quisque scelera et secum constituat, ubi eo ventum sit, ut aliorum velit purgationem, nisi innocentia sua se tutetur, nequitquam purgari.

Accordingly let each one shun crimes and determine with himself that, when it has come to that point that he desires the purgation of others, unless his own innocence protects him, he will be purged in vain.

8. Est cenobium quoddam nostre patrie, cuius aliquot abbatibus aliquandiu Bachus, quam Chrystus, potior fuit, cuius quoque monachi suorum abbatum instituto adveniente tempore solvendorum matutinalium hymnorum adeo et Liberi patris et Veneris cerymoniis solebant esse fatigati, ut et ligua et pedes, nedum ocelli in suo titubarent officio. In quis erat monachus, qui aliis tedio erat, quod anime sue cautius consulere statuens in dies suplicaciones deo ex voto debitas tum pro templo, tum aliis locis ad hoc ab antiquo electis habere non obmittebat. Abbas vero semel habiturus quantoque in eos, qui a formula regule sue deficerent, eundem coram se vocavit.

8. There is a certain coenobium in our homeland, under several of whose abbots for some time Bacchus was preferred rather than Christ; and its monks too, by the institution of their abbots, when the time came for discharging the matutinal hymns, were wont to be so wearied by the ceremonies of Father Liber and of Venus that both tongue and feet—not to mention their little eyes—stumbled in their own office. Among these there was a monk who was a weariness to the others, because, having resolved to consult more cautiously for his soul, he did not omit day by day to offer the supplications owed to God by vow, both in the temple and in other places chosen for this from of old. But the abbot, once being about to hold a proceeding and moreover to act against those who fell short of the form of his rule, summoned that same man before him.

Aliis autem impune abeuntibus, omnis culpa acutissima abbatis voce in hunc solum transfertur, quippe qui solus regulam abbatis desereret. Quicquid enim temporis et psallendo et suplicando absumeret, hoc totum ad sui abbatis et aliorum suorum confratrum pernitiem et ludibrium spectaret, nec sue religionis aliud nisi hypocrisim esse causæ, ut sibi aliquam inde in hoc evo laudem, abbati vero et ceteris suis complicibus infamiam conflaret; ad hec non modicas minas addendo. Quibus verbis confusus ille bonus monachus ob sua probefacta acerrime correptus abiit.

But while the others went off with impunity, all blame, with the abbot’s most cutting voice, is transferred onto this one alone, since he alone was deserting the abbot’s rule. For whatever time he spent in psalmody and supplication, all of this, he said, tended to the ruin and derision of his abbot and of his other confreres, and that there was no other cause of his religion but hypocrisy, so that he might thereby concoct some praise for himself in this age, but infamy for the abbot and his other accomplices; adding to these things no small threats. At these words, that good monk, confounded, on account of his good deeds most sharply rebuked, departed.

Non merentur autem laudem, qui sub ovis fatie lupi dissimulant scelus, alios tamen nituntur ad virtutes perlicere; faciunt enim perinde atque isti, qui ipsi egentes aliis ferunt opem, quique rem, quam ipsi non habent, aliis pollicentur. Isti autem non modo non sunt laudandi, verum eciam longe maxime vituperandi, quod ad hoc, quod ipsi potissimum a virtutibus absunt in omni vitiorum genere triti, studiosissimum quenque teterrime persequuntur.

They do not deserve laud, who under the face of a sheep dissimulate the crime of a wolf, yet strive to allure others to virtues; for they act just like those who, being themselves needy, bring aid to others, and who promise to others a thing which they themselves do not have. These, however, are not only not to be praised, but even by far most to be vituperated, because, in addition to this—that they themselves are especially far from virtues, well-worn in every kind of vices—they most foully persecute each most studious (zealous) person.

9. Maccellator quidam oppidi Hagnow, ab urbe Argentina forsan vigenti millibus passuum, circa crepusculum nocte iam tenebras diffundente furcam eius oppidi comparatum in rure bovem trahens festinans preterierat, strangulata illa cadavera ioco alloquendo, monendo scilicet ea, si velint in oppidum, festinato opus esse, alioquin fore, ut exclusi foras maneant. Ipso vero citato gradu oppidum versus tendente, comitatur eum alius quidam, qui eo celerius pariter properabat, quod sollicitus habebatur, ne clausis portis sibi ingressus in urbem non patesceret. Precedentem maccellatorem acclamat, rogitans, ut sese maneat, at una oppidum intrandi sibi copiam faceret.

9. A certain butcher of the town of Hagnow, perhaps twenty miles from the city of Argentina, around twilight, with night now spreading its darkness, had, hurrying, passed by the gallows of that town, dragging along an ox procured in the countryside, jokingly addressing those strangled cadavers, warning them, namely, that if they wished into the town, there was need of haste, otherwise it would be that, being shut out, they would remain outside. But as he himself, at a quickened pace, was tending toward the town, another fellow accompanies him, who was likewise hastening all the faster, because he was held anxious lest, the gates being closed, entry into the city would not stand open to him. He hails the butcher going before, asking that he wait for him, and that, together, he would give him the opportunity of entering the town.

Illi autem respicienti occurrunt verba, quibus antea cum illis in furea usus fuisset. Credens hunc quoque ex eis unum esse, et quanto alius clamore, tanto ille magis fuga contendit. Tantusque metus atque timor eum invasit, ut relicto bove, manante pre angustia sudore vir semivivus in oppidum venerit.

But as he looked back, the words occurred to him with which before he had used with them on the gallows. Believing this one also to be one of them, and the more the other with clamor, the more he strove in flight. And so great fear and terror invaded him that, leaving the cow behind, with sweat streaming from distress, the man, half-alive, came into the town.

Ludificamur autem sepe vano terrore, ubi nisi obmissa ratione nullum est periculum. Cum enim deus homini ratione in hac vita nichil contulerit prestantius, convenit ut in omnibus rebus nostris agendis ea nobis sit in promptu, quod ipsa veram nobis vite viam prescribit; quam si gradiemur, nunquam aberrabimus, et si quando aberratum sit, ipsa duce verum recuperatur iter.

We are, however, often deluded by vain terror, where, unless reason is set aside, there is no danger. For since God has conferred upon man nothing more excellent than reason in this life, it is fitting that in all our affairs to be managed it be at the ready for us, since it itself prescribes to us the true way of life; which, if we walk, we shall never err, and if ever a deviation has occurred, with it as our guide the true path is recovered.

10. Iohanni de Coburg, magistro insignis schole erfordensis, vini singularis excellentie fuit cadus, cuius animo ad ipsum aditum prohibendi omnia ducibula amputavit, in eius eminentiori loco scribens: «Hic non est ducibulum.» Scholares vero sui de hoc edocti clam in celare vento ac vase a tergo terebrato trahentes vinum illicque scripsere: «Hic est ducibolum.» Ipso vero magistro semel in quorundam hospitum suorum convivio per ipsum prebito exeunte iubet sibi de vino eius cadi afferre. Quod ubi per famulum frustra in vacuo vase attemptatum fuit, refert magistro. Magister rei indignitate commotus, per sese vas aggressus vinum ducere nititur.

10. To John of Coburg, master of the distinguished school of Erfurt, there was a cask of wine of singular excellence, and, with the intention of prohibiting access to it, he cut off all taps, inscribing on its most eminent place: “Here there is no tap.” But his students, instructed about this, secretly, in hiding, drawing the wine by means of “wind” (suction) and a vessel bored from the back, wrote there: “Here is a tap.” Now once, when the master himself, at a banquet of certain of his guests, as the supply furnished by himself was running out, ordered some of the wine from that cask to be brought to him, when this had been attempted in vain by a servant at the empty vessel, he reports to the master. The master, moved by the indignity of the matter, set upon the vessel himself and tries to draw the wine.

Quod ubi pariter incassum fuit, cepit ipse vas intentius perspicere, quoad apparuit et ducibolum et scriptura, index loci vini trahendi.

When this likewise had proved fruitless, he himself began to inspect the vessel more intently, until both the ducibolum (tap) and the inscription appeared, the index of the place for drawing the wine.

Contigit autem frequenter nescio quo fato, quod hee res, quæ adeo apud nos caritate pollent, quod earum usu interdictum esse volumus, brevi ex nostra solent excidere et in eorum venire potestatem, quorum nos vite in primis pertesum, quibus quoque vita nostra invisa fuit, qui proinde eis nedum uti, verum etiam abuti solent. Inconsulte igitur agunt, quibus simul auri argentive, scilicet frumenti et vini copia domi existit, ipsi vero se fame macerant, inscii cuius gratia, nisi forsan ut eo lautior agat heres, quom heredum non minus, quam nostris fatis nullus certus existat terminus. Ipse quoque heres qui sit, incertum est.

It has, moreover, frequently happened, I know not by what fate, that these things which among us are so potent in charity (affection)—so that we wish their use to be interdicted—are wont shortly to slip from our possession and to come into the power of those whose life we have been especially weary, and to whom our life also has been hateful; who accordingly are accustomed not only to use them, but even to abuse them. Inconsiderately, therefore, do they act, for whom at the same time there exists at home a supply of gold and silver—namely of grain and of wine—while they themselves macerate themselves with hunger, unaware for what sake, unless perhaps so that the heir may live the more sumptuous life by it; since for heirs no fixed term exists any more than for our fates. The heir himself, who he may be, is uncertain as well.

11. Monachus quidam monasterii sancte Genoeve inclite urbis parisiensis animum attollebat ad abbatis sui successionem, et quia plures alii in eodera erant cenobio, sibi tum virtute tum scientia vel pares vel superiores, alia arte opus esse censuit. Cepit igitur sese omnino gerero summisse, parco sumptu, omnibus blandus, nemini contrarius esse. Ministris quoque inter alias epulas pisces grandiores afferentibus renuere, asserens sibi minimos potiores.

11. A certain monk of the monastery of Saint Geneviève of the illustrious city of Paris was lifting his mind—aspiring—to the succession of his abbot; and because there were several others in the same monastery who were to him in both virtue and science either equals or superiors, he judged that there was need of another art. Therefore he began to conduct himself altogether humbly, with sparing outlay, amiable to all, opposed to no one. And when the servers, among other dishes, brought in larger fish, he refused them, asserting that for himself the smallest were preferable.

Istac arte non solum cenobitarum, sed aliorum etiam hominum ad se converterat animum. Abbate igitur nature concedente, is omnium consensu abbas creatur. Coqui vero ceterique dispensatores aliquamdiu nihilo lauciores, quam antea, epulas ministrant, quoad ille indignabundus quesivit, quid se fastidirent; num scirent, cum fortuna eciam fercula mutanda.

By that artifice he had turned toward himself the mind not only of the cenobites, but even of other men besides. The abbot, therefore, yielding to nature, he is by the consensus of all created abbot. The cooks, however, and the other dispensers for some time minister the feasts by no means more sumptuous than before, until he, indignant, asked why they were disdaining him; whether they knew that, along with fortune, the dishes too must be changed.

Tum territis reliquis coquis, quod hoc genus hominum ligua plerumque esset solet licentiore, ait, se antea mores suos sat habuisse exploratos, qui semper et minus extructas mensas et viliores pisciculos nobilioribus anteposuisset; quibus ille, eos minus, quam par sit, sapere, quippe qui magnos illos cum minusculis inescasset, nunc, ubi magni pisces capti sint, eis utendum esse.

Then, with the remaining cooks terrified—because this sort of men’s tongue is for the most part wont to be more licentious—he said that he had previously had his own habits sufficiently explored, he who had always preferred both less heaped-up tables and cheaper little fishes to the more noble ones; to whom he added that they were less wise than is proper, since they had baited the great ones with the tiny ones: now, when the great fishes have been caught, they must be used.

Res autem humane ita se habent, ut qui animum suum ad honorem tendunt, secum etiam constituant, nullum temnere laborem. Virtus quidem sudore nanciscitur estque gustus eius primo acerbus. Sed ubi labore superatur, omni dulcedine respersa est et, veluti terra, nunquam sine fœnore reddit, quod accepit.

Human affairs are thus: those who tend their mind toward honor also determine with themselves to contemn no labor. Virtue indeed is acquired by sweat, and its gust at first is acerbic. But when that is overcome by toil, it is sprinkled with every sweetness and, just like the earth, never returns what it received without interest.

12. Ruricola quidam ex oppido Zabern Alsatie, ab urbe Argentina millibus passuum viginti, tria forsan satis amena pira in urbem Argentinam venditum pergit. Ipsis itaque pro foro positis, cuius quidam preteriens famulo pira emendi dat negotium. Dicto precio rusticus famulo magnitudinem precii aspernanti risui fuit.

12. A certain rustic from the town of Zabern in Alsatia, 20 miles from the city of Argentina, proceeds into the city of Argentina to sell perhaps three quite pleasant pears. With the pears themselves therefore set out right in the marketplace, there a certain passer-by gives his servant the business of buying the pears. The price having been stated, the rustic was a laugh to the servant, who, spurning the magnitude of the price, mocked him.

Ille indignabundus mox vinum deglutivit. Quo domino renunciato, famulus statim remittitur. Rusticus autem reliqua duo non minoris, quam antea tria, venditurus in primo perseverat pretio.

He, indignant, soon gulped down the wine. With this reported to the master, the servant is immediately sent back. But the rustic, intending to sell the remaining two for no less than the three before, perseveres in the first price.

Famulus contra nititur, hec magis indigna ratus, quoad ruricola denuo commotus alterum pariter absumpsit. Tum famulus accelerans ad herum rem narrat, unum tamen restare prium; quod si velit, festinato opus esse, alioquin etiam mox rustici gula periturum. Ita numerato pro uno tantum, quantum pro tribus solvendum erat peccunie, vilissimo apetitui obtemperatum est.

The servant, on the other hand, strives against it, judging these things the more unworthy, until the country-dweller, again stirred, likewise swallowed another. Then the servant, hastening to the master, relates the matter: that one pear still remains; that, if he wants it, there is need of haste, otherwise it too will soon perish in the rustic’s gullet. Thus, with as much money counted out for one as ought to be paid for three, obedience was rendered to the vilest appetite.

Quorum autem appetitus eo provehitur, ut, quicquid oculis concipiant, continuo suo ventri voveant exorbiendum, hy simul et se et suos rebus avitis exutos in miseriarum baratrum precipites agunt, simul imposita per ipsos rebus venalibus lege iniqua eciam alios, quorum usus, non gula, res hasce postulat, eandem pati cogunt. Laudantur igitur, qui ad hoc quod condicionem vite sue non ignorant, etiam et pondus saculi sui et census sui honorem exploratum habent.

But those whose appetite is carried so far that whatever they conceive with their eyes they straightway vow to their own belly to be gulped down, these men at once drive both themselves and their own, stripped of ancestral goods, headlong into the pit of miseries; at the same time, by an iniquitous law imposed through them upon saleable goods, they likewise compel others—whose use, not gluttony, demands these items—to suffer the same. They are therefore praised who, to the extent that they are not ignorant of the condition of their life, also have ascertained both the weight of their purse and the honor of their census (means).

13. Civis quidam treverensis nocte in edibus suis fure experto mox se cum omni familia levans furem per totam domum conquirit. Fur autem iam in extrema constitutus necessitate furto oneratus, cum iam proxime domini domus erat, quanta potest maxima voce exelamat: «Fuge! fuge!

13. A certain citizen of Trier, at night, having discovered a thief in his house, soon, rising with all his household, searches for the thief through the whole house. But the thief, now placed in utmost necessity, laden with the theft, when he was now very near to the master of the house, cries out with the loudest voice he can: «Flee! flee!

dyabolus sum.» Qua voce omnes, qui aderant, una cum patre familie adeo terrebantur, quod ipse fur facile impune cum ipso furto evaserit.

I am the devil.» At this cry all who were present, together with the paterfamilias, were so terrified that the thief himself easily escaped unpunished with the theft.

Fortis autem viri est, non illico vanum horrere clamorem, cum quorundam hominum sic ferat consuetudo, quod parum moribus suis a demonibus discidant, ut proinde aliis terrori sint. Ubi autem senserint contra se niti et insaniæ suæ locum non esse, sed penam, tum per metum mussant et ne os quidem hiscere audent.

It is the part of a brave man not straightway to shudder at a vain clamor, since the custom of certain men is such that they differ little in their mores from demons, so that consequently they are a terror to others. But when they perceive that people set themselves against them and that there is no place for their insanity, but a penalty, then for fear they mutter and do not dare even to open their mouth.

14. Quidam ex finibus Hassie veniens in urbem Erfordiam casu aromatum preteriit apothecam, ex cuius odore sibi insueto corruit fere exanimis. Accurrunt homines tollendi rustici gratia atque varia ex apotheca, quod ad manus erat, aromatum genera apponunt. Ille vero non solum nihilo magis se attollit, verum continuo moribundus dilabitur, donec quidam arrepto bubulo fimo narium tenus ponit.

14. A certain man, coming from the borders of Hesse into the city Erfurt, by chance passed by an apothecary’s shop of aromatics, from whose unaccustomed odor he collapsed almost lifeless. Men run up for the sake of lifting the rustic, and from the apothecary they apply various kinds of aromatics, whatever was at hand. But he not only does not raise himself any the more, rather straightway, moribund, he slips away, until someone, having snatched up bovine dung, puts it up to his nostrils.

Tum ille primum levat oculos in cælum amissamque fere vitam recuperat.

Then he for the first time lifts his eyes to heaven and recovers his life, nearly lost.

Cognoscat igitur suam quisque naturam et sese intra eius fines contineat! Cum nusquam nos celerius adoriatur periculum, quam si quando rebus nos insuetis credentes vel crapula vel alia eius generis re in naturam nostram delinquimus. Sint igitur sua et principibus et rusticis fercula!

Let each person, then, know his own nature and keep himself within its bounds! Since nowhere does danger assail us more swiftly than when, trusting ourselves to unaccustomed things—whether crapulence or another thing of that kind—we transgress against our nature. Therefore let there be their own dishes both for princes and for rustics!

15. Alberthus de Rechberg, prepositus monasterii Ellwangen, Georio Bavarie duci aliquot canes venaticos ex domo mittit. Princeps autem, ubi nuncius coram de dono retulit, inter cetera bonorum canum iudicia etiam, si vocibus clari essent, quesivit. Cui nuncius mox ex obrupto, se id nescire, minime tam enhesitare, quin canes isti in monasterio Elwangen pro templi cantoribus retenti fuissent, si de suarum vocum dulcedine apud dominum suum prepositum compertum extitisset; ipsum tamen principem illud facile experiri posse; nam si singulos in aures morderet, fore, ut clamantes ipsos audiret et uniuscuiusque vocem internosceret.

15. Alberthus of Rechberg, provost of the monastery of Ellwangen, sends to George, Duke of Bavaria, several hunting dogs from the house. The prince, however, when the messenger reported in person about the gift, among other criteria of good dogs also inquired whether they were clear in their voices. To which the messenger at once, off the cuff, said that he did not know that, and would by no means hesitate to assert that those dogs would have been kept in the monastery of Elwangen as the temple’s cantors, if the sweetness of their voices had been ascertained by his lord the provost; yet the prince himself could easily test that: for if he were to bite each one on the ears, it would come to pass that he would hear them shouting and would distinguish each one’s voice.

Pro qua facecia dominus dux nuncium magnifice donatum donum remittit.

For this witticism the lord duke sends the messenger back to give the gift magnificently.

Sunt autem huiusmodi sales grati a mimis et hystrionibus, quorum munus hoc est; viro autem gravi et honesto indigni, nisi si quando hoc tempus postulare visum sit. Quod quilibet sapiens pro temporum qualitate discernere poterit.

Such witticisms are welcome from mimes and histrions, whose office this is; but for a grave and honorable man they are unworthy, unless perhaps at some time it has seemed that the occasion demands it. Which any wise man will be able to discern according to the quality of the times.

16. Est in dyocesi curiensi villa Superior-Vatz. Cum illis ac tota eius terra finitima lites habuit quondam Iohannes de Rechberg. Et ut homo fuit magni animi, aliquando sub mercatoris, tum sub monachi fratrum minorum caseos colligendo habitu, singula speculandi gratia, per terram illam errabat.

16. There is in the diocese of Chur a village, Superior‑Vatz. With them and with all its neighboring land, one John of Rechberg once had disputes. And, as he was a man of great spirit, sometimes under the guise of a merchant, then under that of a monk of the Friars Minor, under the pretext of collecting cheeses, for the sake of spying out the particulars, he wandered through that land.

Discedens vero litteris aut aliquo alio iuditio, sese istic fuisse, eos reddebat certiores, eis pro caseis, quos sibi tam liberaliter obtulissent, gratias agens. Quibus potissimum rebus in furorem concitati incole eius terre sevire ceperunt, secum statuentes, ipsum Iohannem de Rechberg haud amplius, si venisset, impune evasurum. Accidit autem, monachum quendam fratrum minorum per hasce terras a scolis papiensibus domum versus proficisci.

Departing, however, he would, by letters or by some other notice, make them more certain that he had been there, giving thanks to them for the cheeses which they had so liberally offered him. By these deeds especially the inhabitants of that land, incited into fury, began to rage, resolving among themselves that John of Rechberg himself, if he should come, would no longer escape with impunity. It happened, moreover, that a certain monk of the Friars Minor set out through these lands homeward from the Pavian schools.

Quem ubi id loci Vatz attigit, villani coniecturam facientes, Iohannem de Rechberg esse ipsos iterum iturus deceptum, mox manciparunt. Is negabat, tum patriam suam, tum scholas, unde venerat, quis et quod hys non esset, quem ipsi dicerent, in testes afferendo. Quibus omnibus neglectis iussere, divino officio hostiam laudis mitteret.

When he reached Vatz at that place, the villagers, making a conjecture that he was John of Rechberg and that he was going to deceive them again, at once seized him. He denied it, adducing as witnesses both his own homeland and the schools whence he had come, showing who and what he was, that he was not the one whom they said. All these things disregarded, they ordered that at the divine office he should offer the sacrifice of praise.

In quo peragendo si tritus appareret, fore, ut eum innocentem mitterent. Eo autem titubante ac contremiscente pre metu, quod hora forsan quarta, declinante iam sole, potius ludendi, quam littandi tempus esset, tumultuantes promiscue omnes eum reum decernunt. Nec longius morati illum bonum monachum in preparatum ignem coniectum concremarunt.

In the performing of this, if he should appear seasoned, it would be that they would send him away as innocent. But as he faltered and trembled from fear—because at perhaps the fourth hour, with the sun now declining, it was a time rather for play than for litanies—the tumultuous crowd, all indiscriminately, declare him guilty. And, not lingering longer, they cast that good monk into the prepared fire and cremated him.

Qui sic patriam letus repetendi gratia sensit in vita nostra nihil fore certi, nec ullam nos unquam a sevis fortune telis innocenciam tutari posse, quin pro more suo in nos sevire valeat, et propositam nostram voluntatem in id, quod maxime exhorrescimus, commutare, quippe qui penas, quas alium debere creditum est, indignissime perpendit.

He, thus glad for the sake of returning to his fatherland, perceived that in our life nothing would be certain, nor that we can ever protect any innocence from the savage darts of Fortune, but that, according to her custom, she can rage against us, and change our settled will into that which we most shudder at—since Fortune most unjustly weighs out the penalties which were believed to be owed by another.

17. Preterea in eadem villa Vatz pestis epidimie acrius cepit sevire, adeo quod ipsi rustici decrevere fere omnes, deserere locum et se alio conferre. Erat autem eis sacerdos satis doctus, qui eos pro templo docens suasit, fidi et constantes inter se essent, nec et se et sua desererent, sed spem suam in deum ponerent, quo duce citius, ac putassent, a peste liberi evaderent. Cuius consiliis cum aliquandiu obtemperassent et ipsa pestis ne dum non desineret, verum continuo auctior fieret, tandem egre patientes inter se varia in sacerdotem serunt crimina, asserentes, eum in suis consiliis lucri sui habuisse rationem, cui res sua peccuniaria in dies exinde abundantior fieret, ipsorumque interitus sibi emolumento esset.

17. Moreover, in that same village of Vatz the pest of the epidemic began to rage more sharply, to such a degree that the rustics themselves, almost all, resolved to desert the place and betake themselves elsewhere. Now they had a priest sufficiently learned, who, teaching them as from the pulpit, persuaded them to be faithful and constant among themselves, and not to abandon both themselves and their goods, but to place their hope in God, with whom as leader they would escape free from the pest sooner than they had supposed. When for some time they had obeyed his counsels, and the pest itself not only did not cease, but indeed was continually becoming more intense, at length, bearing it ill, they spread among themselves various charges against the priest, asserting that in his counsels he had had regard to his own profit, whereby his pecuniary estate would from then on day by day become more abundant, and that their destruction would be to his emolument.

Ineuntes igitur mutuo incondita consilia, statuere, sese antequam omnes sepeliret, ultum ire, et casu venientem in prius ordinatum sepulchrum vi precipitavere et continuo misere clamantem et nequicquam se excusantem umum terra obruerunt.

Entering therefore into mutually ill‑considered counsels, they resolved, before he should bury all, to take vengeance; and, as he came by chance into the previously ordained sepulcher, they hurled him down into it by force, and immediately, while he was piteously crying out and excusing himself in vain, they covered him with earth.

Caveant igitur sibi fideles et iusti homines in impertiendis suis consiliis potissimum et tyrannos et temerarios stultos. Si enim res ex sententia consultoris processerit, nihil mereris. Contra vero et damnum et iniurias feres nulla vel innocentie vel fidelitatis tue habita ratione.

Let faithful and just men therefore beware, for their own sake, in imparting their counsels, especially of both tyrants and temerarious fools. For if the matter has proceeded according to the sentence of the counselor, you merit nothing. Conversely, you will bear both damage and injuries, with no regard had either to your innocence or to your fidelity.

18. In oppido Enndingen, unde mihi origo est, duxit civis quidam natu grandior virginem annorum sedecim, forma sane luculentam.Is vero quandam pre se ferebat sanctimoniam, qua fretus nocte prima cum sponsa in palestram Veneris iturus docet virginem, ea haud unquam licere, nisi prius deo oratione dominica, que incipit «Pater noster» per eos supplicatum sit, ratus, tum coniugem pro etate sua vel in bonum vel in malum facile flecti posse. Consuetudini itaque huic dies aliquot senex intentus, demum tamen exhaustus et orare et ludere cum uxore aliquamdiu missum facit. De quo uxor primo ammirabatur, maxime cum antea se erga eam tam eius cupidum exhibuisset, ac si nunquam eius satiari potuisset, oblivionem forte in causa esse credens, statuit monitione opus esse.

18. In the town of Enndingen, whence my origin is, a certain citizen, older by birth, took to wife a maiden of sixteen years, truly brilliant in form. He, indeed, bore before himself a certain sanctimony; relying on this, on the first night, about to go with his bride into the palestra of Venus, he instructs the maiden that that is never permitted unless first to God, with the Lord’s Prayer, which begins “Pater noster,” supplication has been made by them—thinking then that a wife, given her age, could be easily bent either to good or to ill. Intent, therefore, upon this custom for several days, the old man at length, however, exhausted, lets both the praying and the sport with his wife go for a while. At this the wife at first marveled, especially since previously he had shown himself so desirous toward her, as if he could never be sated of her; believing forgetfulness perhaps to be the cause, she resolved that a monition was needful.

Senem igitur et osculis et complexu aggressa rogat, quando iterum una orandum sit, sic, quod manifeste petere subverebatur, religionis simulacione postulando.

Therefore, having approached the old man with kisses and with an embrace, she asks when they might again pray together—thus, by petitioning under the semblance of religion for that which she was shy to ask openly.

Consulant igitur valitudini sue, opus est, quibus nove socie sunt sponse, nec primo temere appetitui, qui nos plerumque seducit, assentiant. Mulier enim licet primo virum exhorrescere videatur timida quasi columba, tamen ubi et sibi blandiri et secum ludere assuefacta fuerit, id autem per impotentiam nostram successu temporis desitum sit, venit in mentem, te te alteri credidisse, et aut te sibi quavis arte reparare nititur aut animum suum quoque a te avertit.

Therefore let them consult their health, those for whom brides are new companions, and let them not at first rashly assent to appetite, which for the most part seduces us. For although a woman at the outset may seem to shrink from the man, timid as a dove, yet when she has grown accustomed both to be blandished and to sport with him, and when that has, through our impotence, with the passage of time been discontinued, it comes to her mind that you have entrusted yourself to another; and she either strives by any art to recover you to herself, or she too turns her spirit away from you.

19. Fuit in oppido Butzbach, ab urbe Frankfordia viginti millibus passuum, virgo extreme pulchra, cuius amore captus adolescens quidam nullum erga eam dies noctuque proci officium omisit, usque dum puella redamore superata se conveniendi et tempus et locum statuit.Ipsis vero in brachiorum suorum complexu simul constitutis sibique amanti pro appetitu suo agendi cum amica potestate facta, cepit ipse continua ducere suspiria nec, ut id loci postulat, hylarem se et letum exhibebat. Sollicite autem ac causam eius tristicie querenti amice respondet, sibi non integrum esse eius ex sua in eam libidine potiundi, quod forte ex se gravida paritura sibi foret prolem, quam haud sine grandi sumptu quiret tollere, rogitans virginem, pace sua sibi liceret abire. Quod audiens virgo tulit indigne, quippe que tam venusta honorem suum posthabuisset amanti, ei sui copiam factura, is vero modicum rei sue peccuniarie iacturam sibi anteponeret.

19. There was in the town of Butzbach, 20 miles from the city of Frankfurt, an exceedingly beautiful maiden, with whose love a certain adolescent, captivated, omitted no suitor’s office toward her day and night, until the girl, overcome by requited love, set both a time and a place for meeting him.Ipsis, however, when they stood together in the embrace of his arms, and when power had been given to himself, the lover, to act with his amica according to his appetite, he began to draw continual sighs and did not display himself, as the place required, cheerful and glad. But to his girlfriend, anxiously asking the cause of his sadness, he replies that it was not open to him to possess her in accordance with his lust toward her, because she, made pregnant by him, might perchance be about to bear progeny for him, which he could not rear without great expense, begging the virgin that, with her leave, it might be permitted him to depart. Hearing this, the maiden took it indignantly—for she, so winsome, had set her honor after her lover’s by making him a grant of herself—while he preferred to himself a small loss of his pecuniary property.

Hasce igitur iniurias ultum ire statuit. Et quia sub tenebris erat, arrepta manu adolescentis, simulando eum foras domum eius ducturam fore, perventoque ad edium usque gradus, longius non morata ipsum violenter per gradus precipitem egit, qui fere exanimis vix tandem recollectus facile expertus est, cum Venere parsimoniam gratiam non inire.

Therefore she decided to go avenge these injuries. And because it was under darkness, having seized the hand of the adolescent, pretending that she was going to lead him out of his house, and when they had come up to the very steps of the house, not delaying longer, she violently drove him headlong down the steps, who, almost lifeless, at length scarcely having recovered himself, easily found out that, with Venus, parsimony does not enter into grace.

Qui igitur libidine captus in alicuius muliercule amorem prolapsus est, inconsulte agit, si palam fieri patitur, quod quanpiam rem aliam amica pluris faciat, precipue qui se adhuc fidei eius permittit. Mulier enim amans egre patitur sibi quicquam anteferri ab amante. Quod simul atque secum fieri sentit, in furorem concitata ultionem petit, cuius tamen ne modum quidem statuit.

Therefore, he who, seized by libido, has slipped into the love of some little woman, acts incautiously if he allows it to become public that he prizes some other thing more than his amica, especially he who still entrusts himself to her fidelity. For a loving woman hardly endures that anything be set before herself by her lover. As soon as she perceives this being done with respect to herself, incited into fury she seeks vengeance, and she sets not even a limit to it.

20. Haud multum dissentit ab illo, de quoaiunt, fuisse in civitate curiensi adolescentem, qui virginem quandam perdite amavit. Evicta igitur virgo precibus tandem adolescentis in prestituto per ipsos convenere loco, penu quodam, ubi quoque poma reposita erant. Quo cum venissent, adolescens pomis comedendis animum suum tantum intendebat, omni cura puelle potiunde postposita.

20. It does not differ much from that, about which they say, that in the Curian city there was an adolescent who loved a certain virgin desperately. Therefore the virgin, overcome at length by the adolescent’s prayers, met in the place appointed by themselves, a certain pantry, where fruits also had been laid away. When they had come there, the adolescent fixed his mind only on eating the apples, with every concern for possessing the girl set aside.

Quo puella exasperata invehendo in eum asseruit, si ipsum tanto pomorum appetitu fuisse affectum habuisset compertum, nihilo fuisse opus quod tantum anima excruciaretur, quando multo citius voti sui potuisset fieri compos. Quo dicto, ipso solo relicto, clausis post se foribus, insalutato hospite abiit, cui etiam post integrum deinde diem primum abeundi ius fuit.

At this the girl, exasperated, inveighing against him, asserted that, if she had found out that he was affected with so great an appetite for apples, there had been no need that her soul be so excruciated, since he could have been made possessor of his wish much more quickly. Having said this, leaving him there alone, with the doors closed behind her, she departed without saluting the host; and he only after an entire day thereafter first had the right to depart.

Sunt autem iniquissime sortis, quibus mulierum affectis amore nequicquam earum fit copia; mulier enim aut forma, qua libidinem excitavit, aut muneribus ad amorem perlicitur, quorum alterum te viribus, alterum vero rebus familiaribus exhaurit. Est quoque ipsa utriusque insaciabilis. Quo etiam fit, ut luxurie intemperantia in primis in senibus sit odiosa, nam cum et venustate et viribus vacant, dare coguntur, quo proximos suos, ad quos bonorum successio spectat, rebus suis avitis spoliant.

They are, however, of most inequitable fortune, those for whom, although affected by love of women, any access to them is in vain; for a woman is allured to love either by beauty, by which libido has been excited, or by gifts, of which the former exhausts you in your powers, the latter indeed in your household resources. She herself is insatiable of both. Hence also it comes about that the intemperance of luxury is especially odious in old men, for since they lack both comeliness and strength, they are compelled to give, whereby they despoil their nearest kin, to whom the succession of their goods looks, of their ancestral possessions.

21. Adolescentes quidam germanilegum discendarum gratia Papiam petierant. Cum autem illic magistri principis Mediolani stipendio doceant, hysque alios mercede antecedat, apud quem maior scholarium est frequentia, solent aliquando magistri ipsis novellis scholaribus proinde blandiri et bene polliceri, si eos ad se perlicere possent. Cepit igitur eosdem magister quidam comiter atque benigne appellare, addens, si quando rem suam vel Cerere vel Bacho vel eciam ere iuvare posset, ipsis se fore presto.

21. Certain adolescents had sought Pavia for the sake of learning the Germanic laws. But since there the masters teach on the stipend of the prince of Milan, and he outstrips others in pay at whose place there is a greater frequency of scholars, the masters are wont sometimes to flatter those same new scholars accordingly and to make fair promises, if they could entice them to themselves. Accordingly a certain master began to address those same men courteously and benignly, adding that, if ever he could help their affair either with Ceres or with Bacchus or even with bronze (cash), he would be ready at hand for them.

Germani autem verbis doctoris pro more patrie sue habentes fidem, demum ubi per nunciorum intermissiones egere ceptum est, ineunt rationem iam dudum pollicite opis ab ipso doctore potiunde ipsumque doctorem adeuntes promissum ab se iam dudum auxilium expetunt. Ille continuo rem trahere, nunc illa, nunc alia afferre impedimenta. Credens tandem illos tedio sese insequendi fatigatos desistere.

The Germans, however, putting faith in the doctor’s words according to the custom of their fatherland, at length, when through interruptions of the messengers they began to be in want, enter upon a plan for obtaining from the doctor himself the help long since promised, and, approaching the doctor himself, they demand the aid long ago promised by him. He straightway drags out the matter, now bringing forward these, now other impediments, believing at last that they, wearied by the tedium of pursuing him, would desist.

Quod ubi frustra fuit, coactus tandem mentem suam erga eos edere, arguit, illos homines minus civiles atque humanos esse, qui verborum honoris forent inscii; sese quidem sepenumero erga alios hisce verbis usum et sibi tamen nihil minus fuisse cordi, quod hic sermo frequens sue patrie hominibus esset.

When this proved in vain, compelled at last to disclose his mind toward them, he charged that they were men less civil and humane, who were ignorant of the honor of words; that he indeed had very often used these words toward others, and yet that it had been nothing at all at his heart, because this manner of speech was frequent among the men of his homeland.

Nihil autem est quod tam dedeceat homini, quam vanitas. Que cum sibi perfidia adulacionis ac sinistra delatione proponit allicere vel excitare favorem, in aliorum erumpit perniciem. Est quoque turpe, cum solis verbis posthabita ratione ceteris animantibus prestamus, eis abuti et in tanta versari levitate, ut omnis oratio nostra sit inanis et nullius ponderis.

Nothing, moreover, so disgraces a man as vanity. Which, when by the perfidy of adulation and sinister delation it proposes to allure or excite favor for itself, bursts forth into the ruin of others. It is also base, since by words alone, reason having been set after, we excel the other living creatures, to abuse them and to move in such levity that all our speech is empty and of no weight.

22. Consuetudo inveterata in plerisque locis patrie nostre habet, mactatis porcis, cum necessariis farcimina dividere, cuius ductu certi villani ville cuiusdam non longe ab oppido Memmingen inter se vicissim farcimina partiri pro tempore consuevere, solo quodam dempto paupere, cui mactanti porcum nulla suppetebat facultas, cuius etiam in parciendis farciminibus nulla quoque penes alios occurrebat memoria. Que cum ipse pauper aliquando cum animo suo reputasset, sui ipsius miserebatur. Statuit tamen experiri, hecne inter alios avaricie an amicicie beneficia essent, et vix tenello pro rebus suis parato porco eum ante alios in singulos suos vicinos partitus est.

22. An inveterate custom in many places of our fatherland holds that, when the pigs have been slaughtered, the sausages are divided along with the necessaries; under the lead of which custom certain peasants of a certain village not far from the town of Memmingen were accustomed in turn, for the season, to share the sausages among themselves, with one poor man excepted, for whom no means were available to slaughter a pig, and for whom also, in the setting aside of sausages, no remembrance occurred among the others. When this the poor man had at some time considered with himself, he pitied himself. He resolved, however, to test whether these were among the others benefits of avarice or of friendship, and, with difficulty, a very tender pig prepared according to his means, before the others he distributed it, one apiece, to each of his neighbors.

A quibus tum omnibus eo anno accepit partem, insequenti vero anno ydem porcum unum a parvulis enutrivit. Quem ut vicini continuo in oculis eorum videre versantem, rati, pauperem ipsum simul atque supra facturum, temporibus farciminum dividendorum nemo eum preteriit. Pauper autem porcum suum mactare usque differt, dum sacrum quadragesimale adest ieiunium, quo lege Chrysti carnis usus interdictus est.

From all of them then in that year he received a share; but in the following year the same man reared one pig from a very small piglet. As the neighbors saw it constantly before their eyes, thinking that the poor man would likewise do as above, at the times for sausages to be divided no one passed him by. The poor man, however, puts off slaughtering his pig right up until the sacred Quadragesimal fast arrives, during which by the law of Christ the use of flesh is interdicted.

Tum a divisione mactati porci facile liberatus alios vana spe detentos decepit.

Then, easily freed from the division of the slaughtered pig, he deceived the others detained by vain hope.

Est autem nusquam animus hominum ad benemerendum propensior, quam ubi cumulate questum vel sperant vel acceperunt, quod in bonis gratitudo dici potest, in malis vero et ambitiosis fœnus vel auctio. Bene igitur sancteque vivitur, si beneficiorum in nos collatorum memores abiecto proprio commodo semper gratitudinem in promptu habebimus, si iusticie et pietati intenti societatis meminerimus humane et ei saltem probo et honesto viro potissimum saffragamur, cuius necessitas proclivius poscit opem.

Moreover, nowhere is the mind of men more inclined to well-deserving than where, in heaps, they either hope for or have received gain; which among the good can be called gratitude, but among the wicked and ambitious, usury or augmentation. Therefore one lives well and holily, if, mindful of the benefactions conferred upon us, with private advantage cast aside, we shall always have gratitude at the ready; if, intent on justice and piety, we remember human society, and at least bestow our suffrage especially upon the upright and honorable man, whose necessity more readily calls for aid.

23. Bugg Strobel, scurra apprime festivo, quondam in Nicolai Gundelfinger, vicarii Hainrici antistitis constantiensis, edibus constituto venit quidam rusticus, quem ipse superbe appellans interrogatum fecit de negotio suo. Rusticus autem ratus ipsum Bugg dominum fore domus, quippe qui splendido erat amictu et pignem sesquipedem pre se gerebat ventrem, quo non difficile cognitu erat, ipsum haud fabis Pythagore vesci solere, prodit causam suam, quod sacerdoti violentas attulisset manus, eius gratia ab eo petens veniam, tanquam eius dyocesis summum sacerdotium gerente. Cui Strobel augendo primo peccati atrocitatem, rem indignam eum patrasse asserit, potissimum si non discrecionem parcium corporis sacerdotis habuisset; proinde necesse foret, sibi enodaret, in qua corporis parte sacerdotem lesisset.

23. Bugg Strobel, a buffoon supremely festive, when once he was stationed in the house of Nicholas Gundelfinger, vicar of Henry, bishop of Constance, there came a certain rustic, whom he, addressing haughtily, caused to be questioned about his business. The rustic, however, thinking that this Bugg was the master of the house, inasmuch as he was in splendid attire and bore before him a foot-and-a-half paunch, from which it was not difficult to recognize that he was by no means wont to feed on Pythagoras’s beans, sets forth his case: that he had laid violent hands upon a priest, requesting pardon from him for this, as though he were holding the supreme priesthood of that diocese. To him Strobel, first by enlarging the atrocity of the sin, asserts that he had perpetrated an unworthy deed, especially if he had not had a discrimination of the parts of the priest’s body; therefore it would be necessary that he explain to him in which part of the body he had injured the priest.

Referenti autem rustico, quod in capite, «Heu», inquit Strobel, «quam tetra in te heret culpa! Consultius quidem fuisset, si cruribus tenus eum cedisses, quod usque eo virtus consecrationis non pervagatur.» Iubet tamen, mane redeat longe ante lucem, nec desinat pulsare fores, donec sibi presentia sui fiat, ad hoc famulorum accusans et pigriciam et superbiam, qui fastidirent pauperes et oculis eorum vino somnoque oneratis lente mane surgerent, cum sibi nullum tempus ad audiendos homines accomodatius esset. Mane autem cum iam vix tercia adesset vigilia et cum adhuc omnis homo somno et quieti est intentus, adest ad ianuam vicarii rusticus importunis continuisque suis pulsationibus.

When the peasant reported, however, that it was on the head, «Alas», said Strobel, «how foul a fault clings to you! It would indeed have been more advisedly done if you had beaten him only up to the legs, for the virtue of consecration does not extend so far.» Yet he orders him to return in the morning long before daybreak, and not to cease to knock at the doors until an audience with him is granted, adding to this an accusation of both the sloth and the pride of the servants, who disdain the poor and, their eyes burdened with wine and sleep, rise slowly in the morning, whereas for himself no time was more accommodating for hearing people. In the morning, however, when scarcely the third watch had now arrived, and while still every man is intent on sleep and repose, the peasant is at the vicar’s door with his importunate and continuous knockings.

Mota ira, non tam domino, quam relique familie domus, nihil execracionis in eum omisso. Addite etiam mine, nisi cesset, haud defore quin pugnis adeo cedatur, ut vix sibi vires abeundi suppetant. Ille non minus instat, fretus pro opinione sua domini iussu, ex quo sibi satis famulorum comperta esset pigritia, opus sibi esse domino eius convento, nec se prius abiturum fore, nisi ad eum introductus sit.

Anger was moved, not so much in the master as in the rest of the household of the house, with no execration against him omitted. Menaces were added as well: unless he ceased, it would by no means be lacking but that he be so beaten with fists that scarcely would the strength to depart suffice him. He, however, presses no less, relying—according to his supposition—on the master’s order, since the sloth of the servants had been sufficiently discovered to him, that he had need for the master to be convened, nor would he depart before he had been introduced to him.

Temeritate autem rustici ad dominum relata vocatoque ipso facile ex verbis eius cognitu fuit, eum tum persona tum persuasionibus Bugg Strobel ludificatum fuisse. Cognito errore rusticus abiit; ipso autem accedente luce redeunte sensit sibi elusionem huiusmodi non fuisse damno.

However, when the rustic’s temerity had been reported to the lord and he himself had been summoned, it was easy to ascertain from his words that he had been made sport of both by the person and by the persuasions of Bugg Strobel. The error recognized, the rustic departed; and as the very light, returning, drew on, he realized that an elusion of this sort had not been to his detriment.

Sunt autem huiusmodi scurre in principum domibus frequentes, quorum gratia, quod satis expedite sunt assentacionis, et splendido vestiuntur amictu et delicatis utentes epulis inflatas gerunt buccas. Nec quicquam est tam accomodatum ad decipiendos nostre etatis homines, quam si quibus est bene fultum corpus in candida veste. Iuvat tamen ad hoc, si nostra ligua sapientiam de nobis profitemur ac de nobis ipsis noverimus grandia loqui.

But buffoons of this sort are frequent in the houses of princes, who enjoy favor because they are quite expeditious at assentation, and they are clothed in splendid attire and, enjoying delicate banquets, they carry puffed cheeks. Nor is anything so accommodated to deceiving the men of our age as when someone has a well‑padded body in a white garment. It helps, however, toward this, if with our tongue we profess wisdom about ourselves and know how to speak grand things about our very selves.

Si semper adversarii damnamus causam, nostram vero nusquam refellimus, tum maxime nobis habetur fides crediturque. Ego vero huius consilia potiora duco, cui satius est, quod alii, quam quod ipse de se predicet, qui equum et rectum sibi ante animum constituit eiusque vim tum ad nostram, tum adversam partem metitur, qui non rumores ponit ante salutem, nec incognita pro cognitis habet, sed ad omnem indagandam veritatem tempus adhibet et diligentiam.

If we always condemn the adversary’s cause, while nowhere refuting our own, then most of all credit is had in us and we are believed. But I for my part judge the counsels of that man preferable, to whom it is more satisfactory that what others proclaim about him be said, rather than what he himself predicates about himself; who has set before his mind what is equitable and right, and measures its force both on our side and on the adverse side; who does not place rumors before safety, nor hold unknowns as known, but applies time and diligence to investigating every truth.

24. Iohannes de Wildenstain, abbas monasterii sancti Marci Augie maioris, ad religionem et sanctimoniam monachorum suorum animum suum adiecit, ut devote et suplicando et cantando ad Cristi laudes intenti essent. Quod ipse (ut par erat) precipue faciendo aliis exemplo erat. Ceterum si qui forent, quos non ipsa virtus perliceret, eos pene formidine ad bonum arcebat.

24. John of Wildenstein, abbot of the monastery of Saint Mark of Augia Maior, directed his mind to the religion and sanctity of his monks, so that, devoutly, both by supplicating and by singing, they might be intent upon the praises of Christ. This he himself (as was fitting), by doing it especially, was to others an example. Moreover, if there were any whom virtue itself did not allure, he constrained them to the good by the dread of penalty.

Sanxit igitur, quotienscumque aliquis ex suis monachis semel tempore peragendarum suplicacionum a templo abesset, ei in eum diem vino interdictum esset. Qua pena etiam in alios delinquentes servos uti solebat. Accidit autem, monachum unum semel ab ecclesia abesse.

He therefore sanctioned that, whenever any one of his monks were absent from the church at the time for the supplications to be performed, wine would be interdicted to him for that day. He was also accustomed to employ this penalty upon other delinquent servants. It happened, however, that one monk was once absent from the church.

Quo die coquus mane nimio cantu dominum abbatem orantem impediens deliquerat; ubi autem tempus prandendi aderat, coquus accedens ad tabulam craterem suum vidit inversum. Erat enim hoc signum a vino vacare debentium. Prospiciens autem lacius reperit eciam cratherem unius monachi in eundem modum positum.

On that day the cook, in the morning, by excessive chant impeding the lord abbot at prayer, had transgressed; but when the time for luncheon was at hand, the cook, approaching the table, saw his goblet turned upside down. For this was the sign of those who were to be free from wine. Looking around more broadly, he also found the goblet of one monk placed in the same way.

A quo cum percontatus esset causam, in conspectum prodiens domini, quod hoc genus hominum sitim inique patitur, querit, quid commeruerit, quod sibi vino carendum esset. Cui abbas, quod mane, ipso suplicationem ad deum peragente, suo cantu eum aberrare coegerit. Coquo vero ulterius querente, quid monachus admississet, cui pariter vinum non partiretur, respondit abbas, quod non cantasset pro templo.

After he had asked him the reason, coming forth into the lord’s presence he complains that this kind of men endures thirst iniquitously, and asks what he had merited, that he must go without wine. To him the abbot said that in the morning, while he himself was performing supplication to God, by his chant he had compelled him to wander. But when the cook further inquired what the monk had committed, to whom likewise the wine was not being portioned, the abbot replied that he had not chanted for the temple.

Ad que coquus: «Et quis sic legis tue vitabit penas, cum ei, qui cantat, non secus atque, qui temperat a cantu, vino carendum sit?»

To this the cook: «And who thus will avoid the penalties of your law, since he who sings, no less than he who refrains from song, must go without wine?»

Neutiquam autem conveniunt in psallendo deo debitas persolvere laudes et cantando lascivas cantilenas homines ad luxuriam intemperantiamque allicere. Est igitur in omnibus rebus modus et certa meta, quam sive vicerimus sive citra resederimus, peccatum conflamus. Nam sicut abunde callidi et astuti, aut qui ingenio ieiuno sunt et tardo, sapientes, sic quoque qui tantam pre se gerunt rigiditatem, ut eos humane condicionis oblivio capiat adeoque nullum elemencie locum penes se paciantur et qui semper presto sunt ad inferendam iniuriam, iusti dici non possunt; nec quoque, qui omnia audet, perinde ac, qui omnia timet, vir fortis est.

By no means, however, do paying out the due praises to God by psalm‑singing and, by singing lascivious cantilenas, luring men to luxury and intemperance, agree together. Therefore, in all things there is a measure and a fixed goal, which, whether we have surpassed or have halted short of, we incur sin. For just as those who are excessively clever and astute, or who are of a meager and slow wit, are not wise, so also those who display such rigidity that oblivion of the human condition seizes them, and to such a degree that they permit no place for clemency with themselves, and those who are always ready to inflict injury, cannot be called just; nor, likewise, is he who dares everything, any more than he who fears everything, a man of courage.

Habet quoque suos ipsa temperantia fines, ne dum vetitam vitet voluptatem, nimia integritate vilitatem contrahet.

Temperance itself also has its own limits, lest, while it shuns forbidden pleasure, by excessive integrity it incur vileness.

25. Marquardus de Emps, miles auratus, quondam magistrum civium oppidi Lindow in arcem suam Emps fecerat invitatum. Habito autem convivio bene lauto miles hospiti, ut eo liberalius haberi videretur, singula castri penetralia videre potestatem facit. Vento autem in quoddam armarium, ubi varia et cultrorum et ensium reposita erant genera, miles, ut etiam maiorem hospitis captaret benivolentiam, eligendi cultri, quem vellet, hospiti optionem fecit.

25. Marquard of Emps, a knight of the golden spur, had once invited the magistrate of the town of Lindow into his fortress Emps. And after a banquet well and lavishly held, the knight, so as to appear all the more liberal, gave his guest leave to see each of the castle’s inner sanctums. But on coming into a certain armory, where various kinds both of knives and of swords had been stored, the knight, in order to capture even greater goodwill of the guest, gave the guest the option of choosing a knife, whichever he wished.

Is autem primo honestatis gratia renuere, quod eius merita eo non accederent; miles vero magis instare et usque precibus fatigare, dum hospes cultrum unum pre aliis opera nobilitatum eligit. Tum miles: «Bene est», inquit. «Sit tuus iste cultellus, hac tamen lege, quod non minus in hoc suo hereat loco!

He, however, at first refused for the sake of propriety, because his merits did not reach to that; but the knight pressed the more and wearied him incessantly with entreaties, until the guest chose one knife before the others, ennobled by its workmanship. Then the knight: «Good», he says. «Let that little knife be yours, yet on this condition, that it shall no less remain fixed in this its place!»

Et si quos inantea introduxero, te cultelli huius fore dominum cerciores reddam.»

And if ever hereafter I introduce anyone, I will make them more certain that you are the owner of this little knife.»

Est autem ad conservandam humanam societatem in primis liberalitas accomodata, dum infra suum conservata fuerit lumen, hoc est, si largitio nostra nec nobis nostrisque nec his, quibus largimur, damno est, si non ab ostentatione, sed a mera proficiscitur voluntate, si dignis, si virtutis, non vanitatis, gratia, et si memminerimus eorum, qui in primis bene meruere de nobis, ut eis potissimum gratificemur, dum tamen non humani obliviscimur commercii, quod nobis est cum unicuique honesto homini, quibus, prout cuiusque poscit necessitas, pro viribus opitulemur.

Moreover, liberality is in the first place accommodated to preserving human society, provided it be kept within its own light—that is, if our largess is to the detriment neither of ourselves and our own nor of those to whom we bestow; if it proceeds not from ostentation but from mere will; if it is for the worthy, for the sake of virtue and not of vanity; and if we remember those who have in the first rank deserved well of us, that we may gratify them most of all; while yet we do not forget the human commerce which we have with each and every honorable man, to whom, as each one’s necessity demands, we lend aid according to our powers.

26. In oppido Ennk Saxonie adolescens quidam non bene prudens mulieris cuiusdam deperibat amore, cuius tamen nec conveniendi nec videndi sibi copia erat. Tabescere autem sibi in dies animus cupidine. Cuius furorem leniri sperabat, si eam videndi semel sibi modo potestas fieret.

26. In the town of Ennk in Saxony, a certain adolescent, not very prudent, was perishing with love for a certain woman, yet he had no opportunity either of meeting or of seeing her. His spirit, moreover, was wasting away day by day with desire. He hoped that the fury of it would be allayed, if only the power of seeing her might be granted to him just once.

Inter pretereundum autem domum amate iniit consilium, ibidem vehementi clamore flagrantem supra omnia tecta ignem verbis ad hoc accomodatis publice obnunciare. Quo sic peracto subito ingens exoritur pavor et clamor. Omnibus hominibus in valvas edium irrumpentibus gratia ignem expergiscendi, ipsa quoque eius amica per fenestras prospexit.

However, as he was passing by the house of his beloved, he entered upon a plan: there, with vehement clamor, to publicly announce, with words accommodated to this purpose, that a fire blazing above all the roofs was aflame. When this had thus been carried through, suddenly a vast fear and clamor arose. As all the people were bursting into the doorways of the houses for the sake of rousing because of the fire, his lady-friend herself also looked out through the windows.

Qua visa mox stultus ille affatur singulos, iam iam flammam extinctam esse.

With this seen, soon that fool addresses each one, that now, now the flame has been extinguished.

Sunt autem nonnulli homines, qui dum ipsi potiantur optato, nullius pensi faciunt, quamvis alios affici molestia, quippe qui nullum sibi cum aliis hominibus ducunt commercium, sed omnes suos sensus solis sibi vel diviciis acquirendis vel voluptatibus intendunt. Qui dum suo inserviunt commodo, in maxima incidunt turpia facinora, ambicionem, furtum, predam, furorem et alia huiusmodi, quibus nedum vel se ipsos vel proximos suos, sed precipua queque imperia, labefactant.

There are, moreover, some men who, while they themselves obtain the desired thing, make no account of anything, although others are afflicted with distress, inasmuch as they reckon that they have no commerce with other men, but direct all their senses to themselves alone, either to acquiring riches or to pleasures. These, while they serve their own convenience, fall into the greatest shameful crimes—ambition, theft, prey/plunder, frenzy, and other things of this kind—by which they shake, not to say either themselves or their neighbors, but even each of the principal empires.

27. Ferunt, dum superioribus annis oppidum tuum Herrenberg fere totum igne absumeretur, fuisse cuidam civi illic filium non tanta sapientia, quanta sui vellent, preditum, ymmo stolidum. Qui inter ardendum et maximum ignis furorem consideravit, que potissimum edes alias igne anteirent. Et comperto, quod genitoris sui edes cunctas Vulcano excederent, illud singulos ambiendo cum quodam animi sui tripudio cunctis enodavit, ydem fore credens, et adversitatibus et rebus prosperis alios anteire.

27. They report that, while in previous years your town Herrenberg was almost entirely consumed by fire, there was there to a certain citizen a son endowed not with as much wisdom as his own would wish—nay rather, stolid. During the burning and the utmost fury of the fire, he observed which houses especially were outstripping the others in the blaze; and, having found that his father’s house surpassed all in being handed over to Vulcan, he made this plain to everyone, going around to individuals with a certain jubilation of spirit, believing the same thing: to outstrip others both in adversities and in prosperous affairs.

Est autem sapientis, adversas res perinde modesto et forti ferre animo atque secundas. Nam cum homines sumus, complecti animo, quid humana et lex et condicio iubeat, par est, que vitam nostram nullis fortune telis eximit, sed monet nos nihil admirari, cum acciderit, nihil, antequam evenerit, non evenire posse, arbitrari. Convenit igitur, rebus prosperis nos gerere sumisse et ad queque pericula excipienda quasi presentia presto esse, adversis vero rebus bene sperare et considerare malam valitudinem, exilium, egestatem, persequutiones iniquorum et alia eiusmodi nobis nec primo, nec solis, nec quicquam humane nature indignum accidisse.

It is, moreover, the mark of a wise man to bear adverse things with a modest and brave spirit just as he bears prosperous ones. For since we are human, it is fitting to embrace in mind what human law and condition enjoin, which exempt our life from no missiles of Fortune, but admonish us to admire nothing when it has happened, and to suppose that nothing, before it has occurred, is unable to occur. It is fitting, therefore, in prosperous affairs to conduct ourselves submissively, and to be at the ready for each and every peril to be met as if present; but in adverse affairs to hope well, and to consider that ill‑health, exile, indigence, persecutions by the unjust, and other things of that sort have befallen us neither for the first time, nor us alone, nor as anything unworthy of human nature.

28. In villa Meils, ab urbe curiensi millibus passuum quinque, fuit mulier quedam, que, licet nupta fuerat marito, contempta tamen matrimonii lege etiam aliis viris in Venere morem gerebat. Quod etsi maritus egre paciebatur, ne tamen primo crudelius de uxore videretur consulere, a debita pena abstinuit et, quod sibi consultius videbatur, rem ad socerum defert. Socer vero, tametsi filiam noverat culpe obnoxiam, ut tamen genero dolorem et filie penam levaret, ad consultationem animum intendit, asserendo, rem istam in filia minus dolendam, que, dum genitricem suam imitaret, hec admitteret, deposituram tamen eam fore tempore, quippe cuius mater etiam talia agere in iuventa solita fuisset, sexagennariam tamen abstinuisse; sic procul dubio filiam facturam, ubi sexagesimum inacta sit annum.

28. In the villa Meils, five miles from the city of Curia, there was a certain woman who, although she had been wed to a husband, yet, the law of matrimony scorned, was comporting herself with other men in Venus’s manner. Although the husband bore this ill, nevertheless, so that he might not at the outset seem to decide more cruelly concerning his wife, he abstained from the due penalty and, as seemed more advisable to him, reported the matter to the father-in-law. The father-in-law, indeed, although he knew his daughter liable to fault, yet, in order to lighten the son-in-law’s pain and the daughter’s penalty, set his mind to deliberation, asserting that this matter in the daughter should be less lamented, since, while imitating her mother, she was admitting these things; that she would, however, put it aside in time, for her mother too had been accustomed to do such things in youth, yet as a sixty-year-old had abstained; thus, without doubt, the daughter would do likewise, when she should have reached her sixtieth year.

Viciorum autem infelicissimus omnium castigator est tempus, quod, dum vel mortem vel aliquam aliam malam valitudinem affert, peccandi tollit vires, quo fit, ut tu non vicia, sed ipsa te vitia deserere cogantur. Boni autem dei amore, qui vera est virtus, non mortis seu alterius cuiusvis pene formidine, et peccata et peccatores exhorrescunt.

But the most ill-fated chastiser of vices is time, which, while it brings either death or some other grievous ill-health, takes away the strength for sinning; whence it comes about that it is not you who abandon the vices, but the vices themselves are compelled to abandon you. But out of love for the good God, which is true virtue, not from fear of death or of any other penalty whatsoever, one shrinks from both sins and sinners.

29. Cum annis superioribus episcopatus constanciensis in magno versaretur discrimine, inclitus noster Otto, antistes nunc constanciensis, tum electus, singula sua oppida, homines dicioni sue subiectos sibi iureiurando obstricturus peragravit, ducens una Werlinum, stultum suum. Fatuus autem inter equitandum e via fatigatus, dira execratione balbuciens in principem quondam Hermannum, proximum antecedentem episcopum, fertur fuisse usus, asserendo, eum inique sensisse in locandis episcopatus oppidis, quod ea tam longo abinvicem spatio constitui curasset, quod si omnes urbes, oppida vicique simul site essent, homines plures fatigationes in eis adeundis vitare posse.

29. When in former years the episcopate of Constance was involved in great peril, our renowned Otto, now prelate of Constance, then elected, traversed each of his towns, intending to bind by oath to himself the men subject to his dominion, leading along with him Werlin, his fool. But the fool, while riding, wearied by the road, is reported to have used a dire execration, stammering against one Prince Hermann, the bishop immediately preceding, asserting that he had thought unjustly in the locating of the episcopate’s towns, because he had taken care that they be constituted at so long a distance from one another; whereas, if all the cities, towns, and vici were situated together, men could avoid many fatigations in going to them.

Est autem stulticie proprium, ad id tantum, quod adest et quod est præsens, tantum, quantum sensu percipit, incumbere, nulla preteritorum futurorumque habita ratione; nam cum ipsi stulti rationem aliquando uti vel nolunt vel nesciunt memoria quoque expertes existunt, neque preteritorum habere poterunt scientiam neque futurorum premeditacionem. Quo fit, ut tantum voluptatis avidi, laboris vero et animi et corporis impacientes existant.

It is moreover the proper characteristic of stupidity to fix itself only on that which is at hand and present, only so far as it perceives by sense, taking no account of things past or future; for since fools themselves at times either are unwilling or do not know how to use reason, they also prove to be devoid of memory, and thus can have neither knowledge of past things nor premeditation of future things. Whence it comes about that they are avid only for pleasure, but impatient of labor, both of mind and of body.

30. Fuit pistor quidam urbis Argentine, cui licet uxor esset satis lepida, famulam tamen domus deperibat. Quem ubi famula neque precibus neque minis reprimere posset, rem pandit uxori, cum qua racionem iniit, virum decipiendi, quod famula ipsi iterum eam sollicitanti et diem et locum se conveniendi prestitueret. Quo sub tenebris, cum uxor concessisset, venit pistor letabundus ipsaque uxore semel sub famule specie potitus est.

30. There was a baker of the city of Strasbourg, who, although his wife was quite charming, nevertheless was pining for the household maid. When the maid could restrain him neither by prayers nor by threats, she revealed the matter to the wife, with whom she entered into a plan for deceiving the husband: namely, that when he again solicited her, the maid would appoint for him both a day and a place for meeting. To which, under cover of darkness—when the wife had consented—the baker came rejoicing, and once, under the guise of the maid, he enjoyed his very wife.

Quo facto cepit eam blande affari et tum comitate, tum forme prestantia supra omnes alias mulieres, nedum uxorem suam, extollere, ingens constituens precium, ut uxor sua eo et comitate et forma accederet. Cum autem nec laudis nec precii modum faceret, mulier impaciens silencii «Tandem bene est», inquit; «hac hora, vir, omnia tibi ad vota respondent. Ego enim sum coniunx tua tam et lepida et venusta, quam petis.

With this done he began to address her blandly, and to extol her both for comity and for the pre-eminence of her form above all other women, not to mention his own wife, setting an enormous price that his wife might approach her in both comity and form. But when he set no measure either to the praise or to the price, the woman, impatient of the silence, said, «At last, it is well; at this hour, husband, all things answer to your wishes. For I am your consort, as charming and as lovely as you seek.»

Cuius tibi preter insignem impensam, dum voles, copia fieri poterit.

Of whom, for you, apart from a remarkable expense, a supply may be made available as long as you wish.

Res igitur in primis fallax est voluptas, que nulla ratione, nulla certa scientia, sed inani quadam oppinione ducitur. Decepti enim aliquando vel oculorum vel aurium ac etiam palati dubio iuditio nobis in rem quampiam constituimus gaudium. Quam dum petimus, si ex errore in aliam incidimus eaque pro illa quam tam avide appetere visi sumus, potimur fungimurque.

Therefore, in the first place, pleasure is a fallacious thing, which is guided by no reason, by no certain science, but by a kind of empty opinion. For, deceived at times either by the eyes or by the ears and even by the palate, with doubtful judgment we set for ourselves joy in some thing. And while we seek it, if by error we fall upon another, we obtain and enjoy that one in place of the one which we seemed so avidly to appetite.

Per hoc voluptas nostra, usque dum in eo versamur errore, nihil aufertur. Non enim refert, quantum ad voluptatem sive aquam sive vinum biberis, dum tamen tecum, quod bibis, vini vim sorcietur. Si igitur voluptas res esset vera, firma, stabilis, propter se ipsam expetenda, nequaquam nos in tantos errores precipitaret cogeretque tantum ab animo nostro aberrare, ut vel sensuum vel rationis expertes essemus.

Through this, our pleasure, so long as we are engaged in that error, loses nothing. For, as regards pleasure, it makes no difference whether you drink water or wine, provided that what you drink, for you, is endowed with the potency of wine. If therefore pleasure were a true, firm, stable thing, to be sought for its own sake, it would by no means precipitate us into such great errors and compel us to stray so far from our mind as to be bereft either of senses or of reason.

Quin immo ad virtutes incumbamus, ubi nihil fallax, nihil fucatum, sed ipso sole omnia illustriora existunt.

Nay rather, let us apply ourselves to the virtues, where nothing is fallacious, nothing fucate, but by the sun itself all things stand forth more illustrious.

31. In villa Aigoltingen, decem millibus passuum ab urbe Constantia, solvebantur viro cuidam nobili exequie, cuius gratia etiam ex aliis finitimis locis sacerdotes illic confluebant, quorum unus in libro missali eius templi non satis tritus in ara constitutus cepit misse introitum iterum atque iterum passim per librum conquirere. Cum autem diucius quesisset, desperatus in incerto habebat, cuius potissimum ope in eo uteretur. Edituus vero, qui ad aram sacerdoti minister aderat, licet homo esset rudis et agrestis presbiteri considerans sollicitudinem, corrigiam pro intersigno in librum positam, qua sepe suum sacerdotem usum viderat, indicat.

31. In the villa of Aigoltingen, ten miles from the city of Constance, obsequies were being paid to a certain noble man, for whose sake even from other neighboring places priests were flocking there; one of whom, not sufficiently practiced in the missal-book of that church, stationed at the altar, began to look for the Introit of the Mass again and again, here and there through the book. But when he had searched rather long, despairing, he was at a loss as to by whose help especially he should avail himself in this. The sacristan, however, who was present at the altar attending the priest as a minister, although he was a rude and rustic man, considering the priest’s anxiety, points out the strap placed in the book as a bookmark, which he had often seen his own priest use.

Quo sacerdos mox sollicitudine liberatus quod petiit invenit.

Whereupon the priest, soon released from solicitude, found what he sought.

Vincit autem nonnunquam usus artem, quod consuetudo mutat ingenium et nos vel virtutibus vel sceleribus imbuit. Qui enim in re quapiam in dies quasi a cunabulis versatur, ys, sive illa mala, sive bona existat, haud iniuria peritior aliis in ea re evadit. Heret quoque obtinetque vim suam ipsa consuetudo potissimum in tenera etate.

Yet sometimes practice conquers art, because custom changes disposition and imbues us either with virtues or with crimes. For he who, day by day, as if from the cradle, is engaged in some matter—whether that be evil or good—not unjustly becomes more experienced than others in that matter. Custom too clings and maintains its force, especially in tender age.

Que dum adhuc mollis, est facile institutioni, que deinde consuetudines et ex consuetudine naturam parit, vel ad bonum, vel ad malum flectitur. Et qui a teneris annis a parentibus suis edoctus consuevit recte facere, hic procul dubio difficilius a vero honestoque avocatur, quam qui furtum, predam, rapinam, stuprum assuefactus est vel videre vel agere.

Which, while still soft, is easy for instruction; which thereafter begets customs, and from custom a nature, and is bent either to good or to evil. And he who from tender years, taught by his parents, has been accustomed to do rightly is, without doubt, drawn away from the true and the honorable with greater difficulty than one who has been habituated to theft, booty, rapine, debauchery, either to see or to do.

32. Fuisse ferunt non multis preteritis annis scurram quendam, cui nomen fuit Hammannus Faber, qui rusticum unum pro fore Constantie lignorum vendendi gratia constitutum adivit. Quem ubi benigne salvere iussit, consanguineum nuncupavit. Cum vero simplex ruricola huiusce et salutationem et assercionem primo ioci loco haberet, alius vero forcius eum sibi propinquum esse persuasioni inniteretur, tum vicinos, tum alios etiam propinquos propriis nominibus appellando, nam ea antea a quodam, cui ipse rusticus notus erat, didicerat, ac etiam predium, quod ipse coleret, describendo, demum persuasum ad prandium invitat.

32. They report that not many years ago there was a certain buffoon, whose name was Hammannus Faber, who approached a certain peasant set up at the forum of Constance for the sake of selling wood. When he had kindly bade him be well, he declared him a consanguine, a kinsman. But when the simple countryman at first took both this greeting and assertion as a joke, while the other, relying on persuasion, more forcefully maintained that he was his relative—then, by calling both his neighbors and other relatives by their proper names (for he had learned these beforehand from a certain person to whom the peasant himself was known), and even by describing the holding which he farmed—at length, once he had been persuaded, he invites him to luncheon.

Venditis igitur lignis precio longe vilissimo festinantium more Hammannus ante omnia balneolum quoddam eis pro singulari solacio ordinatum intrandum esse disserit, ut ad potandum aptiores fierent, ut interim tempus prandii lautioris parandi superesset. Habebat autem scriba publicus urbis in edibus suis balneolum privatum, in quod illa die matronas primates urbis invitarat. Illic Hammannus cum ruricola festinans contendit.

Accordingly, the wood having been sold at a price by far the most paltry, after the fashion of people in a hurry, Hammannus, before everything, declares that a certain little bath, arranged for them as a singular solace, must be entered, so that they might become more apt for drinking, and so that meanwhile time might remain for preparing a more sumptuous luncheon. Now the city’s public scribe had in his own house a private little bath, into which on that day he had invited the leading matrons of the city. Thither Hammannus, hastening with the rustic, made his way.

Quo cum ventum est, rustico aliis vestibus nudato asserit Hammannus, femorale eius fœde olere sibi, ut abiecto femorali balneolum intret persuadet, ipso Hammanno ante omnia taliter faciente. Destituto igitur ruricola bracca sua, ipsum antecedentem disbraccatum in multarum honestarum matronarum conventum ante se in balneolum trusit, foribus balneoli, ne rustico fugendi potestas esset, ocius ab extra occlusis. Mulieribus autem magnum clamorem edentibus accurritur a tota familia domus.

When they had come there, with the rustic stripped of his other garments, Hammannus asserts that his breeches smell foul to him, and he persuades him, with the breeches cast aside, to enter the little bath—Hammannus himself before all doing thus. Therefore, the countryman being deprived of his breeches, he thrust him, going before him unbreeched, into the assembly of many honorable matrons, the doors of the little bath quickly closed from outside so that the rustic might not have the power of fleeing. But as the women were uttering a great clamor, there was a running-together from the whole household of the house.

Ad quas tamen antequam ventum esset, Hammannus aufugit seque mutatis vestibus ocello uno clauso in forum recepit. Ruricola iureiurando affirmante, nullam nisi necis penam ab ipso Hammanno recepturum ire, interrogatus autem viso eo, qui ipsum illuc duxisset, si eum cognosceret, asseruit. Adductus igitur per certos huius facinoris participes ad Hammannum, si is esset, quesivere.

But before they were reached, Hammannus fled and, his garments changed and one eye closed, withdrew into the forum. The rustic, affirming on oath that he would accept no penalty other than the penalty of death from Hammannus himself; and when, on seeing him who had led him thither, he was asked whether he recognized him, he asserted that he did. Therefore, brought by certain participants in this crime to Hammannus, they asked whether he was the man.

Quibus ruricola respondit, hunc non fore, cum ille ambos suos oculos habuisset, hic vero monoculus esset. Sic ipse rusticus, secundum per Hammannum deceptus, confusus urbem exiit.

To these the countryman replied that this was not he, since that man had had both his eyes, but this one was one‑eyed. Thus the rustic himself, deceived a second time by Hammannus, left the city in confusion.

Prudentes autem viros, si quando res nove admirandeque adoriuntur, non illico vel annuunt vel recusant, sed adhibentes deliberationem singulas circumstantias debite, si quod occurrit vel in damno vel incommodo sit, perpendunt, nec quoque repentino adfulgente commodo temere assentiunt, sed diligenter prius prospiciunt, ne sub utilitatis spetie in fraudem incidant, ne leges, ne honestatem, ne virtutes deserant; si vero adverse fuerint res, non illico territi consternantur animo, sed tum considerare incipiunt, si vel pena digni, vel a culpa vacui sint. Quem enim innocentia sua tutatur, hic ab omni metu curaque liber atque securus agit omniaque alia, que sibi preter culpam suam accidunt indigna, spernit atque contemnit.

Prudent men, however, whenever they undertake things new and admirable, do not straightway either assent or refuse, but, bringing deliberation to bear, duly weigh each single circumstance, to see whether what occurs be in loss or in inconvenience; nor do they rashly assent even to a benefit that suddenly flashes forth, but first carefully look ahead, lest under the appearance of utility they fall into fraud, lest they abandon the laws, honor, and the virtues; if, however, matters have been adverse, they are not immediately terrified and confounded in spirit, but then begin to consider whether they are worthy of penalty or free from fault. For the man whom his innocence safeguards is free from every fear and care and secure, and he spurns and contemns as unworthy all other things which, apart from his own fault, befall him.

33. Civi cuidam oppidi Arbon cis lacum Bodamum fuit famulus modice sapiens. Erat autem domino in villa Roschach negocium, mille passus ab oppido Arbon, servo expediendum. Iubet igitur famulum, se paret, postridie villam Roschach petiturus.

33. A certain citizen of the town Arbon, on this side of Lake Bodam, had a household servant of modest wisdom. Now the master had business at the villa Roschach, a thousand paces from the town Arbon, to be expedited by the servant. Therefore he orders the servant to prepare himself, being about on the next day to make for the villa Roschach.

Famulus mane, priusquam illucescerit, se ad Roschach contulit, mox, antequam dominus se e strato levaret, domum redeundo. Experrectus dominus monet servum, mox se expediat ad iter Roschach versus, rei gerende gratia. Cui famulus, se rediisse, respondit.

Early in the morning, before it had grown light, the servant betook himself to Roschach, and soon, before the master lifted himself from his couch, he returned home. The master, having awakened, admonishes the servant to expedite himself at once for a journey toward Roschach, for the sake of conducting the business. To him the servant replied that he had already returned.

Interrogatus autem, quid negocii habuerit, inquit, non aliud, quam quod dominus heri iussisset, se pararet ad Roschach; itaque se ante lucem profectum et mox rediisse.

When asked, moreover, what business he had had, he said: nothing other than what the master had ordered yesterday—that he prepare himself for Roschach; accordingly he set out before light and soon returned.

Sunt autem quidam homines, qui malunt videri, quam esse, boni, qui nullius pensi faciunt, si opera eorum eis, quibus vel servitio vel beneficio obligantur, vel prosit vel obsit, dum tamen ipsi tempus frustra terendo apareant aliquid fecisse. Hos, si mercenarii sint, ganeones, heluones et nequam, si vero speciem amici necessariique pre se gerere videntur, haud multum vel nihil ab aliis dissidentes et adulatores et assentatores appellabo.

There are, moreover, certain men who prefer to seem rather than to be good, who make no account whether their efforts, for those to whom they are bound either by service or by benefaction, benefit or harm, provided only that they themselves, by wasting time in vain, may appear to have done something. These, if they are mercenaries, I shall call revellers, gluttons, and good-for-nothings; but if they seem to carry before them the appearance of a friend and of a close associate, differing little or nothing from the others, I shall call them flatterers and assenters.

34. Maccellator quidam constanciensis cum semel peccora comparandi gratia civitatem exiisset, in diversorio quodam constitutus monente tempestate mencionem fecit cyrothecarum suarum, asserens iocose, so frigus haud ledere posse, quod cyrothece sue fornace tenus posite essent. Quod audiens ganeo quidam se mox in edes eius recepit sibique sex nummorum libras uxorem tradere ex mandato mariti iussit, quippe qui cyrothece viri eis fornacem site essent uxori pro intersigno afferens. Quod ubi sic esse ab uxore compertum est, ei petitam peccuniam credidit.

34. A certain butcher of Constance, when once he had gone out of the city for the sake of buying cattle, having taken up at a certain inn, as the weather gave warning, made mention of his chirothecae (gloves), asserting jokingly that thus the cold could not at all harm him, because his gloves had been placed by the furnace. Hearing this, a certain tavern-haunter (ganeo) straightway betook himself to his house and ordered the wife, by her husband’s command, to hand over to him six pounds in coin, bringing to the wife as a countersign that the man’s gloves were set by the furnace. When the wife had found that this was so, she entrusted to him the requested money.

Quem abeuntem postea nunquam vel vidit vel novit.

Him, once he had gone away, thereafter she never either saw or knew.

Noscamus igitur omnes liguam nostram domare et semper premeditate circumspectantes, ubi, quando, cum quo, quid et de quo loquamur, ne quaudo verbis nimium indulgentes vel bonorum et maxime primatum aures temere obtundamus, vel in nebulonum turbam incidentes et nos et nostra prodamus. Est quoque ipsa loquacitas per se digna odio, nec taciturnus hominibus unquam tam fuit oneri, quam garrulus. Quo fit, ut sapientes illud semper potius, quam hoc, duxerint.

Let us therefore all learn to tame our tongue and, always premeditating and being circumspect, consider where, when, with whom, what, and about what we speak, lest at some time, indulging too much in words, we either rashly batter the ears of the good, and especially of the chief men, or, falling into a mob of knaves, betray both ourselves and our belongings. Loquacity itself, moreover, is in itself worthy of hatred, nor has a taciturn man ever been as much a burden to people as a chatterer. Whence it comes that the wise have always judged the former rather than the latter.

35. Hainricus Nithart, canonicus ecclesie constanciensis, iuris tum pontificii, tum civilis nostri evi apprime peritus habitus, cum sibi alias ad cetera sua ecclesiastica benefitia etiam ecclesia oppidi ulmensis esset addita, habebat ipse rerum suarum ab urbe Constantia ad Ulmam aurigam. Qui constitutus in edibus ipsius Hainrici Constantie edendorum pomorum adeo incontinens erat, ut nulla in cacabis fornacis stube domino domus tuta pre se essent. Erat autem administrator domus Heinricus Piscatoris, canonicus ecclesie sancti Iohannis constanciensis, vir certe perhumanus, qui, indigne ferens gulam rustici in absumendis pomis, ipsum rusticum ulcisci secum statuit.

35. Heinrich Nithart, a canon of the church of Constance, regarded as most expert in law both pontifical and civil of our age, when, in addition to his other ecclesiastical benefices, there had also been added to him the church of the town of Ulm, had for his affairs a coachman from the city of Constance to Ulm. Stationed in the house of Heinrich himself at Constance, he was so incontinent for eating-apples that nothing in the kettles of the stove-room furnace belonging to the master of the house was safe from him. Now the administrator of the house was Heinrich Piscator, a canon of the church of Saint John of Constance, a truly very humane man, who, taking ill the rustic’s gullet in consuming the apples, resolved with himself to avenge himself on the rustic.

Et aliis duobus sumptis pomis, altero eorum aloes referto, ipsa in patulo ut rustico in oculis essent constituit, que quoque, cum iam tempus cubitum eundi adesset, inter abeundum ipse rusticus furtim tulisset, mox deglutivit. Senciens autem aloes, inscius, quid esset rei, mœrere incipit. Tum mox familia domus accedens lamentabili clamavit voce, eum, qui ista tulisset poma, continuo mortem obiturum, nisi ipso statim publicato, ut sibi aliquid opis ferri posset, quod alterum istorum pomorum veneno, murium capiendorum gratia, plenum fuisset.

And, two other apples having been taken, one of them stuffed with aloes, he set them out in the open so that they would be before the rustic’s eyes; which also, when now the time of going to bed was at hand, in the act of leaving the rustic himself had stealthily taken, and soon gulped down. But, feeling the aloes and not knowing what the matter was, he begins to lament. Then straightway the household of the house, drawing near, cried with a lamentable voice that he who had taken those apples would immediately meet death, unless he made himself known at once, so that some help might be brought to him, because one of those apples had been filled with poison, for the purpose of catching mice.

Rustico maior terror incutitur et statim pomum per se consumptum pandit, singulos proferenda sibi cura compellans. Tum primum accessit Heinricus Piscatoris iam ante paratum et bene amplum coclear cum mixto aceto aloes plenum sub tyriace specie afferens, nulle vitande mortis fore curam affirmans, nisi per huiusce fermenti sumptionem. Quod licet rustico primum horridum sumptu esset, avidus tamen vivendi cum magno gemitu ab orientibus lachrimis, cum amaritudine rei victus sepius incepto desisteret, tamen iterum atque iterum aggressus tandem acri voce Heinrici exhortatus totum poculum trepide et pavide hausit.

A greater terror is instilled in the rustic, and straightway he discloses the apple consumed by himself, urging each and every person to bring forward the care to be provided him. Then first approached Heinricus Piscatoris, already beforehand prepared, bringing a well-ample spoon full of mixed vinegar with aloes under the guise of theriac, affirming that there would be no remedy for avoiding death except through the taking of this ferment. Although this was at first horrid in taking to the rustic, yet eager for living, with a great groan and tears arising, although, overcome by the bitterness of the thing, he would often desist from his begun attempt, nevertheless, having gone at it again and again, at last, exhorted by the sharp voice of Heinricus, he drained the whole cup, trembling and afraid.

Qui igitur animum sibi ad queque audenda suppeterre credit, antea secum statuat, quecunque accidere possint presentia, equa ferenda esse mente. Vix quoque vitabit pericula, quem apetitus sic coercet, ut et in Venerem et in gulam ita preceps feratur, ut animi sui compos non sit et ut nihil videatur a natura discrepare ferarum. Est enim nihil, quod hominem cicius sepiusque precipitem agere soleat, atque hec duo, nisi et superbiam et avariciam addere velis.

Therefore, whoever believes that his spirit suffices for daring anything, should first resolve with himself that whatever present things may befall are to be borne with an equal mind. He will hardly avoid dangers, moreover, whom appetite so constrains that he is borne headlong into Venus and into gluttony, so that he is not in control of his own mind and seems to differ in nothing from the nature of beasts. For there is nothing that is wont to drive a man more quickly and more often into precipitancy than these two—unless you wish to add pride and avarice as well.

36. Monialis quedam, ut hoc christiana nostra postulat institutio, quadragesimali tempore sua confitebatur peccata. Peracta autem confessione sacerdos, ut per onus penitentie delicti pena tolleretur, iussit primo, certis diebus iuxta ecclesie ritum ieiunando abstineret a crapula. Quod illa minus comode facere posse asseruit, quippe que capite adeo esset debili, ut nullam abstinentiam ferre posset.

36. A certain monial, as our Christian institution demands this, in Quadragesimal time was confessing her sins. But when the confession had been completed, the priest, so that by the burden of penitence the penalty of the delict might be taken away, first ordered that, on certain days according to the church’s rite, by fasting she should abstain from crapulence. She asserted that she was less able to do that conveniently, since she was so weak in the head that she could bear no abstinence.

Quo audito aliquot supplicationes, quam «Pater noster» vocant, ad deum singulis diebus dicendas indixit. Quod pariter sibi non convenire enodavit, que tot quottidianis septa esset negociis, quod nullis oracionibus intendere posset. Tum ille, elargiret tamen gratia dei certis pauperibus elemosinam.

On hearing this, he appointed that several supplications, which they call the “Our Father,” be said to God each day. She explained that this likewise did not suit her, as she was hemmed in by so many quotidian affairs that she could attend to no prayers. Then he [directed] that, at least, by the grace of God, she should bestow alms upon certain poor persons.

Id quoque fieri non posse, refert monialis, rei familiaris sue tenuitate causante, nec etiam ad imagines sanctorum peregre proficisci posse, sacerdoti petenti propter minus bonam sui corporis valitudinem ait. Indignante vero sacerdote impacienciam mulieris ipsamque propterea corripiente, quesivit mulier, num sibi cordi essent dies festi, si aliquot dies ab omni corpori suo contrario vacaret opere.

That too cannot be done, the nun reports, the tenuity of her household resources being the cause; nor can she even go abroad as a pilgrim to the images of the saints, she says to the priest who is requesting it, because of the less-than-good health of her body. But when the priest, indignant at the woman’s impatience and rebuking her on that account, spoke thus, the woman asked whether feast days were dear to him, if for some days she should refrain from every work contrary to her body.

Errant autem indignum in modum, qui in animum suum inducunt facinora lascivia et voluptate admissa luxu atque gaudio reparari posse, quod morbis plerumque amare et egris contrarie afferuntur medicine, nec quoque huic unquam remittitur noxa, qui inter petendum veniam nihil aliud precatur, quam ut liceat in eum, a quo petit veniam, iterum delinquere, ut iterum liceat insidiari. Aut quam veniam meretur, cui, dum petit, animus est, sibi, quem lesit, nihil pene deberi? si proponit, cum animo ab iniuriis illatis temperare nec velle nec posse?

But they err in an unworthy manner who induce into their mind that crimes committed in lasciviousness and pleasure can be repaired by luxury and joy, since for diseases the medicines that are offered are for the most part bitter and contrary to the sick; nor is guilt ever remitted to the man who, while asking for pardon, prays for nothing else than that it may be permitted him to sin again against the one from whom he asks pardon, that it may again be permitted him to lie in wait. Or what pardon does he merit, who, while he asks, has it in mind that to him whom he has injured almost nothing is owed by himself? if he proposes, in his mind, neither to be willing nor to be able to refrain from the injuries he has inflicted?

Nullam certe. Si igitur Iesum optimum maximum sceleribus nostris offenderimus, que voluptate atque libidine aliisque delictis contraximus, quomodo cum eo in graciam reverteremur, nisi sua lege culpam nostram sacerdoti suo prodamus, nisi nos pena dignos fateamur, nisi criminum cogitatio exasperet mentem nostram, nisi decreverimus, similia inantea admittere nolle? Tum abiicimus voluptatem, tum libidini bellum denunciamus, tum nos ipsi Iesu optimo maximo ita obligamus, ut semper et vitam et corpus et omnia nostra pro ipso devovere presto simus.

None, certainly. If therefore we have offended Jesus, Best and Greatest, by our crimes, which we have contracted through pleasure and libido and other delicts, how would we return into grace with him, unless by his law we disclose our fault to his priest, unless we admit that we are worthy of penalty, unless the cogitation of our crimes exasperates our mind, unless we have decreed to be unwilling henceforth to admit similar things? Then we cast away pleasure, then we declare war on libido, then we bind ourselves to Jesus, Best and Greatest, in such a way that we are always ready to devote both life and body and all our possessions for him.

Quod fieri non poterit, dum luxui, dum lascivie aliquis adhuc nobiscum locus est.

Which cannot be done, so long as there is still with us any room for luxury, so long as there is for lasciviousness.

Propulsabimus igitur ea, si sumisse nos gesserimus, si die noctuque suplices ad deum virtutibus intenti fuerimus, si macerantes corpora nostra, non quod desideramus, sed quod satis est, utimur.

We shall therefore repel them, if we have conducted ourselves as having assumed this, if by day and by night, suppliant before God, we have been intent upon virtues, if, macerating our bodies, we use not what we desire, but what is sufficient.

37. In villa Schenkenberg cis oppidum Engen, ab urbe Constantia viginti millibus passuum, Hainrico Menin, presbytero, populum in die festo pro templo edocente intervenit ex improviso Iohannes Truckenbrot, procurator curie constanciensis. Quem ut vidit sacerdos, perterritus, quod ipsum se novit doctiorem, «Adest», inquit, «nunc alius, me longe peritior, quo presente nec phas, nec tutum est, me dicere quicquam.» Quo dicto mox abiens populo tergum dedit.

37. In the villa Schenkenberg, on this side of the town of Engen, 20 miles from the city Constance, while Hainricus Menin, a presbyter, was instructing the people on a feast day in place of a church, there intervened unexpectedly Johannes Truckenbrot, procurator of the Constance curia. When the priest saw him, terrified—because he knew him to be more learned than himself—he said: “Now there is present another, far more skilled than I, in whose presence it is neither right nor safe for me to say anything.” With this said, he soon departed, turning his back to the people.

Est vero difficile indocto, qui mavult apparere, quam esse, coram doctis disserere. Cum enim verum et falsum, equum et iniquum iudicare nequeunt, ignorantia eorum, que alias inter agrestes sepulta maneret, in lucem prodit. Secus autem cum litteratis, studiosis et doctis viris.

Indeed, it is difficult for the unlearned man, who prefers to appear rather than to be, to discourse before the learned. Since they are unable to judge the true and the false, the equitable and the inequitable, their ignorance—which otherwise would remain buried among rustics—comes forth into the light. It is otherwise, however, with lettered, studious, and learned men.

Cum enim animus eorum nulla ubertate, nulla fecunditate scientiarum saciari possit, gaudent inter doctos versari, ut, si sit in eis error, castigetur; et nec solum a magnis doctissimisque, sed etiam a minimis et semidoctis, dum tamen proficiant, ediscere avent.

Since indeed their mind can be satisfied by no abundance, no fecundity of the sciences, they delight to be among the learned, so that, if there be in them any error, it may be castigated; and they are eager to learn thoroughly not only from the great and most learned, but even from the least and the semi-learned, provided only that they make progress.

38. Primo anno, quo Claram, coniugem meam, duxeram, res mihi familiaris plus satis tenuis erat, quod isti, a quibus bene sperare licebat, me in matrimonio esse egre habebant. Erat autem annus natalis chrystiani octavus et septuagesimus quadringentesimus supra millesimum, etatis vero mee tercius et vicesimus in nundinis urbis Constantie ad festum dedicacionis templi, me quoque, ut solet, necessarii mei visebant, quibus ex virtutum offitio victus administrationem per totas debebam nundinas. Absumptis autem in cena omnibus esculentis surgenti mane non amplius sex denariis eris mihi domi erat.

38. In the first year in which I had taken Clara, my wife, my household estate was more than sufficiently slender, because those from whom it was permitted to hope well took it ill that I was in marriage. Now it was the year 1478 of the Christian nativity, and my age was 23, at the fairs of the city of Constance for the feast of the dedication of the temple; me too, as is customary, my intimates were visiting, to whom, by the office of virtues, I owed the administration of victuals through the whole fair. But with all the esculents consumed at supper, when I rose in the morning there were at home for me no more than six copper denarii.

Quos cum uxor pro emendis carnibus tulisset, sperabam pro veteri consuetudine me a procuratore canonicorum templi in sex denariis donatum iri, et quia hospitibus vinum ponere pro liberalitate mea statueram, eosdem sex denarios pro comparando et vino et pane ordinaram. Ubi autem in chorum templi, locum distribucionis, ventum est, statui me in patulo, ne non visus a procuratore preterirer. Demum cum omnibus datum sit, nec esset quem necessitas plus me vigeret, nec qui avidior expectaret, cessat in me distributio, cunctis aliis letis abeuntibus.

When my wife had carried these for buying meats, I hoped, by old custom, that I would be given six denarii by the procurator of the canons of the temple; and because I had resolved, for my liberality, to set wine before guests, I had assigned those same six denarii for purchasing both wine and bread. But when it was come into the choir of the temple, the place of distribution, I stationed myself in the open, lest, not seen by the procurator, I be passed over. At length, when it had been given to all, and there was no one whom necessity pressed more than me, nor anyone who awaited more avidly, the distribution stops with regard to me, as all the others depart glad.

Ita et discedo et redeo domum vacuis loculis.

Thus I both depart and return home with empty purses.

Non est autem satis cautus, qui fretus spe alterius sacculi sumptum facit, cum plerosque homines tanta rei peccuniarie capiat aviditas, ut omnia peccunie posthabeant. Apud quos turpe non sit, beneficienciam quantumcumque priscam peccunie amore tollere, nec scelus quidem, in conservanda peccunia fœdus, pactum, fidem aut quavis consuetudine et benivolentia contractam amiciciam rumpere et violare. Qui si cum animo suo volverent, quis peccunie usus et cuius causa es, argentum et aurum signatum sit, honestatis sue, non nummi haberent racionem, nec eum in tantum vindicarent libertatem, ut sibi ne tangere quidem eum phas esset, sed eum in suo conservarent ministerio servituti obnoxium, ut eius opera et ipsi et sui aliisque, quorum inopia hoc postularet, quoad cum comodo suo fieri posset, uterentur.

However, he is not cautious enough who, relying on the hope of another’s purse, incurs expense, since such avidity for the pecuniary thing seizes very many men that they postpose all things to money. Among such people it is not shameful to take away beneficence, however ancient, for love of money, nor even a crime, in conserving money, to break and violate a covenant, a pact, faith, or friendship contracted by any custom and benevolence. If they would revolve with their mind what the use of money is and for what cause stamped silver and gold exist, they would take account of their own honesty, not of the coin; nor would they so vindicate freedom for it that it would not even be lawful for them to touch it, but they would keep it in their own service, subject to servitude, so that by its work both they and their own and others, whose need demanded this, might use it, so far as it could be done with their convenience.

39. Scholaris quidam parisiensis mulierem clam in cubiculo suo aliquandiu fovebat. Ipso autem semel ante lucem ad exercitium magistri sui eunte, surrexit mulier et queque secreta cubiculi pro illarum mulierum ingenio indagavit, que vitandi ignis gracia aliquando res sibi commodas secum auferunt. Offendit autem in tenebris ydriolam atramento refertam, quo, ut sibi visum est, rosaceam aquam sapere totum suum corpus linivit.

39. A certain Parisian scholar was secretly harboring a woman in his little room for some time. But once, as he himself was going before daybreak to the exercise of his master, the woman got up and, after the manner of those women, investigated whatever secrets of the chamber there were—who, for the sake of avoiding the fire, sometimes carry off with them things convenient to themselves. However, in the dark she happened upon a little jar filled with ink, and with it—as it seemed to her to be rose-water—she smeared her whole body, to make it savor of rose-water.

Scolaris autem a scholis rediens, ubi illam vidit per totum nigram, primo exanimatus fere horrore adeo, quod fauces sibi vocem negabant, quippe cui venit in mentem, interim permissu dei per demonem aliquem in eam sevitum fuisse. Ipsa quoque mulier considerans stuporem scholaris exterrita est, quod causa horroris ipsius eam fugerat. Uno autem alterum sic aliquandiu intuente exorsa est mulier prior, cur sisteret gradum, cur se non ad eam, ut sepe antea, reponeret.

But the scholar, returning from the schools, when he saw her black all over, at first was almost exanimate with horror, to such a degree that his throat denied him a voice, since it came into his mind that meanwhile, by the permission of God, some demon had raged against her. The woman too, considering the scholar’s stupefaction, was terrified, because the cause of his horror had escaped her. And while the one and the other were thus gazing at each other for some time, the woman was the first to begin, asking why he halted his step, why he did not betake himself to her, as so often before.

Cui scholaris, se maxime ex atro eius aspectu territum, cuius vultus iucundus et amenus in fœdum et deformem, interim quod fuisset in scholis, mutatus fuisset. Tum mulier se ipsam aspiciens facile consideravit, se non rosacea aqua, sed atramento lautam esse, remque scholari ordine pandit, qui reviviscens mox amicam repeciit.

To whom the scholar said that he had been especially terrified by her dark aspect, whose face, jocund and pleasant, had, while he had been at the schools, been changed into something foul and deformed. Then the woman, looking upon herself, readily perceived that she had been washed not with rose-water, but with ink, and she set forth the matter to the scholar in due order; and he, reviving, soon took back his mistress.

Non igitur omnis liquor inservit venustati; proinde rem suam cuique accomodemus, ne re quando utentes illi, quam petimus contraria aliis risui simus, in stultorum numero habiti. Prestitit enim deus homini sensus quinque, quorum ope ratio in rebus gerendis uteretur. Ubi licet suum cuique sensui tribuerit officium, voluit tamen non minus, ut ipsi inter se unus alteri in discernendis rebus iudicandisque auxilio esset, quod nobis fixum et bene destinatum debet esse menti, simul ne unius tantum virtuti innixi credentes reliquis contemptis sensibus sepius ludificemur.

Not, therefore, does every liquid serve beauty; so let us accommodate each thing to its proper use, lest, when using a thing contrary to that which we seek, we be for laughter to others, held in the number of fools. For God has provided man with five senses, by whose aid reason might be employed in conducting affairs. And although He has attributed to each sense its own office, He nonetheless wished no less that they themselves, among themselves, each should be a help to the other in discerning and judging things—something which ought to be fixed and well-determined in our mind—lest at the same time, leaning on the virtue of only one, and the remaining senses despised, we be more often deluded.

40. Cum alias, ut hoc lex nostre religionis fert, ne quis maledicendo vane per deum visceraque eius optima maxima iuraret, publico edicto per urbem Constantiam vetitum esset, acri adiecta pena, Hainricus Oppentzhofer, tum societatis ad Cattum eiusdem urbis minister, lacessitus forsan iniuria, in aliqua verba petulantia incidit. Quod nonnulli audientes, qui ad hoc ipsum forsan provocaverant, mox ad eum lictorem, qui sibi diem coram magistro civium atque senatu admissi delicti causa diceret, ordinarunt, illud tamen magistro civium et toto senatu ignorante. Ubi autem ad pretorium ventum est, ordinatus erat carnifex, qui virgis, quibus in eiusce crimina animadverti solet, continuo in oculis eius versabatur.

40. Since previously—as the law of our religion provides—that no one, by cursing, should vainly swear by God and by his bowels, “Best and Greatest,” had been forbidden by public edict throughout the city of Constance, with a sharp penalty added, Heinrich Oppentzhofer, then steward of the Society at the Cat of the same city, perhaps provoked by an injury, fell into certain petulant words. Which some, hearing—who perhaps had even provoked him to this very thing—straightway appointed against him a lictor, to give him a day to state, before the master of the citizens and the senate, the cause of the offense he had admitted; yet with the master of the citizens and the whole senate unaware of it. But when it came to the praetorium, a headsman had been set, who, with the rods with which crimes of this sort are wont to be punished, was immediately being brandished before his eyes.

Ipse quoque Beghardus cum effigie Cristi quasi consolandi gratia affuit. Ita ille tanta complexus angustia, sollicitudine atque metu, ut penitus in incerto haberet, quonam se modo ex illis expediret, quod aliter non crederet, quam quod virgis publicis per civitatem plectendus esset, et tamen fugendi nec tempus nec locus erat, quem continuo et lictores et carnifex circumsistebant. Ipso autem sic anxio, quando a senatu accersiretur, atque varia cum animo suo volvente, cui nunc se defendere, nunc veniam petere veniebat in mentem, dimittebatur senatus, ipsisque senatoribus domum euntibus comitantur lictores magistrum civium.

The Beghard himself also was present with the effigy of Christ, as if for the sake of consoling. Thus he, encompassed by so great an anguish, solicitude, and fear, that he held it wholly uncertain by what means he might extricate himself from them—since he believed nothing else than that he would be punished with public rods through the city—and yet there was neither time nor place for fleeing, as both the lictors and the executioner were continuously surrounding him. But while he was thus anxious, when he was to be summoned by the senate, and while he was turning over various things with his mind—now it came into his mind to defend himself, now to seek pardon—the senate was dismissed; and as the senators themselves were going home, the lictors accompany the master of the citizens.

Carnifex quoque et Beghardus abibant, isto in pretorio solo relicto. Tum primum ille notavit, se vano metu illusum, hac molestia liberatus etiam letus domum repetit.

The executioner also and the Beghard went away, with him left alone in the praetorium. Then for the first time he noted that he had been deluded by vain fear; freed from this annoyance, he even joyfully returned home.

Maxima autem sepenumero nobis videntur impendere pericula, ex quibus tamen deinde absque oinni offensa vel innocentia nostra vel principium dementia freti emergimus. Contra vero aliquando involvimur negociis, ex causis quas principio tanquam viles et inanes sprevimus et contempsimus, que deinde pedetentim in dies per negligentiam nostram suscipientes vires demum eo usque provehuntur, quod cupientes nec causam deserere, nec eam ad finem usque prosequi aut perducere absque maximo nostro detrimento valemus. Qui igitur sibi cautum velint, principio prospiciant rerum causas et, quid ex quaque nascatur, diligenter perpendant eique continuo consilio et cura assint, ne dum more indulgeant, sese eciam invitos labefactare cogantur.

Very great perils, moreover, very often seem to impend over us, from which nevertheless thereafter we emerge without any offense, relying either on our innocence or on the clemency of the prince. Conversely, at times we are entangled in affairs from causes which at the beginning we spurned and contemned as cheap and empty, which then little by little, day by day, through our negligence, taking on strength, are at last borne forward to such a point that, though we desire it, we are able neither to abandon the matter nor to pursue or carry it through to the end without our very great detriment. Therefore, let those who wish to be secure look ahead from the outset to the causes of things and carefully weigh what is born from each, and attend to it with continuous counsel and care, lest, while they indulge delay, they be compelled, even unwilling, to unsteady themselves.

41. In pago Hegoye, ab urbe Constancia xx millibus passuum, fuit cuidam militi uxor plus satis procax atque proterva adeo, quod ne unquam quidem paci in edibus suis locus esset, que non modo verba sese castigantis mariti, sed ne verbera quidem magni penderat, marito semper occurrens, eum se ex hac pelle nunquam agi posse. Quibus verbis cum sepius mariti aures exasperasset, induxit ille animum experiri, si quando eam pelle sua exuere posset, et ipsam in tabulam unam cordis ligatam cepit pedum tenus excoriare. Que tamen adeo pertinaciter in sua perseveravit sententia, quod usque verba sua revocare renuit, donec maritus pro magna parte cutem eius lesit.

41. In the district of Hegowe, 20 miles from the city of Constance, a certain knight had a wife more than enough saucy and so insolent that there was never even a place for peace in his house; and she set at no great value not only the words of her husband chastising her, but not even beatings, always retorting to her husband that he could never drive her out of this skin. When with these words she had often exasperated her husband’s ears, he made up his mind to try whether he could ever strip her of her skin, and, her bound by cords to a single plank, he began to flay her down to the feet. Yet she persisted so pertinaciously in her opinion that she refused to revoke her words, until the husband had for the greater part lacerated her skin.

Tum primum clamavit, se et hac pelle exutam et marito pro viribus morem gerere semper velle.

Then for the first time she cried out that she was even stripped of this skin, and that she wished always to comply with her husband to the best of her strength.

Sunt enim quidam homines, qui nec minis nec precibus induci possunt, quod id, quod secum statuerint, deserant; quod in bonis laudi et constantie, in malis vero vicio et pertinacie datur. Est quoque illicitum, hominem, qui sui iuris non sit, quitquam patrono suo indignum cogitare et in hoc pertinaciter herere.

For there are certain men who can be induced neither by threats nor by prayers to abandon that which they have determined with themselves; which, in the good, is attributed to praise and constancy, but in the bad to vice and pertinacity. It is likewise illicit for a man who is not his own master to think anything unworthy of his patron and to cling pertinaciously to it.

42. Iohanni Lib, iurisconsulto, causarum quondam curie constanciensis patrono, uxor fuit apprime honesta. Cum aliquando inter socios convivaretur et, ut fecundi calices oracionem augent, quisque quod suam uxorem extimesceret, quod forte serius domum repeteret, mencionem faceret, solitus fuit ille gloriari, se ammirari et incommoda et affectus eorum, qui uxores suas timerent, quod ipse non uxoream seviciem unquam expertus fuisset. Semel vero in cute quadam afficiebatur scabie, ut eius gratia sepius balneum adeundum sit, quod fidelis coniunx egre ferebat, rata forsan, sibi pro vera valitudine recuperanda satius fore, hunc morbum successive auferri, quam sic precipitem agere.

42. John Lib, a jurisconsult, formerly patron of causes at the court of Constance, had a wife most upright. When at times he was banqueting among companions and, as fruitful goblets augment oration, each made mention that he was afraid of his wife, because perchance he might return home rather late, he was wont to boast that he marveled at both the incommodities and the dispositions of those who feared their wives, since he himself had never experienced wifely savagery. Once, however, he was afflicted in his skin with a certain scab, so that on account of it the bath had to be resorted to more often, which the faithful spouse bore with difficulty, reckoning perhaps that, for the sake of true health to be recovered, it would be better that this disease be removed successively than to act so headlong.

Hic vero more impaciens cogitavit, ut se quavis arte velocius curaret, quadam autem vice proficiscenti clam coniuge balneum versus, caligis tamen adhuc amictus, minime balneum petentium more, fit sibi obviam quidam ex contubernalibus suis. A quo sciscitatus, quo graderetur, respondit, quod in balneum. Illo vero ulterius querente, et cur se non antea domi et exuendarum et post balneum item involvendarum caligarum molestia solvisset, cui ille, se huiusmodi balneum coram uxore dissimulare, que ipsum inique pateretur, amictum autem quottidianis suis vestibus difficile iudicatu fore, se in balneo fuisse.

Here indeed, impatient by habit, he conceived that he should cure himself more swiftly by any art whatsoever; and on a certain occasion, as he was setting out, unbeknownst to his wife, toward the bath, yet still clad in his leggings, by no means in the manner of those seeking the bath, there met him a certain one of his companions. Being asked by him whither he was going, he answered: to the bath. But when he pressed further—why he had not beforehand at home freed himself from the annoyance both of leggings to be taken off and, after the bath, likewise to be wound on again—he replied that he dissimulated such a bath before his wife, who would bear it ill, and that, being clothed in his everyday garments, it would be difficult to judge that he had been in the bath.

Per que verba, quod antea iactaret, se uxorem suam non timere, irrisus ab alio seipsum convicit.

By which words, because he had earlier vaunted that he did not fear his wife, he, mocked by the other, convicted himself.

Est autem turpe, virum uxori subditum esse, ad eius vocem contremiscere, si vocat, presto esse, si iubet, obedire, nec aliam causam inquirere, sed pro racione femine voluntatem satis esse. Turpius vero, honestam mulierem scorti loco haberi, fidelitatem suam contumeliis prosequi, sedulitatem eius probro duci ac verba sua nusquam audiri. Sunt enim quedam rei et familiaris et domestice negocia, ubi mulierum ingenia valent, ubi quoque vir mulieri non iniuria audiens sit.

Moreover, it is disgraceful for a man to be subject to his wife, to tremble at her voice if she calls, to be at the ready if she commands, to obey, and to inquire no other cause, but to hold a woman’s will as sufficient in place of reason. More disgraceful indeed, that an honorable woman be held in the place of a harlot, that her fidelity be pursued with insults, that her assiduity be reckoned a reproach, and that her words be nowhere heard. For there are certain affairs both of estate and household where women’s talents prevail, where also it is no injustice that the man be a listener to the woman.

Tum igitur res uxoria bene geritur, cum coniuges equato imperio suo quisque munere fungitur et cum neutrum alteri amore et reverencia concedit.

Then therefore the marital affair is well conducted, when the spouses, with authority equalized, each performs his own office, and when neither yields to the other in love and reverence.

43. Fuere duo cives thuricenses non obscuro loco orti, altero eorum, quippe milite aurato existente, capitales inimici. Qui cum per multa tempora varios fori iudicialis anfractus experti essent, rem suam familiarem pene totam consultorum impensa absumpsere. Quod cum miles prior pensasset, ipso semel in templo divorum Felicis et Regule exorante ac nequicquam deo supplicare attemptante, quod continuo sibi, ut solet, cause sue status ante oculos obversaretur, cepit cum animo suo pacem agitare, et continuo ex templo adversarium in edes suas proprias adiit atque benigne appellari cepit.

43. There were two citizens of Zurich, sprung from no obscure rank, mortal enemies, one of them, namely, being a gilded knight. After they had for many seasons experienced the various windings of the judicial forum, they consumed almost their whole household estate at the expense of counselors. When the knight first weighed this, he himself once, while praying in the temple of the saints Felix and Regula and attempting in vain to supplicate God—because immediately, as is his wont, the state of his cause kept presenting itself before his eyes—began to negotiate peace within his mind; and straightway from the temple he went to his adversary at his own proper house and began to be addressed kindly.

Alio autem egre ferente, aperit ille mentem suam et utriusque errorem, quorum simultas atque lis alio non spectaret, quam ad suam perniciem et aliorum emolumentum, aliorumque exinde pinguescere fortunam, suam vero in dies fieri tenuiorem. Dum enim patroni et iureconsulti eorum redderentur attenti, omnes domi archas inanes fieri. Expediret igitur sibi ipsi consulerent, dum adhuc aliquid rei superesset.

But as the other took it ill, he opened his mind and the error of both, whose rivalry and lawsuit looked to nothing else than to their own ruin and the emolument of others—others’ fortune from this growing fat, while their own was becoming thinner by the day. For while their patrons and jurisconsults were rendered attentive to them, all the coffers at home were being made empty. It would be expedient, therefore, that they take counsel for themselves, while still something of their estate remained.

Quod ut procederet, se quibuscunque legibus pacem alius offerret, accepturum esse. Quibus condicionibus alius victus convenere, ut filia eius militis nato traderetur nuptui.

That this might proceed, he declared that he would accept peace on whatever terms the other should offer. On which conditions the other, being overcome, agreed, that the daughter of that soldier be handed over in marriage to his son.

Is autem mihi sapere videtur, qui cause utcunque bone pacem anteponit, cum in iuditio versantem plura incommoda circumsepiunt, metus, sollicitudo, simul spes, cura, angor, omnia incerta, certi nihil, cum autem pleraque, fama vel opinio nostri in iudicio laborent. Cavendum erit, nequando nobis nummus, quam honestas, potior sit. Sed ita pacem petamus, ut nihilominus honestatis, virtutis, iusticieque racionem habuisse videamur, cum vera pax nusquam sine honestate vel dici vel esse posset.

He, however, seems to me to be wise who prefers peace to a cause, however good, since one engaged in judgment is hedged about by many inconveniences—fear, solicitude, together with hope, care, anguish—everything uncertain, nothing certain; and moreover, for the most part, our fame or the opinion of us labors in court. We must beware lest ever coin be more preferable to us than honor. But let us seek peace in such a way that nevertheless we may seem to have had regard for honesty, virtue, and justice, since true peace could nowhere either be said or be without honesty.

44. Agente legacionem quadam tribuno plebis, quos scabinos dicunt, civitatis cuiusdam Suevie, quam nunc prodere non phas est, inter eundum ad oppidum Buochorn cis lacum Bodamum appulit, ubi quoque tum quorundam principum, tum aliarum urbium legaciones erant. Quo fiebat, ut singulis plumas quietis gracia per noctem locandi hospiti non esset facultas. Continuit igitur se per noctem scabinus una cum famulo suo in stuba ante lucem profecturus, hospite vero vitulum ea nocte enixum arcendi frigoris gracia, quod tum extreme seviebat, in stubam propius scabinum ipso sopore obruto ponente.

44. While conducting a legation, a certain tribune of the plebs, whom they call scabini, of a certain city of Swabia, which it is not lawful now to disclose, in the course of the journey put in at the town of Buochorn on this side of Lake Bodamum, where there were then embassies both of certain princes and of other cities as well. Whence it came about that there was not the means for each to arrange lodging as a guest with feather-beds for the sake of rest through the night. Therefore the scabinus kept himself through the night together with his servant in the stuba, intending to set out before daybreak, while the host, for the sake of warding off the cold, which was then raging extremely, placed in the stuba, nearer to the scabinus, a calf brought forth that night, the scabinus himself being overwhelmed by sleep.

Aparuit scabino dormienti, se peperisse vitulum. Quod mox experrectus famulo enarrari incipit. Cui famulus: «Et id quidem, here, somnium proximi verum est; vitulus ad manus adest.» Que res scabino quasi notorio convictus esset, vehementem simul pavorem verecundiamque incuciebat, adeo ut notabili mercede pacisceretur cum famulo, ut rationem iniret rei occultande, famulo vero illud sibi recipiente mox arrepto vitulo ipsum sub tenebris adhuc alam in lacum precipitavit.

It appeared to the scabinus as he slept that he had borne a calf. Soon on waking he begins to recount this to his servant. To whom the servant: «And that, indeed, sir, is a dream about something close at hand; the calf is at hand.» This affair, as the scabinus stood as if convicted by notorious proof, was instilling at once vehement fear and shame, to such a degree that he bargained with the servant for a notable fee, to devise a plan for concealing the matter; and the servant, indeed taking this upon himself, at once, the calf having been seized, hurled it under the wing of still darkness into the lake.

Quis igitur tam stultus est, qui somniis fidem habeat et ex his certi quid presagire in animum inducat, cum vix ea, que vigilantes peragimus vocatis ad hoc et deo et hominibus in testibus procedant? Sunt quoque somniorum rationes vane. Cum enim animus hominis nunquam quiescat, etiam ea, quibus vigilantes intenti fuimus, dormientibus ingerit oneratisque corporibus nostris cibo meroque ex eorum exhalacionibus varie figure sopore dimersis offeruntur.

Who, then, is so foolish as to put faith in dreams and to induce into his mind to presage anything certain from them, when scarcely even those things which we accomplish while awake, with both God and men called as witnesses for this, proceed securely? The reasons (rationales) of dreams are vain as well. For since the human mind never rests, it even thrusts upon us in sleep those things to which we had been intent while awake; and, with our bodies burdened by food and wine, from their exhalations various figures are offered to those plunged in slumber.

Ad hec aliquando variis affectibus, ambicione, spe, metu detinemur, que dum dormivimus, vel abesse vel adesse aparent.

Moreover, at times we are detained by various affections—ambition, hope, fear—which, while we sleep, appear either to be absent or to be present.

45. Erat cuidam in Bavarie partibus filius, qui sepius vinceretur a vino, quam vinceret. Quod pater egre habens dies noctuque eius remedio studuit. Accidit autem semel, quod pater offenderet quendam ebrium in via publica iacentem, omnis rationis expertem ac vomitu et cibum et potum fede spumantem aliasque ebrii partibus omnimode innixum.

45. A certain man in the parts of Bavaria had a son who more often was conquered by wine than conquered it. The father, taking this ill, by day and night strove for his remedy. It befell once, however, that the father encountered a certain inebriate lying in the public way, devoid of all reason, and with vomiting foully spuming forth both food and drink, and in every way exhibiting the other characteristics of a drunkard.

Quem ut vidit, cogitavit, si hunc filius cerneret, ipsum haud dubie deinceps tanto cautius cum vino acturum fore, et festinans ipsum adduxit. Quem simulatque natus vidit, pre gaudio exiliit et mox inquit: O quam bonum is bibit vinum! Num, pater, hunc nosti cauponem, qui hoc venundat, ut quoque ego eo accedere valeam?

When he saw him, he thought that, if his son should behold this fellow, he himself would without doubt thereafter conduct himself so much more cautiously with wine, and, hastening, he brought him along. As soon as the son saw him, he leaped up for joy and soon said: O how good a wine this man drinks! Father, do you perchance know the innkeeper who vends this, so that I too may be able to get access to it?

Omnium autem consuetudinum nulla difficilius tollitur, quam que voluptate nascitur. Occecat enim voluptas onmes sensus hominis ipsamque racionem obstruit, ne turpitudinem, ne scelus, quod inde contrabitur, discernere valeat. Quo fit, ut homo voluptati deditus ei tantum incumbat et inserviat, ubi nobis precipue et Venus et ebrietas exemplo sunt.

Of all habits, however, none is more difficult to remove than that which is born from pleasure. For pleasure blinds all the senses of a man and even obstructs reason itself, so that he is not able to discern the disgrace, nor the crime, which will thereby be incurred. Whence it comes about that a man devoted to pleasure applies himself to it and serves it—where, for us, Venus and ebriety are especially the example.

46. Cum alias in urbe Argentina nonnulli in multam noctem ad qnartam fere vigiliam potassent, eorum duo una domum ire contendunt, et quia templum pretereundum erat, ubi ad fores anteriores templi pervenere, quod lima erat pernox, loca per eam illustrata respectu umbre arcis et tocius templi aqua et ingens fluvius esse eis visa sunt. Ubi cum perstitissent, incerti, quis eos traiceret, aparuit aquam ipsam fore vadabilem. Nudatis igitur corporibus se ad vadandum parant atque inter eundum levant pedes altius vadantium more, donec umbram edium ex adverso pertingunt.

46. On another occasion, in the city of Strasbourg, when several men had drunk far into the night, almost to the fourth watch, two of them set out to go home together; and because a temple had to be passed, when they reached the front doors of the temple—since it was a very moonlit night—the places illuminated by it, by the contrast of the shadow of the citadel and of the whole temple, seemed to them to be water and a vast river. And when they stood there, uncertain who would carry them across, it became apparent that the “water” itself would be fordable. Therefore, stripping off their clothes, they prepare to ford; and as they go, they lift their feet higher, in the manner of those fording, until they reach the shadow of the building opposite.

Tum euntes domum inmodica de sua vadatione predicant.

Then, going home, they proclaimed immoderately about their wading.

Est autem ebrius nec sensuum suorum nec rationis compos, sed dormientium ritu, ex sobrie gestis inscii, quid faciant, et loquuntur et agunt. Tum nemini parcunt, omnia secreta pandunt et se ipsos et alios produnt. Tum omni titubante corpore in Martem feruntur.

Moreover, a drunkard is in possession neither of his senses nor of his reason, but, in the manner of sleepers, unknowing of things done soberly, of what they are doing; and they both speak and act. Then they spare no one, they lay open all secrets and betray themselves and others. Then, with the whole body staggering, they are borne into Mars.

Non est in eis pudor, non metus, sed omnia superbe agunt, nec amici nec reverencie habita racione omnia profuudunt, alios heredes instituunt, et quanto plus bibunt, tanto magis siciunt.

There is no shame in them, no fear, but they do everything arrogantly, and, with no account taken of friends or reverence, they pour out everything, institute other heirs, and the more they drink, the more they thirst.

47. Cum adolescens in scholis erfordensibus degerem, fuit mihi preceptor artis gramaticen Iohannes Beck de Marckpurg in partibus Hassie, qui retulit, sibi fuisse contribulem, cum quo in iuventa coniunctissime vixisset, fuissetque sibi tanta familiaritate atque consuetudine iunctus, ut eum fratris loco habuisset, qui ubi se deinde in monasterium Capel, etiam in finibus Hassie, devovisset, tandem abbate nature concedente abbas creatus sit, quo audito ipsius Iohannis animum tantum gaudium incessisse, ut continuo ad Cappel amicum suum salutatum sibique congralatum acceleraret. Quo cum provenisset, ipsum, primo a ministris inique habitum, vix obtinuisse, ut sibi cum domino loquendi potestas fieret. In cuius presentia cum ille, quis foret et cuius causa adesset, edidisset ac familiaritates amiciciasque fidas priscas commemorasset, respexisse abbatem superbo vultu atque dixisse, nihil horum amplius sibi memoria fixum esse, qui vix, cum quibus pridie eius diei egisset, meminisset, esse quoque cum fortuna amicicias et familiaritates mutatas.

47. When as an adolescent I was living in the schools of Erfurt, I had as a preceptor of the art of grammar one Johannes Beck of Marckpurg in the parts of Hesse, who related that he had had a fellow-countryman, with whom in youth he had lived most closely, and had been joined to him with such familiarity and custom that he had held him in the place of a brother; and that when he thereafter had devoted himself in the monastery of Capel, also on the borders of Hesse, at length, the abbot yielding to nature, he was created abbot. On hearing this, so great a joy invaded the mind of this same Johannes that straightway he hastened to Cappel to greet his friend and to congratulate him suitably. When he arrived there, he himself, at first treated unfairly by the attendants, scarcely obtained that the power of speaking with the lord be granted to him. In whose presence, when he had set forth who he was and for what cause he was present, and had recalled their ancient faithful familiarities and friendships, the abbot, with a proud countenance, is said to have looked upon him and to have said that none of these things was any longer fixed in his memory—he scarcely remembered with whom he had dealt the day before that day—that friendships and familiarities also are changed together with fortune.

Quo dicto sese in penetralia recipient illum eo, quo venisset, redire iussisse.

With this said, he withdrew into the inner chambers and ordered that man to return to the place whence he had come.

Maxime autem levitatis seque nunquam amasse, sed assentatum fuisse notatur, qui cum fortuna amicicias mutat, quod in amicicia omnia sunt certa, firma, stabilia, omnia in promptu, in occulto nihil. Rebus igitur prosperis amicus una gaudet et, si quando in fortuna modum excesserimus, alterius nos sortis meminisse monet. Nec omnia, que fecerimus, statim extollit, sed, si bene fecerimus, nos ad meliora hortatur, alia benigne castigans.

But he is especially noted for levity, and for never having loved himself but for having been a flatterer—the sort who changes amities with fortune—whereas in amity all things are certain, firm, stable: everything is in the open, nothing hidden. Therefore, in prosperous affairs a friend rejoices together with us and, if ever we exceed the measure in good fortune, he reminds us to remember another lot. Nor does he straightway extol all the things we have done; rather, if we have done well, he exhorts us to better things, kindly chastising the rest.

Si amico auctior fortuna adfulserit, nescit tamen propterea fastidire, nescit contemnere, semper idem animus est. Afflictis quoque rebus non mutat fidem, una dolet et continuo consilio et auxilio adest. Eius igitur ductu auspitioque levantur dolores et res secunde augentur, urbes regnaque conduntur.

If an augmented fortune has shone upon a friend, nevertheless he does not on that account know how to be fastidious, he does not know how to contemn; his disposition is always the same. Even in afflicted affairs he does not change his fidelity: he grieves together and is at once present with counsel and aid. Therefore under his leadership and auspices pains are lightened and prosperous affairs are augmented; cities and kingdoms are founded.

Que si quando secus se habere in homine amicum se exhibente comperta fuit, eum non amicum, sed vel adulatorem vel assentatorem dicito, in quo omnia sunt contraria. Nihil enim in se vel adulator vel assentator habet, quod verum, quod stabile, quod firmum sit, sed omnia sunt falsa, incerta, occulta, doli fraudisque plena. Secundis tuis rebus in vultu simulat gaudium, in corde vero tristiciam socia invidia gerit.

But if ever it has been found that things are otherwise in a man presenting himself as a friend, call him not a friend, but either an adulator or an assentator, in whom all things are contrary. For neither the adulator nor the assentator has in himself anything that is true, that is stable, that is firm, but all things are false, uncertain, hidden, full of guile and fraud. In your prosperous affairs he simulates joy in his face, but in his heart he bears sadness with envy as his companion.

Non te monet, non corripit, sed, quicquid egeris, laudat et tamen, cum bene egeris, fert moleste. Si tua ope sublimius evaserit, te continuo despicit et vilipendit, nec adversis tuis rebus longius manet, sed te tanquam pestiferum aliquod virus et vitat et fugit.

He does not admonish you, he does not reprove you, but whatever you do he praises; and yet, when you have done well, he bears it ill. If by your help he has risen higher, he straightway despises and disparages you, nor does he remain longer in your adversity, but both shuns and flees you as some pestiferous virus.

48. Fuit sacerdos quidam ville Capel, ab urbe Argentina quinque et viginti millibus passuum, qui semel pro templo docens acerbius in mares invehi cepit, annotando, quod rustici per hoc, quod indulgentius crapule incumberent, cibo vinoque abuterentur, ebrii multum molestie sub noctem mulieribus afferrent, tum eructantes vomitum, tum displosa vesica vetorem facientes, quo ipsas mulieres in commiseracionem sui ipsius adducebat, quod tanta pati a viris suis cogerentur. Quod ubi viri indigne tulere nec convenire assererent, ut sacerdos inter coniuges discordias publice sereret, cepit sacerdos secum volvere, se haud facile virorum indignationem ferre posse et pro reconciliata ipsorum gratia cogitare. Adveniente igitur die festo, cum iterum pro templo dicendum erat, commemorat, quomodo virorum alias viciorum mencionem fecisset, mulierum autem adhuc superesse, que, maritis in rure opere intentis, delicatis epulis, gallinis quippe et melioris suis ovis vescerentur seque electiori vino ingurgitarent, viris autem domum redeuntibus per diem labore fatigatis pultem una cum trulla aqua referta apponerent, quod tum etiam facile ex eo constaret, quod mulieribus egrotantibus nil assererent convenire, nisi bene lixatas gallinas, veteri adiuncto Falerno, contra vero in virorum mala valitudine nihil aliud apponi, nisi aliquod ptisanarium, et sic astu mulierum semper condicionem meliorem esse, et alia amplius.

48. There was a certain priest of the village Capel, twenty-five miles from the city Strasbourg, who once, teaching from the pulpit, began to inveigh somewhat more bitterly against the males, noting that peasants, in that they more indulgently lay upon crapulence, abused food and wine, and, drunk, brought much molestation to the women toward night, now belching up vomit, now, with the bladder discharged, making a musty fetor—by which he led the women into commiseration of their own selves, that they were compelled to suffer so much from their husbands. When the men bore this indignantly and asserted it was not fitting that a priest should publicly sow discords between spouses, the priest began to revolve with himself that he could hardly bear the indignation of the men, and to consider in favor of their reconciled grace. Therefore, with the feast day approaching, when again he had to speak from the pulpit, he recalls how he had earlier made mention of the men’s other vices, but that there still remained those of the women, who, while their husbands were intent on work in the fields, feasted on delicate viands—namely hens and the choicer portions of their swine and sheep—and ingurgitated themselves with a more select wine; but when their husbands, wearied by labor through the day, returned home, they set before them porridge together with a ladle brimming with water; which also, he said, was then easily established from this: that for women who were sick they asserted nothing was suitable unless well-boiled hens with old Falernian joined to it, whereas in men’s bad health nothing else was set on the table except some ptisan; and thus, by the astuteness of the women, their condition was always the better—and more besides.

Quibus verbis sibi adeo mulierum conflavit odium, ut ipse mulieres die noctuque viros contra eum provocarent, adeo quod hoc ipsum sibi mutandi locum causam prebuit.

By these words he so kindled against himself the hatred of the women, that the women themselves day and night provoked their husbands against him, so much so that this very thing afforded him a cause for changing his place.

Proxime autem insaniam accedunt, qui secum constituunt vel omnibus vel maiori parti hominum, quibus, cum ducunt moram, gratificari. Nam prout spes nostre sic quoque mentes nusquam conveniunt. Conducit igitur, si bene loqui nescias, pocius tacere, quam male loqui; si autem vel obiurgandi vel docendi causa loquaris, veritati inniti, abiecta et ira et omni acerbitate, ne pocius invidia nostraque aliquando vel gloria vel utilitate, quam veritate, ducti ad castigandum processisse videamur.

Most nearly do they approach insanity, who resolve with themselves to gratify either everyone or the greater part of men, those with whom, whenever they dally, they would ingratiate themselves. For just as our hopes, so too our minds agree nowhere. It is expedient, therefore, if you do not know how to speak well, rather to be silent than to speak ill; but if you speak either for the sake of objurgating or of teaching, to rely on truth, with both anger and all acerbity cast aside, lest we seem to have proceeded to castigation led rather by envy and by our own glory or utility at some time, than by truth.

49. Fuit cuidam militi aurato controversia cum quodam iurisconsulto, pro cuius decisione, cum ambo ad diem constitutum coram cesare romano nostro Friderico pro se quisque oraturus comparuissent, iurisconsultus, quod ipse agebat, prior orabat et hoc latine, nec iniuria quidem, quippe qui coram rege Latinorum diceret, haud ab re fore credebat, eciam latine dicere. Cuius sermonis licet ipse miles expers esset, conticuit tamen nec pro more ignobilis vulgi doctorem interloquitur, sed habito per doctorem loquendi fine, mox ipse ad orandum prodiit suamque oracionem bohemica ligua, nedum iurisconsulto, vel ipsi cesari, verum omnibus, qui aderant, incognita dicit. Imperiali autem senatu ea in malam partem accipiente, solus cesar pro clementia sua subrisit acceptaque placide excusatione militis, quod doctor orando ligua latina sibi ignota visus fuisset eum decipere.

49. There was for a certain gilded knight a controversy with a certain jurisconsult; for the decision of which, when both had appeared on the appointed day before our Roman Caesar Frederick, each to plead for himself, the jurisconsult, who was acting as plaintiff, pled first, and this in Latin—and not unjustly, since, as he was speaking before the king of the Latins, he believed it would not be out of place to speak in Latin. Although the knight himself was devoid of that speech, he kept silent and, not after the custom of the ignoble crowd, did he interrupt the doctor; but once the doctor had brought his speaking to an end, at once he himself came forward to plead, and delivered his oration in the Bohemian tongue, unknown not only to the jurisconsult or to the Caesar himself, but indeed to all who were present. But as the imperial senate took this amiss, the Caesar alone, by his clemency, smiled, and placidly accepted the knight’s excuse: that the doctor, by pleading in the Latin tongue unknown to him, had seemed to be deceiving him.

Cui reddere vices nequiverit, nisi per liguam eciam sibi doctori incognitam possetque sic neuter alteri intencionem suam refellere, iussi sunt ambo per cesarem, ligua vernacula, vulgari germanico rem suam edere.

Since he had been unable to reply in turn to him, unless through a tongue unknown even to the doctor himself, and thus neither could refute the other’s intention, both were ordered by the Caesar to set forth their case in the vernacular tongue, in vulgar German.

Est autem tum cognitum, neminem tam exquisita preditum fore astutia, ut sibi vere credi possit, quin semper reperire liceat alium, qui calliditate par est, modo ne sit superior. Suam igitur prodit stultitiam, qui sententie sue adeo fidens est, ut omnino secum statuat, quod vinci nequeat. Proinde cum prout viribus, sic ingenio, duo pleraque unum prestant, conducit res nostras dubias in amicorum consilia deferre et ex multis sentenciis unam collectam tum primum, cum exitum finemque nacti simus, probare.

Moreover, it was then recognized that no one is endowed with such exquisite astuteness that he can be truly believed, but that it is always possible to find another who is equal in callidity—provided only that he be not superior. He therefore betrays his own stupidity who is so confident in his own opinion that he altogether resolves with himself that he cannot be overcome. Accordingly, since, as by strength, so by ingenium, two for the most part excel one, it is conducive to refer our doubtful affairs into the counsels of friends, and to approve one opinion collected from many only then, when we have obtained the outcome and the end.

50. Doctor quidam insignis tum pontificii cum civilis iuris pro sapientia sua prope singulari undecim ecclesiastica possederat beneficia. Ea semel lætus in amicorum suorum convivio discumbens rogatus dinumeravit. Fuit autem doctori germanus, qui sibi taliter racionanti semper addidit duodecimum.

50. A certain distinguished doctor of pontifical (canon) and civil law, for his almost singular wisdom, had possessed eleven ecclesiastical benefices. These once, happy as he reclined at a banquet of his friends, when asked, he counted out. Moreover, the doctor had a brother, who, as he thus reckoned them up for himself, would always add the twelfth for him.

Ille vero ea iterum atque iterum repetente nec plura, quam undecim iuveniente, tandem, quod tamen duodecimum esset, erga fratrem instare cepit. Tum frater, «Duodecimum», inquit, «est longe certissimum, quod te, ubi alia deserere cogeris, apud inferos procul dubio manet, qui in tanta rei familiaris versaris abundantia ex ecclesiasticorum beneficiorum vectigali, tot aliis sacerdotibus vili penurie deditis», ratus pro vulgi simplicitate, iniquum fore, quenquam sacerdotum alterum, ne dicam undecimum, habere beneficium.

But while he was repeating these items again and again and finding no more than eleven, at length he began to press his brother as to what, nevertheless, the twelfth might be. Then the brother said, «The twelfth is by far the most certain: it is that which, when you are forced to abandon the others, without doubt awaits you among the dead below—since you, moving in such abundance of household estate from the revenue (vectigal) of ecclesiastical benefices, while so many other priests are given over to wretched penury», thinking, in view of the simplicity of the common crowd, that it would be iniquitous for any priest to have a second benefice, not to say an eleventh.

Ab illorum autem opinione ego longe discedo, cum censeam, cuique tantum vel commodi vel honoris deberi, quantum cuiusque et legalitas et industria poscit, ut tamen inter bonos et malos, industrios et ignavos discrimen habeatur; ne doctos aliquando viros studii sui penitere cogamus et ut tenera etas, si viderit virtutem in precio esse, ad emulandas virtutes acuetur.

From their opinion, however, I depart far, since I judge that to each there is owed only so much either advantage or honor as each one’s legality and industry demand, yet so that a distinction be maintained between the good and the bad, the industrious and the idle; lest we at some time compel learned men to repent of their study, and so that tender age, if it sees that virtue is in price (held in esteem), may be sharpened to emulate virtues.

51. Est consuetudo in aliquot locis Germanie, quod sacerdotes parrochi, quos plebanos dicunt, ad calendas ianuarias, cum christianam circumcisionem commemoramus, aliquam faceciam pro templis disserant, eam in populum pro utriusque sexus commoda interpretacione distribuentes, muneris, quod bonum annum vocant, loco. Fuit autem quidam sacerdos, qui habito sermone pro templo et distributo bono anno per fabulam unam, eam fabulam nunc feminis, nunc virginibus, tum viduis per inversionem applicabat, rusticis restantibus. Ipso autem sacerdote ea diutius cum animo suo volvente, nec fabulam eam ullatenus rusticorum moribus accomodare valente, venere sibi in mentem et contumelie et molestie, quibus rustici eum affecerant, qui eum, eque atque de serio Ditis imperio in miseras manes apud inferos fertur, in dies torquerent, cuius gracia is ipsis Herebi incolis a se non minus, quam rusticis, deberi.

51. There is a custom in some places of Germany, that parish priests, whom they call plebans, at the Calends of January, when we commemorate the Christian Circumcision, should discourse some facetia for the churches, distributing it among the people with an interpretation suited to the advantage of either sex, in place of the gift which they call the “good year.” Now there was a certain priest who, after delivering a sermon for the church and distributing the “good year” by means of one fable, was applying that fable now to women, now to virgins, then to widows by a turnabout, the rustics remaining over. But as the priest himself for a long time turned these things over in his mind, and was in no way able to accommodate that fable to the manners of the rustics, there came to his mind both the contumelies and annoyances with which the rustics had afflicted him, who, even as it is reported of the earnest command of Dis that one is borne down among the wretched shades in the underworld, were day by day tormenting him; for which reason he judged that it was owed by him to the inhabitants of Erebus themselves no less than to the rustics.

Ut autem utrinque conquerendi occasionem tolleret, ipsos rusticos Furiis infernalibus, quos demones vocant, ipsasque Furias rusticis pro bono anno publice pro ambone dedit, asserens pro utrorunque pravitate neutros alteros fastidire posse.

But in order to remove the occasion for complaining on both sides, he publicly from the ambo gave the rustics to the infernal Furies—whom they call demons—and the Furies themselves to the rustics, in place of the “good-year,” asserting that, on account of the depravity of both parties, neither could disdain the other.

Non est autem ab re, pravos cum pravis comparare. Est tamen longe alienissimum a societate hominum, eorum fame, qui a culpa vacant, promiscue cum malis detrahi. Nam cum hominem homines persequi contra, clementia vero maxime secundum humanitatem existat, humanius esset, centum nocentes impune transire, quam unum insontem contumeliis et iniuriis prosequi.

Nor is it out of place to compare the depraved with the depraved. Yet it is by far most alien to the fellowship of men that the reputation of those who are free from fault be dragged down indiscriminately with the wicked. For since for men to persecute a man is against humanity, whereas clemency is most of all in accordance with humanity, it would be more humane to let a hundred guilty pass unpunished than to pursue a single innocent with contumelies and injuries.

Si igitur alicuius ligua adeo loquendi et avida et prona est, ut gravius ducat tacere, quam male loqui, contineat tamen se paulisper, usque dum a malis bonos segrabit, et non, quod ab uno seu altero semel lesus est, scriba continuo omnes iniusticie condemnet.

If therefore someone's tongue is so avid and prone to speaking that he deems it more grievous to be silent than to speak ill, nevertheless let him restrain himself for a little while, until he segregates the good from the bad, and let not the scribe, because he has once been injured by one or another, immediately condemn all as guilty of injustice.

52. Dictus sacerdos, cum aliquotiens subditos suos acrius correxisset, subditi indigne tulere, de eo apud principes suos questum euntes. Ut fit, quod omnes impacientes audimus vitiorum nostrorum proditores, simus licet quantumcunque scelesti, petentes sibi loco illius alium surrogari sacerdotem, esset quia in eis nimis molestus, quippe quod ipso pro ambone dicente nec paci nec quieti in ecclesia sua locus esset, nec quenquam mordacis sue ligne fulmine preteriret. Vocato autem sacerdote auditaque purgatione sua, quod mores suorum rusticorum tales castigationes poscerent, qui non habito discrimine inter phas nephasque animum suum in perniciem aliorum hominum solis fallaciis atque astuciis intenderent; quod autem alium peterent sacerdotem, id non in alterius principis, nisi pontificis esse potestate, ad quem ecclesiaram institucio pertineret; aliorum autem principum interesset, rusticos demoliri; amoverent igitur scelestos illos rusticos et sibi alios darent; haud defore, quin cum melioribus tranquillius acturus foret.

52. The said priest, when he had several times corrected his subjects more sharply, the subjects bore it indignantly, going to make complaint about him before their princes. As happens—for we all, being impatient, take as traitors those who disclose our vices, however criminal we may be—asking that in his place another priest be substituted for them, because he was excessively troublesome to them, inasmuch as, with him speaking from the ambo, there was room neither for peace nor for quiet in his church, nor did he pass over anyone with the thunderbolt of his biting tongue. But when the priest was summoned and his defense heard, he said that the manners of his rustics required such chastisements, who, making no distinction between right and wrong, directed their mind to the ruin of other men by deceits and stratagems alone; and that, as for their asking for another priest, that was in the power of no other prince except the pontiff, to whom the institution of churches pertained; it concerned the other princes to remove the peasants. Let them therefore remove those wicked rustics and give him others; there would be no failure but that with better ones he would act more tranquilly.

Male autem res se habet, cum quis eam rem moderare nititur, cuius ipse et expers est et que ad se non spectat, et cum quis se eius artis prebet preceptorem, cuius nunquam fuit discipulus. Dum enim aliorum cohercent vicia, suis ignoscunt, et cum acrem aliorum se faciunt iudicem, ingenii sui sterilitate innocentes pessundant. Obeant igitur quique sua munera et, quod sua non interest, respuant et contemnant!

However, the matter stands ill, when someone strives to moderate that affair of which he himself is both devoid and which does not pertain to him, and when someone offers himself as preceptor of that art of which he was never a disciple. For while they coerce the vices of others, they pardon their own, and when they make themselves a sharp judge of others, by the sterility of their own talent they oppress the innocent. Let each, therefore, discharge his own offices and, what does not concern him, reject and contemn it!

53. Nupsit fatuus quidam in oppido Endingen, unde me oriundum esse supra dixi, adolescentule amplius venuste, quam sponsi conditio ferebat. Quos mutuam gerere economiam penuria rei familiaris vetuerat, cuius gratia sponsa alterius civis famulatui fuit obligata. Erat autem ipse sponsus zelotipus et edes domini coniugis sue per noctem circumeundo haud unquam deserebat.

53. A certain fool in the town of Endingen—whence I said above that I am sprung—married a rather young girl, more charming than the bridegroom’s condition allowed. The penury of their family estate had forbidden them to conduct a mutual household economy, for which reason the bride was obligated to the servitude of another citizen. However, the bridegroom himself was jealous, and he never left the house of his wife’s master, making rounds around it through the night.

Quadam autem nocte serius, quam custodia uxoris sue postulabat, venerat, adeo quod eum alius antecesserat, et quia ascendentis calceos sub valvam in terram positos reperit, facile cognitu fuit, alium ad uxorem suam habuisse aditum, qui sibi iam mechum moliretur, unde censuit, rem illam sibi haud neglectui esse debere. Maturius tamen agere volens vindictam in crastinum usque distulit, dum negocium ad sapienciores referret. Enodato vero postridie negotio asseruit, se facile expertum, hominem ira excandescentem animi sui non fore compotem; parum enim abfuisse, quin tempore ire calceos adulteri in frusta scidisset; racione autem aliud iubente, furorem suum sedatum esse.

But on a certain night he came later than the guardianship of his wife required, with the result that another had forestalled him; and because, as he was going up, he found shoes placed on the ground beneath the door-leaf, it was easy to know that another had had access to his wife, who was already contriving a paramour for her; whence he judged that that matter ought by no means to be neglected by him. Yet wishing to proceed more maturely, he put off vengeance until the morrow, while he should refer the business to men more sapient. But when on the next day the business had been disentangled, he affirmed that he had easily found by experience that a man blazing up with anger is not master of his mind; for it had been little lacking but that, in the time of his ire, he had cut the adulterer’s shoes into fragments; but with reason commanding otherwise, his fury was allayed.

Est autem inprimis sapientis, fugere iram ipsamque primo impetu irrupturam, tanquam pro vallo hostem deturbare; si autem aliquando animum nostrum occuparit, nihil penitus, dum aliqua eius apparet favilla, agere. Racionem enim aufert et omnes nostros sensus capit eisque vinctis cathenas iniicit. Cum autem in omnibus rebus nostris gerendis ratio semper in promptu esse debeat, ira autem ad eam omnem precludat aditum, neutiquam temporibus ire, inter bonum et malum, commodum et periculum, nimium et parum quid intersit, cognoscere poterimus.

Moreover, it is above all the mark of a wise man to flee anger, and, when it is about to burst in at the first onset, to beat it back as one would thrust an enemy from the rampart; but if at any time it should seize our mind, to do absolutely nothing so long as any spark of it appears. For it removes reason and seizes all our senses, and upon them, once bound, it casts chains. Now since in the conduct of all our affairs reason ought always to be at hand, but anger precludes all access to it, by no means, in times of anger, shall we be able to recognize what difference there is between good and evil, advantage and peril, excess and defect.

Est igitur sacius negligere iniurias, quam ire puniendi, etiamsi possimus, potestatem fieri, ne pro furore suo et nos et nostra perdat.

It is therefore better to neglect injuries than to go to punish—even if we are able and have the power to do so—lest in its frenzy it destroy both ourselves and what is ours.

54. Aurifaber quidam oppidi cuiusdam nostre Germanie in rure comparavit porcellum. Quem deinde rusticus sibi in sacco inclusum domum presentavit. Porcus autem dum in oppido libere graditur, rus ad agricolam suum rediit.

54. A certain goldsmith of a certain town of our Germany bought a piglet in the countryside. Which a rustic then presented to him at home, enclosed in a sack. But the pig, while freely walking in the town, returned to the countryside to its farmer.

Quo viso rusticus ad aurifabrum veniens, sese purgans, illa preter culpam suam accidisse, aurifabro optionem facit vel peccuniam vel porcum eligendi. Aurifaber autem porcum renuit, asserens, sibi non convenire, tante prudentie animal domi sue porci loco habere, quippe quod illa sus omnes tribunos plebis, alias scabinos, eius oppidi sapientia prestaret, cum nullus ex eis esset, cui, si ligatis et occlusis oculis in locum duceretur, sibi ignotum domum redire, atque illa sus fecisset, compertum esset.

Upon seeing which, the rustic, coming to the goldsmith and excusing himself, saying that those things had happened without his fault, offers the goldsmith the option of choosing either the money or the pig. But the goldsmith refuses the pig, asserting that it is not fitting for him to have at his house, in the place of a pig, an animal of such prudence; inasmuch as that sow would surpass in wisdom all the tribunes of the plebs, otherwise the scabini, of his town, since there was none of them who, if with eyes bound and closed he were led into a place unknown to him, could return home; and that that sow had done it, as had been ascertained.

Contingit autem aliquando magistratus et publica munera ad homines minus dignos deferri, quod aliquando rerum publicarum principes alios homines non secundum virtutes, sed secundum suam utilitatem lucrumve meciuntur. Quo fit ut non studiosos, sed peccuniosos ad dignitates velint elevatos. Alii vero, avidi dominandi, grave ducunt, in officiis et magistratibus secum habere virtute pares, et id semper maxime agunt, ut aliorum sepulta sit virtus, sua illustretur.

It happens, however, that sometimes magistracies and public offices are conferred upon less worthy men, because at times the leaders of commonwealths measure other men not according to virtues, but according to their own utility or lucre. Whence it comes about that they wish to have, not the studious, but the pecunious elevated to dignities. Others, for their part, avid of dominion, deem it grievous to have with them in offices and magistracies men equal to them in virtue, and they always strive most of all for this: that the virtue of others be buried, and their own be made illustrious.

Quod tum potissimum se obtinere arbitrantur, cum penes se habent ineptos et extremi ingenii homines, quorum virtus semper obscura et nunquam penetrabilis sit. Nonnullis autem res familiaris nimis tenuis obstat, ita quod vita eorum ex aliorum ope pendet. Cuius gratia muneribus publicis preesse nequeunt.

They reckon that they most especially maintain themselves then, when they have in their power inept men and men of the lowest ingenium, whose virtue is always obscure and never penetrable. Moreover, for some, the family estate, being too slender, stands in the way, in such wise that their life depends upon the help of others. For which reason they are unable to preside over public offices.

Illos ego potius censerem publico impendio iuvandos, quam nihili et male rei homines ad rem publicam gubernandam admittendos.

I would rather judge those to be aided at public expense than that men of no account and of ill character be admitted to govern the republic.

Hasce igitur primitias ingenii mei, illustris princeps, accipias, que, utcunque sunt, ad experiendam tamen mentem tuam in hoc genere scribendi sufficiunt. Nam quom Germani, maiores nostri, ab antiquo satius duxerint, res grandes memoratu dignas gerere, quam vel scribere, vel legere, rerum gestarum scriptores hactenus in Germania nullius habiti sunt precii. Proinde vel pauci vel nulli fuere.

Therefore receive these first-fruits of my ingenium, illustrious prince, which, such as they are, nevertheless suffice to make trial of your mind in this kind of writing. For since the Germans, our ancestors, from of old have judged it better to perform great deeds worthy of remembrance than either to write or to read, historiographers have hitherto in Germany been held of no value. Accordingly they have been either few or none.

Nemo enim ad scribendum animum adiicit, qui sibi non aut aliquam inde laudem aut graciam illius, cuius causa scripserit, conflare, sed potius in spem irritam frustrari tempus compertum habet. Opusculum igitur hoc tui gratia susceptum vix semiperfeci, egre moram tue cognoscende voluntatis passus. Quod usque eo elucubratum adeo tue maiestatis respectu et modicum et vile mihi visum est, quod absistendi tanquam temerario incepto et quasi iamiam in pugnam ituris militibus, nisi pro tua magis, quam sua virtute audaces imperium meum aspernassent, receptui canendi animus fuerit.

For no one applies his mind to writing who does not have it ascertained for himself that he will either thereby kindle some praise or the grace of him for whose sake he has written, but rather that he will be squandering time upon a vain hope. Therefore this little work undertaken for your sake I have scarcely half completed, having with difficulty endured the delay of coming to know your will. Which, elucubrated to that point, seemed to me, out of regard for your Majesty, both modest and paltry, to such an extent that I was of a mind to desist—as from a rash inception—and, as if to soldiers now about to go into battle, to sound the retreat, unless the bold, relying more on your valor than on their own, should have spurned my command.

Si ergo eas amplexus sis, in potestate tua erit, vim omnem ingenioli mei a me expetendi. Sin autem inusitatus hisce litteris pro plurimorum patrie nostre more eas fastidis, mea tamen cum eis oblata officia etiam te invito tibi semper in animo meo erunt parata.

If therefore you embrace them, it will be in your power to demand from me all the force of my little ingenuity. But if, unaccustomed to these letters after the manner of the majority of our fatherland, you disdain them, nevertheless my offered services along with them will, even you unwilling, always be ready for you in my mind.

Vale!

Farewell!

Ex Constantia quarto kalendas decembres anno a natali cristiano sexto et octuagesimo quadringentesimo supra millesimum.

From Constance, on the fourth day before the Kalends of December (November 28), in the year from the Christian Nativity 1486.