Famous Erasmus Quotes Explained
Desiderius Erasmus of Rotterdam was a Dutch Renaissance humanist, Catholic priest, and one of the most influential European intellectuals of the early 16th century. Erasmus shaped the Northern Renaissance with editions of classical and Christian texts and with the satirical <em>Praise of Folly</em> (1511). Below are eight of the most-quoted lines.
“In the country of the blind, the one-eyed man is king.”
In regione caecorum rex est luscus.
What it means
In regione caecorum rex est luscus — from Erasmus's Adagia, his vast collection of classical proverbs. The aphorism is both descriptive and resigned: leadership often comes not to the genuinely competent but to whoever is least incapable of those available, and the community's standards rise no higher than the rulers it produces.
Attributed to Erasmus:
“Prevention is better than cure.”
What it means
From the Adagia. The proverb encodes the Hippocratic-Galenic medical commonplace that early intervention is cheaper and more effective than late repair; Erasmus extends the principle to moral and political life as well as to health.
“When I get a little money I buy books; and if any is left I buy food and clothes.”
Ad Graecas literas totum animum applicui; statimque ut pecuniam accepero, Graecos primum autores, deinde vestes emam.
What it means
Attributed to Erasmus in his letters and consistent with the famously bookish poverty of his early career. The line is the slogan of the bibliophile scholar's reordered priorities: books before bread, on the premise that the bread is replaceable in a way the book is not.
Attributed to Erasmus:
“It is the chiefest point of happiness that a man is willing to be what he is.”
What it means
From The Education of a Christian Prince (1516). Erasmus argues that tranquillitas animi — peace of mind — rests on the alignment of self-image with reality; the unhappy person is generally the one who has refused the role his life actually offers.
Attributed to Erasmus:
“Let a king recall that what he holds he holds as a steward, not as an owner.”
What it means
From The Education of a Christian Prince. Erasmus is restating, in Christian humanist terms, the classical conception of office as a stewardship rather than as a possession; the ruler holds his power in trust for the people, and is accountable for it.
Attributed to Erasmus:
“War is delightful to those who have had no experience of it.”
What it means
Dulce bellum inexpertis — from the Adagia, where Erasmus develops the proverb into one of his most extended essays. The argument is that the romance of war is sustained only by distance from its actual conduct; first-hand experience converts enthusiasts into pacifists more reliably than any sermon.
“Animals only follow their natural instincts; but man, unless he has experienced the influence of learning and philosophy, is at the mercy of impulses that are worse than those of a wild beast. There is no beast more savage and dangerous than a human being who is swept along by the passions of ambition, greed, anger, envy, extravagance, and sensuality.”
De pueris statim ac liberaliter instituendis declamatio (1529), translated by Beert C. Verstraete as On Education for Children , in The Erasmus Reader (University of Toronto Press: 1990), p. 73
What it means
From On the Education of Children (1529). Erasmus inherits the Aristotelian view that the human capacity for goodness or evil exceeds the animal range because it is shaped by learning; without education, the human falls below the animal rather than rising above it.
“I consider as lovers of books not those who keep their books hidden in their store-chests and never handle them, but those who, by nightly as well as daily use thumb them, batter them, wear them out, who fill out all the margins with annotations of many kinds, and who prefer the marks of a fault they have erased to a neat copy full of faults.”
Letter to an unidentified friend (1489), as translated in Collected Works of Erasmus (1974), p. 58
What it means
From Erasmus's letters and consistent with the bibliophilic theme of his works. Erasmus distinguishes the lover of books from the collector of books: the relationship is constituted by use, not by possession, and a private library that is never opened is barely a library at all.