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"Scilicet ultima semper Exspectanda dies homini est; dicique beatus Ante obitum nemo supremaque funera debet."

Beatus Rhenanus, writing to a servant-pupil who had recently left him to launch forth into the world, counsels him to marry, if possible, a rich and elderly widow; in order that in a few years by her death he may find himself equipped with an ample capital for his real start in life.

Their friendship was kept alive by popular festivals celebrated in common, and also by the reverence which was paid, especially in the interior of Switzerland, to Saint Beatus, who, as the first promulgator of Christianity in that region, dwelt in a cave on the shore of lake Thun, called by his name, and received canonization. Numerous pilgrimages were made thither from the Five Cantons.

Quocum multa volup ac gaudia clamque palamque, Ingenium cui nulla malum sententia suadet Ut faceret facinus lenis aut malus, doctus fidelis Suavis homo facundus suo contentus beatus Scitus secunda loquens in tempore commodus verbum Paucum, multa tenens antiqua sepulta, vetustas Quem fecit mores veteresque novosque tenentem, Multorum veterum leges divumque hominumque, Prudenter qui dicta loquive tacereve possit.

A measure of the confidence which Erasmus subsequently reposed in both his judgement and his good faith is that in 1519 and 1521, when he had decided to publish some more of his letters, he just sent to Beatus bundles of the rough drafts he had preserved, and told him to select and edit them at his discretion.

There is nothing to offend the taste even of those who have been in Italy, except perhaps the use of stoves instead of fires, and the dirt of the inns, which is universal throughout Germany. The climate is singularly mild and agreeable, and the citizens polite. A bridge joins the two towns, and the situation on the river is splendid. Beatus Rhenanus, Res Germanicae, 1531, pp. 140, 1.

And perhaps if, as the poets tell, jealousy falls silent after death, fame will shine out the more brightly: although it ill becomes a Christian heart to be moved by human glory; may I have the glory of pleasing Christ! Farewell, my dearest Beatus. The rest you will learn from my letter to Capito. Louvain, 30 May 1519 Best greetings, most beloved brother in Christ.

Now there was no longer merely the question of a little book of translations, but Aldus had declared himself willing to print the enormously increased collection of the Adagia. Beatus Rhenanus tells a story which, no doubt, he had heard from Erasmus himself: how Erasmus on his arrival at Venice had gone straight to the printing-office and was kept waiting there for a long time.

S. Beatus, a British or Irish missionary, settled into a cave above the lake of Thun, dreaded by the natives as the abode of a dragon. He succeeded in his work, and died there at the advanced age of ninety. In 1556 the Protestant Government of Berne built up the mouth of the grotto and set soldiers to repel the pilgrims who came there.

English tourists should feel some interest in the Cave of S. Beatus, inasmuch as its canonised occupant went from our shores to preach the Gospel to the wild men of the district, and died in this cave at a very advanced age.