Many of your readers, as well as "ROTERODAMUS," will be ready to
acknowledge their obligation to Mr. Bruce for his prompt
identification of the author of the epigram against Erasmus (pp. 27,
28.). I have just referred to the catalogue of the library of this
university, and I regret to say that we have no copy of any of the
works of Frusius. Mr. Bruce says he knows nothing of Frusius as an
author. I believe there is no mention of him in any English
bibliographical or biographical work. There is, however, a notice
{181} of him in the _Biographie Universelle_, vol. xvi. (Paris), and
in the _Biografia Universale_, vol. xxi. (Venezia). As these works
have, perhaps, found their way into very few private English
libraries, I send you the following sketch, which will probably be
acceptable to your readers. It is much to be lamented that
sufficient encouragement cannot be given in this country for the
production of a _Universal Biography_. Roses's work, which promised
to be a giant, dwindled down to a miserable pigmy; and that under
"The Society for the Diffusion of Useful Knowledge" was strangled in
its birth.
André des Freux, better known by his Latin name, Frusius, was born
at Chartres, in the beginning of the sixteenth century. He embraced
the life of an ecclesiastic, and obtained the cure of Thiverval,
which he held many years with great credit to himself. The high
reputation of Ignatius Loyola, who was then at Rome, with authority
from the Holy See to found the Society of the Jesuits, led Frusius
to that city, where he was admitted a member of the new order in
1541, and shortly after became secretary to Loyola. He contributed
to the establishment of the Society at Parma, Venice, and many towns
of Italy and Sicily. He was the first Jesuit who taught the Greek
language at Messina; he also gave public lectures on the Holy
Scriptures in Rome. He was appointed Rector of the German College at
Rome, shortly before his death, which occurred on the 25th of
October, 1556, three months and six days after the death of Loyola.
Frusius had studied, with equal success, theology, medicine, and
law: he was a good mathematician, an excellent musician, and made
Latin verses with such facility, that he composed them, on the
instant, on all sorts of subjects. But these verses were neither so
elegant nor so harmonious, as Alegambe asserts[1], since he adds,
that it requires close attention to distinguish them from prose.
Frusius translated, from Spanish into Latin, the _Spiritual
Exercises_ of Loyola. He was the author of the following works:--Two
small pieces, in verse, _De Verborum et Rerum Copia_, and _Summa
Latinæ Syntaxeos_: these were published in several different places;
_Theses Collectæ ex Interpretatione Geneseos; Assertiones
Theologicæ_, Rome, 1554; _Poemata_, Cologne, 1558--this collection
often reprinted at Lyons, Antwerp and Tournon, contains 255[2]
epigrams against the heretics, amongst whom he places Erasmus;--a
poem _De Agno Dei_; and, lastly, another poem, entitled _Echo de
Presenti Christianæ Religionis Calamitate_, which has been sometimes
cited as an example of a great _difficulté vaincue_. The edition of
Tournon contains also a poem, _De Simplicitate_, of which Alegambe
speaks with praise. To Frusius was also owing an edition of
Martial's _Epigrams_, divested of their obscenities.
EDW. VENTRIS.
Cambridge, Jan. 10. 1850.
[Our valued correspondent, MR. MACCABE, has also informed us that
the "_Epigrams_ of Frusius were published at Antwerp, 1582, in 8vo.,
and at Cologne, 1641, in 12mo. See Feller's _Biographie_."]
[1] I presume in his _Bibliotheca Scriptorum Societatis
Jesu_.
[2] Duthilloeul, according to Mr. Bruce, says 251.
* * * * *