The _Ciceronianus_, however, must receive a little fuller treatment, both because of its intimate connection with our subject, and because hardly any work of Erasmus, except the _Colloquies_, so definitely estates him in the new position of critical man of letters, as distinguished from that of philosophical or rhetorical teacher. [Sidenote: _The_ Ciceronianus.] The piece[11] (which has for its second title _De Optimo Dicendi Genere_) did not appear, and could not have appeared, very early in his career. He might even, in the earlier part of that career, have been slow to recognise the popular exaggeration which, as in the other matter of the Reformation itself, struck his maturer intelligence. He glances at its genesis in divers of his letters, to Budæus, to Alciatus, and others, from 1527 onwards, and the chief “begetter” of it seems to have been the Flemish scholar, Longolius (Christophe de Longueil), who during the latter part of his short life was actually very much such a fanatic as the Nosoponus of the dialogue. This person is described by his friends Bulephorus and Hypologus as _olim rubicundulus, obesulus, Veneribus et gratiis undique scatens_, but now an austere shadow, who has no aspiration in life but to be “Ciceronian.” In order to achieve this distinction, he has given his days and nights wholly to the study of Cicero. The “copy” of his Ciceronian lexicon would already overload two stout porters. He has noted the differing sense of every word, whether alone or in context; and by the actual occurrence, not merely of the word itself, but of its form and case, he will be absolutely governed. Thus, if you are to be a true Ciceronian, you may say _ornatus_ and _ornatissimus_, but not _ornatior_; while, though _nasutus_ is permitted to you, both comparative and superlative are barred. In the same way, he will only pass the actual cases and numbers found in the Arpinate; though every one but, let us say, the dative plural occurs, the faithful must not presume to usurp that dative. Further, he intends to reduce the whole of Cicero to quantitative rhythm, fully specified; and in his own writing he thinks he has done well if he accomplishes one short period in a winter night. The piece begins with the characteristic Erasmian banter,—Nosoponus is a bachelor, and Bulephorus observes that it is just as well, for _his_ wife would in the circumstances either make an irruption into the study, and turn it topsy-turvy, or console herself with somebody else in some other place,—but by degrees becomes more serious, and ends with a sort of adjustment of most ancient and many modern Latin writers to the Ciceronian point of view. ----- Footnote 11: First printed at Basle, 1528. Besides the general editions, there are some separate reprints (_e.g._, Oxford, 1693). But it ought to have shared the popular diffusion of the _Colloquies_. -----