"I was myself but lately present at a theological discussion--for I often go to such meetings--when someone asked what authority there was in Holy Writ for burning heretics instead of convincing them by argument. A certain hard old man, a theologian by the very look of him, answered with great scorn, that the apostle Paul had laid down this law when he said '_hereticum hominem post unam et alteram correptionem devita_'--'avoid an heretic after one or two attempts to convince him.' And when he had yelled out these same words over and over again and some were wondering what had struck the man, he finally explained '_de vita tollendum hereticum_'--'the heretic must be put out of life.' Some burst out laughing, but there were not wanting some to whom this commentary seemed perfectly theological." An opportunity for Erasmus to express his usual detestation of war is furnished by his references to the papal warfare, which seemed to him the most unjustifiable of all forms of military action. Indeed one may fairly say that in this year, 1509, Erasmus had clearly in mind and had already given expression to the views which were to form the ground-work of the Reformation. This was the year before Luther's journey to Rome, and Erasmus himself was just fresh from the impressions of an Italian residence. The worldly lives of clergymen, from pope to friar, the burden of monastic vows, the ignorance of theologians and their scholastic backers, the wickedness of indulgences, the follies and superstitions of saint-worship, the cruel weight of ceremonies which had no support in any worthy authority--all these things were as boldly pointed out by Erasmus in 1509 as ever they were to be shown by any reformer of a later day. The Praise of Folly carried his proclamation into a thousand hands that would never have touched the more sober, but not more serious, criticism of less broadly human critics.