Quevedo's worldly circumstances, as the owner of a landed estate, and his rank in the public service under the powerful Duke of Osuna, kept him, happily, free from that necessity of writing for bread which oppressed the fine genius but could not stifle the kind heart of the author of _Don Quixote_. But they did not preserve him from the envy of his other less fortunate brothers of the pen. With Lope de Vega, with whom he could have no rivalry, whom he survived ten years, his relations seem to have been tolerably friendly--that is to say, they exchanged compliments and commendatory sonnets. With Góngora there was too much similarity of humour to be much love. They had various tilts at each other, in which there was too much venom spilt for either to emerge with honour. When Góngora abandoned his early simplicity of style and took to that affected and extravagant way of writing which came to be called after him, _Gongorismo_, which corresponded to the disease called _Euphuism_ in England and _Marinism_ in Italy--Quevedo took up his lance against the intruder and in defence of the language, writing a pamphlet, _La Culta Latiniparla_, in which, under the guise of a catechism for the instruction of ladies of culture in the new way of speech, he quizzes his rival and the new invention very happily. A French critic and student of Spanish letters, M. Germond de Lavigne, in his account of Quevedo, has shown himself so far lost to the sense of humour as to call this piece _un discours critique litteraire_; which is as though we should class Swift's _Argument against the Abolition of Christianity_ among works of devotion. Quevedo's wit had little effect in checking the depraved fashion of writing; and it is sad to tell that he himself, in his later years, was infected with the barbarous taste, and Gongorized like the rest. Góngora bitterly resented the attack upon his style, and there passed between the two much dyslogistic verse in the shape of epigram and sonnet. Góngora relieves his feelings by a poem in which he charges his critic with being no great scholar, and with _wandering slow with heavy pace_--one who _sleeps in Spanish and dreams in Greek_--insinuating that he is unsound in his religion. In another sonnet Góngora sneers at his critic's learning, his limping gait, and his blindness, laughs at his red cross of Santiago, and his adventures, calling him _borracho_ (drunkard), _pedante gofo_ (stupid pedant), _muy crítico y muy lego_, &c. Quevedo retorted with equal spirit and good taste, reflecting on his rival's origin, and hinting that he was no better Catholic than he should be:-- _He de untarte mis versos con tocino_ _Porque no me los roas, Gongorilla._ (I have to anoint my verses with bacon fat That you may not gnaw them, Gongorilla.)