References
- Many thanks to Professor Michael Hunter for advice and suggestions on how best to transcribe these variant manuscripts: his forthcoming article ‘How to edit a seventeenth century text’ should provide an important starting point for further discussion. This text is reproduced by permission of the British Library.
- report
- a book of
- MS2 also includes at this point: ‘I shall therefore first set down the words of Cantapratensis as I find them in his book de Apibus before mentioned, and yn set down the testimonies of other authors touching the said Simon Tornacensis and his impiety though not punctually in ye very words of Cantapratensis And so I shall leave ye consideration & ye probability thereof to ye judgement of others’.
- MS2 places this phrase in the body of the text, not in the margins.
- MS2 does not contain this marginal note.
- high
- MS2 includes the earlier passage ‘a learned & judicious Historiographer of the affairs of our nation’ from above. Note the following sentence in MS2 does not contain the book reference.
- MS2 has a different reading for this: ‘The words of Matth Paris are not the ye same wch are set down by Cantapratensis but others yet do they show the vile conditions of Tornacensis as do others writers following’.
- include ‘very’.
- most
- fortouched
- inexplicable
- MS2 includes the following: ‘Joannes Trithemius that learned Abbot of Spanheim who flourished A D 1500 writeth thus of this Simon Tornacensis. Simon de Tornaco (saith he) a Presbyter was a learned man in Divinity & publicly learned in secular philosophy A most fine logician & most expert in all ye Liberall Arts He was Master of the Divinity Schoole; he taught many years in the University of Paris where (he had) very many auditors but following to much Aristotle he was found to have erred in some points he wrote some small works of his witt as of his sentences of divers questions and upon Athanasius Creed SC and others not come to my knowledge/Thus Trithemius/Polydor Vergil in his Histor Angl: thus shortly writeth of him at this time (saith he) wch was at ye death of K John) there were these famous men to witt Eustachius Gaufredus Eboracensis Antistes and Simon Turnais so he nameth him a very learned man who boasting more yn was fiting of his own learning suddainly forgat his own reading in such sort he became altogether ignorant of his letters/Thus Polydor Vergil/John Bale our countryman in his centuries of the ecclesiasticall writers of Brittain thus writeth of this Simon Tornaiensis or Tiurnais as he &C Pold. Vergill call him Simon Thurvai a Presbyter by nation an Englishman by his countie as they saie a cornish man being a most acute logitian & expert in all ye liberall Arts leaving the university of ye English was for many years governour of ye Divinity school at Paris he was so excellent at yt doctrine, wch puffed him up yt he had ye masters of ye University as well to admire him as to heare him; but when as he proudly & arrogantly too much adhered to his Aristotle despising the humility of Evangelicall Doctrine he belched forth very many Blasphemies agst moses & Christ and being smitten wh divine revenge, he was deprived of all knowledge and after yt bellowed like a beast instead of a mans voice whereof Pol. Verg: Lib 15 is not silent so yt as nothing was more dull in him when he was an old man when he was compos memoria he wrote many things some of ym noted by Bale, he abhorred saith Bale wholsome marriage and kept Aleydis a strumpet instead of a wife he florished A D 1216 under the reign of King John/Thus Baldus/Neither is this Tornacensis the sole man yt hath uttered this blasphemy of ye 3 Grand impostors for it is reported also of ye like Blasphemy charged on ye Emp: Frederick 2 wch his accusors pretended he uttered A Dm: 1239 as is related by Alb. Monarchus & (/) Fontium in his Chron: cited by Arnold Bostius in his Chronological Collection who lived A Dm 1494 whose relation is mentioned by the author of Magnus Chron: Belgicii published (with other German writers) by Pictorius A Dm: 1607 in these words following Item in ye year following wch was A 1239 17 cases were laid to ye Emperors charge among wch is a certain blasphemy of his, agst the Christian Religion wch our Lord the Pope mentioneth in his letters to the Archbishop of Serva Franca (?) thus There was saith ye Emperor 3 barators or juglers in ye world Moses, Christ & Mahomet and herein he gives so great honour to Mahomet yt he associates him with moses & Christ But whereas Mahomet never called Moses or Christ Barators it appears herin yt the Emperor was worse yn Mahomet moreover it is reported yt one time he said to one of his aquaintance when he saw the priest carrying the Lords Body to a sick person, these words viz. Woe is me how long shall this cousenage or fraud last for these blasphemy and other heynous Acts the Pope caused him all over the world to be excommunicated and to be denounced eccommucat. Thus Alb: Monachus & Magn: Chron both.’
- As he called them ie. juglers & Impostors.
- Thus Matth: Paris out of the letters of Pope Gregory ye Dat 12 Calend: junii A Papat 9 Sui 13 set downe by Matth Paris in his Histor Angl: A:D: 1239 sub Henr: 3 Reg: pag: ult edit: 506 whereby it appears (whether the Emperor Frederick was justly charged or not by ye Pope with this Blasphemy wch ye Emperor himself denied nor is it material to our purpose) that this report of.
- take it from Tornacensis or the Emperor is no new report being acted so many ages past before the times of the said.
- the same Blasphemy yet they could not be the first inventors thereof.
- MS2 ends at this point with the phrase ‘so I end with this discourse’.