Page:History of the German people at the close of the Middle Ages vol1.djvu/109

UNIVERSITIES AND OTHER CENTRES OF LEARNING 97 to an end, and they were obliged to take leave of him, it was with difficulty that they tore themselves away. His friend Ortwin Gratius, the object of such unjust attack and ridicule in the ' Letters of Distinguished Men,' gave lectures in Cologne on Latin grammar and the ancient classics, and was also the literary adviser of the heirs of Quentel. He enjoyed friendly and literary intercourse with many celebrated contempo- raries : with the Florentine poet, Eemaclus ; the English lawyer, William Harris, and with the famous Peter of Eavenna, whom Italy and Germany both agreed to denominate as a ' Marvel of Jurisprudence.' ' The latter expressed in the warmest terms his reiterated thanks to Gratius for much kind assistance and encouragement in his scientific studies, and parted from him with deep regret ; and when he returned home in 1508 from the Ehenish capital, where for a time he had conducted a course of lectures, he esteemed himself fortunate to have had the privilege of intercourse at Cologne with so many shining lights in theology, jurisprudence,, medicine, and art. He took leave with tears in his eyes. ' Farewell, happy Cologne ! Farewell, thou sacred city, to which distance will prevent my ever returning, but which I shall daily see with my mind's eye!' A lasting mark in the spread of the movement along the Ehine district was made at the beginning of the sixteenth century by the two Latin poets, George Sibu- tus and Henry Glareanus. The latter received the laurel crown from the Emperor Maximilian at Cologne. Melancthon records that, in his youth, philological and philosophical studies were zealously pursued in the VOL. I. H