Excerpt from The Praise of Folly HE works of Erasmus, which have so greatly enriched the literature of the world, have survived the lapse of centuries that have passed; and, because they contain that one touch of nature which makes the whole world kin, they will survive the lapse of untold centuries yet to come. His description of the bigotry and superstition - the ignorance and credulity of the masses of his day, is as true now as it was when first given to the world and his account of the pleadings and preachings - the pretensions and presumptions of the dominant priesthood - is as ap plicable to the twentieth, as to the fifteenth century in which it was written. Under the pleasing mask of Folly our author has uttered truths which are indeed sublime, and in the witty language of the Jester he has exposed the fallacies of that Faith which has, not inaptly, been defined by an inspired writer in the New Testament, as the evidence of things not seen, and the substance of things hoped for. About the Publisher Forgotten Books publishes hundreds of thousands of rare and classic books. Find more at www.forgottenbooks.com This book is a reproduction of an important historical work. Forgotten Books uses state-of-the-art technology to digitally reconstruct the work, preserving the original format whilst repairing imperfections present in the aged copy. In rare cases, an imperfection in the original, such as a blemish or missing page, may be replicated in our edition. We do, however, repair the vast majority of imperfections successfully; any imperfections that remain are intentionally left to preserve the state of such historical works.