.
It is, however, equally true that there were mediocrities among them,
and even worse; men with low standards and no ideals, who brought
their fellows to shame. Vows in those days were indissoluble, except
in rare cases; as a rule it was only by flight and disappearance for
ever that a man could escape social disgrace and the penalties
threatened by the spiritual arm to a renegade monk. To-day, when
orders can be laid down at the holder's will, the Church of England
contains priests of whom it cannot get rid.

The good, even when they rule, do not always lead; nor are they always
learned. Erasmus found the atmosphere of Steyn hopelessly distasteful.
It was not that he was prevented from study. His compositions of this
period show a wide acquaintance with the classics and the Fathers; and
his style, though it had not yet attained to the ease and lucidity of
his later years, has much of the elegance beyond which his
contemporaries never advanced. The fact, too, that he left Steyn to
become Latin Secretary to a powerful bishop implies that he must have
had many opportunities for study and have made good use of them. But
from what he says it is clear that the tone of the place was set by
the mediocrities. We need not suppose that vice was rampant among
them, to shock the young and enthusiastic scholar. There was quite
enough to daunt him in the prospect of a life spent among the
narrow-minded. Sinners who feel waves of repentance may be better
house-mates than those who have worldly credit enough to make them
self-satisfied.

Fortunately all houses of religion were not alike, any more than
colleges are alike to-day. Butzbach's lot was very different; and it
is a pleasant contrast to turn to his experiences at Laach, an
important Benedictine abbey some miles west of Andernach. In the
autumn of 1500, when he had been two years at Deventer, there appeared
one day in the school the Steward of the Abbey of Niederwerth, an
island in the Rhine below Coblenz. What the business was which had
brought him from his own monastery, is not stated; but he had also
been asked to do some recruiting for the Benedictines at Laach. The
Abbot there was nephew of the Prior at Niederwerth, and had taken
this opportunity to extend his quest further afield. The Steward
brought with him letters from the Abbot to the Rector of Deventer, now
Ostendorp, and also to the Brethren of the Common Life, asking for
some good and well-educated young men. Th