[In the essay below, Schultz suggests that too many critics have focused on Ship of Fools in order to define Barclay's impact on English literature and proposes that literary critics examine the bulk of Barclay's writing as well as his biographical information in order to study his importance in literary history.]

To students of literature the name of Alexander Barclay is linked with his Ship of Fools—a translation, or rather a derivation, from the Narrenschiff of Sebastian Brant. Brant's poem had such universal appeal that it was translated into several languages, and was popular throughout Europe in the sixteenth century. Barclay was fortunate in his original, and his rendition came at an opportune time. But the reputation of Barclay does not rest upon the Ship of Fools alone. He was industrious in literary work and the list of his writings includes many books. Among them are the Introductory to Write and Pronounce Frenche, a translation of Sallust, the Myrrour of Good Manners, and the five Eclogues. Besides the foregoing, he is the author of many works that have not survived. Such a writer must have had considerable fame in his own day. That he was known at court is shown by the fact that he was considered a suitable poet to devise “Histoires and Convenient Raisons” for the Field of the Cloth of Gold. John Bale, a contemporary, in spite of a bitter personal prejudice, speaks of him as “poeta ac rhetor insignis.” If he were so well known as all this would imply, it seems curious that the facts of his life should be so uncertain. The date and place of his birth are unknown, his nationality is a matter of dispute, and the surviving details of his career are few. His biographers have collected the scattered facts of his life, drawn conclusions from them, and deduced others on the theory that in his works Barclay reproduces his own experience. Such to a certain extent, is the character of the most elaborate discussion that has yet appeared—the sketch prefixed by Jamieson to his edition of the Ship of Fools.¹ Koelbing in the latest criticism of Barclay, the section devoted to him in the Cambridge History of English Literature,² follows rather closely the work of his predecessor. But further light is thrown upon Barclay's career by the Letters and Papers of the Reign of Henry VIII³ which was published subsequent to Jamieson's work, and was apparently unknown to Koelbing. It is barely mentioned by Jusserand⁴ in his history of English Literature. Gardiner, in his introduction to the Letters and Papers, calls attention to the letters concerning Barclay as a source of biographical material, but apparently no attempt has been made to reconstruct the details of Barclay's life in the light of this new information.

An examination of the majority of the accounts of Barclay's life discloses the fact that stripped of all speculation and doubtful statements they draw their information very largely from John Bale's short sketch printed in his Scriptorum Illustrium Maioris Brytannie,⁵ published seven years after Barclay's death. When this account is carefully analysed at least one point that has puzzled Barclay's biographers, the question of whether he was a Franciscan or a Benedictine, can be cleared up; and by the aid of the Letters and Papers Barclay's later career may be traced.

The following is Bale's account of Barclay in full:

“Alexander Barkeley, quem alii Scotum, alii Anglum fuisse contendunt, poeta ac rhetor insignis, ab eruditis artibus magnam sibi, dum viveret, existimationem peperit. Plures sectas ille probavit, quandoque sacrificulum, quandoque Benedictum aut Franciscanum indunes, nulli certus; sed in illis omnibus veritatis osor, & sub coelibatus fuco foedus adulter perpetue mansit. Multa tamen in Anglicum sermonem eleganter ille transtulit ac scripsit, praesertim

The work quoted above is a valuable and interesting source of information. In recent years Bale's veracity has been questioned, but through the publication of his autograph notebook in 1902⁶ we are able to see his modus operandi.⁷ What Bale did was to gather information from various sources and combine this material into one publication. In his lists of books he distinguishes those he had seen by reproducing the first line of each, as shown by the list presented, and in the case of works so noted there is no duplication. This is not true of the notebook, however, where there is repetition both in title and first line. In other words, he makes corrections by striking out the duplicates; otherwise they remain, as a reference to the lists will show.

From the notebook we learn that there are four sources for his account of Barclay. These are the lists received from “Nicolaus Brigan et alii,” “ex officina Roberti Toye,”⁸ “ex museo Joannis Alen,” and “ex hospitis domo Dubline.” In the first of these we have this statement prefixed to the list: “Alexander Barkeley, Scotus, Benedicti Monachus in Anglia primum, postea Franciscanus, scripsit,” etc. Heading another list is, “Alexander Barclay, Anglus, doctor et poeta, scripsit,” etc. Since these statements are given on the authority of different sources it is easy to see how contradictions may appear. Thus in the lists cited he is claimed by one to be a Scot and by another an Englishman. It is evident, then, that any inference drawn from one source in the notebook may be incorrect; and that Bale's final summary itself may not be entirely reliable.⁹

With these facts in mind, Bale's account may be discussed together with the work of later writers. There is no need to review the discussion concerning Barclay's nationality. The dispute goes back to Bale's time, and Jamieson has given fully the arguments of both sides.¹⁰ His decision is that Barclay was a Scot, an opinion that seems to have the weight of evidence. The main testimony is that of Wm. Bullein,¹¹ a contemporary of Barclay and a native of the Isle of Ely where for a time Barclay lived and wrote. Bullein says of Barclay that he was “borne beyonde the cold river of Twede.” Another argument is that in the Ship of Fools there is an acrostic passage in eulogy of James IV of Scotland. Moreover, throughout the works of Barclay there is a large number of Scottish words. Jamieson lists several examples from the Ship of Fools, while in other works many dialectic peculiarities occur that are undoubtedly of northern origin. It seems safe, therefore, to assume that Barclay was a Scot.

Jamieson's conjecture that Barclay in his early days lived at Croyden seems plausible because of his frequent mention of that town throughout the Eclogues, and the fact that he was buried in the church there. At what university he studied it is impossible to say. He is claimed for Cambridge because of a single mention of the place in the Eclogues; and for Oxford on the ground that he received his first preferment from Thomas Cornish, the Suffragan Bishop of Tyne, in the diocese of Bath and Wells, who was earlier a Provost of Oriel College. It is also impossible to say whether he traveled and studied abroad. Certain passages in his works would indicate such travels, if we are to believe that Barclay puts his own experience into the mouths of his characters, and his apparent knowledge of foreign languages might lead to the same inference. But there is no direct evidence. At any rate he entered the church and became chaplain at the College of Saint Mary Ottery in Devonshire. Here he wrote his first work, The Ship of Fools, as is stated in the preface, in the year 1508.¹²

After leaving Devonshire, Barclay is next heard of, says Jamieson, “in monastic orders, a monk of the order of St. Benedict, in the famous monastery of Ely.” This brings up the question whether Barclay was a Benedictine or a Franciscan, or as Jamieson says, following the statements of preceding writers, at different times both. The statement of Mackenzie,¹³ for which no authority is given, that “he entered into the Order of St. Benedict, and the Rules of that Society not pleasing him, he changed his Habit, and entered into the Order of St. Francis,” and other statements equally unsupported, may be disregarded. The only indication that Barclay was at any time of the order of St. Benedict is that he speaks of himself in the title of his version of the Myrrour of Good Manners¹⁴ as “Monke of Ely”; that in the letter of Sir Nicholas Vaux to Wolsey¹⁵ concerning the arrangements for the Field of the Cloth of Gold he is called “the Blacke Monke and Poete”; and Barclay's own reference in the prologue to the Eclogues to his “habite blacke.” In one of Bale's lists, quoted earlier,¹⁶ Barclay is spoken of as first a Benedictine and later a Franciscan. But that Bale himself did not consider this statement of value is shown by his remark that the matter is “nulli certus.”

In the last analysis, then, the question of Barclay's having been a member of the order of St. Benedict depends upon the fact that he is called by himself and others a monk, that he speaks of his black habit, and that he was at one time located at Ely where there was a Benedictine monastery. The term monk, however, was, and still is, so loosely used that it may have been applied to a friar, and in that capacity he may have been at Ely without being a member of the monastery there. Moreover, he may well have been one of the so-called “Black Franciscans.”¹⁷ There is no question of his having been a Franciscan since his contemporary Bullein¹⁸ speaks specifically of “the five knots upon his girdle after Francis tricks.” This testimony of Bullein is significant in another way. Perhaps the best argument that Barclay was a Benedictine is his connection with Ely Monastery. But it is at this place that he was known by Bullein, who tells us that he was a Franciscan. Although it was possible for a monk to become a friar, and no one can say for certain that Barclay did not, the probability is against what would be considered going from a higher to a lower spiritual state. In view of these facts, and of Bale's doubt upon this point, it seems reasonable to assume that Barclay was never a Benedictine, but that some time after he left the chaplaincy of St. Mary Ottery he entered the order of St. Francis.

Barclay's biographers are silent upon the interval between 1520, the year of the letter from Vaux to Wolsey, and 1546, when he became Vicar of Much Badew in Essex. During this period, which covers Wolsey's height of power and later fall, the dissolution of the monasteries, and the separation of the Church of England and the Church of Rome, Barclay's own career must have undergone many changes in his transition from a Franciscan Friar to a position in the English Church.

Light is thrown upon this period of Barclay's life by the Letters and Papers of the Reign of Henry VIII, already mentioned. In a letter from Herman Rinck to Wolsey, dated at Cologne, Oct. 4, 1528,¹⁹ the writer acknowledges the receipt of letters delivered to him by John West, an Observant, concerning the arrest of certain heretics. Among other things he offers to go to the Emperor to obtain the renewal of privileges for English merchantmen, “as there was a clause for the prevention of English rebels or heretics taking refuge in the empire,” etc. He adds that “William Roy, William Tyntaell, Jerome Barlo, Alexander Barckley, and their adherents, and George Constans and others ought to be delivered up.” This would indicate that Barclay's criticism of certain abuses of the Church and Clergy, which had appeared in his earlier works, had ripened into something stronger until he was compelled to flee to the continent.

That Barclay returned, or was brought back, to England is shown by a letter from John West to Wolsey, dated 1529.²⁰ The letter “asks that he may speak with him secretly before he sees Brother Alysander Barkley, who has called Wolsey a tyrant and other opprobrious and blasphemous words.”²¹ Barclay had already made a veiled attack on Wolsey in the Eclogues²² written many years before, where in his tribute to Bishop Alcock he tells of the harm done by “butchers dogges wood,” a term that must refer to Wolsey.

The next reference to Barclay appears in a letter of Robert Ward to Cromwell, Oct. 9, 1538.²³ “In Barking Parish Suffolk,” says Ward, “where Mr. Richard Redman is parson the word of God is not preached unless a stranger comes by chance, and those that have come have not set forth the king's title nor defaced the usurped power of the Bp. of Rome; no, not Alex. Barkley who preached in Wytson Holidays. Spoke to him of his negligence after the sermon before the Parson and Mr. Walter Watlond, one of the Justices.”

Three days later in a letter to Cromwell²⁴ William Dynham tells of a visit to the Priory of St. Germayne in Cornwall where he “sat at supper with the prior, accompanied by Alex. Barclay, who the day before preached in honor of the Blessed Virgin.” Here Barclay is spoken of as “a frere in a somewhat honester weed.” Dynham describes the conversation in which Barclay is quoted as saying “I would to God that at the least the laws of God might have as much authority as the Laws of the Realm,” and that he thought men were “too busy pulling down images without special commandment of the Prince.” Dynham takes exception to these remarks, and in the heat of the argument finally tells Barclay that his “cankered heart is disclosed,” and calls him a “false knave and a dissembling frere.” Some one, perhaps one of the writers quoted above, has also written to Latimer about the same matter. Latimer sends word to Cromwell²⁵ that he has been informed “that Frere Bartlow does much hurt in Cornwale and in Daynshire, both with open preaching and private communication.”

The final reference in this connection is given by Foxe.²⁶ “Hereunto also pertaineth the example of Friar Bartley, who wearing still his Friar's cowl after the suppression of the religious houses, Cromwell, coming through Paul's Churchyard and espying him in Rheines's shop, ‘Yea,’ said he, ‘Will not that cowl of yours be left off yet? And, if I hear by one o'clock that this apparel be not changed, thou shalt be hanged immediately for example of all others.’ And so, putting his cowl away, he durst never wear it after.” This incident probably took place shortly before the writing of the letters quoted above since Dynham speaks of him as “a Frere in a somewhat honester weed.”

From the foregoing documents we are able to gain a general idea of Barclay's activities during the period left blank by his biographers. In the Roman Church he had been a reactionary. He wished the Church to be remodeled and reformed, but from within. This led him to attack Wolsey with the result that he was compelled to flee to the continent. The next year he is brought back and charged with these attacks. But it must not be inferred from this that Barclay had become a Protestant. As he attacked Wolsey, so he apparently attacks Cromwell. It must be remembered that the Reformation in England was political as well as religious. Barclay accepted the political, but not the religious reformation. The result is that we find him a few years later preaching in Cornwall and Devonshire. He had put off his cowl, had outwardly conformed, but is attacked by the extreme party as too conservative. He has not “defaced the usurped power of the Bp. of Rome,” and thinks that men are “too busy pulling down images.” Latimer himself takes up the matter and writes about it to Cromwell. These things account for the animosity of Bale, and his attacks upon Barclay's character. Bale belonged to the party of Latimer and Cromwell, and to him Barclay was a wolf in sheep's clothing. But Barclay was not within the reach of his enemies, and received preferment in the English Church. He became Vicar of Much Badew in Essex on Feb. 7, 1546, and of St. Mathew at Wokey in Somerset on March 30, of the same year. On April 30, 1552 he was presented with the rectory of All Hallows, Lombard Street,²⁷ but a few weeks later he died, as Newcourt's record shows, and was buried at Croyden.²⁸ The Croyden Parish Register reads, “June 10, 1552. Alexander Barkley sepult,” thus corroborating the statement of Bale.

These, then, are the scanty facts in the life of Alexander Barclay. It is possible that the speculations and deductions from Barclay's works made by Jamieson and other writers referred to previously may be true in part at least. But this outline, bare as it is, may clear up some matters hitherto unsettled; and it shows Barclay more clearly than ever as a typical representative of the transition period between Humanism and Scholasticism.

Notes

1. T. H. Jamieson, Ed. The Ship of Fools. Translated by Alexander Barclay. 1, 1-85.

2. Arthur Koelbing, Cambridge History of English Literature, 3.4.63.

3. Letters and Papers of the Reign of Henry VIII. Ed. Brewer and Gardiner, London, 1862-1910.

4. J. J. Jusserand, Histoire Littéraire du Peuple Anglais, Paris, 1904, p. 103 N.

5. No. 723.

6. Index Britanniae Scriptorum, 19.

7. Cf. Berdan, Alexander Barclay, Poet and Preacher, Modern Language Review, 8. 296.

8. A London Printer and Bookseller, 1542-60.

9. An instance of this in the question of the authorship of The Castell of Labor is given by Berdan, op. cit., 296.

10. Op. Cit., XXV-XXXI.

11. A Dialogue Both Pleasaunt and Pietiful … against the Fever Pestilence. Cf. Jamieson, op. cit., XXII.

12. Cf. Jamieson, op. cit., CXVI.

13. Lives and Characters of Eminent Scots Writers, 287.

14. Cf. Jamieson, op. cit., CV.

15. Letters and Papers, 3.1., 737.

16. Op. cit., p. 117.

17. For much of this information I am indebted to Father Aldrich, of the Dominican Fathers of New Haven, Conn.

18. Jamieson, op. cit., XXIII.

19. Letters and Papers, 4. 4810.

20. Ibid., 4. 3. 5462.

21. Father Aldrich (mentioned previously) suggests that there is here additional evidence that Barclay was a Franciscan in the fact that John West, an Observant, speaks of him as “Brother.”

22. Eclogue 1. 349.

23. Letters and Papers, 13. 2. 571.

24. Ibid., 13. 2. 596.

25. Ibid., 13. 2. 709, dated 28 Oct. 1538.

26. Acts and Monuments (Townsend's Ed.), 5. 396.

27. Newcourt, Reportorium Ecclesiasticum Parochiale Londinense (under respective parishes named).

28. Lysons, The Environs of London (under Croyden).