Erasmus, the greatest Renaissance figure in the North, was born at Rotterdam or Gouda in the Low Countries and died scarcely two decades after the beginning of the Reformation.1 Critical of papal power, monastic amorality, and the pedantic theologians of the Roman Catholic Church, he encouraged man to be interested in mankind, in the consciousness of self, in reality, and in simple devotion. As a humanist, Erasmus was consumed with the rediscovery of the classics and preferred the study of Greek and Latin literature to concern over the soul and spirit. Although doubt exists regarding the birthdate of Erasmus, history leaves no question that his mother was the daughter of a commonplace middle-class family; whereas his father, who never married, was studying in Rome to become a priest at the time of the birth of Erasmus, his second son. Half a century later the stigma of illegitimacy was removed