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De Zeventiende Eeuw. Jaargang 18 (2002)

De Zeventiende Eeuw. Jaargang 18

(2002)– [tijdschrift] Zeventiende Eeuw, De–rechtenstatus Auteursrechtelijk beschermd

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Detraction and Derision: Language and Honor in the Orbis Phaëthon of Hieremias Drexel S.I.⋆
T. Van Houdt - J. Latham

Introduction: the genesis and diffusion of the Orbis Phaëthon

It may seem odd to discuss an emblem book written by a Bavarian Jesuit in a journal that is devoted to cultural life in the Netherlands in the sixteenth and seventeenth centuries. However, the diffusion and reception of Drexel's emblematic works go well beyond the boundaries of Bavaria where he spent his entire lifetime. Born in Augsburg in 1581 as the son of Lutheran parents, Hieremias Drexel soon converted to Catholicism and joined the Jesuit order as early as 1598. After his philosophical and theological studies at the university of Ingolstadt, he worked as a teacher at Jesuit schools in Munich and Augsburg. In 1615, he was appointed preacher (Hofprediger) to the court of Maximilian of Bavaria in Munich, a post he held for 23 years until his death in 1638.1 During his service at court, he revealed himself as an extremely prolific author, writing nearly one book a year in the 1620s and 30s. Each one was based on sermons he had earlier preached before the Duke and Duchess of Bavaria. The Orbis Phaëthon, a voluminous emblem book on the vices of the tongue which was first issued in 1629, was no exception to the rule.2

As was often the case with Drexel's works, Orbis Phaëthon was printed by more than one publisher in Munich within the same year. Together, Melchior Segen, Nicolaus Henricus, and Cornelius Leysser must have released thousands of copies, as can be inferred at least indirectly from the account given by Leysser in his preface to Drexel's Noe, architectus arcae (Munich 1639).3 It is inconceivable that all these copies were destined for a local market only. Soon after 1629, clandestine editions began to appear in other cities, such as Cologne and Douai. In 1636, the Orbis Phaëthon was included into the collected works of Drexel published by Joannes Cnobbaert in Antwerp, a printer

who had excellent contacts with various members of the Jesuit order and had specialized in publishing didactic and devotional works. In 1643, the widow and heirs of Joannes Cnobbaert published an edition of Drexel's Opera omnia which soon established itself as a standard edition for years to come. The edition was made by the Augustinian friar Petrus de Vos (ca. 1598-1658) from Schiedam who was living and working in Bruges. De Vos basically limited himself to adding a series of indices to Drexel's work in order to make it more accessible to catechizers, preachers and other kinds of readers who were eager to use it as a commonplace-book to be pillaged for their own purposes.

The intertextual dimension: Drexel and Pelecyus

Drexel's emblem book is an ambitious one. The author apparently hoped to produce the definitive work on the vices of the tongue.4 His ambitions may even have reached a little further than that. Indeed, the preface to the reader seems to suggest that the author had been disappointed in his hopes of producing the very first book on language and ethics. Some other authors had preceded him, he says. This did not prevent Drexel from claiming priority for his own intellectual achievement. He wants his readers to know - or rather, to believe: ‘quod mihi tuto credes’ - that he had been preaching on the ethics of language two years before these works appeared in print. Furthermore, he is eager to minimize the merits of his predecessors: they have overlooked a number of important vices, he contends, thereby leaving it to him to write the first all-encompassing work on the abuses of the tongue.

Drexel does not mention any of his predecessors by name. It is safe to contend, however, that Joannes Pelecyus (1545-1623), a fellow Jesuit, was his main target. In 1620, he had published a moral tract on the vices of the tongue which was entitled Universitas iniquitatis.5 In his work, Pelecyus treats no more than thirty different ‘tongues’ - much less than Drexel in his Orbis Phaëthon. It is interesting to note, however, that Pelecyus arranged the various tongues in alphabetical order - just as Drexel would do in his work. This is not to say that Drexel slavishly copied Pelecyus's treatise when adopting an alphabetical arrangement of the subject-matter. On the one hand, alphabetical arrangements were not uncommon in medieval and early modern didactic and moralizing literature, with the use of the alphabet serving as a practical mnemonic device.6

On the other hand, Drexel seems to have chosen an alphabetical arrangement of ‘tongues’ very deliberately. In the epilogue to his work, he refers to a sermon by the famous Jesuit theologian and preacher Alphonsus Salmeron (1515-1585) in which it is stated that ‘the Tongue is an alphabet or a mass of vices’.7 The tongue is the source of innumerous kinds of evil which tend to spread and pile up in an utterly chaotic, seemingly uncontrollable manner, affecting both the young and the old, the rich and the poor, the humble and the noble. By using the alphabet as a grid, Drexel aimed to convey to his readers an impression of the all-pervasive nature and the cumulative effects of improper speech.

It is not difficult to understand why Drexel felt the need to emphasize the originality of his own work. At first sight, Universitas iniquitatis and Orbis Phaëthon look similar. A closer inspection of the volumes, however, confirms Drexel's claim that his work is quite different from Pelecyus's. To begin with, there is the obvious fact that Pelecyus did not insert any illustrations, let alone emblematic picturae, into his treatise. Furthermore, there is the less striking but equally relevant fact that Pelecyus could not compete with Drexel in erudition. Authoritative texts from Scripture, moral exempla and sententiae extracted from authors sacred and profane, as well as ancient and contemporary historical anecdotes, are heaped up in a way that does not fail to impress and even baffle the reader. Orbis Phaëthon is a treasure-house which dazzles the reader, and is meant to do so.8 It is clearly the result of a life spent almost entirely on reading and of a rigorous application of an elaborate commonplace method which enabled Drexel to rapidly turn his vast erudition into voluminous and erudite works of his own. To him, quantity was as important as quality.9

Language and Honor

There is yet another important difference between Pelecyus's moral treatise and Drexel's emblem book. Although both authors discuss an impressive array of vices of the tongue and insist on the all-pervasive nature of wicked speech, Drexel appears to have made a special effort to highlight the political dimension of the subject-matter. This explains why he introduced new kinds of verbal abuse which cannot be traced back to the canon of evil tongues as it had been established in medieval moralizing litera-

ture.10 This is notably the case with what Drexel has labeled the ‘political’ tongue (lingua politica), a tongue which bears some resemblance to the tongues of flattery, hypocrisy and mendacity, but has some peculiar features of its own. It is a tongue that adorns - or rather flaws - the mouth of machiavellian politicians and calculating courtiers.11 The focus on the political dimension of language and speech is of course perfectly in line with the genesis of Drexel's work. As we have said before, it was based on sermons held at the court of Maximilian, Duke of Bavaria. Understandably enough, the author was eager to tackle issues which were particularly relevant to rulers and their courts.

The image of court life presented by Drexel is not a very sympathetic one. On the contrary, the author shows us a microcosm of highly ambitious and distrustful noblemen who are involved in a subtle, yet deadly serious game to enhance their own status and honor by ingratiating themselves with their prince, on the one hand, and by harming or even destroying their competitors' good name, on the other.12 It is a world infected with ostentation, flattery and hypocrisy, yet at the same time a world full of rumor-mongering, backbiting, and even direct verbal assaults through insults and reproofs. It is a world where each participant has to learn the hard lesson of how to survive and deal with the unchristian but almost ineradicable practice of verbal abuse. In a funny anecdote about a wedding party he may have attended himself, Drexel reveals almost casually one of the strategies of survival that were widely adopted in noble circles - counterattacking or, to be more precise, retorting in such a way that the aggressor is left speechless and, preferably, even made to look a fool. The story is to be found in the chapter on insults (lingua convicians). The wedding party is attended by a very rich man from a distinguished and recently ennobled family. As soon as he shows up at the banquet, he is mocked by the bridegroom, an insolent man who appears to set great store by his own illustrious and age-old ancestry. ‘I smell a bag of pepper’, he says, insinuating that the guest is merely a homo novus, the descendant of a family of merchants who have enriched themselves by trading spices and used their money to buy themselves into the nobility. The guest is not thrown off balance, but immediately replies: ‘And I smell a bag of great poverty’, or to give a more literal translation that does more justice to the aggressive humor implied: ‘And I smell a beggar's pouch’ (‘Et ego olfacio saccum mendicitatis’). Adroitly but cruelly, the guest accuses his impudent host of belonging to a family that, for all its genuinely blue blood, has been reduced to beggary.13 The main reason why Drexel reported this story was to explain the dangers inherent to verbal aggression. At the same time, it seems to illustrate the difference between insults (which are deemed unacceptable) and wit or raillery (urbanitas) (which is not only permissible

but even commendable).14 According to the author, a man who is so impudent as to insult another person should know - and accept - that he runs the risk of being insulted in turn. Or, to use Drexel's more florid expression: ‘He who wants to play ninepins, should be willing to lose his money’ (‘Qui conis vult ludere, ne recuset numos perdere’).

The comparison of social life among the nobility with a game of ninepins is perhaps not altogether adequate. Although it reveals that honor and fame were never fixed but always liable to damage and, consequently, had to be safeguarded with utmost care, it tends to obscure the fact that what was lost or gained in the highly competitive game in which noblemen were involved could not really be assessed in pecuniary terms. For, as the late scholastic doctors whom Drexel had read as a student of theology acknowledged, honor and reputation exceeded any estimation in money; if damaged by insult or slander, they could not be restored by means of a financial compensation.15 The comparison is also misleading in so far as it suggests that people were free to join the game or not. The anecdote reported by Drexel makes it perfectly clear that this was not the case. Whether the guest wants it or not, he is drawn into the game. The bridegroom's verbal assault simply forces him to retort. If he had ignored the insult and kept silent, he would certainly have suffered a loss of face. By retorting so wittily, on the other hand, he not only manages to avoid a loss of face (or at least to limit the damage done) but also, and perhaps more importantly, succeeds in giving his aggressor an equally heavy, perhaps even heavier, blow. It is only fair to add, however, that Drexel would not have agreed with this conclusion. As we will see, he was strongly opposed against retorting. According to him, there were other, more Christian ways of dealing with verbal assaults.

A book for meditation

In his Orbis Phaëthon, Drexel pays as much attention to people who are guilty of verbal abuse as to people who are confronted with it. If anything, Drexel counsels patience. Taking the ancient Stoic philosopher Epictetus as his starting-point, he offers his readers a long list of arguments meant to improve their capacity of remaining unaffected by, if not completely immune against, the ravages of verbal abuse. This first of all requires his readers to carry out a penetrating, yet at the same time completely detached, analysis in order to perceive in all circumstances the difference between reality and false opinion. Once the distinction is clearly established, the reader will realize that more often than not he lets himself be carried away by his anger and frustration because he is

misled by his false judgement. Thus, the reader has to learn that he is not insulted by the man who attacks him but rather by his idea that the man is insulting him:

Bear in mind that it is not the man reviling or striking you who insults you, but it is your judgement that these men are insulting you. Therefore, when someone irritates you, be assured that it is your own opinion which has irritated you. And so make it your first endeavor not to be carried away by the external impression; for if once you gain time and delay, you will more easily become master of yourself.16

The reader has to reflect upon the verbal attack which has occurred, examining it systematically from all possible angles and making a clear distinction between fact and opinion, between what has really happened and his own perception of what has happened. In so doing, he will eventually reach the conclusion that he has not been damaged at all, but rather that he has benefited from the aggressor's action. For the insult has either been completely unfounded and therefore does not deserve any further attention (for any attempt to deny the allegations and insinuations made will turn out to have the opposite effect) or else it has brought to the surface flaws in his life and personality that should perhaps be mended. Whether truthful or not, the offender has rendered his victim an important service in so far as he has revealed what would otherwise have remained hidden for a long time. Indeed, the insult reveals the general opinion of other people. In short, thorough reflection makes sure that the so-called victim does not feel victimized at all. Far from being offended and, as a result, carried away by his emotions into launching a quick and vehement counter-attack, he remains completely untouched by what was meant to be a direct verbal assault. As a consequence, the aggressor will soon be disappointed and give up: just as one is unable to insult a rock, so it is impossible to insult a detached person who has been trained to maintain his mental peace.17

In order to better inculcate this moral lesson in his readers' minds, Drexel consciously taps their powers of imagination. This explains why he frequently makes use of comparisons and images which illustrate in a quite vivid manner various aspects of sinful speech. Thus, in the chapter on detraction, the author provides a long list of similes likening the detractor to various animals. A detractor is like a dog, Drexel says, that sinks its teeth into its prey, and does not let loose until it has eaten away all the flesh. By the same token, a detractor can rightly be called a beetle that feeds on other animals' excrements or a pig that runs around in the forest, not looking for flowers to eat but rather some mud in which it can wallow. A detractor is like a leech lavishly sucking the blood of its ‘host’, or a wolf dwelling in graveyards, not afraid to dig up recently buried corpses. First and foremost, however, a detractor is to be compared to a snake which

avoids open confrontations, preferring to attack secretly. Similarly, just as a single bite of a snake can be lethal, so a detractor needs only a few words to destroy someone's reputation.18

It goes without saying that all these similes could easily have been turned into emblematic images. In fact, quite similar descriptions of animals were actually visualized by the engravers Philip and Raphael Sadeler Junior. This is the case with, for instance, the description of an eagle which serves as a symbol for the wise man who, self-contained and detached, maintains his mental calm when being insulted by wicked men. It is an eagle of an exceptional nature:

In order to visualize their contempt for insults, the ancients painted an eagle with eyes that did not threaten, with a beak that did not terrify, with folded wings, and with inoffensive claws. Seeking no quarry, it sat down, immobile, quiet, and composed. Next to the eagle they placed a crow, a restless and garrulous bird that seemed to provoke and clamor with its beak and wings. Therefore, dear Christian, be like the eagle that despises loquacious little crows. Let the fools caw, but keep your peace. Even though railers babble, they will not irritate the eagle. He answers best to insults who obliterates them with silence.19

Not unlike the vivid description of animals within the broader context of quite often very elaborate comparisons, the visual representation of animals, as well as of objects and human actions, in complex emblematic picturae serves as an initial stimulus for the reader to absorb and ponder the moral message conveyed by the author. As such, the images are crucial to the ‘spiritual exercise’ the reader is invited to make. For although the Orbis Phaëthon occupies a somewhat special place in Drexel's vast oeuvre in that it is moralizing rather than devotional, there is no denying that its ultimate purpose was to provide readers with a meditative therapy that would enable them to cure their own passions and mental disturbances by using their own power of imagination and reflection. Orbis Phaëthon is a book for meditation far more than a manual for good behavior. By leaving out the engravings that traditionally adorned the twenty-three chapters of Drexel's emblem book when he composed his standard edition of 1643, Pieter de Vos mutilated the work and drastically altered its nature and scope. What had originally been conceived as an emblem book based on rhetorical and meditative principles wellestablished in the Jesuit order,20 was now turned into a mere commonplace-book that

lent itself all too easily to exploitation by preachers and catechizers who were looking for material to compose their own sermons and lessons. While the new edition, with its numerous and detailed indices, erased some of the most peculiar features of the Orbis Phaëthon, it also ensured that, both in the Netherlands and elsewhere, in the Catholic as well as in the Protestant world, the work would have a long Nachleben whose richness we can hardly fathom today. For many of the considerations, telling anecdotes or striking comparisons inserted by Drexel into his emblem book were from that time onwards incorporated in sermons and exhortations that were often as ephemeral as the voice of the preacher who delivered them.

Abstract - The Bavarian Jesuit Hieremias Drexel (1581-1638) was perhaps the most published European writer in the sixteenth and seventeenth centuries. In 1629, he published Orbis Phaëthon, a voluminous emblem book on the vices of the tongue which was reprinted time and again, not only in Germany but also in the Southern Netherlands and elsewhere. Although Drexel was not the first author to devote an entire work on the ethics of language and speech, he distanced himself from his predecessors by focusing on the political dimension of verbal abuse. Revealing and criticizing the world of machiavellian politicians and calculating courtiers, Drexel discusses at length the vices of detraction and derision which were so frequently used by noblemen to destroy their competitors' good name. According to Drexel, reflection and meditation are called for in order to remain unaffected by the ravages of verbal abuse. A real book for meditation, Orbis Phaëthon provides its readers with detailed comparisons and vivid images which force them to make the ‘spiritual exercise’ necessary to maintain their mental peace.

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