The Praise of Folly — A Reader’s Guide

Folly’s Self-Praise and the Letter to More

The dedicatory letter to Thomas More establishes the work's playful premise. Erasmus explains that while traveling from Italy to England, to avoid “foolish and illiterate fables,” he chose to “make some sport with the praise of folly.” The pun on More's name—Moriae—is explicit, and Erasmus anticipates critics who might find the subject too light or too biting. He cites a lineage of classical precedents: Homer’s Batrachomyomachia, Virgil’s Culex, Lucian’s The Fly, and Seneca’s satire on Claudius. This catalogue does more than defend; it positions the work within a tradition of learned jest. Folly then begins her oration, claiming that her very presence makes the audience cheerful, and that she alone dispenses the pleasures that gods and men enjoy. The opening thus frames the entire speech as a paradoxical encomium, where the speaker’s authority is both asserted and undercut.

The Madness of Merchants and the View from the Moon

In the middle excerpt, Folly catalogs human follies with escalating energy. She describes merchants who “venture on everything be it never so dishonest,” yet “shuffle themselves into the first rank” because of their gold rings. She mocks those who borrow from Peter to pay Paul, starve themselves to enrich heirs, or risk their lives at sea for uncertain gain. The tone is comic but sharp, and the list builds to a striking image: if a man like Menippus could look down from the moon, he would see “a swarm of flies and gnats quarreling among themselves, fighting, laying traps for one another, snatching, playing, wantoning, growing up, falling, and dying.” This cosmic perspective reduces human striving to absurdity. Folly then turns to grammarians, calling their schools “cloisters, bridewells, or slaughterhouses,” and notes that they take pride in terrorizing boys with “ferules, rods, and whips.” The satire here is both specific—targeting the pedantry of schoolmasters—and general, exposing the self-importance that masks misery.

The Rhetoric of Irony and the Unreliable Narrator

Throughout the excerpts, Folly’s voice is consistently ironic. She praises what she ostensibly condemns, and her self-congratulation is so exaggerated that the reader is forced to question every claim. For instance, she declares that grammarians “think themselves the most excellent of all men” because of her courtesy—yet the description of their wretched conditions undercuts the praise. This technique, inherited from Lucian and the classical paradoxical encomium, requires the reader to remain alert. Erasmus does not signal when Folly is being serious; the humor depends on recognizing the gap between her words and the implied truth. The letter to More reinforces this: Erasmus calls the work a “small declamation” and asks More to defend it, acknowledging that some may find it “more biting than may beseem the modesty of a Christian.” The frame thus prepares the reader for a text that is both entertaining and provocative, where the speaker’s folly is a mask for critique.

Classical Precedents and Humanist Play

Erasmus’s letter to More explicitly situates The Praise of Folly within a humanist tradition of learned jest. He names Homer, Virgil, Ovid, Lucian, Apuleius, and even St. Jerome as authors who wrote playful or satirical works. This is not mere name-dropping; it signals that the book participates in a serious intellectual game. The reader is expected to recognize allusions—to Menippus, to the “golden bough” proverb, to the five curses of Homer—and to appreciate the wit of applying classical forms to contemporary targets. The translation by John Wilson (1668) preserves this learned tone, though the English may feel archaic. The excerpts show Folly quoting or adapting classical sources freely, blending them with observations of everyday life. This fusion of erudition and popular satire is the book’s hallmark, and it rewards readers who can catch the references while enjoying the surface comedy.

Reading The Praise of Folly requires a willingness to follow a speaker who is both entertaining and unreliable. Folly’s oration is a performance: she praises herself, mocks everyone else, and leaves the reader to decide where the truth lies. Pay attention to the classical allusions and the shifts in tone—from broad comedy to sharp critique. The letter to More is not just a preface; it is a key to the book’s method. Treat Folly’s words as a puzzle, not a sermon, and the satire will reveal its layers.

The rain kept rhythm with Folly’s laughter, Erasmus’s sly wink at Erasmus’s own world. Later, idly tracing his England, I found myself inside a different sort of home—a quiet, brick-and-ivy one. It was a small detour, but the weight of both books felt alike: ideas living in rooms where people actually sat. Little Journeys to the Homes of the Great - Volume 05 Little Journeys to the Homes of English Authors — Text and Context holds that same gentle curiosity, just walking through a different doorway.