Editing Florentius Volusenus

{{Short description|Scottish linguist and humanist}}
{{Use dmy dates|date=June 2017}}
{{Use British English|date=June 2017}}

'''Florentius Volusenus''' (c. 1504{{snd}}1546 or 1547) was a [[Scotland|Scottish]] [[Humanism|humanist]] most noted for his ''De Animi Tranquillitate''. "Florentius Volusenus" is a [[Latinization (literature)|latinization]] of uncertain derivation; his first name is variously suggested as Florence or Florens, and surname as Wolson, Wolsey, or [[Wilson (surname)|Wilson]]. In his letters written in English he refers to himself as Volusene.

==Early life==
He was born near [[Elgin, Moray|Elgin]], studied Philosophy at [[Aberdeen]], and in the dialogue ''De Animi Tranquillitate'' says that the description of the abode of tranquillity was based on a dream that came to him after a conversation with a fellow-student on the banks of his native [[River Lossie]]. He was then a student of [[Philosophy]] of four years' standing.<ref name="EB1911">{{EB1911|inline=y|wstitle=Volusenus, Florentius |volume=28 |pages=209–210}}</ref>

==In Paris==
Proceeding to Paris, he became tutor to [[Thomas Wynter]], reputed son of [[Cardinal Wolsey]]. He paid repeated visits to England, where he was well received by the king, and, after Wolsey's fall, he acted as one of [[Thomas Cromwell]]'s [[secret agent|agents]] in Paris. He was in England as late as 1534, and appears to have been [[Rector (ecclesiastical)|Rector]] of [[Speldhurst]] in [[Kent]].<ref name="EB1911"/>

In Paris he knew [[George Buchanan (humanist)|George Buchanan]], and found patrons in the cardinal [[Jean de Lorraine]] and [[Jean du Bellay]]. He was to have gone with du Bellay on his mission to Italy in 1535, but illness kept him in Paris. As soon as he recovered he set out on his journey, but at [[Avignon]], by the advice of his friend [[Antonio Bonvisi]] (d. 1558), he sought the patronage of the bishop of the diocese, the learned and pious [[Paul Sadolet]], who made him master in the school at [[Carpentras]], with a salary of seventy crowns. Volusenus paid frequent visits to [[Lyon]] (where [[Conrad Gesner]] saw him, still a young man, in 1540), probably also to Italy, where he had many friends, perhaps even to Spain. A letter addressed to him by Sadolet from Rome in 1546 shows that he had then resolved to return to Scotland, and had asked advice on the attitude he should adopt in the religious dissensions of the time. He died on the journey, however, at [[Vienne, Isère|Vienne]] in [[Dauphiné]], in 1546, or early in the next year.<ref name="EB1911"/>

==Work==
Volusenus's linguistic studies embraced [[Hebrew language|Hebrew]] as well as [[Greek language|Greek]] and [[Latin]]. His reputation, however, rests on the beautiful dialogue, ''De Animi Tranquillitate'', first printed by [[S. Gryphius]] at Lyon in 1543. From internal evidence it appears to have been composed about that time, but the subject had exercised the writer for many years. The dialogue shows us [[Christian humanism]] at its best. Volusenus is a great admirer of [[Erasmus]], but he criticises the purity of his [[Latin]] and also his philosophy.<ref name="EB1911"/>

His own philosophy is Christian and Biblical rather than classical or scholastic. He takes a fresh and independent view of [[Christian ethics]], and he ultimately reaches a [[doctrine]] as to the witness of the Spirit and the assurance of grace which breaks with the traditional Christianity of his time and is based on ethical motives akin to those of the [[German Reformers]]. The verses which occur in the dialogue, and the poem which concludes it, give Volusenus a place among Scottish Latin poets, but it is as a Christian philosopher that he attains distinction.<ref name="EB1911"/>

The dialogue was reissued at Leiden in 1637 by the Scots writer [[David Echlin]], whose poems, with a selection of three poems from the dialogue of Volusenus, appear, with others, in the famous [[Amsterdam]] collection ''Delitiae Poetarum Scotorum hujus'' and printed by [[Johannes Blaeu]] in 2 vols. in 1637. Later editions of the dialogue appeared at Edinburgh in 1707 and 1751 (the latter edited by [[G. Wishart]]). All the reissues contain a short life of the author by Thomas Wilson, advocate, son-in-law and biographer of [[Archbishop]] [[Patrick Adamson]]. Supplementary facts are found in the letters and state papers of the period, and in Sadolet's ''Letters''.<ref name="EB1911"/>

==References==
{{Reflist}}
*Dominic Baker-Smith, "Florens Wilson and his Circle: Émigrés in Lyon, 1539-1543." ''Neo-Latin and the Vernacular in Renaissance France''. Ed. Grahame Castor and Terence Cave. Oxford: Clarendon, 1984. 83-97.

{{Authority control}}

{{DEFAULTSORT:Volusenus, Florentius}}
[[Category:1500s births]]
[[Category:1540s deaths]]
[[Category:People from Elgin, Moray]]
[[Category:English spies]]
[[Category:Scottish Renaissance humanists]]
[[Category:Linguists from Scotland]]
[[Category:Scottish scholars and academics]]
[[Category:Scottish poets]]
[[Category:Scottish Christian theologians]]
[[Category:Alumni of the University of Aberdeen]]
[[Category:University of Paris]]
[[Category:16th-century spies]]
[[Category:People from Speldhurst]]