Note 631 — Chapter V

Though this is generally said, on the authority of Erasmus himself, Peter Bunel is asserted by some French scholars of great name, and particularly by Henry Stephens, to have equalled in Ciceronian purity the best of the Italians; and Paulus Manutius owns him as his master, in one of his epistles: Ego ab illo maximum habebam beneficium, quod me cum Politianis et Erasmis nescio quibus miserè errantem, in hanc rectè scribendi viam primus induxerat. In a later edition, for Politianis et Erasmis, it was thought more decent to introduce Philelphis et Campanis. Bayle, art. Bunel, Note A. The letters of Bunel, written with great purity, were published in 1551. It is to be observed, that he had lived much in Italy. Erasmus does not mention him in the Ciceronianus.