The shamelessness of his looks, the rapacity of his hands, the frivolousness of his bearing, the foulness of his manners (which the whole neighborhood spews out), the obscenity of his lust, the ugliness of his body, the baseness of his life, his spotted reputation, I would lay bare and thrust into the face of the public, did not my respect for his Christian name restrain me.  For being mindful of my profession, and of the fraternal communion which we have in the Lord, I have believed that indulgence should be given to his person while, nevertheless, indulgence is not given to his sin.

Having fairly joined battle by several pages of vituperation, John proceeds to describe his opponent’s manner of teaching: 

But I object vigorously to his views, which have destroyed many, because he has a crowd that believes in him, and although the new Cornificius is more senseless than the old, yet a mob of foolish ones agrees with him.  And there are in particular some of these who, although inert and slothful, are eager to seem rather than to be wise.

* * * * *

For my part I am not at all surprised if after being employed at a large fee, and beating his drum a long time, he taught his credulous hearer to know nothing.  For he, too, was equally untaught by teachers, since, without eloquence, and yet verbose, and lacking the fruit of ideas, he continuously throws to the wind the foliage of words ...  He feeds his hearers on fables and trifles, and if what he promises is true, he will make them eloquent without the need of skill, and philosophers by a short cut and without effort....  In that school of philosophizers at that time the question whether the pig which is being led to market is held by the man or by the string, was considered insoluble.  Also, whether he who bought the whole cloak bought the cowl.  Decidedly incongruous was the speech in which these words, “congruous” and “incongruous argument” and “reason” did not make a great noise, with multifold negative particles and transitions through “esse” and “non-esse.” ...  A wordy clamor was enough to secure the victory, and he who introduced anything from any source reached the goal of his proposition....  Therefore they suddenly became expert philosophers, for he who had come there illiterate delayed in the schools scarcely longer than the time within which young birds get their feathers.  So the fresh teachers from the schools and the young birds from the nests flew off together, having lingered an equal length of time....  They talked only of congruity or reason, and argument resounded from the lips of all, and to give its common name to an ass, or a man, or any of nature’s works, was like a crime, or was much too inelegant or crude, and abhorrent to a philosopher....  Hence this seething pot of speech in which the stupid old man exults, insulting those who revere the originators of the Arts because