had doubtless reached her, to consult the stars concerning the destinies
of France. This Agrippa refused, and complained of being employed in such
follies. His refusal aroused the ire of the Queen; her courtiers eagerly
took up the cry, and "conjurer," "necromancer," etc., were the
complimentary terms which were freely applied to the former favourite.
Agrippa fled to the court of Margaret of Austria, the governor of the
Netherlands under Charles V., and was appointed the Emperor's
historiographer. He wrote a history of the reign of that monarch, and
during the life of Margaret he continued his prosperous career, and at her
death he delivered an eloquent funeral oration.

But troubles were in store for the illustrious author. In 1530 he
published a work, _De Incertitudine et Vanitate Scientiarum et Artium,
atque Excellentia Verbi Dei Dedamatio_ (Antwerp). His severe satire upon
scholasticism and its professors roused the anger of those whom with
scathing words he castigated. The Professors of the University of Louvain
declared that they detected forty-three errors in the book; and Agrippa
was forced to defend himself against their attacks in a little book
published at Leyden, entitled _Apologia pro defencione Declamationis de
Vanitate Scientiarum contra Theologistes Lovanienses_. In spite of such
powerful friends as the Papal Legate, Cardinal Campeggio, and Cardinal de
la Marck, Prince Bishop of Liege, Agrippa was vilified by his opponents,
and imprisoned at Brussels in 1531. The fury against his book continued to
rage, and its author declares in his Epistles: "When I brought out my book
for the purpose of exciting sluggish minds to the study of sound learning,
and to provide some new arguments for these monks to discuss in their
assemblies, they repaid this kindness by rousing common hostility against
me; and now by suggestions, from their pulpits, in public meetings, before
mixed multitudes, with great clamourings they declaim against me; they
rage with passion, and there is no impiety, no heresy, no disgrace which