The first scholar to argue in favor of Cervantes' likely exposure to the Folly, whether through his teacher, López de Hoyos, the original Latin text, or translations in either Italian or Spanish, was Américo Castro, El pensamiento de Cervantes (Barcelona: Editorial Noguer, 1972, orig. 1925), especially pp. 51, 114, n. 62, and 170. Following Castro's lead, later studies that cite clear affinities between Don Quixote and Erasmus' best known fiction include: Antonio Vilanova, «La Moria de Erasmo y el prólogo del Quijote», Collected Studies in Honor of Américo Castro's Eightieth Year (Oxford: Lincombe Lodge Research Library, 1965), pp. 423-433; and Marcel Bataillon, «Un problème d'influence d'Erasme en Espagne. L'Eloge de la Folie», Actes de Congrès Erasme, 1969 (Amsterdam: Acadèmie Royale Néerlandis, 1971), pp. 136-147. Studies that deal more generally with the influence of Erasmus, and Christian humanism, on Cervantes are: Américo Castro, «Erasmo en tiempos de Cervantes», Hacia Cervantes (Madrid: Taurus, 1967), pp. 222-261; Marcel Bataillon's now somewhat outdated chapter, «El erasmismo de Cervantes», Erasmo y España, A. Alatorre, tr. (México: Colegio de México, 1966), pp. 777-801; Francisco Márquez Villanueva, Personajes y temas del "Quijote"; Alban K. Forcione, Cervantes and the Humanist Vision; also by Forcione, Cervantes and the Mystery of Lawlessness; and Antonio Vilanova's revised and augmented edition of Erasmo y Cervantes (Barcelona: Lumen, 1989, orig. 1949). A splendid critical edition and translation of Erasmus' The Praise of Folly, with good bibliography, is that of Clarence H. Miller (New Haven: Yale University Press, 1979). (N. from the A.)

On the generic and rhetorical tradition behind Erasmus' work, see Clarence Miller's «Introduction», ibid., pp. ix-xxv. Erasmus himself provides a litany of his sources in his «Prefatory Letter to Thomas More», ibid., pp. 1-5. Two standard studies on the paradoxical encomium as a distinct genre are: Arthur S. Pease, «Things Without Honor», Classical Philology 21 (1926), pp. 27-42; and Henry Knight Miller, «The Paradoxical Encomium», Modern Philology 53 (1956), pp. 145-178. (N. from the A.)

On such contrary critical views of the protagonist, see John J. Allen, Don Quixote: Hero or Fool?, 2 vols. (Gainesville: University Presses of Florida, 1969, 1979). (N. from the A.)

In his general study, Don Quixote (Cambridge: Cambridge University Press, 1990), p. 48, Anthony Close states: «I have no doubt that Don Diego is meant to be seen as an exemplary figure». This does not mean that Close perceives the encounter between Don Quixote and Don Diego as a univocal instance of authorial moralizing (ibid., p. 52): «However -and this this is the point that I wish to stress- the dialectical opposition of life-styles in the episode involving Don Diego is not explicitly resolved; it is simply presented and left to the discreet reader's judgement». (N. from the A.)

Miguel de Cervantes Saavedra, El ingenioso hidalgo don Quijote de la Mancha, Luis Murillo, ed., 2 vols. (Madrid: Castalia, 1978), v. 1, p. 171. Future references will be to this edition, cited by part, chapter and page number. For example: I, 1; 171. (N. from the A.)

For a thorough discussion of the aesthetic and moral critiques of the romances of chivalry, with ample bibliography, see Alban K. Forcione, Cervantes, Aristotle and the "Persiles" (Princeton: Princeton Univesity Press,1970), pp. 11-48. Also see Martín de Riquer, «Cervantes y la caballeresca», Suma Cervantina, J. B. Avalle-Arce and E. C. Riley, eds. (London: Tamesis Books, 1973), especially pp. 279-284. (N. from the A.)

On the various uses of discreción in Cervantes' works, often with ironic overtones, see Margaret J. Bates, "Discreción" in the Works of Cervantes (Washington, DC: Catholic University of America Press, 1945). For a discussion concerning the precise distinction between «prudence» and discreción in the time of Cervantes -a distinction that broke with the formerly synonymous meaning of the two terms in medieval works of moral theology- see ibid., pp. 14-17. As virtues, rather than simply as qualities of mind (e.g., shrewdness), the two terms continued to be used interchangably. Regarding the character of Don Diego, I think it important to bear in mind that Cervantes is playing on two related notions of the term «prudence». The first, classical acceptation relates to the most cardinal (cardo in Latin means «hinge») of all the cardinal virtues (the others being justice, fortitude and temperance), and denotes both the ability and the readiness to suit the proper means to a morally praiseworthy end. Thus, prudence is the sine qua non of all the virtues; it orders actions toward to their proper ends. The classical virtue of prudence may often involve risk and necessitate decisive action. The second, «decadent» acceptation of prudence denotes a selfserving tendency to avoid risk and to decide only in favor of such actions as will benefit oneself. Both forms of prudence are grounded in a type of «foresight» (pro-videre): one suiting means and actions to objectively good ends; the other suiting means and limiting actions to subjectively beneficial ends. Implicitly, Don Diego, a decadent, pre-bourgeois version of the caballero, implicitly claims to live the classical virtue of prudence while, in fact, adhering to the more selfserving type. I submit that this decadent form of prudence lies at the heart of what Márquez Villanueva ably describes as Cervantes' moral critique of Erasmus' Christian Epicureanism («El Caballero del Verde Gabán», pp. 173-174). For a thorough discussion of the classical understanding of prudence, in contradistinction to its more modern acceptation, see Josef Pieper, The Cardinal Virtues (Notre Dame: Notre Dame University Press, 1966), pp. 3-40. (N. from the A.)

Francisco Márquez Villanueva («El Caballero del Verde Gabán», pp. 168-175) convincingly argues that Don Diego's moral philosophy derives from Christian Epicureanism. Although I subscribe to this reading in the main, I also believe that Cervantes ironically adds such elements of Tridentine religiosity as daily attendance at Mass and Marian devotion to reinforce the impression of Don Diego's self-proclaimed sanctity. The typical portrait that Cervantes has Don Diego draw of himself, moreover, aims less at describing a particular philosophical posture than a popular misunderstanding of what virtue and sanctity entail. That Don Diego is attempting to emulate his own understanding of Erasmus' Epicurean philosophy is true, as Márquez Villanueva shows. But one ought to avoid implying that Don Diego is a careful student of Erasmus. (N. from the A.)

Helmut Hatzfeld sees Don Diego as a typical example of Tridentine piety and Ignatian spirituality in El "Quijote" como obra de arte del lenguaje (Madrid: Imprenta Aguirre, 1966), pp. 135-136, 184. A similar view is put forth by Joaquín Casalduero, Sentido y forma del "Quijote" (Madrid: Insula, 1970), pp. 259-265. (N. from the A.)

On this point, see Carroll B. Johnson's interesting observations in "Don Quijote": The Quest for Modern Fiction (Boston: Twayne Publishers, 1990), pp. 97-98. (N. from the A.)