Excerpted from Epistle 205 (Marsh) and Compendium Studii Theologiae 4 (Bacon)

Adam Marsh: You know, my beloved, how precious and useful the presence of Richard is to your brothers. That makes the distinguished evidence of his titles to praise pleasing to all friars. His conversation is worthy; his science is brilliant; his piety is warm; his opinions, sound. His capacity to teach and to examine is subtle. The arguments of his merits are so well-known that their manifest consideration supports our profession among the great, the middle [class], and those of the lowest [condition] -- both clerical and popular -- [prompting] them to associate with the friars and fostering faithful friendship.

Roger Bacon: Because of ignorance in regard to these two problems the multitude holds that dead Caesar is a man, that a dead man is an animal, and that Christ was a man during the three days [in the tomb] and [it holds] another unlimited number of false and very foolish things abut restriction and ampliation in propositions and about necessities and contingencies and other things, all of which are to be disputed in an orderly way in their proper places.

original latin

Bacon (continued): Et duobus modis procedam pro veritatibus stabiliendis, probando, scilicet, quod verum est, et dando oppositum, omnia volo solvere quae possunt obici in hac parte. Nam in his erroribus maxime vigent auctoritas fragilis et indigna, et consuetudo longa, et sensus damnabilis multitudinis stultae, quae sunt causa errorum omnium in vita et studio, sicut copiose et efficaciter declaratum est in prima parte huius operis et probatum est.

Et optime novi pessimum et stultissimum istorum errorum auctorem, qui vocatus est Ricardus Cornubiensis, famossissimus apud stultam multitudinem. Sed apud sapientes fuit insanus et reprobatus Parisius propter errores quod invenerat et promulgaverat quando solemniter legebat Sententias ibidem, postquam legerat Sententias Oxoniae ab anno Domini 1250.

Ab illo 1250 igitur tempore remansit multitudo in huius magistri erroribus usque nunc, scilicet, per quadraginta annos et amplius, et maxime invalescit Oxoniae, sicut ibidem incepit haec dementia infinita.