The first to go to school have to endure hazing, an ugly name for an ugly habit.
A freeborn boy is sent to school to learn the liberal arts.
But what inhumane humiliations [illiberales contumeliae] await him by way of initiation!
First they smear his chin as if to shave him; urine is used, or if possible even dirtier junk. That fluid is pushed into his mouth; he must not spit it out.
He is mercilessly beaten, supposedly to lose his last baby teeth.
Sometimes he gets a few more gulps of vinegar or brine, or whatever youngsters like in their unhinged brutality. Naturally, the game begins with a mandatory oath that he will obey his tormentors through thick and thin.
Finally, he is lifted off the ground and slammed against a door with his back like a battering ram, as often as the others see fit. The result of that rough ceremony is often a fever or incurable back pain.
And, of course, that tasteless jesting ends in a drunken party.

With such starting rituals, the study in the liberal arts [artes liberales] begins.
Those kinds of initiation rites befit…not a boy destined to serve the Muses and the Graces.
I can't believe liberal arts students behave like this, but it's even more incredible that the supervising teachers [Erasmus uses the term moderators] accept that kind of behaviour!

The stupidity, as scandalous as it is cruel, is tolerated under the guise of habits, as if an abominable habit were anything other than ingrained evil, which must be eradicated with all possible effort as it spreads further and further.