ARNALD OF VILLANOVA
Recent research into his life--His twofold
importance--Narrative of his life--In theological
difficulties--Events of 1305--The close of his life--Arnald
and the Inquisition--His works--Attitude to natural
science--Magic excluded from medicine--_Disapprobation
of Sorcerers_--The devices of sorcerers--Counter-magic
against them--Arnald’s works and the Inquisition
again--Incantations--Cures of old-wives--Ligatures
and suspensions--Marvelous virtues in nature--Occult
virtue defined--Due to the stars--Astrological
medicine--Bleeding and the moon--Bernard Gordon’s personal
experience--Operative astrology or magic--Seals or
images--Experimental method--Further foibles of Arnald’s
medicine--The affair of Bernard Délicieux.
[Sidenote: Recent research into his life.]
Arnald of Villanova has been rather unusually fortunate among medieval
men of learning in the accurate research which within the last fifty
years scholars have made into the sources for the facts of his career.
Before that time all sorts of assertions and dates were current
concerning his life, although even then those who took the pains to
turn back to Astruc,[2668] could find in his work a tolerably correct
account of Arnald’s biography. But now we have a much fuller treatment
of his life and works by Hauréau in the _Histoire Littéraire de la
France_,[2669] while the researches of Menéndez Pelayo[2670] in the
Vatican library and the crown archives of Aragon have brought to light
new documents of importance. Subsequently Chabás has discovered an
old and authentic copy of Arnald’s last will and testament in the
cathedral archives of Valencia.[2671] Further materials bearing upon
his career appeared in Finke’s _Acta Aragonensia_,[2672] and have
been written up by Diepgen in a monograph on Arnald’s political and
theological activity after 1299.[2673]
[Sidenote: His twofold importance.]
Arnald’s personality and career have long attracted attention, not
only because of his prominence as a practicing physician and writer
on medicine and alchemy, and because of his close relations with
several kings and popes. He also is noted for his connection with
ecclesiastical history, his relations with the Spiritual Franciscans
and the theologians of Paris, and for his criticisms of existing
conditions in the church of his time,--criticisms which he combined
with Joachimite ideas of a speedy end of the world and coming of
Antichrist. These points long ago caused his inclusion in Matthias
Illyricus Flacius’s _Catalogue of Witnesses to the Truth who before
our time attacked the primacy of the Roman pontiffs and the various
superstitions, errors, and impious frauds of Popery_,[2674] and more
recently in Menéndez Pelayo’s _Historia de los heterodoxos españoles_.
And it is true that Arnald composed a violent diatribe against the
regular clergy of his day and also a _Sword of Truth against the
Thomists_.[2675]
[Sidenote: Narrative of his life.]
Arnald was a Catalan, although Pope Clement V speaks of him as “a clerk
of Valencia.” Arnald writes of his youth as a time of hardship and
of himself as “a country practitioner” without literary culture. Yet
he came to shine at courts and to defy synods of learned doctors of
theology. He also mentions his early education in a Dominican convent
and his study of medicine at Naples under John Calamida. During his
entire life he seems to have been continually moving about, and his
works speak of observations and operations in many towns of Spain,
Italy, and France. Some of his treatises were written in Valencia,
others in Barcelona, others in Naples, or in Gascony, Piedmont,
Bologna, Rome, and even Africa. He was often called abroad to render
medical services to popes and other potentates and was frequently
employed in foreign diplomacy by the kings of Aragon and Sicily. By
1285 he had won a sufficient reputation as a physician to be called
from Barcelona to attend Peter III of Aragon in his last illness. Peter
gave him a castle in Tarragona. After that Arnald seems to have taught
at Montpellier which was then under the jurisdiction of Aragon. Three
later bulls of Clement V in 1309 making regulations for the medical
faculty at Montpellier mention Arnald of Villanova as one of the
persons by whom the pope has been advised in the matter, and speak of
him as having “once long ruled” in that university.[2676] Astruc tells
us that in the eighteenth century the house where he had lived was
still shown in Montpellier, ornamented with sculptured figures which
were interpreted as magic symbols.[2677]
[Sidenote: In theological difficulties.]
In 1292 Arnald composed a treatise on the significance of the
holy name, _Tetragrammaton_, both in Hebrew and Latin, and on the
declaration of the mystery of the Trinity. This and later essays of his
in the field of religion were not well received by most theologians,
who would have preferred that he confine his efforts to medicine.
In 1299 Arnald was sent to Paris with a message from James II of
Aragon to Philip the Fair. Here he was arrested by the inquisition,
but was bailed out the next day, Nogaret being among those who stood
security. Presently he was brought to trial before the bishop and
the theological faculty of Paris for a work predicting the coming of
Antichrist about the middle of the fourteenth century upon the basis of
passages in Daniel and the Erythrean sibyl, and his book was ordered
to be burned.[2678] Arnald protested to the king of France and later
to a crowd of distinguished people at the bishop’s palace and appealed
to Pope Boniface VIII. Finally he was allowed to leave France and in
November, 1301, is found at Genoa.
Arnald submitted to Boniface VIII a slightly modified version of his
work on Antichrist, accompanied by a tone of pious self-abnegation
and considerable shrewd flattery of the pope as “Christ on earth” and
“God of gods.” The theologians of Paris, however, had sent a portion
of the original text to the pope with the result that Boniface kept
Arnald in prison for a time and forced him to abjure his work in
secret consistory, but finally said that Arnald had erred only in
not submitting the work to him in the first place. After Arnald had
treated Boniface successfully for the stone, that pontiff’s estimation
of him greatly improved, and he received favorably a new work which
predicted the history of the Mediterranean world for the next century
until the coming of Antichrist, bewailed the worldliness of the clergy,
but upheld the papal power, to which, of course, Arnald looked to
further the ecclesiastical reforms which he had at heart. Boniface
also presented Arnald with a castle at Anagni, but the sun proved too
hot there for Arnald’s head. Early in 1302 he left the papal curia,
in April he received permission from King James II to dispose of his
property in Valencia. His writings on Antichrist and against certain
of the clergy continued, and in February, 1304, he was at Marseilles
complaining before the bishop of some Dominicans who had attacked
his treatises. He then addressed himself to the new pope, Benedict
XI, at Perugia, but was not well received, and complained that the
pope had judged and punished him before hearing him. But Benedict’s
brief pontificate was soon over and Clement V showed himself more
gracious.[2679]
[Sidenote: Events of 1305.]
Meanwhile in April, 1305, Arnald returned to Barcelona where he
found James II sick abed and very glad to see him and to entrust
himself to his medical care rather than that of Ermengard Blasius (or
Blasii)[2680] who had hitherto attended James. About this time Arnald
seems to have interpreted a dream for James, but that monarch later
repudiated Arnald’s account of the affair and they were estranged for
a time.[2681] Arnald’s will, drawn up on July 20, 1305, by a public
notary of Barcelona, informs us concerning his library, other property,
generosity to the poor, and reveals the fact that he had a wife and
children.
[Sidenote: The close of his life.]
Arnald, however, still had several years of life before him. A
declaration has been preserved which he made in 1306 concerning the
observance of certain statutes at the University of Montpellier.[2682]
James II employed him in 1306-1307, and he corresponded with Clement
V and Philip IV. In 1308-1309 he interpreted a dream for Frederick of
Sicily and with him concocted a scheme for a crusade and reform of the
church, in pursuance whereof he went to Rome, Barcelona, and Avignon,
and carried letters back and forth between James and Frederick.[2683]
Arnald had been with Clement V at Bordeaux and seems to have been with
him again at Avignon in 1309, but he does not appear to have been the
pope’s official physician,[2684] although very probably he rendered him
some medical service. About this time he also seems to have written
several treatises in medicine and alchemy, including his _Preservation
of Youth_, for King Robert at Naples. Raymond Lull speaks of meeting
him there and acknowledges his debt to his friend Arnald for one of his
“Experiments.” A letter of December 6, 1311, from Escarrer at Naples
to King James shows that Arnald died in the closing months of that
year.[2685] In 1312 we find Clement V advertising by public letter for
a medical treatise by Arnald intended for his perusal but which the
death of the author had prevented from reaching its destination.
[Sidenote: Arnald and the Inquisition.]
Already during Arnald’s lifetime in 1305 the inquisitor of Valencia
forbade the possession or reading of his books, a decree against which
King James protested. Five years after Arnald’s death the inquisitor
and provost of the church at Tarragona declared some statements in
Arnald’s writings heretical, and Diepgen thinks that we have lost a
number of his religious writings in Catalan in consequence;[2686] but
this sentence appears to have no more lessened his medical influence
than his trial at Paris had prevented his having intimate relations
with the popes.
[Sidenote: His works.]
One indication of Arnald’s long continued influence in the learned
world is that some seven so-called complete editions of his works
were printed in the course of the sixteenth century.[2687] Besides
this, some of his writings were published separately or appeared
in miscellaneous collections, and some were translated into the
vernacular languages. Some, however, still remain in manuscript
form. The majority of his writings are medical, such as the _Mirror
of Medical Introductions_, _Breviary of Practice_, _Rule of Health_,
_General Rules for the Cure of Disease_, _Commentary on the Regimen
Salernitanum_, _Collection of Antidotes_, and special treatises on the
stone, gout, and epilepsy. But besides the works of alchemy ascribed
to him there are other treatises on themes of especial interest to
us, the _Disapprobation of Sorcerers_ (_Libellus de improbatione
maleficiorum_), _Remedies against Sorcery_, _Judgments of Infirmities
by the Motion of the Planets_, and the treatise on _Seals_ or
astrological images. Although Arnald interpreted dreams for kings, the
treatise on interpretation of dreams which is printed with his works is
in the manuscripts either anonymous or ascribed to William of Aragon.
Some of these other works too are perhaps not by him, but similar
themes are occasionally touched upon in his more purely medical works.
In the printed editions of his works is found a Latin translation of
the treatise of Costa ben Luca _On physical ligatures_, which we have
already discussed, and it is not unlikely that some of the aforesaid
works are translations from the Arabic and not original compositions by
Arnald. Some of his medical writings seem little more than repetitions
of Galen, whose works he cites a great deal.
[Sidenote: His attitude to natural science.]
In one of his medical works Arnald states that the proverbs of Solomon
show that what learned men have revealed in the world of nature can be
adapted by convenient metaphor to moral instruction. But from this one
should not jump to the conclusion that he thought that the chief use
of natural science was to point a moral. On the contrary in almost the
next sentence we find him affirming that “all true knowledge arises
from the senses” and that the education of youth should begin with
this sense knowledge, “graciously and efficiently demonstrated.” Thus
Arnald would assign to natural science a leading place in education.
As the mind went over this material, he thinks that it would reach
many abstract conclusions, and could gradually attain “to the
knowledge of insensible and occult and arduous and subtle things, as is
illustrated by the whole course of theology and by the whole course of
medicine.”[2688]
[Sidenote: Magic excluded from medicine.]
There are passages in Arnald’s works where, like Pliny, Galen,
and other writers since them, he professes to exclude everything
savoring of magic and superstition from his medicine. For instance,
in his chapter on _Those things whose use is permitted in the cure
of epilepsy_, a disease into whose treatment we have seen that magic
is especially liable to enter, he would “repel the ignominious”
enchanters, conjurers, and invokers of spirits, diviners and augurs,
from the field of medicine as a godless crew who are servants of the
devil. He cites the church fathers to show that all pagan divination
is by demon aid. In the same chapter he disapproves of any use of
“characters and superstitions” in medicine, and even forbids the use
of the sign of the cross or Lord’s Prayer in collecting medicinal
simples.[2689]
[Sidenote: _Disapprobation of Sorcerers._]
In his _Libellus de improbatione maleficiorum_[2690] Arnald questions
the power of sorcerers or necromancers to invoke demons and compel
them to give responses or to work wonders. By adopting a very similar
argumentation to that of the early fathers he arrives at the familiar
theological conclusion that men are purposely misled in these arts of
sorcery and necromancy by the demons who have invented the fiction
of an art and a procedure to cover their own iniquitous ends. Arnald
is not concerned to emphasize this conclusion especially, however;
his object is rather simply to show that demons cannot naturally be
compelled by man to obey him. He argues that the human mind, which
is joined to a body, is of inferior grade to separate or incorporeal
substances and so cannot command them. He also holds that demons who
are spiritual beings cannot be coerced by human use of natural objects
such as gems or even by human use of the influence of the stars. He
denies that demons are distributed in any particular quarters of the
heavens, or that they are subject to man at any particular hours of
the day. He denies that spirits can be coerced by the light of the
celestial bodies, asking, if this is so, why they are invoked at night
and in darkness rather than at midday. He admits that it is the opinion
of many that a spirit can be coerced by the special virtue of Saturn
or of Jupiter or some other star; but he questions whether man can
master this special virtue of a planet, “since no terrestrial substance
naturally governs a star, although some philosophers have said that
the human soul sometimes commands the nature of the elements.” He also
raises the familiar objection that the invokers of spirits are usually
inferior to other men in virtue and intelligence, whereas those who
lead pure and rational lives should by rights be the ones to control
the influence of the stars, if any men can. Arnald further denies
that artificial figures and characters or words uttered by man can
overpower demons, since these artificial products derive such virtues
as they have from things of inferior nature or the stars or the human
artificer, and he has already insisted that none of these can coerce
spirits. He justly observes that to contend that necromancers can
control the demons through superior demons is “stupidly said” and begs
the question. He therefore concludes that God alone can control the
evil spirits and that He would delegate His power, if at all, only to
saintly men and not to such wicked sinners as the invokers of demons
are. The _Histoire Littéraire de la France_, in its brief account of
this treatise, says, “It goes without saying that Arnald does not think
all sorceries purely imaginary; however, it should be stated that he
tries to demonstrate that demons are less at the beck and call of
sorcerers than is commonly thought, and that many so-called instances
of sorcery are merely pathological cases.” This last has reference to
the close of the treatise where Arnald makes the commonplace medieval
observation that persons suffering from melancholy are to be humored in
their delusions.
[Sidenote: The devices of sorcerers.]
That Arnald did not regard all sorceries as purely imaginary is further
indicated by the long list of remedies against them collected in his
_Remedia contra maleficia_. All but one or two of the suggestions
made by Petrus Hispanus in the chapter on counteracting witchcraft
and dispelling demons in the _Thesaurus pauperum_ are found again
in Arnald’s treatise. He also adds others and prefaces his list of
cures by a description of the devices employed by sorcerers to impede
conjugal relations. The sorcerer usually secretes in the mattress
or pillow of the nuptial bed such objects as the two halves of an
acorn, granulated beans, written characters, the filth of a bat, or
the testicles of a live cock. Arnald recommends that such articles be
searched for and removed, or preferably taken to a priest; or that the
couple sleep in another bed or house.
[Sidenote: Counter-magic against them.]
In the case of the divided acorn he more explicitly recognizes the
validity of the sorcerer’s sympathetic magic by prescribing an equally
magical counter-ceremony. The husband and wife are each to take
one-half of the nut and place the two halves together, and, after
an interval of six days, eat them. Apparently Arnald believes that
humans can be bewitched by use of natural substances and written
characters, although in the other treatise he denied that demons could
be so invoked. But now he goes farther and lists natural antidotes and
preventives against demons as well as sorcery. Thus keeping the heart
of a vulture or certain herbs in the house is said to cause demons to
flee, although we have heard him deny that demons can be attracted
by natural substances. Less surprising is the use of the sign of the
cross, of holy water, masses, and the writing of the Tetragrammaton
and other names. Interesting rites for the protection of newly married
couples against witchcraft of unknown origin are suffumigations of the
nuptial chamber with the gall of a certain fish, or the leaves and
fruit of a bramble bush, or the pulverized tooth of a dead man.[2691]
[Sidenote: Arnald’s works and the Inquisition again.]
The _Histoire Littéraire de la France_, remarking that this treatise
by Arnald was forbidden later by the Spanish Inquisition, adds, “No
one will hold that decision against them” (_On ne leur reprochera pas
cette décision_). But one wonders if the Inquisition also condemned the
_Thesaurus pauperum_ of Pope John XXI, which we have seen contained
many of the same remedies against witchcraft. Only another proof that
censors never know what is in the books that they condemn! But perhaps
the medieval or papal inquisition would not have made such a slip.
Certainly the Spanish Inquisition had grown very captious, if, as
the _Histoire Littéraire_ says, it also forbade Arnald’s treatise on
astrological medicine and some alchemistic works ascribed to him.
[Sidenote: Incantations.]
Arnald’s attitude in the matter of incantations is as inconsistent as
his position regarding the effect of natural substances on spirits.
In one passage of his _Breviarium_[2692] he condemns the incantations
employed in cases of childbirth by the old-wives of Salerno. Taking
three grains of pepper, the enchantress would say over each a Lord’s
prayer, substituting for the words, “Deliver us from evil,” the
request, “Deliver this woman from the pangs of childbirth.” Then she
would administer the grains one after another in wine or water so that
they should not touch the patient’s teeth, and finally she would repeat
thrice in the patient’s ear this incantation, accompanied each time by
a _Paternoster_,
_Bizomie lamion lamium azerai vachina deus deus sabaoth,_
_Benedictus qui venit in nomine domini, osanna in excelsis._
Arnald declares that such diabolical practices should be shunned by
all the faithful. Yet in the same treatise[2693] he tells of an almost
identical procedure by which a priest cured him of over a hundred warts
within ten days. The priest touched the warts, made the sign of the
cross, turned to a parietary and kneeling repeated the Lord’s prayer,
substituting for the words, “Deliver us from evil,” the request,
“Deliver Master Arnald from the wens and warts on his hands.” After
which, instead of the three peppercorns he plucked the tips of three
of the stalks of the parietary, at the same time repeating three
_Paternosters_, and placed those three tips in the ground in a damp and
secluded spot. “And,” concludes Arnald, “when they began to wither,
my warts began to disappear.” It is true that the couplet of jargon,
which perhaps Arnald regarded as alone diabolical, is omitted and that
a priest rather than a witch performed the rite, but the Lord’s prayer
is still used as an incantation and the ceremony with the stalks is a
clear case of magic transfer of disease and of sympathetic magic. In a
third passage of the same treatise[2694] Arnald suggests the following
“good prayer” against quinsy, “Lord Jesus Christ, truly our God, by the
power of thy name Jesus and by the prayer of thy servant Blasius,[2695]
deign to free A. thy servant.” The popularity of _The Breviary of
Practice from head to soles of feet_, in which these passages occur is
indicated by the fact that it had been printed three times during the
later fifteenth century before any complete edition of Arnald’s works
had been published.[2696]
[Sidenote: Cures of old-wives.]
Arnald does not always speak ill of the cures of the old-wives. At
Rome he saw a poor woman cure quinsy sore-throat with a plaster of her
own,[2697] and at Montpellier a good wife cured by some secret method a
man who was threatened with death by a continuous hemorrhage.[2698]
[Sidenote: Ligatures and suspensions.]
It was not inappropriate that Arnald should have translated the
treatise of Costa ben Luca on _Incantations, Adjurations, and
Suspension from the Neck_, or that at least that treatise should appear
among his works, in view of the specimens of prayers and formulae which
we have just given and of the more numerous instances of ligatures
and suspensions in his works which we shall next illustrate. In his
_De parte operativa_ he says that there are plants, stones, and parts
of animals which, if suspended about the neck or bound about the body
or sewn into the clothing, produce impotency, a belief which his
_Remedia contra maleficia_ have already illustrated. In his treatise on
wines he states that coral suspended from the neck so that it touches
the abdomen prevents disturbances of the stomach. In his work on
epilepsy[2699] among other suspensions he mentions some which he has
tried with boys, the wood of certain trees bound with silver. Kings are
taught to suspend an emerald about their children’s necks as soon as
they are born as a protection against epilepsy, or the gem may be worn
in a ring as an amulet against that disease. “Socrates recites this
marvelous experience,” of the two stones found in swallows’ gizzards
and how one may be worn in skin as an amulet. In his _Treatment for
Gout_ Arnald tells how “some experimenters” bind a frog’s legs on the
patient’s feet, right foot on right, and left on left; while “another
philosopher and experimenter” binds on the stone magnet, and still
others use the talon of an eagle or the foot of a tortoise.
[Sidenote: Marvelous virtues in nature.]
As these ligatures and suspensions suggest, Arnald was a believer in
marvelous virtues in stones, plants, animals, and human beings, and
he discusses the general subject of occult virtue at some length. He
accepts the notion that the magnet cannot attract iron in the presence
of adamant.[2700] A way to discover whether an epileptic has been cured
is to make him inhale smoke from burning horn of goat or pulverized
agate; if not perfectly cured, he will straightway fall in a fit.[2701]
Fumigation of a villa or manor with a cow’s left horn keeps away
locusts.[2702] Arnald enlarges upon the great virtue of wine in which
a heated gold plate has been extinguished four or five times. Some
persons merely hold a gold-piece in the mouth while drinking wine, but
Arnald deems it wiser to reduce the gold to potable form, although
he admits that there may be some efficacy in the other method, since
merely holding silver in the mouth quenches thirst and holding coral in
the mouth comforts the stomach.[2703]
[Sidenote: Occult virtue defined.]
In the eighteenth chapter of his _Mirror of Introductions to Medicine_
Arnald defines occult virtue or _proprietas_, as he also calls it.
Briefly it is a property which is not immediately perceptible to the
senses as are heat and cold, color, odor, and taste, and also one for
which reason cannot account and whose existence cannot be learned by
reasoned experiment but only by chance discovery. This is because such
occult virtue depends on two things: the mixture of the elements in
the object possessing it and its “specific form.” But the ratio of
components in compounds “varies infinitely” and cannot be learned by
reason, and the same is true of their “specific forms.” Nor can they
be discovered by rational experiment which requires some objective
to aim at. Therefore the only way to discover the occult virtue of
an object is to happen upon its manifestation by chance. Again in
his _Repetitio super Canon ‘Vita Brevis_’[2704] Arnald declares that
“properties” cannot be learned by reason but only by experience or
revelation.
[Sidenote: Due to the stars.]
Such occult virtue, or at least the “specific form” upon which it
partly depends, is ascribed by Arnald as usual to the influence of the
stars. It is owing, for example, to “the specific influence of the
heavens” that gold is “something arcane, most perfect in its equable
temperament, composed of a marvelous proportion of the virtues of the
elements, and which has not its like among compounds.”[2705] The gold
made by alchemists may resemble it in color and substance but not in
this occult virtue. Arnald, indeed, holds what Aquinas and others
denied, that different individuals of the same species may be endowed
by the stars with diverse properties.[2706] This is in his opinion the
explanation why one sapphire will harm and another cleanse the human
eye. “It leaps into the eye and is received in its bosom without injury
and comes out loaded with foreign matter.”
[Sidenote: Astrological medicine.]
From the occult virtue of terrestrial objects we are thus led as usual
to the superior influence of the stars, which occupies a prominent, or
better, fundamental place in Arnald’s works. He affirms that “since it
is evident that God, the supreme artificer and begetter, has committed
the government of nature to the motions of the stars, their influence
upon the human body is no slight one.”[2707] Or he cites Galen as
saying that philosophers assert that all things on earth are formed
and fulfilled by the course and working of the heavenly bodies.[2708]
The hour of collecting medicines is often very important[2709] and
the physician should also know how the air about us is altered by the
stars.[2710] Astrological medicine is also found in Arnald’s treatise
on preserving youth and retarding age,[2711] and in his _Judgments of
Infirmities by the Motion of the Planets_, where he also associates the
members of the human body with the signs of the zodiac. This he does
for the seven planets in his treatise on epilepsy.[2712]
[Sidenote: Bleeding and the moon.]
Arnald alludes a number of times to the practice of bleeding
according to the phases of the moon. In his _Regulation of Health_
he discusses how the age of the moon and its location, conjunctions,
and aspects must be taken into account.[2713] In his _General Rules
for the Cure of Disease_[2714] he says that the influence of the
moon should be regarded by physicians in their pharmacy as well as
their blood-letting, as anyone who operates long and intelligently
will find by experience. Astrological authors prove it, but medical
authors generally remain silent on this point. Arnald finds support,
however, in Galen’s _Critical Days_ and other works, and in the
more recent works of Gilbert of England, who cautions to observe
the moon in bleeding and advises against blood-letting in dog-days
or on Egyptian days. Arnald would also include cauterization, other
surgical operations, and the administration of drugs, and there is much
observance of dog-days in his _Treatise against the stone_. On the
other hand, Arnald rejects as false and worthless the statement in the
_Regimen Salernitanum_ that the months of April, May, and September are
lunar and that in them are the days on which bleeding is prohibited.
[Sidenote: Bernard Gordon’s personal experience.]
Bernard Gordon, a medical contemporary of Arnald, notes in his
_Phlebotomy_, written in 1307, that wise astronomers agree that
bleeding should not be practiced when the moon is in Gemini, because
at that time the vein will not give blood or it will open again or the
patient will die. He goes on to narrate, however, that once having
made all preparations to bleed himself, it suddenly occurred to him
that the moon was then in Gemini. He persisted with the operation,
however, which would seem to indicate that he did not really believe
that it would prove disastrous; and he records that as a matter of
fact that particular bleeding did him more good than any other one
he ever underwent. Yet as the _Histoire Littéraire_ notes,[2715] he
reproduced the opinion of the astronomers without comment in his
_Prognostications_. Which suggests that clergy who practiced in private
arts of divination which they condemned in their writings were not the
only ones whose preaching and practice might be divergent; Bernard
defies astrological medicine successfully in personal practice but he
continues to preach it in his writings. But to return to Arnald.
[Sidenote: Operative astrology or magic.]
Arnald believes that a human operator can accomplish great things by
availing himself of the influences of the stars, an idea which he
develops especially in the treatise entitled, _De parte operativa_.
In the first place, there is the negative consideration that the
force which pours forth unceasingly from the stars is not absorbed
unless bodies are in a condition to receive it, and that they may be
put into such a favorable condition by art as well as by nature. More
positively, everything produced by art or nature receives from the
sky some property of acting upon other bodies or of being acted upon
by them. So any man who knows the influences of the stars and how
to prepare objects to receive them, can produce great and marvelous
changes in inferior things. Arnald thinks that “the juggleries of the
magicians and the illusions of the enchanters” and the operations
of sorcerers and those who fascinate, have efficacy in no other
way, except of course as demons may lend their aid. In other words,
astrology is the basis of magic.
[Sidenote: Seals or images.]
Arnald speaks particularly of gems to which either Nature, the
marvel-worker, or some erudite artist has given efficacious powers by
engraving them with images in accordance with the constellations.[2716]
In his medical works he states that a lion on a lead seal prevents one
from feeling pain in an operation for the stone,[2717] and that an
image of a man holding a dead serpent in his right hand and its tail
in his left hand is an antidote for poison.[2718] That Arnald also
employed such methods in actual medical practice is shown from the
fact that Pope Boniface VIII set great store by a seal in the form of
a lion which Arnald had prepared for him when he was suffering from
the stone.[2719] Arnald’s separate treatise on seals gives detailed
directions for engraving one for each sign of the zodiac. The following
example is typical of the others and also further illustrates Arnald’s
propensity to pious incantations: “In the name of the living Father
of our Lord Jesus Christ, take the purest gold and melt it as the sun
enters Aries. Later form a round seal from it and say while so doing,
‘Arise, Jesus, light of the world, thou who art in truth the lamb that
taketh away the sins of the world and enlighteneth our darkness.’ And
repeat the Psalm, _Domine dominus noster_. After doing this much, put
the seal away, and later, when the moon is in Cancer or Leo and while
the sun is in Aries, engrave on one side the figure of a ram and on
the circumference _arahel tribus juda v et vii_, and elsewhere on the
circumference let these sacred words be engraved, ‘The Word was made
flesh and dwelt among us,’ and in the center, ‘Alpha and Omega and
Saint Peter.’” These instructions are perhaps some relic of gnosticism.
Arnald then states the virtues and powers of the seal: “Moreover, this
precious seal works against all demons and capital enemies and against
witchcraft, and is efficacious in winning gain and favor, and aids in
all dangers and financial difficulties (_vectigalibus_), and against
thunderbolts and storms and inundations, and against the force of the
winds and the pestilences of the air. Its bearer is honored and feared
in all his affairs. No harm can befall the building or occupants of
the house where it is. It benefits demoniacs, those suffering from
inflammation of the brain, maniacs, quinsy sore throat, and all
diseases of the head and eyes, and those in which rheum descends from
the head. And in general I say that it wards off all evils and confers
goods; and let its bearer abstain as far as possible from impurity and
luxury and other mortal sins, and let him wear it on his head with
reverence and honor.”
[Sidenote: Experimental method.]
Arnald’s pages have supplied some evidence of the continued vogue of
that “experimental knowledge” and “experimental science” of which
Albertus Magnus and Roger Bacon and others of the early thirteenth
century wrote. In a passage not yet noted[2720] Arnald recognizes
the difficulty of medical experimentation and, like Petrus Hispanus
and John of St. Amand, makes some suggestions as to how it should be
conducted. They are, however, not novel. We have also heard him speak
of experimenters, of a “philosopher and experimenter,” of “the long
experience of any intelligent operator”, and of “rational experiment”
which “always presupposes a determined object.” We have also heard him
admit that the occult virtues of natural objects can be hit upon only
by chance experiment or by some sort of revelation. And since these
last two channels are as open to the common people as to the learned,
it is possible that knowledge of occult virtues should be attained
sooner by uneducated men than by others.[2721] This is not necessarily
the case, however, and in a third treatise he speaks of a truth
having been verified by experience until it has come to the notice of
illiterate men and women. This truth is that the weakened powers of
age can to some extent be restored, and as a proof of this assertion
Arnald presently adduces the invention of eye-glasses,[2722] which are
likewise mentioned by his contemporary, Bernard Gordon.[2723] We
also have observed in Arnald the usual inclination to base marvels upon
experience, as in “the marvelous and elect experiment” of Socrates or
the cure of gout by binding on frog’s legs.
[Sidenote: Further foibles of Arnald’s medicine.]
In conclusion some foibles of Arnald’s medicine may be noted which do
not exactly fall under any of the preceding heads. In the treatment
of mania in the _Breviarium_ he advises as a last resort that the
skin be cut in the form of a cross and the skull perforated so that
the noxious vapors may escape from the brain.[2724] In another place
he warns against washing the head too often, “since thereby many have
lost their sight before their time.”[2725] He advises to lave the
eyes not with cold but with tepid water, and recommends as especially
beneficial to the eyes washing with one’s own urine when one rises from
bed in the morning, or with one’s own saliva. Throughout this same
work he repeatedly recommends the most awful concoctions as remedies,
but perhaps the climax in the way of a series of complicated recipes
occurs in his _Treatise against the Stone_,[2726] a disease for which
he had treated the pope. In his collection of antidotes[2727] we again
run across the Potion of St. Paul and the opiates supposed to have been
discovered by the emperor Hadrian and the prophet Esdras.
[Sidenote: The affair of Bernard Délicieux.]
The trial of Bernard Délicieux[2728] before the inquisition should
perhaps be mentioned at this point as a connecting link between Arnald
of Villanova of whom we have just treated and Raymond Lull to whom
the next chapter will be devoted, especially as the tendency of this
affair would appear to be to bring both of them into disrepute with the
inquisition and under suspicion of magic. Thus two citizens of Albi
testified that on the eve of Benedict XI’s death Bernard Délicieux or
Delitiosi sent a leather chest wrapped in waxed cloth to Arnald of
Villanova at the papal court, the imputation being that Arnald helped
Bernard to poison the pope. Furthermore, Bernard was found to have
in his possession a book of nigromancy which he said Raymond Lull, a
Catalan of Majorca, had given to him at Rome. No doubt this evidence
against Raymond and Arnald is very flimsy; Bernard himself was freed of
the charge of poisoning;[2729] still, it may have done them some harm.
FOOTNOTES:
[2668] Jean Astruc, _Mémoires pour servir à l’histoire de la Faculté de
Médecine de Montpellier_, Paris, 1767. A much cited book, but seemingly
rare in this country.
[2669] HL 28, 26-104, with corrections and additions based on Menéndez
Pelayo’s researches at pp. 487-90.
[2670] Menéndez Pelayo, _Arnaldo de Villanova médico Catalán del siglo
XIII_, Madrid, 1879; and _Historia de los heterodoxos españoles_,
Madrid, 1880, I, 449-87, 720-81.
[2671] Roque Chabás, in _Boletín de la real Academia de la Historia_.
vol. 28, p. 87. I have not seen this, but have used Leopold Delisle,
_Testaments d’Arnaud de Villeneuve et de Raimond Lulle, 20 juillet 1305
et 26 avril 1313. Extrait du Journal des Savants_, June, 1896.
[2672] H. Finke, _Acta Aragonensia_, vol. II (1291-1327), 1908.
[2673] P. Diepgen, _Arnald von Villanova als Politiker und
Laientheologe_, 1909, in _Abhandl. z. Mittl. u. Neuer. Gesch._, Heft 9.
Diepgen proposed to treat later of Arnald’s medicine and investigate
the genuineness of several works ascribed to him.
[2674] _Catalogus testium veritatis qui ante nostram aetatem Pontificum
Romanorum Primatui Variisque Papismi superstitionibus erroribus ac
impiis fraudibus reclamarunt. Nova hac Editione emendatior_, etc., 1608.
[2675] Vatican MS 3824, _Confessio ... de spurcitiis
pseudo-religiosorum. Eulogium de notitia verorum et pseudo-apostolorum.
Gladius veritatis adversus thomistas._ And other anti-clerical or
theological treatises.
[2676] The bulls are printed by M. Fournier, _Les Statuts et Privilèges
des Universités Françaises_. II (1891), 21-3.
[2677] Astruc (1767), p. 153
[2678] Diepgen (1909), 17-21. Denifle et Chatelain, _Chartularium
Universitatis Parisiensis_, II, 86-90, give Arnald’s letter notifying
James II of Aragon of his detention at Paris, and his appeal to the
pope, both dated in October, 1300.
[2679] In this paragraph I have followed Diepgen (1909), pp. 23-36,
44-46.
[2680] Noted as a translator; see _Translatio Canticorum Avicennae cum
commentario Averrois ex arabico in latinum_, Venetiis, 1492. This work
was executed in 1283 according to Peterhouse 101, 13-14th century, II.
In 1307 he translated the treatise on poisons of Moses Maimonides for
Clement V at Barcelona; see Peterhouse 101, III, and Corpus Christi
125, fols. 1r-13v. Before that in 1302 he had translated at Montpellier
another medical work of Maimonides, _De asinate_; see Gonville and
Caius 178, 14-15th century, fols. 130-65.
Steinschneider (1905), p. 6, speaks of “Armengab (oder Armengaud,
nicht Armengand) Blasii, in Montpellier, Arzt Philipps des Schönen,
gest. 1314 übs. aus dem Hebr.” But Fabricius speaks of Armegandus
or Ermengardus Blasii, and the aforesaid MSS give such forms as
“dymengandus blasii,” “a mag. hermengaldo blasii,” “a mag. Armengando
blazini,” “a mag. Armegando blasii de monte pessulano magistro in
medicina.”
[2681] Diepgen (1909), 83-88.
[2682] Listed but not printed by Fournier, _Les Statuts et Privilèges
des Universités Françaises_, II (1891).
[2683] Diepgen (1909), 48-82.
[2684] One of the above-mentioned papal bulls of 1309 speaks of “our
cherished sons, masters William of Brixia and John of Alesto, our
physicians and chaplains, and also of Master Arnald of Villanova,
physician”; while the other two bulls speak of “our cherished sons,
Arnald of Villanova and John of Alesto, our physician and chaplain.”
Thus William and John, rather than Arnald, seem to be the pope’s
private physicians.
[2685] Diepgen (1909), p. 94.
[2686] _Ibid._, p. 99.
[2687] They will be found listed in HL 28, 50-51. I have used the
edition published at Lyons, in 1532.
[2688] _Regule Generales Curationis Morborum, Doctrina VI_. “Cum omnis
vera cognitio a sensu oriatur et ab his quae sensibilia sunt habeat
ortum, necessario ipsa sensibilia debent gratiose et efficaciter
demonstrari iuvenibus et adiscentibus, cum tunc intellectus discurrens
per ea abstrahit multa media et multas conclusiones. Unde per
sensibilia venit intellectus ad cognitionem insensibilium et occultorum
et arduorum et subtilium, ut declaratur per totum processum theologiae
et per totum processum medicinae.”
[2689] _De epilepsia_, cap. 25. A similar passage in a work
contemporary with Arnald, Bernard Gordon’s _Tractatus de decem ingeniis
curandorum morborum_, pp. 228-9 of the Venice, 1496, edition, reads:
“Tertio quod medicus operatur secundum artem seu per canones Galenis
et Hippocratis et aliorum sapientium et in hoc condemnatur omnis ars
auguriandi sicut est ars geomantica et suspendendi herbas ad collum et
omnia emperica et forticinia et fassina et alia quam plurima quae non
est bonum revelare propter abutentes qui conscientia neglecta utuntur
magis et quibusdam ingeniis fatuis et cum omni sollertia pessima et
mala lege et multa similia quae non sunt tunc narrabilia.... Et testor
deum et nimirum quod numquam vidi hominem malitiosum in medicina qui
diu duraret dies suos.”
[2690] Also rather inappropriately entitled in the MSS (BN 6971,
fol. 65; 7337, fol. 110; 17847, fol. 53), _Quaestio de possibilitate
et veritate imaginum astronomicarum_. The treatise is addressed to
“Reverendissimo patri et non ficte bonitatis exemplo dei provisione
presuli valentino....”
I have somewhat altered the order of Arnald’s arguments in order to
make them more comprehensible and readable.
[2691] Of these the first two are not given in the _Thesaurus pauperum_.
[2692] _Breviarium_, III, 4.
[2693] _Breviarium_, II, 45.
[2694] _Ibid._, II, 1. Possibly this particular passage is a later
gloss, as it is marked _Additiones_, but HL 28, 62-3, regards it as
Arnald’s, and marvels that a man of his zeal for science and truth
should believe in the efficacy of such procedure.
[2695] Presumably Ermengard Blasius, mentioned above, and his colleague
at Montpellier.
[2696] _Breviarium practicae a capite usque ad plantam pedis, cum
capitulo generali de urinis et tractatu de omnibus febribus, peste,
empiala et liparia_, Milan, 1483; Venice, 1494 and 1497.
[2697] _Compend. medic. pract._ II, 1; cited HL 28, 43.
[2698] _Breviarium_, I, 38; cited HL 28, 34.
[2699] _De epilepsia_, caps. 24 and 4.
[2700] _De parte operativa_, fol. 127.
[2701] _Breviarium_, I, 22.
[2702] _De venenis._
[2703] _De vinis_, fol. 263v.
[2704] Fol. 276.
[2705] _De vinis_, fol. 263v.
[2706] _De parte operativa_, fol. 127; _Antidotarium_, cap. 2.
[2707] _De epilepsia_, cap. 1.
[2708] _Regulae generales curationis morborum, Doctrina iv._
[2709] _Antidotarium_, cap. 3.
[2710] _Medicinalium Introductionum Speculum_, cap. 13.
[2711] _De conservanda iuventute et retardanda senectute._
[2712] _De epilepsia_, cap. 1.
[2713] _De regimine sanitatis_, cap. 37, fol. 78v.
[2714] _Doctrina iv._
[2715] HL, 25, 330.
[2716] _Antidotarium_, cap. 3.
[2717] _De parte operativa_, fol. 127.
[2718] _Antidotarium_, cap. 3.
[2719] Diepgen (1909), p. 25.
[2720] _Medic. Introd. Spec._, cap. 20.
[2721] _Repetitio super Canon ‘Vita Brevis’_, fol. 276.
[2722] _De conserv. iuvent. et retard. senectute_, “Palam autem
est quia obiectum politicum et diaffanum est aggregatum visus eius
congregans disgregatum.”
[2723] Bernard’s mention of eye-glasses in his _Lilium medicinae_,
Venice, 1496, Partic. III, cap. v, fol. 94, is both more incidental and
more specific. At the close of his “ninth experiment” for the eyes, a
formidable mixture, he says, “et est tantae virtutis quod decrepitum
faceret legere litteras minutas sine ocularibus.” Magnifying lenses
have of course been mentioned earlier by Grosseteste; see above p. 441.
Bernard Gordon also mentions “experimenters,” _Lilium_ V, 12, fol. 159,
“et dicunt experimentatores.”
[2724] _Breviarium_, I, 26.
[2725] _Ibid._, I, 13.
[2726] _Tractatus contra calculum._
[2727] _Antidotarium._
[2728] HL 29, 276; Lea, _Hist. of Inquisition of Middle Ages_
(1888) III, 452; but especially B. Hauréau, _Bernard Délicieux et
l’Inquisition Albigeoise_, Paris, 1877.
[2729] Diepgen (1909), pp. 36-7. The further articles by Diepgen
on Arnald, alluded to above on p. 842, note 3, appeared in _Arch.
f. Gesch. d. Med._, V., 397-9; VI (1913) 380-91; and in _Arch.
f. Kulturgesch._, IX (1912) 385-403, “Arnoldus de Villanova _de
improbatione maleficiorum_.”