other and much more interesting bull, _Super illius specula_, of
1326. One would suppose from the {145} doctor's account that this
Pontiff was a kindly and rational scholar seeking to save the people
from the clutch of superstition. The bull of 1326 shows Pope John
himself, in spite of his infallibility, sunk in superstition, the
most abject and debasing; for, in this bull, supposed to be inspired
from wisdom from on high, Pope John complains that both he and his
flock are in danger of their lives by the arts of the sorcerers. He
declares that such sorcerers can shut up devils in mirrors,
finger-rings and phials, and kill men and women by a magic word;
that they had tried to kill him by piercing a waxen image of him
with needles, in the name of the devil. He therefore, not only in
this bull, but in brief after brief, urged bishops, inquisitors and
other authorities, sacred and secular, to hunt down the miscreants
who thus afflicted the faithful, and he especially increased the
power of the inquisitors in various parts of Europe for this
purpose. This bull it was indeed, and others to the same purpose,
which stimulated that childish fear and hatred against the
investigation of nature which was felt for centuries and which
caused chemistry to be known more and more as one of the 'seven
devilish arts.'"
There can be no doubt that this is an awful arraignment of a Pope. The
bull in question is quoted so confidently under its Latin title that
anyone who reads this paragraph must necessarily conclude that it
contains all that President White says, and that he was fresh from the
reading of it. I may say that, though I had already found that two
other Papal documents had been utterly misrepresented in President
White's references, I could not bring myself to think that the same
thing might be true with regard to this third Papal document cited by
him. After having had two lessons in the necessity for {146} careful
collation of his references to his authorities, I did not think it
possible for him to make another misquotation, if possible, more
serious than the preceding examples. Though I had by me, thanks to my
good friend Father Corbett, of St. Charles Seminary, Overbrook, Pa., a
copy of this bull at the time I wrote an answer to some of President
White's curious wanderings into the history of anatomy and chemistry,
I did not consult it, for I felt sure that it must contain the
expressions which were so confidently quoted. My surprise can be
better imagined than described when on reading the bull I found that
it contained practically no foundation for the awful charges made by
President White. I had been given another lesson in the difference
between traditional and documentary history, the significance of which
will, I hope, be appreciated by others. It led me to consult further
bulls of John XXII., which bring out his character better than any
modern historian possibly can, and which serve to show that, far from
being an obscurantist in any sense of the word, he was deeply
interested in education, expressed his appreciation for it on many
occasions in the highest terms, encouraged his people to seek it, in
any and every form, scientific as well as literary and philosophic,
and stated confidently that education would surely redound to the
benefit of the Church and deserved to be the special object of
ecclesiastical favor.
First, however, let me quote the bull _Super illius specula_, of which
President White has said so much. I present a close, almost literal,
translation of the document as it is to be found in the collections of
Thomassetti and Coquelines. As President White conceded that my
translation of the previous document of Pope John {147} with regard to
alchemy was flawless, I shall be careful not to undo his compliment.
[Footnote 20]
[Footnote 20: The full Latin text of this bull will be found in the
appendix.]
"Seeking to discover how the sons of men know and serve God by the
practice of the Christian religion, we look down from the
watch-tower where, though unworthy, we have been placed by the
favoring clemency of Him who made the first man after His own image
and likeness; setting him over earthly things; adorning him with
heavenly virtues; recalling him when a wanderer; bestowing on him a
law; freeing him from slavery; finding him when he was lost; and
finally ransoming him from captivity by the merit of His passion.
With grief we discover, and the very thought of it wrings our soul
with anguish, that there are many Christians only in name; many who
turn away from the light which once was theirs, and allow their
minds to be so clouded with the darkness of error as to enter into a
league with death and a compact with hell. They sacrifice to demons
and adore them, they make or cause to be made images, rings,
mirrors, phials or some such things in which by the art of magic
evil spirits are to be enclosed. From them they seek and receive
replies, and ask aid in satisfying their evil desires. For a foul
purpose they submit to the foulest slavery. Alas! this deadly malady
is increasing more than usual in the world and inflicting greater
and greater ravages on the flock of Christ.
"Section I.--Since, therefore, we are bound by the duty of our
pastoral office to bring back to the fold of Christ the sheep who
are wandering through devious ways and to exclude from the Lord's
flock those who are diseased lest they should infect the rest, We,
by this edict, which, in accordance with the counsel of our brother
bishops, is to remain in perpetual vigor, warn all and in virtue of
holy obedience and under pain of anathema enjoin on all those who
have been regenerated in the waters of baptism not to inculcate or
study any of the perverse teachings we have mentioned, or, what is
more to be condemned, practise them in any manner upon any one.
{148}
"Section II.--And because it is just that those who by their deeds
make mockery of the Most High should meet with punishments worthy of
their transgressions we pronounce the sentence of excommunication
which it is our will they shall _ipso facto_ incur, who shall
presume to act contrary to our salutary warnings and commands. And
we firmly decree that in addition to the above penalties a process
shall be begun before competent judges for the infliction of all and
every penalty which heretics are subject to according to law, except
confiscation of goods, against such as being duly admonished of the
foregoing or any of the foregoing practices, have not within eight
days from the time when the admonition was given amended their lives
in the aforesaid matters.
"Section III.--Moreover, since it is proper that no opportunity or
occasion should be given for such flagitious practices, We, in
conformity with the advice of our brother bishops, ordain and command
that no one shall presume to have or to hold books or writing of any
kind containing any of the before-mentioned errors or to make a study
of them. On the contrary, we desire and in virtue of holy obedience
we impose the precept upon all, that whoever shall have any of the
aforesaid writings or books shall, within the space of eight days
from their knowledge of our edict in this matter, destroy and burn
them and every part thereof absolutely and completely; otherwise, we
decree that they incur the sentence of excommunication _ipso facto_
and, when the evidence is clear, that other and greater penalties
shall be inflicted upon culprits of this kind."
Now here is a Papal document that, far from containing any of the
superstitions that President White so outspokenly declares it to
contain, is a worthy expression of the fatherly feelings of the head
of Christendom that might well have been issued at even the most
enlightened period of the world's history. The two sentences on which
all of President White's serious accusation is founded are simple
expressions of the Pope's solicitude for his flock on hearing of some
of the practices that {149} some are said to give themselves up to. He
does not say even that sorcerers can shut up devils in mirrors,
finger-rings and phials, but uses the hypothetical expression that in
these things, by magic art, evil spirits are to be enclosed. The bull
has no reference at all to the killing of men and women by a magic
word, and where President White found that Pope John declares in this
bull that sorcerers had tried to kill him by piercing a waxen image of
him with needles in the name of the devil, it is impossible to
understand; I should like very much to know what his authority is,
because then it could be refuted in its source. As it is, Dr. White
said it was in the bull, and now every one can see for himself that it
is not.
Let us go a step further and take President White's single sentence,
"One would suppose from the doctor's (Dr. Walsh's) account that this
Pontiff was a kindly and rational scholar seeking to save the people
from the clutch of superstition," and let us illustrate the phrase "a
kindly and rational scholar" by some documents issued by Pope John
XXII. Take for instance the special bull issued by him for the
confirmation of the establishment of chairs in canon and civil law,
and the founding of masterships in medicine and in arts in the
University of Perugia by which he also conveyed the authority to
confer the degrees of doctor and bachelor in all these faculties on
those who were found worthy after careful examinations. In the
preamble of this bull we shall find abundant evidence of Pope John's
kindly and rational scholarship, of his eminent desire to encourage
education in all its forms, literary and scientific, and to make the
people of his time understand how valuable he considered education,
not only for the sake of the {150} individuals who might acquire it,
but also for the Church and for the cause of religion.
This bull was issued Feb. 18, 1321:
"While with deep feelings of solicitous consideration we mentally
resolve how precious the gift of science is and how desirable and
glorious is its possession, since through it the darkness of
ignorance is put to flight and the clouds of error completely done
away with so that the trained intelligence of students disposes and
orders their acts and modes of life in the light of truth, we are
moved by a very great desire that the study of letters in which the
priceless pearl of knowledge is found should everywhere make
praiseworthy progress, and should especially flourish more
abundantly in such places as are considered to be more suitable and
fitting for the multiplication of the seeds and salutary germs of
right teaching. Whereas some time ago, Pope Clement of pious memory,
our predecessor, considering the purity of faith and the excelling
devotion which the city of Perugia belonging to our Papal states is
recognized to have maintained for a long period towards the church,
wishing that these might increase from good to better in the course
of time, deemed it fitting and equitable that this same city, which
had been endowed by Divine Grace with the prerogatives of many
special favors, should be distinguished by the granting of
university powers, in order that by the goodness of God men might be
raised up in the city itself pre-eminent for their learning, decreed
by the Apostolic authority that a university should be situated in
the city and that it should flourish there for all future time with
all those faculties that may be found more fully set forth in the
letter of that same predecessor aforesaid. And whereas we
subsequently, though unworthy, having been raised to the dignity of
the Apostolic primacy, are desirous to reward with a still richer
gift the same city of Perugia for the proofs of its devotion by
which it has proven itself worthy of the favor of the Apostolic See,
by our Apostolic authority and in accordance with the council of our
brother bishops, we grant to our venerable brother the Bishop of
Perugia and to those who may be his successors in {151} that diocese
the right of conferring on persons who are worthy of it the license
to teach (the Doctorate) in canon and civil law, according to that
fixed method which is more fully described and regulated more at
length in this our letter.
"Considering, therefore, that this same city, because of its
conveniences and its many favoring conditions, is altogether
suitable for students and wishing on that account to amplify the
educational concessions hitherto made because of the public benefits
which we hope will flow from them, we decree by Apostolic authority
that if there are any who in the course of time shall in that same
university attain the goal of knowledge in medical science and the
liberal arts and should ask for license to teach in order that they
may be able to train others with more freedom, that they may be
examined in that university in the aforesaid medical sciences and in
the arts and be decorated with the title of Master in these same
faculties. We further decree that as often as any are to receive the
degree of Doctor in medicine and arts as aforesaid, they must be
presented to the Bishop of Perugia, who rules the diocese at the
time or to him whom the bishop shall have appointed for this
purpose, who having selected teachers of the same faculty in which
the examinations are to be made, who are at that time present in the
university to the number of at least four, they shall come together
without any charge to the candidate and, every difficulty being
removed, should diligently endeavor that the candidate be examined
in science, in eloquence, in his mode of lecturing, and anything
else which is required for promotion to the degree of doctor or
master. With regard to those who are found worthy their teachers
should be further consulted privately, and any revelation of
information obtained at such consultations as might redound to the
disadvantage or injury of the consultors is strictly forbidden. If
all is satisfactory the candidate should be approved and admitted
and the license to teach granted. Those who are found unfit must not
be admitted to the degree of doctor, all leniency or prejudice or
favor being set aside.
"In order that the said university may in the aforesaid studies of
medicine and the arts so much more fully {152} grow in strength,
according as the professors who actually begin the work and teaching
there are more skillful, we have decided that until four or five
years have passed some professors, two at least, who have secured
their degree in the medical sciences at the University of Paris,
under the auspices of the Cathedral of Paris, and who shall have
taught or acted as masters in the before-mentioned University of
Paris, shall be selected for the duties of the masterships and the
professional chairs in said department in the University of Perugia
and they shall continue their work in this last-mentioned university
until noteworthy progress in the formation of good students shall
have been made.
"With regard to those who are to receive the degree of doctor in
medical science, it must be especially observed that all those
seeking the degree shall have heard lectures in all the books of
this same science which are usually required to be heard by similar
students at the universities of Bologna or of Paris and that this
shall continue for seven years. Those, however, who have elsewhere
received sufficient instruction in logic or philosophy having
applied themselves to these studies for five years in the aforesaid
universities, with the provision, however, that at least three years
of the aforesaid five or seven-year term shall have been devoted to
hearing lectures in medical science in some university, and
according to custom, shall have been examined under duly authorized
teachers and shall have, besides, read such books outside the
regular course as may be required may, with due observation of all
the regulations which are demanded for the taking of degrees in
Paris or Bologna, also be allowed to take the examination at
Perugia."
Here is a bull issued within five years after the bull which President
White so falsely impugns and which tells a very different story with
regard to the relationship of the Popes to education in general, and
especially to scientific education, from that which unfortunate
misrepresentations have accorded to them. Perugia was a city of the
Papal States, though really scarcely more {153} than under the
dominion of the Popes in name. The citizens exercised a large freedom
not only in all civic matters, but even in regard to their
relationships with neighboring cities and political powers. One of the
things which Pope John seems to have been especially solicitous about,
however, as we shall see in a subsequent bull, was that the
educational institutions in the Papal States should be maintained at a
high standard. A university had been established at Perugia by his
predecessor, and Pope John not only confirmed this establishment, but
gave the additional privilege of conferring degrees in Canon and Civil
Law as well as in Medicine and the Arts.
Lest there should be any thought that the fact that the conferring of
such privileges by the Pope might seem to be a limitation of
university privilege, it may be said at once that practically all
universities have at all times been under the supervision of
Government and have derived their privileges from the political
authorities. During the Middle Ages the universities were really
developments of Cathedral schools, and as such were usually under the
authority of the Chancellor of the Cathedral. As an ecclesiastical
person he looked to the Pope as the source of his authority, and in
order that uniformity of requirement for various degrees and of
educational methods might be maintained, there was practically
universal agreement that such centralization of the power to grant
privileges for the erection of universities and the conferring of
degrees was the most practical way. With regard to Perugia besides
there was the additional reason that the Pope represented the
political as well as the ecclesiastical authority in the matter, and
that very naturally the {154} encouragement for the good educational
work already being done in the Umbrian City should come from him.
This premised, certain features of this bull are especially noteworthy
in the light of modern educational experiences. The Pope was
confirming the establishment of a new university. It was to be as he
realized, a smaller university in size, but he did not want its
standard of education to be lower than that of the great universities.
For this reason he insists specifically in the bull that the license
to teach--the equivalent of our modern doctorate in law, letters and
science, shall not be given except after the completion of a course
equivalent to those given in these subjects in Paris or Bologna, the
great universities of the time, and that the examination shall be
quite as rigid and shall be conducted under conditions that, as far as
human foresight can arrange, shall preclude all possibility of
favoritism of any kind entering into the promotion of candidates for
these degrees. The fact that oaths were required in the hope that
standards would be thus maintained shows how seriously the subject of
education was taken at this time, when, if we would believe some of
those who depreciate the Middle Ages, ecclesiastical efforts were
mainly occupied with the attempt to keep the people as ignorant as
possible.
This phase of the Papal decree is all the more interesting when it is
viewed in the light of some modern educational developments. A few
years ago there was a very general complaint that the doctorate in
philosophy was conferred too easily, especially by the minor
universities, and that as a consequence this degree had come to mean
very little. It required a distinct crusade of effort to raise
standards in this matter, and even at {155} the present time the
situation is not entirely satisfactory. A very curious element in the
situation lies in the fact that, in comparison to the number of
students, certain of the smaller universities confer this distinction
much more frequently than the larger universities. This was found to
be true even among the German universities, where I believe that
according to statistics the little University of Rostock, in
Mecklenberg, confers the degree proportionately oftener than any other
German university. Pope John XXII. was evidently endeavoring to
prevent any such development as this, or perhaps he was trying to
remedy an abuse which he knew had already crept in, for all of his
bulls on educational matters insist with no little emphasis on the
necessity for the maintenance of a high standard of educational
requirements as regards the length of time in years and the books to
be read and lectures attended, as well as on the rigor, yet absolute
fairness of examinations.
I am sure that the bulls of John XXII. must never have come under
President White's eyes, or he, as an experienced educator who has had
to meet most of these problems in our time, would have been more
sympathetic with this medieval ecclesiastic, who did all in his power
to maintain university standards. Pope John's career deserves study by
all modern educators for this reason, and the surprise of it will be
that in education, as practically in everything else, in spite of our
present-day self-complacency in the matter of educational progress,
there is nothing new under the sun, certainly nothing new in the
problems university authorities have to meet in order to maintain
their standards.
The best possible proof that Pope John XXII. was not opposed in any
way to the development of science nor {156} to the study of sciences
at the universities is to be found in his establishment of this
medical school at Perugia. We may say at once that this is not the
only medical school with whose encouragement he was concerned since
the erection of the University of Cahors, his birthplace, and the
establishment of a medical school there, as well as the provision of
funds for certain medical chairs in the University at Rome, shows the
reality and the breadth of his interest in medicine. It must be
remembered that under the term medicine at this time most of the
physical sciences as we know them now were included. It is the custom
sometimes to think that the students of medicine in the Middle Ages
knew very little about medicine itself or the sciences related to
medicine. This thought was excusable some years ago when the old
medical text-books of the thirteenth and fourteenth centuries had not
as yet been printed.
At the present time, such a mistake would be unpardonable for any
scholar who pretends to first-hand knowledge of this period. In the
chapter on Science at the Medieval Universities I call special
attention to the fact that medicine and surgery developed in such a
wonderful way at the medical schools of the universities of the
thirteenth and fourteenth centuries, that many presumed discoveries of
much later times were marvelously anticipated. A short catalogue of
them here may not be out of place, though the reader is referred to
other chapters for further details. In the medical schools which Pope
John XXII. was then fostering, they taught the ligature of arteries,
the prevention of bleeding by pressure, the danger of wounds of the
neck, the relation of dropsy to hardening of the kidneys, the true
origins of the venereal diseases, the methods of treating {157} joint
diseases, the suture of divided nerves, the use of the knife rather
than the cautery because it made a cleaner wound which healed more
readily, and even, wonder of wonders, healing by first intention.
Anyone who was fostering this kind of education in medicine was
advancing the cause of one of the applied sciences in a very wonderful
way.
If we add that, at this same time the proper use of opium in medicine
was a feature of medical teaching which had just been introduced by a
Papal physician, while a form of anaesthesia was being practically
developed and very generally employed, the question will be why we, in
the twentieth century, do not know ever so much more than we actually
do, rather than why these earnest students of the thirteenth century
knew so little, which is the absurd thought that most authorities in
education seem to entertain at the present time with regard to our
forbears of early university history. The student of medicine during
the thirteenth century had to devote himself very nearly to the same
department of science as those which occupy his colleagues of the
present century.