159-167.
[125] Gautier, _o.c._ i. 168.
[126] Gautier, _o.c._ ii. 127.
[127] Gautier, 3rd ed., p. 186. This is in Migne 196, col. 1502.
[128] A charlatan in Salimbene’s Chronicle, _ante_, Chapter XXI., uses a
like phrase.
[129] For the data as to Alanus see the Prolegomena to Migne, _Pat. Lat._
210, which volume contains his works. See also Hauréau, _Mém. de l’acad.
des inscriptions et des belles lettres_, tome 32 (1886), p. 1, etc.; also
_Hist. lit. de France_, tome 16, p. 396, etc. On Alanus and his place in
scholastic philosophy, see _post_, Chapter XXXVI., III.
[130] Migne 210, col. 686-1012.
[131] Migne 210, col. 431-481. See _post_, Chapter XXXII., I.
[132] The significance of the title is not quite clear. The poem is
written in hexametre, and is not far from 4700 lines in length. It is
printed in Migne 210, col. 486-576; also edited by Thos. Wright, Master of
the Rolls Series, vol. 59, ii. (1872).
[133] The poem is highly imaginative in the delineation of its allegorical
figures.
[134] These curious lines are as follows:
“O nova picturae miracula, transit ad esse
Quod nihil esse potest! picturaque simia veri,
Arte nova ludens, in res umbracula rerum
Vertit, et in verum mendacia singula mutat.”
_Anticlaudianus_, i. cap. iv.
(Migne 196, col. 491.)
[135] The allusion here is to the fate of Hippolytus, whose
chariot-horses, maddened by the wiles of Venus, dashed the chariot to
pieces and caused their lord’s death.
[136] i. cap. vi. Her garb and attributes are elaborately told. In the
latter part of the poem she is usually called Phronesis.
[137] A favourite commonplace; Heloïse uses it.
[138] The functions of these virgins, the Seven Liberal Arts, are
poetically told. The _Anticlaudianus_ is no text-book. But the poet
apparently is following the _De nuptiis Philologiae et Mercurii_ of
Martianus Capella, _ante_, Chapter IV.
[139] Compare the succession of Heavens in Dante’s _Paradiso_.
[140] One may recall Raphael’s painting of Theology on the ceiling of the
Stanza del Segnatura in the Vatican. It is impossible not to compare the
rôles of Alan’s Reason and Theology with those of Virgil and Beatrice in
the _Commedia_.
[141] Here we are back in the _Celestial Hierarchy_ of Dionysius the
Areopagite.
[142] As in Dante’s _Paradiso_.
[143] Most of these epithets of the Virgin come from allegorical
interpretations of the text of the Vulgate.
[144] Compare the final vision of Dante in _Paradiso_, xxxiii.
[145] The reader will notice the Platonism and Neo-Platonism of all this.
[146] Notice that the Arts are here equipping and perfecting the man for
his fight against sin;--which corresponds with the common mediaeval view
of the function of education.
[147] The poem gives a full description of Fortune and her house, and
unstable splendid gifts.
[148] But the different names of Alanus’s Virtues and Vices, and their
novel antagonisms, indicate an original view of morality with him. On the
_Psychomachia_ see Taylor, _Classical Heritage_, pp. 278 _sqq._ and 379.
Allegorical combats and _débats_ (both in Latin and in the vernacular
tongues) are frequent in mediaeval literature. Cf. _e.g._ _post_, Chapter
XXX. Again, in certain _parabolae_ ascribed to St. Bernard (Migne 183,
col. 757 _sqq._) the various virtues, Prudentia, Fortitude, Discretio,
Temperantia, Spes, Timor, Sapientia, are so naturally made to act and
speak, that one feels they had become personalities proper for poetry and
art. Compare Hildegard’s characterizations of the Vices, _ante_, Chapter
XIX.
[149] The English reader will derive much pleasure from F. S. Ellis’s
admirable verse translation: _The Romance of the Rose_ (Dent and Co.,
London, 1900). Each of the three little volumes of this translation has a
convenient synopsis of the contents. Those who would know what is known of
the tale and its authors should read Langlois’s chapter on it, in
_Histoire de la langue et de la littérature française_, edited by Petit de
Julleville. It may be said here, for those whose memories need refreshing,
that William de Lorris wrote the first part, some forty-two hundred lines,
about the year 1237, and died leaving it unfinished; John de Meun took up
the poem some thirty years afterwards, and added his sequel of more than
eighteen thousand lines.
[150] The names are Englished after Ellis’s translation.
[151] See _ante_, Chapter XXIII.; De Meun took much from the _De planctu
naturae_ of Alanus.
[152] _Post_, Chapter XXXIII.
[153] _Ante_, Vol. I. p. 213.
[154] Migne, _Pat. Lat._ 172, col. 1056.
[155] _Ante_, Chapter XII., I.
[156] _Ante_, Chapter XIII., I.
[157] _Ante_, Chapter XXVIII.
[158] _Didascalicon_, iii. 4 (Migne 176, col. 768-769).
[159] _De vanitate mundi_, i. (Migne 176, col. 709, 710).
[160] _Ep._ 169 (Migne, _Pat. Lat._ 100, col. 441).
[161] _Opusc._ xiii.; _De perfectione monachi_, cap. xi. (Migne 144, col.
306). See _ante_, Chapter XVI.
[162] _Speculum ecclesiae_ (Migne 172, col. 1085).
[163] Sonnet 56.
[164] _Ep._ i. (Migne 119, col. 433).
[165] John approved of reading the _auctores_, for educational purposes,
and not confining the pupil to the _artes_. See _Metalogicus_, i. 23, 24
(Migne, _Pat. Lat._ 199, col. 453). On John, cf. _post_, Chapter XXXI. and
XXXVI., III.
[166] _Polycraticus_, Prologus (Migne, _Pat. Lat._ 199, col. 385).
[167] _Post_, Chapter XXXVI., III.
[168] I draw upon the extracts given in the thesis of M. Demimuid, _De
Bernardo Carnotensi grammatico professore et interprete Virgilii_ (Paris,
1873), who, as appears by his title, confuses the two Bernards.
[169] The author of a bastard epitome on the Trojan War, see _post_,
Chapter XXXII., IV.
[170] The above, in substance, is taken from Macrobius.
[171] _Post_, Chapter XXXVII.
[172] _Ante_, Chapter XXIX., II., and _post_, Chapter XXXVI., III.
[173] _Post_, Chapter XXXVI., I.
[174] For a successor or friendly rival to Chartres, in the interest taken
in grammar and classical literature, one should properly look to Orleans,
where apparently those studies continued to flourish. Cf. L. Delisle, “Les
Écoles d’Orléans au douzième siècle,” _Annuaire-Bulletin de la Societé de
l’Histoire de France_, t. vii. (1869), p. 139 _sqq._ In a _Bataille des
septs arts_, by Henri d’Andeli, of the first half of the thirteenth
century, Logic, from its stronghold of Paris, vanquishes Grammar, whose
stronghold is Orleans. In the conflict, with much symbolic truth,
Aristotle overthrows Priscian, _Histoire littéraire de la France_, t.
xxiii. p. 225.
[175] _Post_, Chapter XXXVII.
[176] See _post_, Chapter XLI. and XLII. for the work of Grosseteste.
[177] Cf. _post_, Chapter XXXIII. and XXXVII.
[178] Cf. Specht, _Geschichte des Unterrichtswesens in Deutschland, etc._
(Stuttgard, 1885), p. 75 and _passim_.
Yet how soon and with what childish prattle youths might begin to speak
and write Latin is touchingly shown by a boy’s letter, written from a
monastic school, to his parents. It just asks for various little things,
and its superscription is: “Parentibus suis A. agnus ablactatus pium
balatum”: which seems to mean: “To his parents, A, a weaned lamb, sends a
loving bah.” This and other curious little letters are ascribed to one
Robertus Metensis (_cir._ A.D. 900) (Migne 132, col. 533).
[179] See Thurot, _Histoire des doctrines grammaticales au moyen âge;
Notices et extraits des MSS._ vol. 22, part 2, p. 85. For what is said in
the preceding and following pages the writer’s obligations are deep to
this well-known work of Thurot, and to Reichling’s edition of the
_Doctrinale_ of Alexander de Villa-Dei (_Mon. Germ. paedagogica_, XII.,
Berlin, 1893). Paetow’s _Arts Course at Medieval Universities_ (University
of Illinois, 1910) treats learnedly of these matters.
[180] See Thurot, _o.c._ p. 204 _sqq._
[181] _Regere_, a mediaeval term not used in this sense by Priscian.
[182] See the _Einleitung_ to Reichling’s edition of the _Doctrinale_
already referred to; also Thurot, _De Alexandri de Villa-Dei doctrinali_
(Paris, 1850). The chief mediaeval rival of the _Doctrinale_ was the
_Graecismus_ of Eberhard of Bethune, written a little later. See Paetow,
_o.c._ p. 38.
[183] _Doctrinale_, line 1561 _sqq._
[184] _Doctrinale_, 1603 _sqq._
[185] _Doctrinale_, 2330-2331.
[186] See passage in Reichling’s _Einleitung_, p. xxvii.
[187] See _e.g._ _Une Grammaire latine inédite du XIII{e} siècle_, par Ch.
Fierville (Paris, 1886).
[188] See Reichling, _o.c._ _Einleitung_, p. xix; Thurot, _Not. et extr._
xxii. 2, p. 112 _sqq._
[189] See _e.g._ Thurot, _o.c._ p. 176 _sqq._; p. 216 _sqq._
[190] Thurot, _o.c._ pp. 126-127.
[191] Thurot, _o.c._ p. 127.
[192] _The Greek Grammar of Roger Bacon_, ed. by Nolan and Hirsch
(Cambridge, 1902).
[193] Bacon defines _idioma_ “as the determined peculiarity (_proprietas_)
of language, which one _gens_ uses after its custom; and another _gens_
uses another _idioma_ of the same language” (_Greek Grammar_, p. 26).
Dialect is the modern term.
[194] _Greek Grammar_, p. 27. Bacon appears to have followed Priscian
chiefly. As to whether he used Byzantine models, or other sources, see the
Introduction to Nolan and Hirsch’s edition of the _Greek Grammar_. These
thoughts inspiring Bacon’s _Grammar_ became a veritable metaphysics in the
_Grammatica speculativa_ ascribed to Duns Scotus, see _post_, Chapter
XLII.
[195] Cf. L. Rockinger, “Die Ars Dictandi in Italien,” _Sitzungsber.
bayerisch. Akad._, 1861, pp. 98-151. For examples of these _dictamina_,
see L. Delisle, “Dictamina Magistri Berardi de Neapoli” (a papal notary
equally versed in law and rhetoric), _Notices et extraits des MSS., etc._,
vol. 27, part 2, p. 87 _sqq._; Ch. V. Langlois, “Formulaires de lettres,”
etc., _Not. et ext._ vol. 32 (2), p. 1 _sqq._; _ibid._ vol. 34 (1), p. 1
_sqq._ and p. 305 _sqq._ and vol. 35 (2), p. 409 _sqq._
[196] For the history of this school in the eleventh century, see _ante_,
Chapter XII. III.
[197] The _Eptateuchon_ exists in manuscript. I have taken the above from
Clerval, _Les Écoles de Chartres au moyen âge_ (Chartres, 1895), p. 221
_sqq._ Thierry appears to have written a commentary on Cicero’s
_Rhetoric_. See _Mélanges Graux_, pp. 41-46.
[198] _Metalogicus_, i. cap. xxiv. (Migne, _Pat. Lat._ 199, col. 853-856).
[199] _Polycraticus_, vii. 13 (Migne 199, col. 666).
[200] _Metalogicus_, i. 24 (Migne 199, col. 856).
[201] Cf. Clerval, _o.c._ p. 211 _sqq._ and p. 227 _sqq._
[202] _Metalogicus_, iii. 4 (Migne 199, col. 900).
[203] Petrus Blesensis, _Epist._ 101 (Migne 207, col. 312).
[204] _Epist._ 92 (Migne 207, col. 289). These letters are cited by
Clerval.
[205] See _post_, Chapter XXXVI. I.
[206] Migne, _Pat. Lat._ 171, col. 1007-1056.
[207] _Metalogicus_, i. 5.
[208] See _post_, Chapter XXXV. I.
[209] The works of Giraldus Cambrensis are published in Master of Rolls
Series, 21, in eight volumes. The last contains the _De instructione
principum_. Giraldus lived from about 1147 to 1220.
[210] _Ante_, Chapter VIII.
[211] Alcuin, _Ep._ 80 (Migne 100, col. 260).
[212] Alcuin, _Ep._ 113, _ad Paulinum patriarcham_ (Migne 100, col. 341).
[213] Traube, _Poëtae Lat. Aevi Carolini_ (_Mon. Germ._), 1, p. 243. Cf.
“Versus in laude Larii laci,” by Paulus Diaconus, _ibid._ p. 42.
[214] _Ante_, Chapter XII.
[215] _Post_, Chapter XXXVI. III.
[216] _Ep._ ii. 33 (Migne 171, col. 256). For the Latin text of this
letter see _post_, Chapter XXXI.
[217] For the entire poem, which is of interest throughout, see _post_,
Chapter XXXII. I.
[218] For the poem see Hauréau, _Mélanges poétiques d’Hildebert de
Lavardin_, p. 64 (Paris, 1882).
[219] Hauréau, _o.c._ p. 56.
[220] _Ibid._ p. 82.
[221] _Ibid._ p. 144.
[222] Migne, _Pat. Lat._ 171, col. 1428. This volume of Migne also
contains the poems criticized and (some of them) edited by Hauréau in the
book already referred to.
[223] Hildebert, _Epis._ i. 1 (Migne 171, col. 141).
[224] Hildebert, _Ep._ i. 22 (Migne 171, col. 197).
[225] A technical illustration from Roman law.
[226] Hildeberti, _Ep._ ii. 12 (Migne 171, col. 172-177). Compare _Ep._ i.
17, consoling a friend on loss of place and dignities. Hildebert’s works
are in vol. 171 of Migne’s _Pat. Lat._ A number of his poems are more
carefully edited by Hauréau in _Notices et extraits des MSS., etc._, vol.
28, ii. p. 289 _sqq._; and some of them in vol. 29, ii. p. 231 _sqq._ of
the same series. The matter is more conveniently given by Hauréau in his
_Mélanges poétiques d’Hildebert de Lavardin_. On the man and his writings
see De servillers, _Hildebert et son temps_ (Paris, 1876); Hebert
Duperron, _De Venerabilis Hildeberti vita et scriptis_ (Bajocis, 1855);
also vol. xi. of _Hist. lit. de la France_; and (best of all) Dieudonné,
_Hildebert de Lavardin, sa vie, ses lettres, etc._ (Paris, 1898).
[227] It is well known that the great Latin prose, in spite of variances
of stylistic intent and faculty among the individual writers, was an
artistic, not to say artificial creation, formed under the influence of
Greek models. Cicero is the supreme example of this, and he is also the
greatest of all Latin prose writers. After his time some great writers
(_e.g._ Tacitus, Quintilian) preserved a like tradition; others (_e.g._
Seneca) paid less attention to it. And likewise on through the patristic
period, and the Middle Ages too, some men endeavoured to preserve a
classic style, while others wrote more naturally.
[228] Even as it is necessary, in order to appreciate some of the methods
of the Latin classical poetry, to realize that their immediate antecedents
lay in Greek Alexandrian literature rather than in the older Greek
Classics.
[229] See Taylor, _Classical Heritage_, chapter viii.
[230] A palpable difficulty in judging mediaeval Latin literature is its
bulk. The extant Latin classics could be tucked away in a small corner of
it. Every well-equipped student of the Classics has probably read them
all. One mortal life would hardly suffice to read a moderate part of
mediaeval Latin. And, finally, while there are histories of the classic
literature in every modern tongue, there exists no general work upon
mediaeval Latin writings regarded as literature. Ebert’s indispensable
_Allgemeine Geschichte der Literatur des Mittelalters_ ends with the tenth
century. The author died. Within the scope of its purpose Dr. Sandys’
_History of Classical Scholarship_ is compact and good.
[231] _Ante_, Chapter X.
[232] _Post_, Chapter XXXII., I.
[233] See Sandys, _History of Classical Scholarship_, i. 463-464.
[234] There was no attempt at classicism in the narrative in which he
recounted the _Translation_ of the relics of the martyrs Marcellinus and
Peter from Rome to his own new monastery at Seligenstadt (Migne 104, col.
537-594). It was an entertaining story of a pious theft, and one may be
sure that he wrote it more easily, and in a style more natural to himself
than that shown in his consciously imitative masterpiece.
[235] _Ep._ vi. (Migne 100, col. 146).
[236] _Ep._ xxxii. (Migne 100, col. 187).
[237] _Ep._ xxxiii. (Migne 100, col. 187).
[238] _Capitula ad Presbyteros_ (Migne 105, col. 202).
[239] See _ante_, Chapter XII.
[240] _Chronicon_, cap. 35 (Migne 139, col. 46). The sense is easy to
follow, but the impossible constructions render an exact translation quite
impossible. It is doubtful whether this Benedictus was an Italian. The
Italian writing of this period, like that of Liutprand, is easier than
among more painful students north of the Alps. But otherwise its qualities
are rarely more pronounced. Ease is shown, however, in the _Chronicon
Venetum_ of John the Deacon (d. cir. 1008). See _ante_, Chapter XIII.,
III.
[241] Migne 133. This work fills four hundred columns in Migne. On Odo see
_ante_, Chapter XII., II.
[242] Odo of Cluny, _Collationes_, lib. i. cap. i. (Migne 133, col. 519
and 520).
“Therefore God, Creator and Judge of mankind, although He have justly
driven our race from that felicity of Paradise, yet mindful of His
goodness, lest man all guilt should incur what he deserves, softens the
sorrows of this pilgrimage with many benefits.... Indeed the purpose of
that same Scripture is to press us from the depravities of this life. For
to that end with its dreadful utterances, as with so many goads, it pricks
our heart, that man struck by fear may shudder, and may recall to memory
the divine judgments which he is wont so easily to forget, cut off by lust
of the flesh and the solicitudes of earth.”
[243] Ruotgerus, _Vita Brunonis_, cap. 4 and 6; Pertz, _Mon. Germ.
Script._ iv. p. 254, and Migne 134, col. 944 and 946. A translation of
this passage is given _ante_, Vol. I., p. 310. See _ibid._, p. 314, for
the scholarship and writings of Hermannus Contractus, an eleventh-century
German. Ruotger’s clumsy Latin is outdone by the linguistic involutions of
the _Life of Wenceslaus_, the martyr duke of Bohemia, written toward the
close of the tenth century by Gumpoldus, Bishop of Mantua, who seems to
have cultivated classical rhetoric most disastrously (Pertz, _Mon. Germ.
Script._ iv. p. 211, and in Migne 135, col. 923 _sqq._).
[244] From Thurot, _Notices et extraits, etc._, 22 (2), p. 87, and p. 341
_sqq._, one may see that the principles of construction stated by
mediaeval grammarians followed the usage of mediaeval writers in adopting
a simpler or more natural order than that of classical prose. An extract,
for example, from an eleventh-century MSS. indicates the simple order
which this grammarian author approved: _e.g._ “Johannes hodie venit de
civitate; Petrus, quem Arnulfus genuit et nutrivit, intellexit multa”
(Thurot, p. 87).
[245] _Ante_, Chapter XXX., II.
[246] So likewise in regard to verse, the perfected two-syllable rhyme
came first in Italy, and more slowly in the North, although the North was
to produce better Latin poetry.
[247] _Ante_, Chapters XI., IV., and XVI.
[248] _Opusc._ xiv., _De ordine erimitarum_ (Migne 145, col. 329).
“We may see upon a tree a leaf ready to succumb beneath the wintry frosts,
and, with the sap of autumnal clemency consumed, even now about to fall,
so that it barely cleaves to the twig it hangs from, but displays most
evident signs of (its) light ruin. The blasts are quivering, wild winds
strike it from all sides, the mid-winter horror of heavy air congeals with
cold; and that you may marvel the more, the ground is strewn with the rest
of the leaves everywhere flowing down, and, with its locks laid low, the
tree is stripped of its grace; yet that alone, none other remaining,
endures, and, as the survivor of co-heirs, succeeds to the rights of the
brotherhood’s possession. What then is left to be understood from
consideration of this thing, save that a leaf of a tree cannot fall unless
it receive beforehand the divine command?”
This description is rhetorically elaborated; but Damiani commonly wrote
more directly, as in this sentence from a letter to a nobleman, in which
Damiani urges him not to fail in his duty to his mother through affection
for his wife: “Sed forte dices: mater mea me frequenter exasperat, duris
verbis meum et uxoris meae corda perturbat; non possumus tot injuriarum
probra perferre, non valemus austeritatis ejus et severae correptionis
molestias tolerare” (_Ep._ vii. 3; Migne 144, col. 466). This needs no
translation.
[249] _Ante_, Chapter XI., IV.
[250] _Proslogion_, cap. 24 (Migne 158, col. 239).
“Awaken now, my soul, and rouse all thy mind, and consider, as thou art
able, of what nature and how great is that Good (God). For if single goods
are objects of delight, consider intently how delightful is that good
which contains the joy of all goods; and not such as in things created we
have tried, but differing as greatly as differs the Creator from the
creature. For if life created is good, how good is the life creatrix! If
joyful is the salvation wrought, how joyful is the salvation which wrought
all salvation! If lovely is wisdom in the knowledge of things created, how
lovely is the wisdom which created all from nothing. In fine, if there are
many and great delectations in things delightful, of what quality and
greatness is delectation (_i.e._ the delectation that we take) in Him who
made the delights themselves!”
The reader may observe that the word-order of Anselm’s Latin is preserved
almost unchanged in the translation.
[251] “Meditatio II.” (Migne 158, col. 722).
“My soul is offended with my life. I blush to live; I fear to die. What
then remains for thee, O sinner, save that all thy life thou weepest over
all thy life, that it all may lament its whole self. But in this also is
my soul miserably wonderful and wonderfully miserable, since it does not
grieve as much as it knows itself (_i.e._ to the full extent of its
self-knowledge) but secure, is listless as if it knew not what it may be
suffering. O barren soul, what art thou doing? why art thou drowsing,
sinner soul? The Day of Judgment is coming, near is the great day of the
Lord, near and too swift the day of wrath, (that day!) day of tribulation
and distress, day of calamity and misery, day of shades and darkness, day
of cloud and whirlwind, day of the trump and the roar! O voice of the day
of the Lord--harsh! Why sleepest thou, soul lukewarm and fit to be spewed
out?”
[252] Perhaps it may seem questionable to treat Anselm as an Italian,
since he left Lombardy when a young man. Undoubtedly his theological
interests were affected by his northern environment. But his temperament
and language, his diction, his style, seem to me more closely connected
with native temperament.
[253] Annals for the year 1077 (Migne 146, col. 1234 _sqq._); also in
_Mon. Germ. Script._ iii.
[254] _Sermo xvi._ (Migne 183, col. 851). The power of this passage keeps
it from being hysterical. But the monkish hysteria, without the power, may
be found in the writings of St. Bernard’s jackal, William of St. Thierry,
printed in Migne, _Pat. Lat._ 180. Notice his _Meditationes_, for example;
also his _De contemplando Deo_, printed among St. Bernard’s works (Migne
184, col. 365 _sqq._).
[255] _Sermo xv._ (Migne 183, col. 847). Translated _ante_, Vol. I., p.
411.
[256] _Ep._ xii., _ad Guigonem_ (Migne 182, col. 116).
[257] Bernard, _Ep._ 112, _ad Gaufridum_ (Migne 182, col. 255). For
translation see _ante_, Vol. I., p. 398.
[258] _E.g._ _Ep._ i. and 144 (Migne 182, col. 70 and 300).
[259] _Ep._ 196, _ad Guidonem_ (Migne 182, col. 363). Translated _ante_,
Vol. I., p. 401. See also the preceding letter, 195.
[260] As to Jerome’s two styles see Goelzer, _La Latinité de St. Jerome_,
Introduction.
[261] _Ep._ ii. 33 (Migne 171, col. 256). Translation _ante_, Chapter
XXX., III.
[262] See _ante_, Chapter XXX., I.
[263] “Against that signal gift of parent nature and grace, a shameless
wrangler has stirred up an old calumny, condemned by the judgment of our
ancestors; and, seeking everywhere comfort for his ignorance, he hopes to
advance himself toward glory, if he shall see many like himself, see them
ignorant, that is to say. For he has this special tumour of arrogance,
that he would be making himself the equal of others, exalting his own good
qualities (if they exist), and depreciating those of others. And he deems
his neighbour’s defect to be his own advancement.
“Now it is indubitable to all truly wise, that Nature, kindest parent of
all, and best-ordering directress, among the other living beings which she
brought forth, distinguished man with the prerogative of reason and
ennobled him with the exercise of eloquence (or ‘with the use of speech’):
executing this with unremitting zeal and best-ordering decree, in order
that man who was pressed and dragged to the lowest by the heaviness of a
clodlike nature and the slowness of corporeal bulk, borne aloft as it were
by these wings might ascend to the heights, and by obtaining the crown of
true blessedness excel all others in happy reward. While Grace thus
fecundates Nature, Reason watches over the matters to be inspected and
considered; Nature’s bosom gives forth, metes out the fruits and faculty
of individuals; and the inborn love of good, stimulating itself by its
natural appetite, follows this (_i.e._ the good) either solely or before
all else, since it seems best adapted to the bliss descried” (_Metal._ i.
1; Migne 199, col. 825). These translations are kept close to the
original, in order to show the construction of the sentences.
[264] “There is another class of philosophers called the Ionic, and it
took its origin from the more remote Greeks. The chief of these was Thales
the Milesian, one of those seven who were called ‘wise.’ He, when he had
searched out the nature of things, shone among his fellows, and especially
stood forth as admirable because, comprehending the laws of astrology, he
predicted eclipses of the sun and moon. To him succeeded his hearer,
Anaximander, who (in turn) left Anaximenes as disciple and successor.
Diogenes, likewise his hearer, arose and Anaxagoras who taught that the
divine mind was the author of all things that we see. To him succeeded his
pupil Archelaus, whose disciple is said to have been Socrates, the master
of Plato, who, according to Apuleius, was first called Aristotle, but then
Plato from his breadth of chest, and was borne aloft to such height of
philosophy, by vigour of genius, by assiduity of study, by graciousness in
all his ways, and by sweetness and force of eloquence, that, as if seated
on the throne of wisdom, he has seemed to command by a certain ordained
authority the philosophers before and after him. And indeed Socrates is
said to have been the first to have turned universal philosophy to the
improvement and ordering of manners; since before him all had devoted
themselves chiefly to physics, that is to examining the things of nature”
(_Polycraticus_, vii. 5; Migne 199, col. 643).
[265] “The most excellent man concluded his oration, and by the power of
the blessed Peter absolved all who had taken the vow to go, and by the
same apostolic authority confirmed it; and he instituted a suitable sign
of this so honourable vow; and as a badge of soldiering (or knighthood),
or rather, of being about to soldier, for God, he took the mark of the
Lord’s Passion, the figure of a cross, made from material of any kind of
cloth, and ordered it to be sewed upon the tunics and cloaks of those
about to go. But if any one, after receiving this sign, or after making
open promise, should draw back from that good intent, by base repenting or
through affection for his kin, he ordained that he should be held an
outlaw utterly and perpetually, unless he turn and set himself again to
the neglected performance of his pledge.
“Furthermore, with terrible anathema he damned all who within the term of
three years should dare to do ill to the wives, children, or property of
those setting forth on this journey of God. And finally he committed to a
certain and praiseworthy man (a bishop of some city on the Po, whose name
I am sorry never to have found or heard) the care and regulation of the
expedition, and conferred his own authority upon him over the tribute (?)
of Christian people wherever they should come. Whereupon giving his
benediction, in the apostolic manner, he placed his hands upon him. How
sagaciously that one executed the behest, is shown by the marvellous
outcome of so great an undertaking” (Guibert of Nogent, _Gesta Dei per
Francos_, ii. 2; Migne 156, col. 702).
[266] _Hist. ecclesiastica_, pars iii. lib. xii. cap. 14 (Migne 188, col.
889-892). “Thomas, son of Stephen, approached the king, and offering him a
mark of gold, said: ‘Stephen, son of Airard, was my sire, and all his life
he served thy father (William the Conqueror) on the sea. For him, borne on
his ship, he conveyed to England, when he proceeded to England in order to
make war on Harold. In this manner of service serving him until death he
gave him satisfaction, and honoured with many rewards from him, he
flourished grandly among his people. This privilege, lord king, I claim of
thee, and the vessel which is called _White Ship_ I have ready, fitted out
in the best manner for royal needs.’ To whom the king said: ‘I grant your
petition. For myself indeed I have selected a proper ship, which I shall
not change; but my sons, William and Richard, whom I cherish as myself,
with much nobility of my realm, I commend now to thee.’
“Hearing these words the sailors were merry, and bowing down before the
king’s son, asked of him wine to drink. He ordered three measures of wine
to be given them. Receiving these they drank and pledged their comrades’
health abundantly, and with deep potations became drunk. At the king’s
order many barons with their sons went aboard the ship, and there were
about three hundred, as I opine, in that fatal bark. Then two monks of
Tiron, and Count Stephen with two knights, also William of Rolmar, and
Rabellus the chamberlain, and Edward of Salisbury, and a number of others,
went out from it, because they saw such a crowd of wanton showy youth
aboard. And fifty tried rowers were there and insolent marines, who having
seized seats in the ship were brazening it, forgetting themselves through
drunkenness, and showed respect for scarcely any one. Alas! how many of
them had minds void of pious devotion toward God!--‘Who tempers the
exceeding rages of the sea and air.’ And so the priests, who had gone up
there to bless them, and the other ministrants who bore the holy water,
they drove away with derision and loud guffaws; but soon after they paid
the penalty of their mocking.
“Only men, with the king’s treasure and the vessels holding the wine,
filled the keel of Thomas; and they pressed him eagerly to follow the
royal fleet which was already cutting the waves. And he himself, because
he was silly from drink, trusted in his skill and that of his satellites,
and rashly promised to outstrip all who were now ahead of him. Then he
gave the word to put to sea. At once the sailors snatched their oars, and
glad for another reason because they did not know what hung before their
eyes, they adjusted their tackle, and made the ship start over the sea
with a great bound. Now while the drunken rowers were putting forth all
their strength, and the wretched pilot was paying slack attention to
steering his course over the gulf, upon a great rock which daily is
uncovered by the ebbing wave and again is covered when the sea is at
flood, the left side of _White Ship_ struck violently, and with two
timbers smashed, all unexpectedly the ship, alas! was capsized. All cried
out together in such a catastrophe; but the water quickly filling their
mouths, they perished alike. Two only cast their hands upon the boom from
which hung the sail, and clinging to it a great part of the night, waited
for some aid. One was a butcher of Rouen named Berold, and the other a
well-born lad named Geoffrey, son of Gislebert of Aquila.
“The moon was then at its nineteenth in the sign of the Bull, and lighted
the earth for nearly nine hours with its beams, making the sea bright for
navigators. Captain Thomas after his first submersion regained his
strength, and bethinking himself, pushed his head above the waves, and
seeing the heads of those clinging to some piece of wood, asked, ‘What has
become of the king’s son?’ When the shipwrecked answered that he had
perished with all his companions, ‘Miserable,’ said he, ‘is my life
henceforth.’ Saying this, and evilly despairing, he chose to sink there,
rather than meet the fury of the king enraged for the destruction of his
child, or undergo long punishment in chains.”
[267] _Post_, Chapter XLI.
[268] _Opus majus_, pars i. cap. 6.
[269] _Op. maj._ ii. cap. 14.
[270] _Op. maj._ iii. 1.
[271] _Op. maj._ ii. 14.
[272] For translation see _post_, Chapter XXXIV.
[273] _Post_, Chapter XXXVIII.
[274] _Itinerarium mentis in Deum_, Prologus, 2.
[275] _Ibid._ cap. vii. 6. For translations see _post_, Chapter XXXVIII.
[276] _Vita prima_, cap. xi. Translated _ante_, Vol. I., p. 427, note 1.
[277] _Spec. perfectionis_, ed. Sabatier, cap. 53. Translated _ante_, Vol.
I., p. 427.
[278] _Ibid._ cap. 93. Translated _ante_, Vol. I., p. 432.
[279] Cap. li., ed. Graesse.
“Annunciation Sunday (Advent) is so called, because on that day by an
angel the advent of the Son of God in the flesh was announced, for it was
fitting that the angelical annunciation should precede the incarnation,
for a threefold reason. For the first reason, of betokening the order,
that to wit the order of reparation should answer to the order of
transgression. Accordingly as the devil tempted the woman, that he should
draw her to doubt and through doubt to consent and through consent to
fall, so the angel announced to the Virgin, that by announcing he should
arouse her to faith and through faith to consent and through consent to
conceiving God’s son. For the second reason, of the angelic ministry,
because since the angel is God’s minister and servant, and the blessed
Virgin was chosen in order that she might be God’s mother, and it is
fitting that the minister should serve the mistress, so it was proper that
the annunciation to the blessed Virgin should take place through an angel.
For the third reason, of repairing the angelical fall. Because since the
incarnation was made not only for the reparation of the human fall, but
also for the reparation of the angelical catastrophe, therefore the angels
ought not to be excluded. Accordingly as the sex of the woman does not
exclude her from knowledge of the mystery of the incarnation and
resurrection, so also neither the angelical messenger. Behold, God twice
announces to a woman by a mediating angel, to wit the incarnation to the
Virgin Mary and the resurrection to the Magdalene.” The order of the Latin
words is scarcely changed in the translation.
[280] In order that no reader may be surprised by the absence of
discussion of the antique antecedents of the more particular genres of
mediaeval poetry (Latin and Vernacular), I would emphasize the
impossibility of entering upon such exhaustless topics. Probably the very
general assumption will be correct in most cases, that genres of mediaeval
poetry (_e.g._ the Conflicts or _Débats_ in Latin and Old French) revert
to antecedents sufficiently marked for identification, in the antique
Latin (or Greek) poetry, or in the (extant or lost) productions of the
“low” Latin period from the third century downward. An idea of the
difficulty and range of such matters may be gained from Jeanroy, _Les
Origines de la poésie lyrique en France au moyen âge_ (Paris, 1889), and
the admirable review of this work by Gaston Paris in the _Journal des
savants_ for 1891 and 1892 (four articles). Cf. also Batiouchkof in
_Romania_, xx. (1891), pages 1 _sqq._ and 513 _sqq._
[281] Cf. Taylor, _Classical Heritage of the Middle Ages_, chap. ix.
[282] There is much verse from noted men, Alcuin, Paulus Diaconus,
Walafrid Strabo, Rabanus Maurus, Theodulphus. It is all to be found in the
collection of Dümmler and Traube, _Poetae Latini aevi Carolini_ (_Mon.
Germ._ 1880-1896).
[283] It is amusing to find a poem by Walafrid Strabo turning up as a
favourite among sixteenth-century humanists. The poem referred to, “De
cultura hortorum” (_Poet. Lat. aev. Car._ ii. 335-350), is a poetic
treatment of gardening, reminiscent of the Georgics, but not imitating
their structure. It has many allusions to pagan mythology.
[284] _Post_, p. 193 _sqq._
[285] _Ante_, Vol. I., p. 147.
[286] _Ante_, Chapter XI., III.
[287] The following leonine hexameters are attributed to Donizo:
“Chrysopolis dudum Graecorum dicitur usu,
Aurea sub lingua sonat haec Urbs esse Latina,
Scilicet Urbs Parma, quia grammatica manet alta,
Artes ac septem studiose sunt ibi lectae.”
Muratori, _Antiquitates_, iii. p. 912.
[288] William was a few years older than Donizo, and died about the year
1100. His hero is Robert Guiscard, and his poem closes with this bid for
the favour of his son, Roger:
“Nostra, Rogere, tibi cognoscis carmina scribi,
Mente tibi laeta studuit parere Poeta:
Semper et auctores hilares meruere datores;
Tu duce Romano Dux dignior Octaviano,
Sis mihi, quaeso, boni spes, ut fuit ille Maroni.”
Muratori, _Scriptores_, v. 247-248.
[289] Muratori, _Script._ v. 407-457.
[290] Muratori, _Script._ vi. 110-161; also in Migne.
[291] Written at the close of the twelfth century. On these people see
Ronca, _Cultura medioevale e poesia Latina d’ Italia_ (Rome, 1892).
[292] Muratori, vii. pp. 349-482; Waitz, _Mon. Germ._ xxii. 1-338. Godfrey
lived from about 1120 to the close of the century. The _Pantheon_ was
completed in 1185. Cf. L. Delisle, _Instructions du comité des travaux
historiques, etc._; _Littérature latine_, p. 41 (Paris, 1890).
[293] _Matthaei Vindocinensis ars versificatoria_, L. Bourgain (Paris,
1879).
[294] _Ante_, Chapter XXX., III.
[295] Text from Hauréau, _Les Mélanges poetiques d’Hildebert de Lavardin_,
p. 60: also in _Notices des manuscrits de la bib. nat._ t. 28, 2nd part
(1878), p. 331.
[296] Hauréau gives a critical text of the _Carmen ad Astralabium filium_,
in _Notices et extraits, etc._, 34, part ii., p. 153 _sqq._ Other not
unpleasing instances of elegiac verse are afforded by the poems of Baudri,
Abbot of Bourgueil (d. 1130). They are occasional and fugitive
pieces--_nugae_, if we will. See L. Delisle, _Romania_, i. 22-50.
[297] The substance of this poem has been given _ante_, Chapter XXIX. On
Alanus see also _post_, Chapter XXXVI., III.
[298] It is printed in Migne 209. Cf. _post_, p. 230, note 1.
[299] The _Ligurinus_ is printed in tome 212 of Migne’s _Patrol. Lat._ On
its author see Pannenborg, _Forschungen zur deutschen Geschichte_, Band
ii. pp. 161-301, and Band xiii. pp. 225-331 (Göttingen, 1871 and 1873).
[300] Alanus de Insulis, _De planctu naturae_ (Migne 210, col. 447). A
translation of the work has been made by D. M. Moffat (New York, 1908).
For other examples of Sapphic and Alcaic verses see Hauréau in _Notices et
extraits, etc._, 31 (2), p. 165 _sqq._
[301] Wilhelm Meyer, a leading authority upon mediaeval Latin
verse-structure, derives the principle of a like number of syllables in
every line from eastern Semitic influence upon the early Christians. See
_Fragmenta Burana_ (Berlin, 1901), pp. 151, 166. That may have had its
effect; but I do not see the need of any cause from afar to account for
the syllabic regularity of Latin accentual verse.
[302] Again Wilhelm Meyer’s view: see _l.c._ and the same author’s
“Anfänge der latein. und griech. rhythmischen Dichtung,” _Abhand. der
Bairish. Akad. Philos., philol. Klasse_, 1886.
[303] _Poet. Lat. aev. Car._ i. 116. Cf. Ebert, _Gesch. etc._ ii. 86. For
similar verses see those on the battle at Fontanetum (A.D. 841), _Poet.
Lat. aev. Car._ ii. 138, and the carmen against the town of Aquilegia,
_ibid._ p. 150.
[304] Cf. _ante_, Vol. I., pp. 227, 228.
[305] Traube, _Poetae Lat. aevi Car._ iii. p. 731. Cf. Ebert, _Gesch.
etc._ ii. 169 and 325.
[306] _Poet. Lat. aev. Car._ iii. 733.
[307] Du Meril, _Poésies populaires latines_, i. 400.
Perhaps the most successful attempt to write hexameters containing rhymes
or assonances is the twelfth-century poem of Bernard Morlanensis, a monk
of Cluny, beginning with the famous lines:
“Hora novissima, tempora pessima sunt, vigilemus.
Ecce minaciter imminet arbiter ille supremus.”
Bernardi Morlanensis, _De contemptu mundi_, ed. by Thos. Wright, Master of
the Rolls Series, vol. 59 (ii.), 1872. Bernard says in his Preface, as to
his measures: “Id genus metri, tum dactylum continuum exceptis finalibus,
tum etiam sonoritatem leonicam servans....”
[308] “Carmina Mutinensia,” _Poet. Lat. aev. Car._ iii. 703. The poem has
forty-two lines, of which the above are the first four. The usual date
assigned is 924, but Traube in _Poet. aev. Car._ has put it back to 892.
[309] See further text and discussion in Traube, “O Roma nobilis,”
_Abhand. Bairish. Akad. Philos., philol. Klasse_, 1891.
[310] The verbal Sequence or _prosa_ was thus a species of _trope_. Tropes
were interpolations or additions to the older text of the Liturgy. The
Sequences were the tropes appended to the last Alleluia of the _Gradual_,
the psalm chanted in the celebration of the Mass, between the reading of
the Epistle and the Gospel. Cf. Leon Gautier, _Poésie liturgique au moyen
âge_, chap. iii. (Paris, 1886); _ibid._ _Œuvres poétiques d’Adam de
Saint-Victor_, p. 281 _sqq._ (3rd ed., Paris, 1894).
[311] On the Sequence see Leon Gautier, _Poésie liturgique au moyen âge_
(Paris, 1886), _passim_, and especially the comprehensive summary in the
notes from p. 154 to p. 159. Also see Schubiger, _Die Sängerschule St.
Gallus_ (1858), in which many of Notker’s Sequences are given with the
music; also v. Winterfeld, “Die Dichterschule St. Gallus und Reichenau,”
_Neue Jahrbücher f. d. klassisch. Altertum_, Bd. v. (1900), p. 341 _sqq._
The present writer has found Wilhelm Meyer’s _Fragmenta Burana_ (Berlin,
1901) most suggestive; and in all matters pertaining to mediaeval Latin
verse-forms, use has been made of the same writer’s exhaustive study:
“Ludus de Antichristo und über lat. Rythmen,” _Sitzungsber. Bairisch.
Akad. Philos., philol. Klasse_, 1882. See also Ch. Thurot, “Notices, etc.,
de divers MSS. latins pour servir à l’histoire des doctrines grammaticales
au moyen âge,” in vol. xxii. (2) of _Notices et extraits des MSS._ pp.
417-457.
[312] “May our trumpet be guided mightily by God’s right hand, and may He
hear our prayers with gentle and tranquil ear: for our praise will be
accepted if what we sing with the voice a pure conscience sings likewise.
And that we may be able, let us all beseech divine aid to be always
present with us.... O good King, kind, just, and pitying, who art the way
and the door, unlock the gates of the kingdom for us, we beg, and pardon
our offences, that we may praise thy name now and through all the ages.”
[313] G. M. Dreves, “Die Prosen der Abtei St. Martial zu Limoges,” p. 59
(vol. vii. of Dreves’s _Analecta hymnica medii aevi_; Leipzig, 1889). “Let
every band sing with fount renewed and the Spirit’s grace with joyful
praise and clear mind. Now is made good the tenth part (_i.e._ the fallen
angels), undone by fault; and thus that celestial casting out is made good
in divine praise. Lo! the bright day of the Lord gleams through the broad
spaces of the world: in which all the redeemed people exult because
everlasting death is destroyed.”
[314] Published by Boucherie, “Mélanges Latins, etc.,” _Revue des langues
romanes_, t. vii. (1875), p. 35.
“Alleluia! O flock, proclaim joy; with melodious praise utter deeds divine
now fixed by revealed doctrine. Through the great sacrifice of Christ thou
art liberated from death; the gates of hell destroyed, opened are heaven’s
doors. Now He rules all things celestial and terrestrial by eternal power;
wherein by the Father’s authority He gives judgment always just.”
[315] See Gautier, _Poésie liturgique_, p. 147 _sqq._ It came somewhat
earlier in Italy. See Ronca, _Cultura medioevale, etc._, p. 348 _sqq._
(Rome, 1892).
[316] While Sequences may be called hymns, all hymns are not Sequences.
For the hymn is the general term designating a verbal composition sung in
praise of God or His saints. A Sequence then would be a hymn having a
peculiar history and a certain place in the Liturgy.
[317] Contained in Migne 178, col. 1771 _sqq._ They have not been properly
edited or even fully published.
[318] Reference should also be made to the six laments (_planctus_)
composed by Abaelard (Migne 178, col. 1817-1823). They are powerful
elegies, and exhibit a richness and variety of poetic measures. It may be
mentioned that the pure two-syllable rhyme is found in hymns ascribed to
Saint Bernard.
[319] Leon Gautier, the editor of the _Œuvres poétiques d’Adam de
Saint-Victor_, in his third edition of 1894, has thrown out from among
Adam’s poems our first and third examples. On Adam see _ante_, Chapter
XXIX., II.
[320] Gautier, _Œuvres poétiques d’Adam de Saint-Victor_, i. 174.
[321] Gautier, _o.c._ 3rd edition, p. 87.
[322] Gautier, _o.c._ 1st edition, i. 201.
[323] Did the Sequence exert an influence upon Hrotsvitha, the tiresome
but unquestionably immortal nun of Gandersheim, who flourished in the
middle and latter part of the tenth century? She wrote narrative poems,
like the _Gesta Ottonis_ (Otto I.) in leonine hexameters. Her pentameter
lines also commonly have a word in the middle rhyming with the last
syllable of the line. But it is in those famous pious plays of hers,
formed after the models of Terence, that we may look for a kind of writing
corresponding to that which was to progress to clearer form in the
Sequence. Without discussing to what extent the Latin of these plays may
be called rhythmical, one or two things are clear. It is filled with
assonances and rude rhymes, usually of one syllable. It has no clear
verse-structure, and the utterances of the _dramatis personae_ apparently
observe no regularity in the number of syllables, such as lines of verse
require.
[324] For these and other songs, written after the manner of Sequences,
see Du Meril, _Poésies pop. lat._ i. p. 273 _sqq._ They are also printed
by Piper in _Nachträge zur älteren deutschen Lit._ (Deutsche Nat. Lit.) p.
206 _sqq._ and p. 234 _sqq._ See also W. Meyer, _Fragmenta Burana_, p. 174
_sqq._ and Ebert, _Allgemeine Gesch. etc._ ii. 343 _sqq._
[325] Du Meril, _ibid._ i. p. 285.
[326] Wil. Meyer, _Fragmenta Burana_, p. 180.
[327] The best text of the “Phillidis et Florae altercatio” is Hauréau’s
in _Notices et extraits_, 32 (1), p. 259 _sqq._ The same article has some
other disputes or _causae_, e.g. _causa pauperis scholaris cum
presbytero_, p. 289.
[328] Du Meril, _Poésies pop. lat._ ii. p. 108 _sqq._ The piece is a
cento, and its tone changes and becomes brutal further on. The poems, from
which are taken the preceding citations, are to be found in Wright’s
_Latin Poems commonly attributed to Walter Mapes_ (London, 1841, Camden
Society); _Carmina Burana_, ed. J. A. Schmeller; “Gedichte auf K.
Friedrich I. (archipoeta),” in vol. iii. of Grimm’s _Kleinere Schriften_.
Cf. also Hubatsch, _Die lateinischen Vagantenlieder_ (Gorlitz, 1870). The
best texts of many of these and other “Carmina Burana,” and such like
poems, are to be found in the contributions of Hauréau to the _Notices et
extraits, etc._; especially in tome 29 (2), pp. 231-368; tome 31 (1), p.
51 _sqq._
[329] _Ante_, Vol. I., p. 145.
[330] _Ante_, Chapter IX., II. and III.
[331] For generous samples of it, see _Geistliche Lit. des Mittelalters_,
ed. P. Piper (Deutsche National Literatur).
[332] For this novel, a Greek original is usually assumed; but the Middle
Ages had it only in a sixth-century Latin version. It was copied in
_Jourdain de Blaie_, a _chanson de geste_. See Hagen, _Der Roman von König
Apollonius in seinen verschiedenen Bearbeitungen_ (Berlin, 1878). The
other Greek novels doubtless would have been as popular had the Middle
Ages known them. In fact, the _Ethiopica_ of Heliodorus, and others of
these novels, did become popular enough through translations in the
sixteenth century.
[333] Hugo of St. Victor says in the twelfth century: “Apud gentiles
primus Darhes Phrygius Trojanam historiam edidit, quam in foliis palmarum
ab eo scriptam esse ferunt” (_Erud. didas._ iii. cap. 3; Migne 176, col.
767).
On the Trojan origin of the Franks, Britons, and other peoples, see Joly
in his “Benoit de St. More et le Roman de Troie,” pp. 606-635 (_Mem. de la
Soc. des Antiquaires de Normandie_, vol. vii. 3{me} ser., 1869); also
Graf, _Roma nella memoria, etc., del medio aevo_. The Trojan origin of the
Franks was a commonplace in the early Middle Ages, see _e.g._ Aimoinus of
Fleury in beginning of his _Historia Francorum_, Migne 139, col. 637.
On Dares the Phrygian and Dictys the Cretan see “Dares and Dictys,” N. E.
Griffin (_Johns Hopkins Studies_, Baltimore, 1907); Taylor, _Classical
Heritage_, pp. 40 and 360 (authorities); also, generally, L. Constans,
“L’Épopée antique,” in Petit de Julleville’s _Histoire de la langue et de
la littérature française_, vol. i. (Paris, 1896).
[334] Joseph of Exeter or de Iscano, as he is called, at the close of the
twelfth century composed a Latin poem in six books of hexameters entitled
_De bello Trojano_. It is one of the best mediaeval productions in that
metre. The author followed Dares, but his diction shows a study of Virgil,
Ovid, Statius, and Claudian. See J. J. Jusserand, _De Josepho Exoniensi
vel Iscano_ (Paris, 1877); A. Sarradin, _De Josepho Iscano, Belli Trojani,
etc._ (Versailles, 1878).
[335] _Eneas_, ed. by Salverda de Grave (Halle, 1891), lines 7857-9262.
[336] _Roman de Troie_, 5257-5270, ed. Joly; “Benoit de St. More et le
Roman de Troie, etc.,” _Mem. de la Soc. des Antiquaires de Normandie_,
vol. vii. 3{me} ser., 1869. On its sources see also L. Constans, in Petit
de Julleville’s _Hist. de la langue et de la litt. française_, vol. i. pp.
188-220.
[337] _Roman de Troie_, 13235 _sqq._
[338] The _Roman de Thebes_, the third of these large poems, is temperate
in the adaptation and extension of its theme. Its ten thousand or more
lines of eight-syllable rhyming verse are no longer than the _Thebaid_ of
Statius, and as a narrative make quite as interesting reading. Statius,
who lived under Domitian, was a poet of considerable skill, but with no
genius for the construction of an epic. His work reads well in patches,
but does not move. Several books are taken up with getting the Argive army
in motion, and when the reader and Jove himself are wearied, it moves
on--to the next halt. And so forth through the whole twelve books. See
Nisard, _Études sur les poètes latins de la décadence_, vol. i. p. 261
_sqq._ (2nd ed., Paris, 1849); Pichon, _Hist. de la litt. lat._ p. 606
(2nd ed., Paris, 1898). The _Roman de Thebes_ was not drawn directly from
the work of Statius, but through the channels, apparently, of intervening
prose compendia. It also evidently drew from other works, as it contains
matters not found in Statius’s _Thebaid_. It is easy, if not inspiring
reading. The style is clear, and the narrative moves. Of course it
presents a general mediaevalizing of the manners of Statius’s somewhat
fustian antique heroes; it introduces courtly love (_e.g._ the love
between Parthonopeus and Antigone, lines 3793 _sqq._), mediaeval
commonplaces, and feudal customs. It drops the antique conception of
accursed fate as a fundamental motive of the plot, substituting in its
place the varied play of romantic and chivalric sentiment.
Leopold Constans has made the _Roman de Thebes_ his own. Having followed
the story of Oedipus through the Middle Ages in his _Légende d’Œdipe,
etc._ (Paris, 1881) he has corrected some of his views in his critical
edition of the poem, “Le Roman de Thèbes,” 2 vols., 1890 (_Soc. des
anciens textes français_), and has treated the same matters more popularly
in Petit de Julleville’s _Hist. de la langue et de la litt. française_,
vol. i. pp. 170-188. These works fully discuss the sources, date, and
language of the poem, and the later redactions in prose and verse through
Europe.
[339] On Pseudo-Callisthenes see Paul Meyer, _Alexandre le Grand dans la
littérature française du moyen âge_ (Paris, 1886); Taylor, _Classical
Heritage, etc._, pp. 38 and 360. In the last quarter of the twelfth
century Walter of Lille, called also Walter of Chatillon, wrote his
_Alexandreis_ in ten books of easy-flowing hexameters. It is printed in
Migne, _Pat. Lat._ 209, col. 463-572. Cf. _ante_, page 192. His work shows
that a mediaeval scholar-poet could reproduce a historical theme quite
soberly. His poem was read by other bookmen; but the Alexander of the
Middle Ages remained the Alexander of the fabulous vernacular versions.
[340] See Gaston Paris, “Chrétien Légouais et autres imitateurs d’Ovide,”
_Hist. litt. de la France_, t. xxix., pp. 455-525.
[341] The words “nexum mancipiumque” are more formal and special than the
English given above.
[342] The early law had as yet devised no execution against the debtor’s
property.
[343] The jurisconsults whose opinions were authoritative flourished in
the second and third centuries. The great five were Gaius, Julian,
Papinian, Ulpian, Paulus. Inasmuch as these jurisconsults of the Empire
were members of the Imperial (or, later, Praetorian) Auditory, they were
judges in a court of last resort, and their “responsa” were decisions of
actual cases. They subsequently “digested” them in their books. See Munroe
Smith, “Problems of Roman Legal History,” _Columbia Law Review_, 1904, p.
538.
[344] _Dig._ i. 1 (“De Just. et jure”) 1. See Savigny, _System des
heutigen römischen Rechts_, i. p. 109 _sqq._ Apparently some of the
jurists (_e.g._ Gaius, _Ins._ i. 1) draw no substantial distinctions
between the _jus naturale_ and the _jus gentium_. Others seem to
distinguish. With the latter, _jus naturale_ might represent natural or
instinctive principles of justice common to all men, and _jus gentium_,
the laws and customs which experience had led men to adopt. For instance,
_libertas_ is _jure naturali_, while _dominatio_ or _servitus_ is
introduced _ex gentium jure_ (_Dig._ i. 5, 4; _Dig._ xii. 6, 64). _Jus
gentium_ represented common expediency, but its institutions (e.g.
_servitus_) might or might not accord with natural justice. For
_manumissio_ as well as _servitus_ was _ex jure gentium_ (_Dig._ i. 1, 4),
and so were common modes and principles of contract. Ulpian’s notion of
the _jus naturale_ as pertaining to all animals, and _jus gentium_ as
belonging to men alone, was but a catching classification, and did not
represent any commonly followed distinction.
[345] _Constitutio_ is the more general term, embracing whatever the
emperor announces in writing as a law. The term rescript properly applies
to the emperor’s written answers to questions addressed to him by
magistrates, and to the decisions of his Auditory rendered in his name.
[346] For this whole matter, see vol. i. of Savigny’s _System des heutigen
römischen Rechts_; Gaius, _Institutes_, the opening paragraphs; and the
first two chapters of the first Book of Justinian’s _Digest_.
[347] _Dig._ i. 3, 32.
[348] _Dig._ i. 3, 10, and 12.
[349] _Dig._ i. 3, 14.
[350] _Ibid._ 39.
[351] _Dig._ l. 17, 30.
[352] _Dig._ l. 17, 31.
[353] _Ibid._ 54.
[354] _Ibid._ 202.
[355] _Dig._ l. 16, 24; _Ibid._ 17, 62.
[356] _Cod. Theod._ (ed. by Mommsen and Meyer) i. 1, 5.
[357] With the Theodosian Code the word _lex_, _leges_, begins to be used
for the _constitutiones_ or other decrees of a sovereign.
[358] From the constitution directing the compilation of the _Digest_,
usually cited as _Deo auctore_.
[359] The original plan of Theodosius embraced the project of a Codex of
the jurisprudential law. See his constitution of the year 429 in _Theod.
C._ i. 1, 5. Had this been carried out, as it was not, Justinian’s
_Digest_ would have had a forerunner.
[360] _Juliani epitome Latina Novellarum Justiniani_, ed. by G. Haenel
(Leipzig, 1873).
[361] Conrat, _Ges. der Quellen und Lit. des röm. Rechts_, pp. 48-59, and
161 _sqq._; Mommsen, _Zeitschrift für Rechtsges_. 21 (1900), _Roman.
Abteilung_, pp. 150-155.
[362] Ed. by Bluhme, _Mon. Germ. leges_, iii. 579-630. Cf. Tardif,
_Sources du droit français_, 124-128. A code of Burgundian law had already
been made.
[363] Edited by Haenel, with the epitomes of it in parallel columns, under
the name of _Lex Romana Visigothorum_ (Leipzig, 1849). See Tardif, _o.c._
129-143.
[364] _Cod. Theod._ i. 4, 3; _Brev._ i. 4, 1.
[365] On these epitomes and glosses see Conrat, _Ges. der Quellen, etc._,
pp. 222-252. Mention should be made of the Edict of Theodoric the
Ostrogoth, a piece of legislation contemporary with the _Breviarium_ and
the _Papianus_. In pursuance of Theodoric’s policy of amalgamating Goths
and Romans, the Edict was made for both (_Barbari Romanique_). Its sources
were substantially the same as those of the _Breviarium_, except that
Gaius was not used. The sources are not given verbatim, but their contents
are restated, often quite bunglingly. Naturally a Teutonic influence runs
through this short and incomplete code, which contains more criminal than
private law. No further reference need be made to it because its influence
practically ceased with the reconquest of Italy by Justinian. It is edited
by Bluhme, in _Mon. Ger. leges_, v. 145-169. See as to it, Savigny,
_Geschichte des röm. Rechts_, ii. 172-181; Salvioli, _Storia del diritto
italiano_, 3rd ed., pp. 45-47.
[366] Cf. Brunner, _Deutsche Rechtsgeschichte_, i. p. 109 _sqq._
[367] For the characteristics and elements of early Teutonic law see
Brunner, _Deutsche Rechtsgeschichte_, Bd. i.
[368] See Brunner, _Deutsche Rechtsgeschichte_, i. p. 254 _sqq._, and
338-340.
[369] “Adversus Gundobadi legem,” c. 4 (_Mon. Germ. leges_, iii. 504). As
to Agobard see _ante_, Vol. I. p. 232.
[370] The matter is suggested here only in its general aspects. The
details present every kind of complication (for some purposes to-day a
court will apply the law of the litigant’s domicile). The _professio_
(_professus sum_ or _professa sum_), by which a man or woman formally
declares by what law he or she lives, remained common in Italy for five
centuries after Pippin’s conquest, and indicates the legal situation
there, especially of the Teutonic newcomers.
[371] One sees an analogy in the fortunes of the Boëthian translations of
the more advanced treatises of Aristotle’s _Organon_. They fell into
disuse (or never came into use) and so were “lost” until they came to
light, _i.e._ into use, in the last part of the twelfth century.
[372] See Conrat, _Ges. der Quellen_, pp. 182-187.
[373] See Conrat, _Ges. der Quellen, etc._, pp. 162-166, 168-182, 192-202,
240-252.
[374] See Salvioli, _Storia di diritto italiano_, 3rd ed., 1899, pp.
84-90; ibid. _L’ Istruzione pubblica in Italia nei secoli VIII. IX. X._;
Tardif, _Hist. des sources du droit français_, p. 281 _sqq._; Savigny,
_Geschichte, etc._, iv. pp. 1-9; Fitting, “Zur Geschichte der
Rechtswissenschaft im Mittelalter,” _Zeitschrift für Rges. Sav. Stift.,
Roman. Abteil._, Bd. vi., 1885, pp. 94-186; ibid. _Juristische Schriften
des früheren Mittelalters_, 108 _sqq._ (Halle, 1876).
[375] A contemporary notice speaks of the enormous number of judges,
lawyers, and notaries in Milan about the year 1000. Salvioli, _L’
Istruzione pubblica, etc._, p. 78. It is hard to imagine that no legal
instruction could be had there.
[376] The evidence is gathered in different parts of Savigny’s
_Geschichte_.
[377] _De parentelae gradibus_, see Savigny, _Geschichte_, Bd. iv. p. 1
_sqq._
[378] See Savigny, _Geschichte_, Bd. ii. pp. 134-163 (the text is
published in an Appendix to that volume, pp. 321-428); Conrat, _Ges. der
Quellen, etc._, pp. 420-549; Tardif, _Hist. des sources du droit
français_, pp. 213-246.
[379] This follows the so-called Tübingen MSS., the largest immediate
source of the _Petrus_. As well-nigh the entire substance of the _Petrus_
is drawn from the immediately prior compilations (which are still
unpublished) its characteristics are really theirs.
[380] Apparently the chief magistrate of Valence: “Valentinae civitatis
magistro magnifico.”
[381] _Petri exceptiones_, iii. 69.
[382] _Petrus_, i. 66.
[383] See Conrat, _Ges. der Quellen, etc._, 550-582; Tardif, _Hist. des
sources, etc._, pp. 207-213; Fitting, _Zeitschrift für Rges._ Bd. vi. p.
141. It is edited by Bocking (Berlin, 1829) under the title of _Corpus
legum sive Brachylogus juris civilis_.
[384] For instance, _Brach._ ii. 12, “De juris et facti ignorantia,” is
short and clear. It follows mainly _Digest_ xxii. 6.
[385] _Summa Codicis des Irnerius_, ed. by Fitting (Berlin, 1894). See
Introduction, and also Fitting in _Zeitschrift für Rechtsgeschichte_, Bd.
xvii. (1896), _Romanische Abteilung_, pp. 1-96.
[386] Cf. _Summa Codicis Irnerii_, vii. 23, and vii. 31. 1.
[387] _Summa Codicis Irnerii_, i. 14. The corresponding passages in
Justinian’s Codification are _Dig._ i. 3, lex 12 and 38, and _Codex_ vii.
45, lex 13.
[388] _Summa Codicis Irnerii_, vii. 22 and 23. The chief Justinianean
sources are _Dig._ xli. 2, and _Cod._ xii. 32.
[389] See Salvioli, _Manuale, etc._, pp. 65-68; ibid. _L’ Istruzione
pubblica in Italia_, pp. 72-75; Brunner, _Deutsche Rechtsgeschichte_, i.
p. 387 _sqq._
[390] _Post_, Chapter XXXV., I.
[391] The Bologna school is commonly called the school of the glossators.
Their work was to expound the law of Justinian; and their glosses, or
explanatory notes, were the part of their writings which had the most
permanent influence. The glosses were originally written between the lines
or on the margins of the codices of the _Digest_, _Codex_, _Novels_, and
_Institutes_.
[392] Savigny gives examples of Irnerius’s glosses in an appendix to the
fourth volume of his _Geschichte_. Pescatore (_Die Glossen des Irnerius_,
Greifswald, 1888) maintains that Savigny overstates the difference between
the interlinear and the marginal glosses of Irnerius.
[393] On Placentinus see Savigny, _Geschichte_, iv. pp. 244-285.
[394] _Proemium_ to _De var. actionum_, given by Savigny, iv. p. 540.
[395] This is from the _proemium_ attached to one old edition, and is
given in Sav. _Ges._ iv. p. 245. In an appendix, p. 542, Savigny gives an
even more florid _proemium_ to the _Summa Codicis_ from a manuscript.
[396] On Azo, see Savigny, _Ges._ v. pp. 1-44.
[397] Quoted by Savigny. On Accursius see Sav. _Ges._ v. pp. 262-305.
[398] On Bartolus see Savigny, _Ges. etc._ vi. pp. 137-184.
[399] Cf. Savigny, _Ges._ v. pp. 222-261.
[400] “Ecclesia vivit lege Romana,” _Lex Ribuaria_, 58. This was
universally recognized, although the individual _clericus_ might remain
amenable to the law of his birth.
[401] For these matters see primarily the sixteenth book of the Theodosian
Code, and book i. chap. 27. Also the suspected _Constitutiones
Sirmondianae_ attached to that Code. Justinian’s _Codex_ and _Novellae_
add much. Zorn, in his _Kirchenrecht_, p. 29 _sqq._, gives a convenient
synopsis of the matter.
[402] One observes that the opening chapter of Justinian’s _Digest_ speaks
of _jurisprudentia_ as knowledge of divine as well as human matters.
[403] _Decretum_, i. dist. viii. c. i.
[404] _Decretum_, i. dist. ix. c. xi.; see _ibid._ dist. xiii., opening.
[405] Tardif, _Sources du droit canonique_, p. 175 _sqq._, has been
chiefly followed here.
[406] On the above matters see (with the authorities and bibliographies
therein given) Maasen, _Geschichte der Quellen, etc., der canonischen
Rechts_ (Bd. i., to the middle of the ninth century); Tardif, _Sources du
droit canonique_ (Paris, 1887); Zorn, _Lehrbuch des Kirchenrechts_
(Stuttgart, 1888); Gerlach, _Lehrbuch des catholischen Kirchenrechts_ (5th
edition, Paderborn, 1890); Hinschius, _Decretales pseudo-Isidorianae_
(Leipzig, 1863); _Corpus juris canonici_, ed. by Friedberg (Leipzig,
1879-1881).
[407] Jurisdiction of the ecclesiastical courts embraced marriage and
divorce, wills and inheritance, and, by virtue of their surveillance of
usury and vows and oaths, practically the whole relationship between
debtor and creditor.
[408] Volume ii. of R. W. and A. J. Carlyle’s _History of Mediaeval
Political Theory in the West_ (1909) maintains that the statements of
papal pretensions which were incorporated in the recognized collections of
_Decretals_ were less extreme than those emanating from the papacy under
stress of controversy.
[409] See Gierke, _Political Theories of the Middle Ages_, trans. by
Maitland (Cambridge, 1900), p. 22 _sqq._ and notes. I would express my
indebtedness to this book for these pages on mediaeval political theories.
Dunning’s _History of Political Theories_ is a convenient outline;
Carlyle’s _History of Mediaeval Political Theory_ gives the sources
carefully.
[410] Occasionally _studium_ (knowledge, study, or science) is introduced
as a third part or element of the human community or of human life. Thus
in the famous statement of Jordanes of Osnabrück--the Romans received the
Sacerdotium, the Germans the Imperium, the French the Studium. See Gierke,
_Political Theories_, p. 104, note 8.
[411] Cf. Gierke, _o.c._ p. 109, note 16. But compare Carlyle, _o.c._ vol.
ii. part ii. chaps. vii.-xi.
[412] Even toward the close of the Middle Ages Marsilius of Padua was
almost alone in positing the absolute supremacy of the State, says Gierke.
[413] See Gierke, _o.c._ p. 144, note 131, and compare notes 132, 133, and
183 for attacks upon the plenary power of the pope.
[414] Gierke, _o.c._ pp. 31-32, and p. 139, notes 107 and 108.
[415] _Dig._ i. 4, 1; Gierke, _o.c._ p. 39 and pp. 146, 147.
[416] Gierke, _o.c._ p. 64.
[417] Gierke, _o.c._ p. 172, note 256. Cf. _ante_, p. 268.
[418] See Gierke, _o.c._ pp. 73-86, and corresponding notes.
[419] Little will be said in these pages of palpable crass heretics like
the Cathari, for example. The philosophic ideas of such seem gathered from
the flotsam and jetsam of the later antique world; their stock was not of
the best, and bore little interesting fruit for later times. Such
mediaeval heresies present no continuous evolution like that of the proper
scholasticism. Progress in philosophy and theology came through _academic_
personages, who at all events laid claim to orthodoxy. All lines of
advance leading on to later phases of philosophic, scientific, and
religious thought, lay within the labours of such, some of whom, however,
were suspected or even condemned by the Church, like Eriugena, Abaelard,
or Roger Bacon. But these men did not stand apart from orthodox academic
circles, and were never cast out by the Church. Thought and learning in
the Middle Ages were domiciled in monastic, episcopal, or university
circles; and these were at least conventionally orthodox.
It has been said, to be sure, that the heresy of one generation becomes
the orthodoxy of another; but this is true only of tendencies like those
of Abaelard, which represent the gradual expansion and clearing up of
scholastic processes. For the time they may be condemned, perhaps because
of the vain and contentious character of the suspected thinker; but in the
end they are recognized as admissible.
The Averroists constitute an apparent exception. Yet they were a
philosophic and academic sect, whose heresy consisted in an implicit
following of Aristotle as interpreted by Averroes. Moreover, they sought
to save their orthodoxy by their doctrine of the two kinds of truth,
philosophic and theological or dogmatic. It is not clear that much
fruitful thought came from their school. The positions of Siger de
Brabant, a prominent Averroist and contemporary of Aquinas, are referred
to _post_, Chapter XXXVII. The best account of Averroism is Mandonnet’s
_Siger de Brabant et l’averroisme latin au XIII{e} siècle_ (a second
edition, Louvain, is in preparation). See also De Wulf, _Hist. of Medieval
Philosophy_ (3rd. ed., Longmans, 1909) p. 379 _sqq._ with authorities
cited.
[420] Called also his _Summa philosophica_, to distinguish it from his
_Summa theologiae_.
[421] _Summa theologiae_, i. i., quaestio i. art. 1-8.
[422] _Post_, Chapter XXXVI., I.
[423] Even the Averroists were more mediaeval than Greek, inasmuch as they
professed to follow Aristotle implicitly. Cf. _post_, Chapter XXXVII., at
the end.
[424] A touch of “salvation,” or salvation’s need, is on Plato when his
“philosophy” becomes a consideration of death (μελέτη θανάτου) and a
process of growing as like to God (ὁμοίωσις θεῷ) as man can. _Phaedo_, 80
E, and _Theaetetus_, 176 A.
[425] _Historia calamitatum_, cap. 9 and 10. Cf. _post_, p. 303.
[426] _Post_, Chapter XLI.
[427] _Ante_, p. 298. I cannot avoid referring to Abaelard several times
before considering the man and his work more specifically, and in the
proper place; _post_, Chapter XXXVI. I.
[428] _Introductio ad theologiam_, lib. ii. (Migne 178, col. 1039).
[429] See Denifle, “Die Sentenzen Abaelard’s und die Bearbeitungen seiner
Theologia,” _Archiv für Literatur und Kirchengeschichte_, i. p. 402 _sqq._
and p. 584 _sqq._ Also Picavet, “Abélard et Alexander de Hales, créateurs
de la méthode scholastique,” _Bib. de l’école des hautes études, sciences
religieuses_, t. vii. p. 221 _sqq._
[430] Two extracts, one from the _Sentences_ and one from the _Summa_,
touching the same matter, will illustrate the stage in the scholastic
process reached by Peter Lombard, about the year 1150, and that attained
by Thomas Aquinas a hundred years later.
The Lombard’s _Four Books of Sentences_ are divided into _Distinctiones_,
with sub-titles to the latter. Distinctio xlvi. of the first Book bears
the general title: “The opinion (_sententia_) declaring that the will of
God which is himself, cannot be frustrated, seems to be opposed by some
opinions.” The first subdivision of the text begins: “Here the question
rises. For it is said by the authorities above adduced [the preceding
Distinctio had discussed “The will of God which is His essence, one and
eternal”] that the will of God, which is himself, and is called His good
pleasure (_beneplacitum_) cannot be frustrated, because by that will
_fecit quaecumque voluit in caelo et in terra_, which--witness the
Apostle--_nihil resistit_. [I leave the Scriptural quotations in Latin, so
as to mark them.] It is queried, therefore, how one should understand what
the Apostle says concerning the Lord, 1 Tim. 2: _Qui vult omnes homines
salvos fieri_. For since all are not saved, but many are damned, that
which God wills to take place, seems not to take place (become, _fieri_),
the human will obstructing the will of God. The Lord also in the Gospel
reproaching the wicked city, Matt, xxiii., says: _Quoties volui congregare
filios tuos, sicut gallina congregat pullos suos sub alis, et noluisti_.
Thus it might seem from these, that the will of God may be overcome by the
will of men, and, resisted by the unwillingness of the weakest, the Most
Strong may prove unable to do what He willed. Where then is that
omnipotence by which in _coelo et terra_, according to the Prophet, _omnia
quaecumque voluit fecit_? And how does nothing withstand His will, if He
wished to gather the children of Jerusalem, and did not? For these sayings
seem indeed to oppose what has been stated.”
The second paragraph proceeds: “But let us see the solution, and first
hear how what the Lord said should be understood. For it was not intended
to mean (as Augustine says, _Enchiridion_, c. 97, solving this question)
that the Lord wished to gather the children of Jerusalem, and did not do
what He willed because she would not; but rather she did not wish her
children to be gathered by Him, yet in spite of her unwillingness (_qua
tamen nolente_) He gathered all He willed of her children.... And the
sense is: As many as I have gathered by my will, always effective, I have
gathered, thou being unwilling. Hence it is evident that these words of
the Lord are not opposed to the authorities referred to.”
(Paragraph 3) “Now it remains to see how the aforesaid words do not
contradict what the Apostle said of the Lord: _Vult omnes homines salvos
fieri_. Because of these words many have wandered from the truth, saying
that God willed many things which did not come to pass. But the saying is
not thus to be understood, as if God willed any to be saved, and they were
not. For who can be so impiously foolish as to say that God cannot change
the evil wills of men to good when and where He will? Surely what is said
in Psalm 113, _Quaecumque voluit fecit_, is not true, if He willed
anything and did not accomplish it. Or,--(and this is still more shameful)
for that reason He did not do it, because what the Omnipotent willed to
come to pass, the will of man obstructed. Hence when we read in Holy
Scripture _velit omnes homines salvos fieri_, we should not detract from
the will of omnipotent God, but understand the text to mean that no man is
saved except whom He wills to be saved: not that there is no man whom He
does not will to be saved, but that no man may be saved except whom He
wills should be saved.... Thus also is to be understood the text from John
i.: _Illuminat omnem hominem venientem in hunc mundum_; not as if there is
no man who is not lighted, but that none is lighted save from Him....”
The next and fourth paragraph takes up the problem whether evil, that is
sin, takes place by the will of God, or He unwilling (_eo nolente_). “As
to this, divers men thinking diversely have been found in contradiction.
For some say that God wills evils to be or become (_esse vel fieri_) yet
does not will evils. But others say that He neither wills evils to be nor
to become. Yet these and those agree in declaring that God does not will
evils. Yet each with arguments as well as authorities strives to make good
his assertion.” We will not follow the Lombard through this thorny
problem. He cuts his way with passages from his chief patristic authority,
Augustine, and in the end concludes: “Leaving this and other like foolish
opinions, and favouring the sounder view, which is more fully sanctioned
by the testimonies of the Saints, we may say that God neither wills evils
to become, nor wills that they should not become, nor yet is He unwilling
(_nolle_) that they should become. All that He wills to become, becomes,
and all that He wills not to become does not become. Yet many things
become which He does not will to become, as every evil.”
Thus the Lombard. Now let us see how Thomas, in his _Summa theologiae_,
Pars Prima, Quaestio xix. Articulus ix. expounds the point: _utrum
voluntas Dei sit malorum_.
“As to the ninth articulus thus one proceeds. (1) It seems [_Videtur_,
formula for stating the initial argument which will not be approved] that
the will of God is [the cause] of evils. For God wills every good that
becomes (_i.e._ comes into existence). But it is good that evils should
come; for Augustine says in the _Enchiridion_: ‘Although those things
which are evils, in so far as they are evils, are not goods; yet it is
good (_bonum_) that there should be not only goods (_bona_) but evils.’
Therefore God wills evils.”
“(2) Moreover [_Praeterea_, Thomas’s regular formula for introducing the
succeeding arguments, which he will not approve] Dionysius says, iv. cap.
_de divinis nominibus_: ‘There will be evil making for the perfection of
the whole.’ And Augustine says in the _Enchiridion_: ‘Out of all (things)
the admirable beauty of the universe arises; wherein even that which is
called evil, well ordered and set in its place, commends the good more
highly; since the good pleases more, and is the more praiseworthy, when
compared with evil.’ But God wills everything that pertains to the
perfection and grace of the universe; since this is what God chiefly wills
in His creation. Therefore God wills evils.”
“(3) Moreover, the occurrence and non-occurrence of evils (_mala fieri, et
non fieri_) are contradictory opposites. But God does not will evils not
to occur; because since some evils do occur, the will of God would not be
fulfilled. Therefore God wills evils to occur.”
“_Sed contra est_ [Thomas’s formula for stating the opinion which he will
approve] what Augustine says in his book of Eighty-three Questions: ‘No
wise man is the author of man’s deterioration; yet God is more excellent
than any wise man; much less then, is God the author of any one’s
deterioration. But He is said to be the author when He is spoken of as
willing anything. Therefore man becomes worse, God not willing it. But
with every evil, something becomes worse. Therefore God does not will
evils.’”
“_Respondeo dicendum quod_ [Thomas’s formula for commencing his
elucidation] since the reason (or ground or cause, _ratio_) of the good is
likewise the reason of the desirable (as discussed previously), evil is
opposed to good: it is impossible that any evil, as evil, should be
desired, either by the natural appetite or the animal, or the
intellectual, which is will. But some evil may be desired _per accidens_,
in so far as it conduces to some good. And this is apparent in any
appetite. For the natural impulse (_agens naturale_) does not aim at
privation or destruction (_corruptio_); but at form, to which the
privation of another form may be joined (_i.e._ needed, _conjungitur_);
and at the generation of one, which is the destruction of another. Thus a
lion, killing a stag, aims at food, to which is joined the killing of an
animal. Likewise the fornicator aims at enjoyment, to which is joined the
deformity of guilt.
“Thus evil which is joined to some good, is privation of another good.
Never, therefore, is evil desired, not even _per accidens_, unless the
good to which the evil is joined appears greater than the good which is
annulled through the evil. But God wills no good more than His goodness;
yet He wills some one good more than some other good. Hence the evil of
guilt, which destroys relationship to divine good (_quod privat ordinem ad
bonum divinum_), God in no way wills. But the evil of natural defect, or
the evil of penalty, He wills in willing some good to which such evil is
joined; as, in willing righteousness He wills penalty; and in willing that
the order of nature be preserved, He wills certain natural corruptions.
“_Ad primum ergo dicendum_ [Thomas’s formula for commencing his reply to
the first false argument] that certain ones have said that although God
does not will evils, He wills evils to be or become: because, although
evils are not goods, yet it is good that evils should be or become. They
said this for the reason that those things which are evil in themselves,
are ordained for some good; and they deemed this ordainment involved in
saying _mala esse vel fieri_. But that is not said rightly. Because evil
is not ordained for good _per se_ but _per accidens_. For it is beyond the
sinner’s intent, that good should come of it; just as it was beyond the
intent of the tyrants that from their persecutions the patience of the
martyrs should shine forth. And therefore it cannot be said that such
ordainment for good is involved in saying that it is good for evil to be
or become: because nothing is adjudged according to what pertains to it
_per accidens_ but according to what pertains to it _per se_.”
“_Ad secundum dicendum_ that evil is not wrought for the perfection or
beauty of the whole except _per accidens_, as has been shown. Hence this
which Dionysius says that evil makes for the perfection of the whole may
lead to an illogical conclusion.”
“_Ad tertium dicendum_ that although the occurrence and non-occurrence of
evils are opposed as contradictories; yet to will the occurrence and to
will the non-occurrence of evils, are not opposed as contradictories,
since both one and the other may be affirmative. God therefore neither
wills the occurrence nor the non-occurrence of evils; but wills to permit
their occurrence. And this is good.”
[431] _Ante_, Chapter XII.
[432] _Ante_, pp. 289 _sqq._
[433] The _Speculum majus_ of Vincent of Beauvais will afford the
principal example of the resulting hybrid arrangement.
[434] Ludwig Baur, _Dominicus Gundissalinus, De divisione philosophiae_
(Baeumker’s _Beiträge_, Münster, 1903), p. 193 _sqq._, to which I am
indebted for what I have to say in the next few pages.
[435] Migne, _Pat. Lat._ 64, col. 10 _sqq._
[436] These works were written near the middle of the twelfth century.
Gundissalinus was Archdeacon of Segovia and drew upon Arab writings.
[437] See L. Baur, _Gundissalinus, etc._, p. 376 _sqq._
[438] The treatise is not printed. Its captions are given by L. Baur in
his _Gundissalinus_, pp. 368-375, from which I have borrowed what I give
of them.
[439] _Liber de praedicabilibus_ (tome 1 of Albertus’s works), which in
scholastic logic means the five “universals,” genus, species, difference,
property, accident, (also called the _quinque voces_) discussed in
Porphyry’s Introduction to the _Categories_. The _Categories_ themselves
are called _praedicamenta_.
[440] The above gives the arguments of chapters i. and ii. of the work.
One notices that Albertus in this exposition of the subject of Porphyry’s
treatise, is using the _method_ which Thomas brings to syllogistic
perfection in his _Summa_.
[441] It was printed, more than once, in the late fifteenth century; the
most readable edition is that printed at Douai in 1624, in four huge
folios.
[442] Boundless as the work appears, neither in mental powers, nor
learning, nor in massiveness of achievement, is its author to be compared
with Albertus Magnus. The _De universo_ of Rabanus Maurus, Migne 111, col.
9-612, is in its arrangement and method a forerunner of Vincent’s
_Speculum_. Later predecessors were the English Franciscan Bartolomaeus,
whose encyclopaedic _De proprietatibus rerum_ was written a little before
the middle of the twelfth century (see Felder, _Studien in
Franciscanerorder, etc._, pp. 251-253); and Lambertus Audomarensis (St.
Omer) with his _Liber floridus_, a general digest of knowledge,
historical, ecclesiastical, and natural, taken from many writers, an
account of which is given in Migne 163, col. 1004 _sqq._
[443] Here, of course, we have the hands of Esau, but the voice of
Augustine and Orosius!
[444] The above is from cap. 9 of liber i. of the _Speculum doctrinale_.
[445] Migne, _Pat. Lat._ 34, col. 246-485.
[446] _Ante_, p. 290.
[447] The three theological virtues are _fides_, _spes_, and _caritas_.
They are called thus because _Deum habent pro objecto_; and because they
are poured (_infunduntur_) into us by God alone. They are distinguished
from the moral and intellectual virtues because their object surpasses our
reason, while the object of the moral and intellectual virtues can be
comprehended by human reason (_Summa_, _Pars prima secundae_, Quaestio
lxii., Art. 1-4).
[448] ἕξις μετὰ λόγου ἀληθοῦς ποιητική, Arist. _Nich. Ethics_, vi. 4.
[449] One notes that these two, like many other of the vices enumerated,
are vices in that they are extremes, in the Aristotelian sense.
[450] We are at Quaestio clxxi. of _Secunda secundae_.
[451] The order which Thomas would have followed in the unfinished
conclusion of his _Summa theologiae_, may be inferred from the order of
the last half of Book IV. of his _Contra Gentiles_, or indeed from the
last part of the fourth Book of the Lombard’s _Sentences_.
[452] _Ante_, Chapter XII.
[453] There were, of course, attempts at translation, notably those of
Notker the German (see _ante_, Vol. I., p. 308) and Alfred’s translation
of Boëthius’s _De consolatione_. But such were made only of the popular
parts of Scripture (_e.g._ the Psalms) or of very elementary profane
treatises. To what extent Notker’s translations were used, is hard to say.
But at all events any one really seeking learning, studied and worked and
thought in the medium of Latin; for the bulk of the patristic writings
never were translated; and when the works of Aristotle had at last reached
the Middle Ages in the Latin tongue, they were studied in that tongue.
Because of the crudeness of the vernacular tongues, the Latin classics
were even more untranslatable in the tenth or eleventh century than now.
One may add, that it was fortunate for the progress of mediaeval learning
that Latin was the _one_ language used by all scholars in all countries.
This facilitated the diffusion of knowledge. How slow and painful would
have been that diffusion if the different vernacular tongues had been used
in their respective countries, for serious writing.
[454] _Ante_, Chapter XII., I.
[455] _Eruditio didascalica_, i. cap. 12 (Migne, _Pat. Lat._ 176, col.
750).
[456] Cf. Abelson, _The Seven Liberal Arts_ (New York, 1906).
[457] I am speaking generally, that is to say, omitting for the present
the aberrant or special or intrusive tendencies found in a man like Roger
Bacon, for example. They were of importance for what was to come
thereafter; but are not broadly representative of the Middle Ages.
[458] St. Anselm, _Epist._ lib. iii. 41, _ad Fulconem_ (Migne, _Pat. Lat._
158, col. 1192). So Roscellin showed in his own case how problems
primarily logical could pass over to metaphysics or theology. Likewise,
although on the other side of the controversy, one, Odo of Tournai, a good
contemporary realist, found realism an efficient aid in explaining the
transmission of original sin; since for him all men formed but one
substance, which was infected once for all by the sin of the first
parents. Cf. Hauréau, _Hist. de la philosophie scholastique_, i. pp.
297-308; De Wulf, _Hist. of Medieval Philosophy_, p. 156, 3rd ed.
[459] Abaelard, _Hist. calamitatum_, chap. 2.
[460] _Ante_, Chapter XXV.
[461] _Ante_, Chapter XII., I.
[462] Abaelard’s _Dialectica_ was published by Cousin, _Ouvrages inédits
d’Abélard_ (Paris, 1836). For a thorough exposition of Abaelard’s logic
see Prantl, _Ges. der Logik_, ii. p. 160 _sqq._
[463] _I.e._ as positive, comparative, and superlative.
[464] Cousin, _Ouvr. inédits_, p. 175. Cf. Aristotle’s _Categories_, ii.
v. 20. The opening of _Pars tertia_ of Abaelard’s _Dialectica_ (in
Cousin’s edition, p. 324 _sqq._) affords an interesting example of this
logical analysis and reconstruction of statement, which seems to originate
in sheer grammar, and then advance beyond it.
[465] Cousin, _o.c._ pp. 190, 192.
[466] Cousin, _o.c._ p. 331.
[467] Prantl’s _Geschichte der Logik_, vol. ii., contains an exhaustive
discussion of the various phases of this controversy: its language is
little less difficult than that of the twelfth-century word-twisters.
[468] Cousin, _o.c._ pp. 434, 435.
[469] _Theologia Christiana_, iv. (Migne 178, col. 1284).
[470] Migne, _Pat. Lat._ 178, col. 1641.
[471] _Ante_, p. 292.
[472] _Scito te ipsum_, cap. 13 (Migne 178, col. 653).
[473] _Scito te ipsum_, cap. 19 (Migne 178, col. 664).
[474] Migne 178, col. 1615.
[475] _Ante_, pp. 304 _sqq._
[476] This has been published by Stölzle: _Abaelards 1121 zu Soissons
verurteilter Tractatus de Unitate et Trinitate divina_ (1891).
[477] Migne 178, col. 1123-1330; Cousin and Jourdain, _P. Abaelardi
opera_, ii. pp. 357-566 (1859).
[478] Migne 178, col. 979-1114; Cousin and Jourdain, _o.c._ pp. 1-149.
[479] _Ante_, Chapter XXXV., I.
[480] Bernard, _Ep._ 338 (Migne 182, col. 542).
[481] Whose sacramental theory of the Creation has already been given at
length, _ante_, Chapter XXVIII. For the incidents of Hugo’s life see the
same chapter. Bibliography, note to page 61. See also Ostler, “Die
Psychologie des Hugo von St. Viktor” (Baeumker’s _Beiträge_, Münster,
1906).
[482] _De script._ cap. 2 (Migne 175, col. 11).
[483] _De script._ cap. 2 (Migne 175, col. 10).
[484] _Summa sententiarum_ (Migne 176, col. 42-174); also under title of
_Tractatus theologicus_, wrongly ascribed to Hildebert of Lavardin, in
Migne 171, col. 1067-1150.
[485] Migne 176, col. 740-838.
[486] I think of no previous work so closely resembling the _Erud. didas._
as the _Institutiones divinarum et saecularum lectionum_ of Cassiodorus.
[487] _Erud. did._ i. 2.
[488] Here one sees the source of much that we quoted from Vincent de
Beauvais, _ante_, Chapter XXXV., 1.
[489] Lib. iii. cap. 13 _sqq._
[490] _Erud. did._ iii. cap. 20. Cf. _ante_, p. 63.
[491] _Ante_, Chapter XXVIII.
[492] Migne, _Pat. Lat._ 175, col. 115 _sqq._
[493] Migne, _Pat. Lat._ 175, col. 923 _sqq._
[494] The following consideration of the mysticism of Christian
theologians is not intended to include other forms of “mysticism”
(Pantheistic, poetical, pathological, neurotic, intellectual, and
sensuous) within or without the Christian pale.
[495] _Ante_, p. 42 _sqq._
[496] _Ante_, Chapter XXVIII.
[497] Migne, _Pat. Lat._ 176, col. 617-680.
[498] _De arca Noe morali_, i. cap. 2 (Migne 176, col. 621).
[499] Migne 176, col. 681-703. With Hugo’s pupil, Richard of St. Victor,
this constant allegory, especially the constant allegorical use of
Scripture names, becomes pedantic, _precieux_, impossible. See _e.g._ his
_Benjamin major_ in Migne 196, col. 64-202.
[500] _De arrha animae_, Migne 176, col. 951-970.
[501] Migne 182, col. 727-808. A translation is announced by George Lewis
in the Oxford Library of Translations.
[502] _De consid._ lib. ii. cap. 2.
[503] Migne 183, col. 789 _sqq._ Chapter XVII., _ante_, is devoted to
Bernard, and his letters and sermons.
[504] Ed. by Willner (Baeumker’s _Beiträge_, Münster, 1903).
[505] See _ante_, Chapter XXX., 1.
[506] Bernardus Silvestris, _De mundi universitate_, i. 2 (ed. by Barach
and Wrobel; Innsbrück, 1876). As to Bernard Silvestris, see Clerval,
_Écoles de Chartres au moyen âge_, p. 259 _sqq._ and _passim_; also
Hauréau (who confuses him with Bernard of Chartres), _Hist. de la phil.
scholastique_, ii. 407 _sqq._
[507] See Hauréau, _Hist. etc._ ii. 447-472; R. L. Poole, _Illustrations
of Mediaeval Thought_, chap. vi. His _Liber de sex principiis_ is printed
in Migne 188, col. 1257-1270.
[508] Werner, “Die Kosmologie und Naturlehre des scholastischen
Mittelalters, mit specialler Beziehung auf Wilhelm von Conches,”
_Sitzungsb. K. Akad., philos. Klasse_, 1873, Bd. lxxv.; Hauréau, _Hist.
etc._ i. 431-446; ibid. _Singularités littéraires, etc._
[509] _Ante_, Vol. I., p. 251.
[510] _Ante_, Chapter XXX., I.
[511] Under another title, _Moralis philosophia de honesto et utile_, it
has been ascribed to Hildebert of Lavardin, Migne 171, col. 1007-1056.
[512] For examples of John’s Latin, see _ante_, p. 173.
[513] See _e.g._ his treatment of logic in Lib. III. and IV. of the
_Metalogicus_ (Migne 199).
[514] _Polycraticus_, ii. 19-21 _sqq._ There is now a critical edition of
this work by C. C. J. Webb (_Joannis Saresberiensis Policratici libri
VIII._; Clarendon Press, 1910).
[515] _Polycraticus_, lib. vii., is devoted to a history of antique
philosophy.
[516] _Polycraticus_, vii. cap. 10.
[517] _Polycrat._ vii. cap. 11.
[518] Migne 199, col. 955.
[519] _Ante_, Chapter XXIX., 11. and XXXII., 1.
[520] The works of Alanus are collected in Migne, _Pat. Lat._ 210. What
follows in the text is much indebted to M. Baumgartner, “Die Philosophie
des Alanus de Insulis” (Baeumker’s _Beiträge_, Münster, 1896).
[521] All this is thoroughly done by Baumgartner, _o.c._
[522] See Baumgartner, p. 76 _sqq._ and citations.
[523] What I have felt obliged to say upon the organization of mediaeval
Universities, I have largely drawn from Rashdall’s _Universities of Europe
in the Middle Ages_ (Oxford, 1895). The subject is too large and complex
for independent investigation, except of the most lengthy and thorough
character. Extracts from illustrative mediaeval documents, with
considerable information touching mediaeval Universities, are brought
together by Arthur O. Norton in his _Mediaeval Universities_ (Readings in
the History of Education, Harvard University, 1909). For the Paris
University, the most important source is the _Chartularium Universitatis
Parisiensis_, ed. by Denifle and Chatelain (1889-1891). See also Ch.
Thurot, _L’Organisation de l’enseignement dans l’Université de Paris_
(Paris, 1850), and Denifle, _Die Universitäten des Mittelalters_ (Berlin,
1885).
[524] What has been said applies to the Bologna Law University. That had
been preceded by a school of Arts, and later there grew up a flourishing
school of Medicine, where surgery was also taught. These schools became
affiliated Universities, but never equalled the Law University in
importance.
[525] The Masters who taught were called _Regentes_.
[526] Both civil and canon law were studied till 1219, when a Bull of
Honorius III. forbade the study of the former at Paris.
[527] See _post_, p. 399.
[528] Mr. Rashdall’s.
[529] Rashdall, _o.c._ ii. p. 341.
[530] Oxford lay in the diocese of Lincoln.
[531] For the course of medicine and the list of books studied or lectured
on, especially at Montpellier, from which we have the most complete list,
see Rashdall, ii. p. 118 _sqq._ and _ibid._ p. 780. In _Harvard Studies in
Classical Philology_, vol. xx., 1909, C. H. Haskins publishes An
unpublished List of Text-books, belonging to the close of the twelfth
century, when classical studies had not as yet been overshadowed by
Dialectic. See also, generally, Paetow, _The Arts Course at Medieval
Universities_ (Univ. of Illinois, 1910).
[532] See generally, Carra de Vaux, _Avicenne_ (Paris, 1900); also
_Gazali_, by the same author.
[533] Whoever will read the two monographs of the Baron Carra de Vaux,
_Avicenne_ and _Gazali_, will be struck by the closely analogous courses
of Moslem and Christian thought; each showing the parallel phases of
scholastic rationalism (reliant upon reason and rational authority) and
scholastic theological piety, or mysticism (reliant upon the authority of
Revelation and sceptical as to the validity of human reason).
[534] See for this matter Mandonnet, O.P., _Aristote et la mouvement
intellectuel du moyen âge_, contained in his _Siger de Brabant_, and
printed separately; De Wulf, _History of Medieval Philosophy_, 3rd ed.,
pp. 243-253 and authorities; C. Marchesi, _L’ Etica Nicomachea nella
tradizione medievale_ (Messina, 1904).
[535] _Ante_, Chapter V.
[536] _Constitutiones des Prediger-Ordens vom Jahre 1228_, Prologus; H.
Denifle, _Archiv für Litt. und Kirchenges. des Mittelalters_, Bd i.
(1885), p. 194.
[537] See Felder, _Wissenschaftlichen Studien im Franciskanerorden_, p. 24
(Freiburg im Breisgau, 1904); a valuable work.
[538] See Felder, _o.c._ p. 29.
[539] _Constitutiones, etc._, cap. 28-31.
[540] Cf. Felder, _o.c._ p. 107 _sqq._
[541] Cf. Felder, _o.c._ p. 177 _sqq._
[542] From Denifle, _Universitäten des Mittelalters_, i. 99, note 192.
[543] See generally, Mandonnet, _Siger de Brabant et l’averroisme latin au
moyen âge_ (Fribourg, Switzerland, 1899); Baeumker (_Beiträge_, 1898),
_Die Impossibilia des Siger von Brabant_; De Wulf, _Hist. of Medieval
Philosophy_, 3rd ed., p. 379 _sqq._ (Longmans, 1909).
[544] Albert was born probably in 1193, and died in 1280; Bacon was born
some twenty years later, and died about 1292. Bonaventura was born in
1221, and Thomas in 1225 or 1227; they both died in 1274.
[545] So Raphael represents them in his “School of Athens.”
[546] Bonaventura, _Sermo IV._, Quaracchi edition, tome v. p. 572 (cited
by De Wulf, _Hist. etc._ p. 304, note). With all their
Augustinian-Platonism, the Franciscans made a good second to the
Dominicans in the study of Aristotle, as is proved by the great number of
commentaries upon his works by members of the former Order. See Felder,
_o.c._ p. 479.
[547] _Epist. de tribus quaestionibus_, § 12.
[548] Tome v. (Quaracchi ed.) pp. 319-325.
[549] This is from § 26, the last in the work. Bonaventura has already
said (§ 7): “Omnes istae cognitiones ad cognitionem Sacrae Scripturae
ordinantur, in ea clauduntur et in illa perficiuntur, et mediante illa ad
aeternam illuminationem ordinantur.” (“All kinds of knowledge are ordained
for the knowledge of Holy Scripture, are in it enclosed and thereby are
perfected; and through its mediation are ordered for eternal
illumination.”)
[550] It is contained in tomes i.-iv. of the Quaracchi edition.
[551] T. v. pp. 201-291.
[552] _Breviloquium_, Prologus.
[553] One feels the reality of Bonaventura’s distinctions here between
theology and philosophy. They are enunciations of his religious sense, and
possess a stronger validity than any elaborate attempt to distinguish by
argument between the two. Thomas distinguishes them with excellent
reasoning. It lacks convincingness perhaps from the fact that Thomas’s
theology is so largely philosophy, as Roger Bacon said.
[554] As this chapter opens a _pars_, it begins with a recapitulation of
what has preceded and a summary of what is to come. The specific topic of
the chapter commences here.
[555] _I.e._ the desiderative, rational, and irascible elements in man.
[556] Bonaventura closely follows Hugo of St. Victor’s _De sacramentis_,
see _ante_, Chap. XXVIII., especially p. 72.
[557] _Opera_, t. v. pp. 295-313.
[558] _Vir desideriorum_, Dan. ix. 23 (Vulgate).
[559] The _Breviloquium_ and _Itinerarium_ are conveniently edited by
Hefele in a little volume (Tübingen, 1861).
[560] Albertus, _Metaphysicorum libri XIII._, lib. i. tract. 1, cap. 4.
[561] _Physic._ lib. viii. tract. 1, cap. 14.
[562] _Poster. Analyt._ lib. i. tract. 1, cap. 1. This and the previous
citation are from Mandonnet’s _Siger de Brabant_.
[563] _Ethic._ lib. vi. tract. 2, cap. 25.
[564] Carus, _Ges. der Zoologie_, p. 231.
[565] Ernst Meyer, _Ges. der Botanik_, Bd. iv. p. 77.
[566] The works of Albertus were edited by the Dominican Jammy in
twenty-one volumes (Lyons, 1651); they are reprinted by Borgnet (Paris,
1890 _et seq._). My references to volumes follow Jammy’s edition.
[567] See _ante_, pp. 314 _sqq._
[568] Prantl, _Ges. der Logik_, iii. 89 _sqq._, calls him an “unklarer
Kopf,” incapable of consistent thinking.
[569] This is the view of A. Schneider, _Die Psychologie Alberts des
Grossen_ (Baeumker’s _Beiträge_, Münster, 1903). The author presents
analytically the disparate elements--Aristotelian, Neo-Platonic, and
theological-Augustinian, which are found in Albert’s writings.
[570] See Endriss, _Albertus Magnus als Interpret der Aristotelischen
Metaphysik_ (Munich, 1886).
[571] The above is mainly drawn from E. Meyer’s _Ges. der Botanik_, Bd.
iv. pp. 38-78.
[572] _Ante_, Volume I. p. 76.
[573] See Carus, _Geschichte der Zoologie_, pp. 211-239.
[574] _Sum. theol. pars prima_, tract. I, quaest. ii.
[575] _Ante_, Chapter XXXV., I.
[576] Tome xx. p. 41_a_.
[577] The _Vita_ of Thomas by Guilielmus de Thoco, _Acta sanctorum_,
Martius, tome i. folio 657 _sqq._ (March 7), is wretchedly confused.
[578] _Vita_, cap. iii. § 15.
[579] One may see the truth of this by comparing the treatment of a matter
in Albert’s _Summa theologiae_ with the corresponding sections in Thomas.
For example, compare Albert’s _Summa theol. prima_, Tract. vii. Quaest.
xxx.-xxxiii., on _generatio_, _processio_, _missio_ of the divine persons,
with Thomas, _Sum. theol. prima_, Quaest. xxvii. and xliii.
[580] John of Damascus, an important Greek theologian of the eighth
century, often cited by Thomas.
[581] Quaestiones are the larger divisions of the argument.
[582] _Pars prima_, Qu. xvi. Art. 3.
[583] _Pars prima_, Qu. lxxxii. Art. 3.
[584] _Prima sec._ Qu. iv. Art. 2.
[585] _Prima sec._ Qu. iv. Art. 3.
[586] _Sum. Phil. contra Gentiles_, iii. 37.
[587] One cannot avoid applying the masculine pronouns to God, and to the
angels also. But, of course, this is a mere convenience of speech. Thomas
ascribes no sex either to God or the angels.
[588] It will, of course, be borne in mind, that Thomas’s use of _videre_
and _visio_ to express man’s perception of God’s essential nature, does
not mean a physical but an intellectual seeing.
[589] Given _ante_, pp. 290 _sqq._
[590] _Secundum quod est in actu_, _i.e._ in realized actuality as
distinguished from potentiality (Aristotelian conceptions).
[591] The foregoing is taken from the thirteen _articuli_ into which
Quaestio xii. is divided.
[592] _Pars prima_, Quaestio xxxii. Art. 1.
[593] _Quaestiones disputatae: De Veritate_, x. 6. Citing Rom. i. 20.
[594] Prooemium to Qu. xiv. _Pars prima_.
[595] Qu. xiv. Art. 2--a point which Thomas reasons out in interesting
scholastic Aristotelian fashion, but in language too technical to
translate.
[596] _Pars prima_, Qu. xiv. Art. 11.
[597] _Pars prima_, Qu. xv. Art. 1-3.
[598] _Pars prima_, Qu. xxvi. Art. 2.
[599] _Pars prima_, Qu. xliv. Art. 3.
[600] _Pars prima_, Qu. xlv. Art. 1.
[601] _Summa theol. pars prima_, Qu. l. As heretofore, I follow the
exposition of the _Summa theologiae_. But Thomas began a large and almost
historical treatment of angels in his unfinished _Tract. de substantiis
separatis, seu de Angelorum natura_ (unfinished, in _Opuscula theol._). He
has another and important tractatus, _De cognitione Angelorum, Quaestiones
disput. de veritate_, viii.
[602] _Pars prima_, Qu. l. Art. 1. Thomas goes on to contradict Aristotle,
in holding _quod nullum ens esset nisi corpus_.
[603] All that has been given concerning the knowledge of angels relates
to what they know through their own natures as created. Further
enlightenment (as with men) comes through grace as soon as they become
_beati_ through turning to good. _Pars prima_, Qu. lxii. Art. 1 _sqq._
[604] _Ante_, Chapter XXXV., 1.
[605] A burning controversy between the Averroists and the orthodox
schoolmen.
[606] This is the substance of Qu. lxxxix. Art. 1.
[607] _Pars prima_, Qu. xix. Art. 1.
[608] _Pars prima_, Qu. lxxxii. and lxxxiii.
[609] _Pars prima_, Qu. xx. 1.
[610] _Summa theol._, _Pars secunda secundae_, Qu. xvii. Art 8.
[611] _Pars secunda secundae_, Qu. xxiv. Art. 8.
[612] _Pars secunda secundae_, Qu. xxvi. Art. 4 and 5.
[613] _Pars prima secundae_, Qu. cix. _sqq._
[614] Another reading is _delectatio_, _i.e._ enjoyment.
[615] Bacon’s _Opus majus_ was edited in incomplete form by Jebb in 1733,
and reprinted in 1750 at Venice. This edition is superseded by that of
Bridges, in two volumes, published with the _Moralis philosophia_ and
_Multiplicatio specierum_ by the Clarendon Press in 1897. The text of this
edition had many errors, which have been corrected by a third volume
published in 1900 by Williams and Norgate, who are now the publishers of
the three volumes. In 1859 Brewer edited the _Opus tertium_, the _Opus
minus_, and _Compendium philosophiae_ for the Master of the Rolls Series.
“An unpublished Fragment of a work by Roger Bacon” was discovered by F. A.
Gasquet in the Vatican Library, and published in the _English Historical
Review_ for July 1897. It appears to be a letter to Clement IV., written
in 1267.
In 1861 appeared the excellent monograph by Émile Charles, entitled _Roger
Bacon, sa vie, ses ouvrages, ses doctrines_. To this one still must turn
for extracts from the _Compendium theologiae_, and the _Communia
naturalium_. The last-named work, with the _Compendium philosophiae_ and
the _Multiplicatio specierum_ (which appears not to be an intrinsic part
of the _Opus majus_), may have been composed as parts of what was to be
the writer’s _Opus principale_. Bacon’s _Greek Grammar_ has been edited by
Nolan and Hirsch (Cambridge, 1902).
[616] _Opus tertium_, chap. xxv. p. 91 (Brewer’s text).
[617] _Opus tertium_, chap. xvii. (pp. 58-59, Brewer’s ed.).
[618] Brewer, _R. Bacon, Opera inedita_, p. 1.
[619] _Opus tertium_, pp. 7 and 8.
[620] In _Opus tertium_, chap. iii. (Brewer, p. 15), Bacon plainly tells
the pope the difficulties in which he had been placed by this injunction
of secrecy: “The first cause of delay came through those who are over me.
Since you have written nothing to them in my excuse, and I could not
reveal to them your secret, they insisted with unspeakable violence that I
should obey their will; but I refused, because of the bond of your
mandate, which bound me to your work, notwithstanding any order from my
prelates. And, of a surety, as I was not excused by you, I met with
obstacles too great and many to enumerate.... And another obstacle, enough
to defeat the whole business, was the lack of funds.”
[621] These are, of course, the _Opus majus_, the _Opus minus_, and the
_Opus tertium_; also the _Vatican Fragment_, the position of which is not
quite clear; but it is part of the writings of this year, and constitutes
apparently the introductory letter to Clement.
[622] The authority for this is the _Chronica XXIV., Generalium Ordinis
Minorum_; see Bridges, vol. iii. p. 158.
[623] See _Op. tertium_, p. 26 _sqq._ (Brewer).
[624] _Opus majus_, pars ii. end of chap. v. and beginning of chap. vi.
(Bridges, iii. p. 49); see _Op. tertium_ (Brewer), p. 81.
[625] _Op. maj._ pars ii. chap. xv. (Bridges, iii. p. 71).
[626] _Op. tertium_, p. 39.
[627] _Op. maj._ pars ii. (Bridges, iii. pp. 69-70). Cf. _ante_, p. 180.
[628] The reference seems to be to the _Ethics_ and _Politics_.
[629] _Compendium studii_, p. 424 (Brewer).
[630] _Op. tertium_, p. 14.
[631] _Op. tertium_, p. 30.
[632] _Compendium studii phil._, p. 429 (Brewer).
[633] _Ibid._ p. 398--written in 1271.
[634] I follow the paging of Bridges, vol. iii. These four causes of error
are also given in _Opus tertium_, p. 69, _Compendium studii_, p. 414
(Brewer), and the Gasquet _Fragment_, p. 504.
[635] _Op. maj._ pp. 2 and 3.
[636] P. 322 _sqq._ (Brewer).
[637] _Opus tertium_, p. 102.
[638] _Ante_, p. 128.
[639] As, _e.g._ where he says that it would have been better for the
Latins “that the wisdom of Aristotle should not have been translated, than
to have been translated with such perverseness and obscurity.” _Compend.
studii_, p. 469, (Brewer).
[640] See _Opus majus_, pars iii.
[641] _Opus majus_, Bridges, vol. i. p. 106.
[642] Commonly called “mathematica.”
[643] _Opus majus_ (Bridges, i. p. 253). Bacon goes into this matter
elaborately.
[644] Cf. S. Vogl, _Die Physik Roger Bacos_ (Erlangen, 1906). Gives
Bacon’s sources.
[645] _Opus minus_, pp. 367-371.
[646] _Opus majus_, pars v. dist. iii. (Bridges, ii. p. 159 _sqq._).
[647] A contemporary of Bacon named Witelo composed a _Perspectiva_ about
1270, following an Arab source; and a few years later a Dominican,
Theodoric of Freiburg, was devoted to optics, and wrote on light, colour,
and the rainbow. Baeumker, “Witelo, ein Philosoph und Naturforscher des
XIII. Jahrh.” (_Beiträge, etc._, Münster, 1908); Krebs, “Meister Dietrich,
sein Leben, etc.” (Baeumker’s _Beiträge_, 1906).
[648] With Bacon, _experientia_ does not always mean observation; and may
mean either experience or experiment.
[649] See Charles, _Roger Bacon_, pp. 17-18.
[650] _Ante_, pp. 313-315. Duns Scotus puts clearly the double aspect of
logic, which Albertus Magnus approached: “It should be understood that
logic is to be considered in two ways. First, in so far as it is _docens_
(instructs, holds its own school): and from its own necessary and proper
principles proceeds to necessary conclusions, and is therefore a science.
Secondly, in so far as we use it, by applying it to those matters in which
it is used: and then it is not a science” (_Super universalia Porphyrii_,
Quaestrio i., Duns Scotus, _Opera_, t. i. p. 51).
[651] The two aspects of the experimental science appear in the following
statement from the Gasquet _Fragment_: “The _antepenultima_ science is
called experimental; and is the mistress of those which precede it; for it
excels the others in three chief prerogatives. One is that all the
sciences except this either use arguments alone to prove their
conclusions, like the purely speculative sciences, or possess general and
imperfect experiences. But only the perfect experience (_experientia
perfecta_, _i.e._ the scientific experiment or observation), sets the mind
at rest in the light of truth; which is certain and is proved in that part
[of my work]. Wherefore it was necessary that there should be one science
which should certify for us, all the magnificent truths of the other
sciences, through the truth of experience, and this is that whereof I say
that it is called _scientia experimentalis_ of its own right from the
truth of experience (_per autonomasiam ab experienciae veritate_); and I
show by the illustration of the rainbow and other things, how this
prerogative is reserved to that science.
“The second prerogative is the dignity which relates to those chief truths
which, although they are to be formulated (_nominandae_) in the terms
(_vocabulis_) of the other sciences, yet the other sciences cannot furnish
(_procurare_) them; and of this character are the prolongation of life
through remedies to counteract the lack of a hygienic regimen from
infancy, or constitutional debility inherited from parents who have not
followed such a regimen. I shall show how it is possible thus to prolong
life to the term set by God. But men, through neglecting the rules of
health, pass quickly to old age, and die before reaching that term. The
art of medicine is not able to furnish (_dare_) these remedies, nor does
it; but it says they are possible (_sed fatetur ea possibilia_), and so
experimental science has devised remedies known to the wisest men alone,
by which the ills of old age are delayed, or are mitigated when they
arrive.
“The third prerogative of this science belongs to it _secundum se et
absolute_; for here it leaves the two ways already touched on, and
addresses itself to all things which do not concern the other sciences,
save that often it requires the service of the others. As a mistress it
commands the others as servants ... and orders them to do its work, and
furnish the wise instruments which it uses; as navigation directs the art
of carpentry, to make a ship for it; and the military art directs the
forger’s art to make it a breastplate and other arms. In like manner, this
science [the experimental], as a mistress, directs geometry to make it a
burning-glass, which shall set on fire things near or far, one of the most
sublime wonders that can come to pass through geometry. So it commands the
other sciences in all the wonderful and hidden things of nature and art”
(pp. 510-511).
[652] _Opus tertium_, chap. xxviii.
[653] _Opus majus_, pars vi. 1 (Bridges, ii. p. 169).
[654] _Ibid._ p. 171. Doubtless the meaning of the above is connected with
Bacon’s view of the Aristotelian _intellectus agens_, which he takes to
signify the direct illumination of the mind of man by God. “All the wisdom
of philosophy is revealed by God and given to the philosophers, and it is
Himself that illuminates the minds of men in all wisdom. That which
illuminates our minds is now called by the theologians _intellectus
agens_. But my position is that this _intellectus agens_ is God
_principaliter_, and secondarily, the angels, who illuminate us” (_Opus
tertium_, p. 74; cf. _Op. majus_, pars i. chap. v.).
[655] _Compendium studii_ (Brewer), p. 397.
[656] _De secretis operibus artis et naturae, et de nullitate magiae_, p.
533 (Brewer). Cf. Charles, _Roger Bacon_, p. 296 _sqq._
[657] The most convenient edition of the works of Joannes Duns Scotus is
that published by Vives, at Paris (1891 _sqq._) in twenty-six volumes. It
is little more than a reprint of Wadding’s Edition.
[658] See Seeberg, _Die Theologie des Johannes Duns Scotus_ (Leipzig,
1900), p. 8 _sqq._, a work to which the following pages owe much.
[659] Grosseteste’s philosophical or theological works are still
unpublished or very difficult of access; and there is no sufficient
exposition of his doctrines.
[660] Seeberg, _o.c._ p. 16 _sqq._
[661] See De Wulf, _History of Medieval Philosophy_, p. 363 _sqq._
[662] See Seeberg, _o.c._ p. 34 _sqq._
[663] The kernel of Duns’s proof is contained in the following passage,
which is rather simple in its Scotian Latin: “Dicendum, quod Universale
est ens, quia sub ratione non entis, nihil intelligitur: quia
intelligibile movet intellectum. Cum enim intellectus sit virtus passiva
(per Aristotelem 3, de Anima, cont. 5 et inde saepe), non operatur, nisi
moveatur ab objecto; non ens non potest movere aliquid ut objectum; quia
movere est entis in actu; ergo nihil intelligitur sub ratione non entis.
Quidquid autem intelligitur, intelligitur sub ratione Universalis: ergo
illa ratio non est omnino non ens” (_Super universalia Porphyrii_,
Quaestio iv.).
[664] Cf. the far from clear exposition in Seeberg, _o.c._ p. 86 _sqq._
and 660 _sqq._
[665] _Miscell. quaest._ 6, 18, cited by Seeberg, _o.c._ p. 114.
[666] The last two or three pages have been drawn mainly from Seeberg,
_o.c._ p. 113 _sqq._ In discussing Duns Scotus, I have given less from his
writings than has been my wont with other philosophers. And for two
reasons. The first, as I frankly avow, is that I have read less of him
than I have of his predecessors. With the exception of such a curious
treatise as the (doubtful) Grammatica _speculativa_ (tome i. of the Paris
edition); and the elementary, and comparatively lucid, _De rerum
principio_ (tome iv. of the Paris edition)--with these exceptions Duns is
to me unreadable. My second reason for omitting excerpts from his
writings, is that I wished neither to misrepresent their quality, nor to
cause my reader to lay down my book, which is heavy enough anyhow! If I
selected lucid and simple extracts, they would give no idea of the
intricacy and prolixity of Duns. His commentary on the _Sentences_ fills
thirteen tomes of the Paris edition! No short and simple extract will
illustrate _that_! On the other hand, I could not bring myself by lengthy
or impossible quotations to vilify Duns. It is unjust to expose a man’s
worst features, nakedly and alone, to those who do not know his better
side and the conditions which partly explain the rest of him.
[667] _Quodlibetalia_, i. Qu. 14, cited by De Wulf, _o.c._ p. 422.
[668] _Expos. aurea_, cited by De Wulf, _o.c._ p. 423, whose exposition of
Occam’s theory I have followed here.
[669] On Occam, see Seeberg’s article in Hauck’s _Encyclopaedia_; Siebeck,
“Occams Erkenntnislehre, etc.,” in _Archiv für Ges. der Philosophie_, Bd.
x., Neue Folge (1897).
[670] Quoted by Seeberg.
[671] De Wulf, _o.c._ p. 425.
[672] In view of the enormous literature upon Dante, popular as well as
learned, it would be absurd to give any bibliographical, biographical or
historical information as to his works, himself, or his Italian
circumstances.
[673] _De mon._ ii. 3.
[674] _De mon._ ii. chaps. 4, 10, 12.
[675] _De mon._ iii. 4 _sqq._
[676] All this seems supported by _Conv._ i. 1, and ii. 13, the main
explanatory chapters of the work.
[677] _Conv._ iii. 12.
[678] e.g. “_benigna volontade_,” _Par._ xv. 1.
[679] Cf. A. d’Ancona, _I Precursori di Dante_ (Florence, 1874); M. Dods,
_Forerunners of Dante_ (Edinburgh, 1903); A. J. Butler, _Forerunners of
Dante_ (Oxford, 1910); Hettinger, _Göttliche Komödie_, p. 79 (2nd ed.,
Freiburg im Breisgau, 1889). Mussafia, “Monumenti antichi di dialetti
italiani,” _Sitzungsber. philos. hist. Classe_ (Vienna Academy), vol. 45,
1864, p. 136 _sqq._, gives two old Italian _descriptions_, one of the
heavenly Jerusalem, the other of the infernal Babylon.
[680] 2 Cor. xii. 2; _Paradiso_, i. 73-75.
[681] _Ante_, Chapter XIX.
[682] _Ante_, pp. 98-100.
[683] The coarseness of _Inf._ xxi. 137-139 is of a piece with the way of
mediaeval art in making demons horrible through a grotesquely indecent
rendering of their persons.
[684] e.g. _Inf._ xviii. 100 _sqq._; and _Inf._ xxviii. and xxix.
[685] _Inf._ viii. 37 _sqq._; xxxii. 97 _sqq._; xxxiii. 116 and 149.
[686] Cf. Moore, _Dante Studies_, vol. ii. pp. 266-267.
[687] Any one who looks through the first volume of Tiraboschi’s great
_Storia della letteratura italiana_, written in the early part of the
nineteenth century, will find a generous acceptance of myth as fact; just
as he would find the same in the _Histoire ancienne_ of the good Rollin,
written a century or more before.
[688] Dante has frequently been spoken of as the “first scholar” of his
time. I do not myself know enough regarding the scholarship of every
scholar in the thirteenth and fourteenth centuries to confirm or deny
this. Personally, I do not regard him as a Titanic scholar, like Albertus
Magnus for example. He studied all the classic Latin authors available.
Doubtless he had a memory corresponding to his other extraordinary powers.
His also was the intellectual point of view, and the intellectual interest
in knowledge and its deductions. His view of life was as intellectual as
that of Aquinas. But as Dante’s powers of plastic visualization were
unequalled, so also, it seems to me, were his faculties of using as a poet
what he had acquired as a scholar. Regarding the extent of Dante’s use and
reading of the Classics, nothing could be added to Dr. Moore’s _Studies in
Dante_, First Series; though I think what Dr. Moore has to say of “Dante
and Aristotle” would have cast a more direct light upon the matter, had he
cited as far as possible from the Latin translation probably used by
Dante, instead of from the original Greek.
[689] _Inf._ iv. 88. Cf. Moore, _Studies in Dante_, i. p. 6. The
application of the term _satirist_ to Horace is peculiarly mediaeval.
[690] _Inf._ iv. 131.
[691] _Inf._ ii. 20.
[692] _Par._ xx. 68.
[693] _Purg._ xxv. 22.
[694] _Inf._ xviii. 83 _sqq._
[695] _Inf._ xxvi. 88 _sqq._
[696] _Purg._ xii.
[697] _Purg._ xv.
[698] According to Dr. Moore, Dante quotes or refers to the “Vulgate more
than 500 times, to Aristotle more than 300, Virgil about 200, Ovid about
100, Cicero and Lucan about 50 each, Statius and Boëthius between 30 and
40 each, Horace, Livy, and Orosius between 10 and 20 each,”--and other
scattering references.
[699] _Inf._ xxxiii. 4; _Aen._ ii. 3.
[700] _Par._ ii. 16.
[701] _Aen._ vi. 309; _Inf._ iii. 112.
[702] _Aen._ vi. 700; _Purg._ ii. 80.
[703] _Purg._ i. 135; cf. _Aen._ vi. 143 “Primo avulso non deficit alter,
etc.”
[704] See _Inf._ xxxi.; _Purg._ xii. 25 _sqq._
[705] _Purg._ vi. 118: “O highest Jove that wast on earth crucified for
us.”
[706] _Par._ i. 13 _sqq._; _Par._ ii. 8.
[707] The _provenance_, etc., of Dante’s classification of sins in the
_Inferno_, like everything else in Dante, has been interminably discussed.
The reference to the _De officiis_ of Cicero is due to Dr. Moore. See
“Classification of Sins in the _Inferno_ and _Purgatorio_,” _Studies in
Dante_, 2nd Series. Also cf. Hettinger, _Die göttliche Kömödie_, pp.
159-162, and notes 6 and 23 on p. 204 and 207 (2nd ed., Freiburg in
Breisgau, 1889). Dante’s main statement is in _Inf._ xi.
[708] In whom does not the awful anguish of the suicides (_Inf._ xiii.)
arouse grief and horror?
[709] _Inf._ xvi. 59. They are more respectable than the blessed denizens
of the Heaven of Venus, _Par._ ix.
[710] _Inf._ xix.
[711] _Inf._ vi. 103 _sqq._
[712] The intellectual temperament finds voice in many great expressions,
which are very Dante and also very Thomas, as _Par._ xxviii. 106-114;
xxix. 17; xxx. 40-42.
[713] _Inf._ iii. 18.
[714] Hettinger, _o.c._ p. 254.
[715] _Aeneid_ vi. 327 _sqq._; Hettinger, _o.c._ p. 226.
[716] See Taylor, _Classical Heritage_, p. 162.
[717] These are pointed out in the Commentaries (_e.g._ Scartazzini’s) and
in many monographs. Hettinger’s _Göttliche Kömödie_ is serviceable: also
Moore’s _Studies in Dante_ and Toynbee’s _Dante Studies_.
[718] _Purg._ i. 71; John viii. 36.
[719] _Purg._ i. 89.
[720] _Purg._ iii. 34 _sqq._
[721] _Purg._ iv. 4 _sqq._
[722] _Purg._ v. 105 _sqq._
[723] _Purg._ vii. 54; iv. 133-135.
[724] Cf. _e.g._ _Purg._ xii. 109.
[725] _Purg._ xv. 40 _sqq._
[726] _Purg._ xvi. 64 _sqq._
[727] _Purg._ xvii. 85 _sqq._, and xviii.; Hettinger, _o.c._ p. 235
_sqq._, and pp. 261-264.
[728] _Purg._ xxiii. 72; xxvi. 14.
[729] _Purg._ xxv. The notes in Hettinger, _o.c._, are quite full in
citations of passages from Thomas and other scholastics.
[730] Thomas, _Summa_, iii. Qu. 89, Art. 5.
[731] As it is rather in _Par._ xxvii. 76 _sqq._
[732] _Par._ iii. 52, 64, 89.
[733] _Par._ iv.
[734] _Par._ xi. 1 _sqq._
[735] _Par._ xiv.
[736] _Par._ xv. 10.
[737] _Par._ xix. 40 _sqq._
[738] _Par._ xx.
[739] _Par._ xxiv.-xxvi.
[740] Typified in St. Bernard, _Par._ xxxi. and following. Suitable
reasons for this choice may be suggested by the extracts from Bernard’s
_De deligendo Deo_ and _Sermons on Canticles_, _ante_, Chapter XVII.
[741] _Conv._ ii. 13. The symbolism inherent in all human mental processes
seems indicated by the argument of Aquinas (_ante_, p. 466) that the mind
knows “the particular through sense and imagination; ... it must turn
itself to images in order to behold the universal nature existing in the
particular.” This is a necessity of our half material nature.
[742] _Convito_ ii. 1. Letter to Can Grande, par. 7.
[743] In the Can Grande letter, having stated this fourfold significance,
Dante does _not_ proceed to exemplify it in the interpretation which
follows of the opening lines of the _Paradiso_. Possibly those lines did
not admit of the fourfold interpretation; yet, in general, Dante does not
try to carry it out in practice, any more than other mediaeval writers
commonly.
[744] _Convito_ ii. ch. 14 and 15.
[745] Doubtless the commentator habit is fixed in the nature of man; but
it was pre-eminently mediaeval. We have seen enough elsewhere of the
multiplication of Commentaries on the _Sentences_ of the Lombard and other
scholastic works. Dante’s friend, Guido Cavalcanti, wrote a little poem
beginning _Donna mi priego_, upon which we have eight Commentaries, the
first from Egidio Colonna in 1316.
[746] Yet, however obvious the meaning, tying the pole of the Chariot to
the Tree of Life was a great stroke (_Purg._ xxxii. 49).
[747] There is a piece of allegory in the _Paradiso_ which almost gets on
one’s nerves, _i.e._ the ceaseless whirling of the blessed spirits,
usually in wheel formations: _e.g._ _Par._ xii. 3; xxi. 81; xxiv. 10
_sqq._: cf. x. 145; xiii. 20.
[748] One notes that all the symbolizing personages of the poem--Virgil,
Statius, Matilda, Lia, Beatrice--have literal reality, however subtle or
far-reaching may be the allegorical intendment with which the poet has
invested them.
[749] See _e.g._ _Par._ xxxi. 67.
[750] Cf. De Sanctis, _Storia della letteratura italiana_, i. p. 46 _sqq._
[751] Compare _Purg._ xxvii. 34 _sqq._; xxx.; xxxi.; _Par._ xviii. 13
_sqq._; xxiii.; xxx.; xxxi.; xxxii. 8.
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