Readings in the History of Education Part 4

3. THE NEW STUDIES

During the twelfth and thirteenth centuries the intellectual life of western Europe was enriched by the addition of a group of books, old and new, which were destined to influence profoundly the growth of the universities, as well as the whole course of mediaeval life and thought.

Without some such addition to the stock of learning higher education could hardly have developed at all, for the materials available for it previous to the twelfth century were decidedly scanty. The books presently to be described furnished a body of advanced and solid instruction, suited to the needs of the times. They formed one of the permanent influences which both developed and maintained centers of higher education, for the new learning was not less potent in attracting students than the fame of individual teachers or the new method of study.

The greater number of the books which formed the body of university instruction were recoveries from the ma.s.s of ancient and long-disused Greek and Roman learning, together with a few works of Arabic and Jewish origin. To this group belong the works of Aristotle, the body of Roman Law, and the medical works of Galen, Hippocrates, and various Arabic and Jewish physicians. In the main, these had been hitherto unknown in western Europe, or at least practically for-gotten since the days of the Roman Empire. In the twelfth and thirteenth centuries they were collected and made generally accessible to students. Those not originally written in Latin were now translated into Latin; ma.n.u.script copies were multiplied and widely diffused.

But the intellectual activity of the times accomplished much more than the recovery of some fragments of ancient learning; it also created two new fields of study,--Scholastic Philosophy and Theology, and Canon Law,--and produced the text-books which marked them off as distinct and professional studies. The book which established the _method_ of these studies was Abelard's "Yes and No" (see p. 20); but the works which furnished the substance of university instruction were, in Theology, the "Sentences" (Sententiae) of Peter Lombard, and in Canon Law, the "Decree" (Decretum) of Gratian, which was also known as the "Harmony of Contradictory Canons" (Concordia Discordantium Canonum), and additions thereto, indicated on page 56.

Thus, during the twelfth and thirteenth centuries, the growth of universities was stimulated by the development of a great body of learning hitherto inaccessible or unknown. The striking nature of this development will be clearer if we recall that no addition to the learning of western Europe in the least degree comparable to this had been made during the entire seven centuries preceding.

The books above mentioned did not const.i.tute the sole resources for higher education. Besides the already long-used text-books on the Seven Liberal Arts there were mathematical and philosophical works of Arabic origin, and as the revival progressed many new books were written on the old subjects. But the books already named were fundamentally important as furnis.h.i.+ng not only the early intellectual impulse to the growth of universities, but also the main body of studies in the Faculties of Arts, Theology, Law, and Medicine down to the year 1500. Many of them were in use at a much later date, and some--with many revisions--are still standard text-books. No one can understand the intellectual life of the universities who does not have some acquaintance with the t.i.tles and contents of these works. It may be added that acquaintance with them is essential also to the understanding of European history and literature. This section is therefore devoted to certain details concerning the early history of university studies.

(a) _The Works of Aristotle_

The works of Aristotle were composed in Athens, 335-322 B.C. Their history, from the time of Aristotle's death to their appearance in Latin translations in western Europe, fifteen hundred years later, cannot be here detailed. The translations commonly used in the universities were nearly all made during the twelfth and thirteenth centuries. The earlier ones were made in Spain, from Arabic versions of the original Greek; the later, directly from Greek copies found in Constantinople, and elsewhere in the East. The Arabic-Latin translations were very poor, owing to the two removes from the original Greek and the incapacity of the translators. Those directly from the Greek were somewhat better, yet far from satisfactory; and new versions were repeatedly made down to the end of the fifteenth century. University reforms sometimes included the adoption of these better translations (see p. 48).

The works known by the year 1300 may be cla.s.sified in four groups:

{1. Categories = {Predicamenta.

I. Logical { {Categoriae.

treatises {2. On interpretation = {De Interpretatione.

commonly { {Peri Hermeneias.

referred to {3. Prior a.n.a.lytics = a.n.a.lytica Priora.

as the Organon {4. Posterior a.n.a.lytics = a.n.a.lytica Posteriora.

or {5. Topics = Topica.

Methodology {6. Sophistical} = Sophisticae Elenchi.

{ Refutations}

II. Moral {7. Politics.

and Practical {8. Ethics.

Philosophy {9. Rhetoric.

{10. Poetics.

{11. A Physical Discourse (Physics).

{12. On the Heavens.

{13. On Generation and Destruction.

{14. Meteorologies.

{15. Researches about Animals.

{16. On Parts of Animals.

{17. On Locomotion of Animals.

{18. On Generation of Animals.

III. Natural {19. On the Soul.

Philosophy. {20. Appendices to the work "On the Soul."

{ (_a_) On Sense and Sensible Things.

{ (_b_) On Memory and Recollection.

{ (_c_) On Sleep and Waking.

{ (_d_) On Dreams and Prophesying in Sleep.

{ (_e_) On Longevity and Shortlivedness.

{ (_f_) On Youth and Old Age.

{ (_g_) On Life and Death.

{ (_g_) On Respiration.

IV. Rational {21. Metaphysics.

Philosophy. {

This encyclopedic collection became accessible in Latin translations only by slow degrees. Abelard knew only the first two (possibly also the third and fourth) works of the Organon. John of Salisbury, in the next generation, was familiar with the six treatises of the Organon, but apparently not with the others. Little seems to have been added to these until the beginning of the thirteenth century, when the Ethics, the Physics, and the Metaphysics were mentioned at Paris,--the last two as forbidden works. The great era of translation seems to have been between 1200 and 1270, when both Arabic-Latin and Greek-Latin versions were made of most of the remaining treatises. The recovery of Aristotle thus occupied more than a century and a half. During that period the intellectual life of western Europe was stimulated by the influx of hitherto unknown works of that philosopher, and weighty additions were made to the list of available studies.

As usual, the world of scholars and the universities were slow to recognize the worth of the new studies. This was due partly to the natural conservatism of teachers, and partly to the fear of ecclesiastical authorities that the study of Aristotle would give rise to heresies. Thus in the doc.u.ments of the time we meet, on the one hand, vigorous arguments by progressive scholars in favor of Aristotle, and on the other, university regulations prescribing what books shall or shall not be studied.

The att.i.tude of Abelard toward Aristotle has already been cited (see p.

19).

His pupil, John of Salisbury, devotes a considerable portion of the _Metalogicus_ to a discussion of the utility of the various portions of the Organon and to the defense of Aristotle, as is shown by the t.i.tles of various chapters of that work. It is important to remember that he is advocating the study of the _newly_ translated books, as well as those already known:

That Logic, because it seeks the truth, takes the lead in all Philosophy.

On the usefulness of the Categories and their appliances.

What Conception is, and the usefulness of the Periermeniae or more correctly Periermenia. [Peri Hermeneias. On Interpretation.]

Of what the Body of Art consists; and on the usefulness of the Topics.

Why Aristotle deserved more than others the name of philosopher.

That Aristotle erred in many ways; that he is eminent in Logic.

John of Salisbury clearly recognized the supremacy of Aristotle among logicians. After naming Apuleius, Cicero, Porphyry, Boethius, Augustine, and others, he adds:

But while individually they s.h.i.+ne forth because of their own merits, they all boast that they wors.h.i.+p the very footsteps of Aristotle; to such a degree, indeed, that by a sure pre-eminence he has made peculiarly his own the common name of all philosophers. For by Antonomy [a figure of speech] he is called The Philosopher _par excellence_.

It is clear, however, that Aristotle had by no means attained, at the middle of the twelfth century, the authoritative position which he held a hundred years later. This appears in the chapter "On those who Carp at the Works of Aristotle":

I cannot sufficiently wonder what sort of a mind they have (if, that is, they have any) who carp at the works of Aristotle, which, in any case, I proposed not to expound but to praise.

Master Theodoric, as I recall, ridiculed the Topics,--not of Aristotle, but of Drogo. Yet he once taught those very Topics.

Certain auditors of Master Robert of Melun calumniated this work as practically useless. All decried the Categories. Wherefore I hesitated some time about commending them; but [there was no question as to] the rest of his works, since they were commended by the judgment of all; but I did not think that they should be praised grudgingly. Yet opposition is made to the Elenchi [Sophistical Refutations], though stupidly, because it contains poetry; but clearly the idiom of [the Greek] language does not lend itself readily to translation. In this respect the a.n.a.lytics seem to me preferable, because they are no less efficient for actual use, and because by their easier comprehension they stimulate eloquence.[18]

The slowness with which these works made their way is described by Roger Bacon at the end of the thirteenth century.

But a part of the philosophy of Aristotle has come slowly into the use of the Latins. For his Natural Philosophy and Metaphysics, and the Commentaries of Averrhoes and of others, were translated in our times, and were excommunicated at Paris before the year of our Lord 1237 on account of [their heretical views on] the eternity of matter and of time, and on account of the [heresies contained in the] book on Interpretation of Dreams (which is the third book on Sleep and Wakefulness), and on account of the many errors in the translation. The Logicalia were also slowly received and read, for the blessed Edmund, Archbishop of Canterbury, was the first at Oxford, in my time, to lecture on the book of Elenchi [Sophistical Refutations] and I saw Master Hugo who at first read the book of Posterior a.n.a.lytics, and I saw his opinion. So there were few [books] which were considered worth [reading] in the aforesaid philosophy of Aristotle, considering the mult.i.tudes of Latins; nay, exceedingly few and almost none, up to this year of our Lord 1292. So, too, the Ethics of Aristotle has been tardily tried and has lately been read by Masters, though only here and there. And the entire remaining philosophy of Aristotle in a thousand volumes, in which he treated all the knowledges, has never yet been translated and made known to the Latins.[19]

The last sentence of the account displays an ignorance of the number of Aristotle's extant writings which was doubtless shared by all of Bacon's contemporaries. Earlier writers, beginning with Andronicus of Rhodes (first century B.C.), had also placed the number at one thousand; Bacon probably copied the statement from one of these.

The att.i.tude of ecclesiastical authorities toward the study of Aristotle at Paris is expressed in a series of regulations extending over nearly half a century (1210-1254). They indicate at first a fear of certain of the newly translated books on account of their heretical views, as is stated by Roger Bacon (p. 44). This suspicion gradually disappears; and by 1254 all the more important works of Aristotle are not only approved, but prescribed for study.

In 1210 a church council held at Paris sentenced certain heretics to be burned, condemned various theological writings, and added:

Nor shall the books of Aristotle on Natural Philosophy, and the Commentaries [of Averrhoes on Aristotle] be read in Paris in public or in secret; and this we enjoin under pain of excommunication.[20]

In 1215 the statutes of the Papal Legate, Robert de Courcon, for the University, prescribe in detail what shall, and what shall not, be studied: