hierarchical system of which God and consequently the Church is both the basis and the summit? With the admirable tact which seldom failed her, Catholicism recognized Aristotle in order to make capital out of him. But the chief advantage resulting from an alliance with Peripatetic philosophy was the following: As soon as Aristotle's system received recognition as the only authentic expression of human reason, its authority naturally transcended that of free thought. Hence Peripateticism gave the Church a still better means of regulating Scholastic philosophy than she already possessed. During the Platonic period thought enjoyed a relative independence; its object was to prove the agreement between the dogma and natural reason; and, as we have seen, it was quite rationalistic in the performance of this task. Henceforth the question no longer is to prove the agreement between the dogma and natural reason, but its agreement with the letter of Aristotle's writings. The proof of this agreement makes Aristotle the highest authority and his system the official criterion of a philosopher's orthodoxy. Aristotle still stands for reason, but reason now is disciplined and reduced to a fixed code. Left to itself, reason is a changeable authority, and its agreement with faith not necessarily a settled fact. What to St. Anselm seemed agreement, Abelard, Gilbert, Amalric, and David regarded as contradictory. The mind is mobile, revolutionary; the letter is eminently conservative. By adopting the philosophy of Aristotle, the Church made use of the most illustrious thinker in order to enslave thought. The advantages arising from this alliance with Peripa tetic philosophy were, it is true, accompanied by disadvantages that became serious dangers in the sequel. In the first place, the truth of the, dogma was proved by its agreement with Aristotle; this raised the authority of Aristotle and philosophy above the authority of the Church. Then PERIPATETICS OF THE THIRTEENTH CENTURY 239 the influence of the Stagirite necessarily introduced into Scholasticism a new element, not very favorable to the spiritual omnipotence of the Church: the taste for science and the spirit of analysis. § 38. The Peripatetics of the Thirteenth Century The Church was converted to Peripateticism by a number of eminent thinkers who were less original than St. Anselm and Abelard, but, owing to the more abundant material at their disposal, more learned than their predecessors. At their head stands the Englishman ALEXANDER OF HALES,1 professor of theology at Paris, whose commentaries on the Sentences of Peter the Lombard and the De anima of Aristotle won for him the title doctor irrefragabilis. WILLIAM OF AUVERGNE, Bishop of Paris,2 whose learning equalled that of Alexander, wrote a series of treatises inspired by Aristotle, and a voluminous work, De universo, a kind of metaphysics, the wonderful erudition of which proves that the author was thoroughly acquainted with the Arabian commentaries on the Stagirite. His Peripatetic leanings, however, did not hinder him from denying the eternity of the world, nor from believing in creation, Providence, and the immortality of the soul. The Dominican VINCENT OF BEAUVAIS, the teacher of the sons of St. Louis, gathers the treasures of learning and of Peripatetic speculation in his Speculum quadruplex: na. turale, doctrinale, morale, et historiale. He cites almost all the writings of Aristotle, and already speaks triumphantly of the nova logica as opposed to the logica vetus. He is an 1 Died 1245. Summa universa theologia, Venice, 1576. 2 Died 1249. Opera, ed. Blaise Leferon, Orleans, 1674; [N. Valois, Guillaume d'Auvergne, Paris, 1880]. 8 Died 1264. Speculum doctrinale, Strasburg, 1473; Speculum qua druplex, etc., 1624. open adherent of the Lyceum on the subject of universals, which still forms the chief topic of discussion among the Schoolmen, and declares with Abelard: Universale in re. Universals are real, even more real than particulars, without, however, existing independently of particulars. As in the system of Abelard, universals and particulars are no longer abstractly and mechanically juxtaposed in the metaphysics of Vincent, but are joined together by the principle of individuation (incorporatio). A new terminology is used by this Schoolman to express Aristotelian conceptions. The Tí éσT of Aristotle, for example, becomes the quidditas. The philosophical vocabulary is developed and enriched at the expense of Ciceronian Latin, which the Renaissance afterwards undertakes to rescue from the neglect of the School. Though a realist, in so far as he regards the universal as & reality,. Vincent makes an important advance towards nominalism by distinguishing between universale metaphysicum and universale logicum, i. e., between the specific type which really exists in the individuals composing the species and the general notion which corresponds to this type, and is but an abstraction of thought. This distinction is a nominalistic deviation from realism, for the pure realism of Champeaux and Anselm absolutely identifies the specific type and the general idea. It is, however, far from being pure nominalism, for nominalism is the absolute negation of the universale metaphysicum as an objective reality. Another Dominican, who has already been mentioned,1 ALBERT OF BOLLSTADT,2 wrote commentaries on most of Aristotle's works, and labored with untiring zeal for the 1 § 37. 2 Albertus Magnus, died at Cologne in 1280. Opera, ed. by P. Jammy, Lyons, 1651 (21 folio vols.). J. Sighart, Albertus Magnus, etc., Regensburg, 1857; Eng. tr. by Dixon, 1876.] propagation of the Peripatetic philosophy. He manifests a remarkable taste for natural science, in which respect he anticipates Roger Bacon, Raymundus Lullus, and the scientific Renaissance. We see how dangerous the Peripatetic alliance proved to the Church! The Franciscan John of Fidanza, known as ST. BONAVENTURA, is less learned and less interested in nature, but more speculative than Albert. He admires both Aristotle and Plato, rational philosophy and contemplative mystieism, piety and knowledge, thus uniting in his person two elements which were growing farther and farther apart. The Church recognized his services by canonizing him, and the School bestowed upon him the title of doctor seraphicus. Finally, two illustrious rivais complete the Peripatetic galaxy of the thirteenth century and finish the work of conciliation between the Church and the Lyceum: the Dominican St. Thomas of Aquin and the Franciscan Duns Scotus. § 39. St. Thomas of Aquin THOMAS OF AQUIN 2 (Aquino), the son of a noble family in the kingdom of Naples, preferring the peaceful pleas 1 Died 1274. Author of a Commentary on the Sentences of the Lombard, of an Itinerarium mentis in Deum, conceived in the spirit of the mystics of St. Victor, etc. Edition of Strasburg, 1482, Rome, 1588, ff., etc.; [K. Werner, Die Psychologie und Erkenntnisslehre des Bonaventura, Vienna, 1876.] 2 Opera omnia, Rome, 1570 (18 folio vols.); Venice, 1594; Antwerp, 1612; Paris, 1660; Venice, 1787; Parma (25 vols.), 1852–71; [Thomas Aquinatis opera omnia jussu impensaque Leonis XIII., P. M. edita, vols. I. & II., Rome (Freiburg i. B.), 1882, 84]; Ch. Jourdain, La philosophie de Saint Thomas d'Aquin, Paris, 1858; Cacheux, De la philosophie de Saint Thomas, Paris, 1858; [Karl Werner, Der heilige Thomas von Aquino, 3 vols., Regensburg, 1858 ff.; Z. Gonzales, Estudios sobre la filosofia de S. Tomás, 3 vols., Manila, 1864 (German translation by C. J. Nolte, Regensburg, 1885). — TR.] He was called doctor angelicus. ures of study to the adventurous life of a feudal lord, entered the order of St. Dominic, in spite of the formal protests of his father. On the eve of his departure from Italy to Paris, he was kidnapped by his brothers and imprisoned in the paternal castle, from which he managed to escape two years later. Taking up his abode at Cologne, he became an enthusiastic disciple of Albert the Great and a profound student of Aristotle. Henceforth all his efforts were directed towards acquainting the Christian Occident with the Aristotelian philosophy as set forth in the Greek text, particularly with the Physics and Metaphysics, of which only Latin translations made from Arabian translations were known. He afterwards returned to the Peninsula, where he died in 1274, scarcely fifty years of age. Philosophy is indebted to him for a series of treatises bearing on the metaphysics of Aristotle (Opuscula de materiæ natura, de ente et essentia, de principiis naturæ, de principio individuationis, de universalibus, etc.). His Summa theologia, which gradually eclipsed the Sentences of Peter the Lombard, forms the basis of the dogmatic teachings of the Church. The philosophy of St. Thomas has no other aim than the faithful reproduction of the principles of the Lyceum. We are therefore interested, not so much in the contents, as in the Neo-Latin form in which the ideas of the Stagirite are expressed. Our modern philosophical vocabulary is in part derived from the system of St. Thomas. Philosophy proper or the first philosophy has for its object being as such (ens in quantum ens = Tò ôv ỷ ŏv). There are two kinds of beings (entia): objective, real, essential beings (esse in re), and beings that are mere abstractions of thought or negations, such, for example, as poverty, blindness, and imperfection in general. Poverty, blindness, and privation exist; they are entia (övra), but not essen |