No More Learning

27, ch. 1). so far as to teach the eternity of the world-process. Between the two motives, the Christian and the Greek, he found a way of escape by making a succession of temporal worlds proceed forth from the eternal spiritual world, which he regarded as the immediate creation of -God, and by holding that these temporal worlds take their origin with the deolension and fall of a number of free spirits, and are to nod their end with the redemption and restitution of the same ( n-CMcaraaTaaif ) . '
The fundamental tendency of Christian thought, on the contrary, was to portray the historical drama of fall and redemption as a connected series of events taking place once for all, which begins with a free decision of lower spirits to sin, and has its turning- point in the redemptive revelation, the resolve of divine freedom.
In contrast with the naturalistic conceptions of Greek thought, kistory is conceived of as the realm of free acts of personalities, taking place but once, and the character of these acts, agreeably to the entire consciousness of the time, is of essentially religious significance.
4. It is highly interesting now to see how in the mythico- metaphysical inventions of the Gnostics, the peculiar relation of Christianity to Judaism is brought to expression in cosmogonic garb. In the Gnostic circles the so-called Gentile Christian ten dency is predominant, the tendency which desires to define the new religion as sharply as possible, as over against Judaism, and this tendency just through the Hellenistic philosophy grows to the most open hostility against Judaism.
The mythological form for this is, that the God of the Old Testa ment, who gave the Mosaic law, is regarded as the fashioner of the world of sense, — for the most part under the Platonic name of the Demiurge, — and is assigned that place in the hierarchy of cosmic forms or Mom, as well as in the history of the universe, which belongs to him in accordance with this function.
At the beginning this relation is not yet that of pronounced oppo sition. A certain Cerinthus (about 115 a. d. ) had already distin guished the God of the Jews as Demiurge, from the Supreme God who was not defiled by any contact with matter, and had taught that in contrast with the "law" given by the God of the Jews, Jesus had brought the revelation of the Supreme God. * So, too,
1 Orig. Dt Prinr. III. 1, 3. These worlds, on account of the freedom from which they proceed, are not at all like one another, but are of the moat mani fold variety; lb. II. 3. 3 f.
• A -"**'~,'l~' which Numenlus also adopted, evidently under Gnostic influ- eaota. Cf. Eoseb. Prop. Ev. XI. 18.
258 Hellenistic- Roman Thought : Religion* Period. [Part II.
with Saturninus, the God of the Jews appears as the head of the seven planetary spirits, who, as lowest emanation of the spiritual realm, in their desire to rule tore away a portion of matter to form from it the world of sense, and set man as guardian over it. But a conflict arises, since Satan, to conquer back this part of his kingdom, sends against man his demons and the lower "hylic" race of men. Iu this conflict the prophets of the Demiurge prove powerless until the Supreme God sends the iEon voxn as Saviour, in order that he may free pneumatic men and likewise the Demiurge and his spirits from the power of Satan. This same redemption of the Jewish God also is taught by Basilides, who introduces him under the name of the " great Archon " as an efflux of the divine world-seed, as head of the world of sense, and represents him as made to tremble by the Supreme God's message of salvation in Jesus, and as brought to repentance for his undue exaltation.
In a similar manner, the God of the Old Testament, with Carpo- crates, belongs to the fallen angels, who, commissioned to form the world, completed it according to their own caprice, and founded sep arate realms in which they got themselves reverenced by subordinate spirits and by men. But while these particular religions are, like their Gods, in a state of mutual conflict, the Supreme Deity reveals in Jesus the one true universal religion which has Jesus as its object, even as he had already before made revelation in the great educators of humanity, a Pythagoras and a Plato.
In more decided polemic against Judaism Cerdo the Syrian further distinguished the God of the Old Testament from that of the New. The God announced by Moses and the prophets, as the purposeful World-fashioner and as the God of justice is accessible even to natural knowledge — the Stoic conception; the God re vealed through Jesus is the unknowable, the good God — the Philonic conception. The same determinations more sharply defined are employed by Marcion1 (about 150), who conceives of the Chris tian life in a strongly ascetic manner, and regards it as a warfare against the Demiurge and for the Supreme God revealed through Jesus,1 and Marcion's disciple Apelles even treated the Jewish God
1 Cf. Volkmar, Philosophoumena und Marcion ( Theol. Jakrb. Tubingen, 1864). Same author, Das Evange. Uum Jiarcion't (Leips. 1862).
3 An extremely piquant mythological modification of this thought is found in the sect of the Ophites, who gave to the Hebraic narrative of the fall the interpretation, that the serpent which taught man to eat of the tree of knowl edge in Paradise made a beginning of bringing the revelation of the true God to man who had fallen under the dominion of the Demiurge, and that after man had on this account experienced the wrath of the Demiurge, the revela tion had appeared victorious in Jesus. For this knowledge which the serpent desired to teach is the true salvation of man.
CHAr. 2, J 21. ] Philosophy of History : Gnostics, Patristics. 259
as Lucifer, who brought carnal sin into the world of sense which had been formed by the good " Demiurge," the highest angel, so that, at the petition of the Demiurge, the Supreme God sent the Re deemer against him.
5. In contrast with this view we find the doctrine firmly held,
not only by the Recognitions,' ascribed to Clement of Rome
arose about 150 a. d. ), but in the entire orthodox development of
Christian doctrine, that the Supreme God and the creator of the
world, the God of the New and the God of the Old Testaments, are a
the same. But a wellplanned educative development of the divine ^JLuCu revelation is assumed, ancTTn This the history of salvation, i. e. the
inner history of the world, is sought. Proceeding in accordance
with the suggestions of the Pauline epistles,' Justin, and especially
Irenaens, took this standpoint. The theory of revelation did not
become complete until it found this elaboration in the philosophy
of history (cf. § 18).
For the anticipations of Christian revelation, that emerge on the
one hand in Jewish prophecy, on the other in Hellenic philosophy, are regarded from this point of view as pedagogic preparations for Christianity. And since the redemption of sinful man constitutes, according to the Christian view, the sole significance and value of the world's history, and so of all that is real aside from God, the well-ordered succession of Ood's acts of revelation appears as the essential thing TIT the entire~"course of the world's events.
Th the main, corresponding to the doctrine of revelation, three stages of this divine, saving activity are distinguished. 3 As divided theoretically there are, first, the universal-human revelation, given objectively by the purposiveness of Nature, subjectively through the rational endowment of the mind ; second, the special revelation imparted to the Hebrew people through the Mosaic law and the promises of the prophets ; and third, the complete revelation through Jesus. Divided according to time, the periods extended from Adam to Moses, from Moses to Christ, from Christ to the end of the world. 4 This triple division was the more natural for ancient Christianity, the stronger its faith that the closing period of the world's redemj>
1 Edited by Geradorf (Leips. 1838). Cf. A. Hilgenfcld, Die clementiniaehen RrcagnitioKtn und Hamihen (Jena, 1848); G. Chlhorn, Die Homilien und rUrrstnUionen det CI. R. (Gottingcn, 1864).
' which treat the " law " as the " schoolmaster " unto ChrUt (waiUywyli tit 1+*t4,); Gal. iii. 24.
•Thia had been done in part already by the Gnostics, by Basilides at least, according to Hippolytus.
• The later (heretical) development of eschatology added to these three pehods yet a fourth, by the appearance of the " Paraclete. " Cf. , e. g. , Ter- tallian. De Virg. Vet. 1, p. 884 O.
(which
*
260 Hellenistic-Roman Thought: Religious Period. [Part II.
tion, which had begun with the appearance of the Saviour, would be ended in a very short time. The eschatological hopes are an essential constituent of the early Christian metaphysics ; for the philosophy of history which made Jesus the turning-point of the world's history had, as by no means its slighest support, the expectation that the Crucified would return again to judge the world, and to complete the victory of light over 'darkness. However varied these ideas become with time and with the disappointment of the first hopes, however strongly the tendencies of dualism and monism assert themselves here also, by conceiving of the last Judgment either as a definite separation of good and evil, or as a complete overcoming of the latter by the former (o7ro»caTa<rrao-is irdvriav with Origen), and however much a more material and a more spiritual view of blessed ness and unhappiness, of heaven and hell, interplay here also, — in every case the last Judgment forms the conclusion of the work of redemption, and so the consummation of the divine plan of salva tion.
6. The points of view from which the world's history is regarded by Christian thinkers are thus indeed exclusively religious ; but the more general principle of a historical teleology gains recognition within them. While Greek philosophy had reflected upon the pur- posiveness of Nature with a depth and an energy which religious thought could not surpass, the completely new thought rises here that the course of events in human life also has a purposeful mean ing as a whole. The teleology of history becomes raised above that of Nature, and the former appears as the higher in worth, in whose service the latter is employed. '
Such a conception was possible only for a time that from a ripe result looked back upon the vivid memory of a great development in the world's history. The universal civilisation of the Roman Empire found dawning in the self-consciousness of its own inner life the presentiment of a purpose in that working together of national destinies through which it had itself come into existence, and the idea of this mighty process was yielded especially by the continued tradition of Greek literature embracing a thousand years. The religious theory of the world, which had developed from this ancient civilisation, gave to that thought the form that the meaning of the historical movement was to be sought in the preparations of God for the salvation of man ; and since the peoples of the ancient civilisation themselves felt that the time of their efficient working was complete, it is comprehensible that they believed they saw the
' Cf. Irenasus, Bef. IV. 38, 4, p. 702 t *t
CHAr, 2, § 21. ] Philosophy of History : Patristics. - 261
end of history immediately before them, where the sun of their day was sinking.
But hand in hand with this idea of a systematically planned unity in human history goes the thought of a unity of the human race, exalted above space and time. The consciousness of common civil- isatiou, breaking through national boundaries, becomes complete in the belief in a common revelation and redemption of all men. Inas- much as the salvation of the whole race is made the import of the
divine plan for the world, it appears that among the provisions of " this plan, the most important is that fellowship («<c<cAipria) to which all members of the race are called, by sharing in faith the sarile work of redemption. The conception of the Church, shaped out from the
Hfe of the Christian community, stands in this connection with the religiuus philosophy of history, and accordingly, among its constitu tive- marks or notes, universality or catholicity is one of the most important:
~T. TrTThis way, man and his destiny becomes the centre of the universe. This anthropocentric character distinguishes the Christian view of the world essentially from the Neo-Platonic. The latter, indeed, assigned a high metaphysical position to the human individ ual, whose psychico-spiritual nature it even held to be capable of deification ; it regarded the purposeful connected whole of Nature also from the (Stoic) point of view of its usefulness for man, — but never would Neo-Platonism have consented to declare man, who for it was a part of the phenomena in which divine efficiency appears, to be the end of the whole.
Just this, however, is the case in the philosophy of the Fathers. According to Irenatus, man is the end and aim of creation : it is to him as a knowing being that God would reveal himself, and for his sake the rest, the whole of Nature, has been created ; he it is, also, who by abuse of the freedom granted him, made farther revelation and redemption necessary ; it is he, therefore, for whose sake all kiatory also exists. Man as the highest unfolding of psychical life
ms Gregory of Nyssa teaches, the crown of creation, its master and king creation's destiny to be contemplated by him, and taken back into its original spirituality. But with Origen, too, men are just those fallen spirits, who, for punishment and improvement, hare been clothed with the world of sense: Nature exists only on account of their sin, and will cease again when the historical
has attained its end through the return of all spirits to the
Thus the anthropological movement, which at first forced its way into Greek science only as shifting of the interest, as change in
process (rood.
a it
a
: it is
is,
262 Hellenistic- Roman Thought : Religious Period. [Pabt IL
the statement of the problem, developed during the Hellenistic- Roman period to be more and more the real principle from which the world was considered, and at last in league with the religious need it took possession of metaphysics. The human race has gained the consciousness of the unity of its historical connection and re gards the history of its salvation as the measure of all finite things.
What arises and passes away in space and time has its true signifi- cance only in so far as it is taken up into the relation of man to his God.
Being and Becoming were the problems of ancient philosophy at . its beginning : the conceptions with which it closes are God and the human race.
PART III.
THE PHILOSOPHY OF THE MIDDLE AGES.
Rousselot, Etude* stir la Philosophie du Moyen Age. Paris, 1840-42.
B. Ilaurgau, De la Philotophie Scholastique. Paris, 1850.
B. Haurfeau, Histoire de la Philotophie Scholastique. Paris, 1872-80. A. Stdckl, Ueschichte der Philotophie des Mittelalters. Mainz, 1864-66.
Whkn the migration of the peoples broke in devastation over the Roman Empire, and the latter lacked the political strength to defend itself against the northern barbarians, scientific civilisation, also, was in danger of becoming completely crushed out; for the tribes to whom the sceptre now passed brought still less mind and
understanding for the finely elaborated structures of philosophy than for the light forms of Grecian art. And, withal, ancient civ ilisation was in itself so disintegrated, its vital force was so broken, that it seemed incapable of taking the rude victors into its school.
Thus the conquests of the Greek spirit would have been given over to destruction beyond hope of rescue, if in the midst of the breaking down of the old world, a new spiritual power had not grown strong, to which the sons of the North bowed, and which, with firm hand, knew how to rescue for the future the goods of civilisation, and preserve them during the centuries of subversion. This power was the Christian Church. What the State could not do, what art and science could not achieve, religion accomplished.
Inaccessible still for the fine workings of aesthetic imagination and abstract thought, the Germans were laid hold of in their deepest filings by the preaching of the gospel, which worked upon them with all the power of its grand simplicity.
Only from this point of religious excitation, therefore, could the process of the appropriation of ancient science by the peoples of the Europe of to-day begin ; only at the hand of the Church could the new world enter the school of the old. The natural conse quence, however, of this relation was, that at first only that portion of the intellectual content of ancient civilisation remained alive
268
264 Mediaeval Philosophy. [Part IIL
which had been taken up into the doctrine of the Christian Church,, and that the teaching authority rigidly excluded all else, and espe cially that which was opposed to her. By this means, to be sure, confusion in the youthful mind of these nations, which would not have been able to comprehend and elaborate much and many kinds of material, was wisely guarded against; but thereby whole worlds of the intellectual life sank to the depth from which they could only be drawn forth again long after, by toil and conflict.
The Church had grown to its great task of becoming the educator of the European nations, first of all, because from the invisible beginnings of a religious society it had developed with steadily growing power to a unified organisation, which amid the dissolution of political life presented itself as the only power that was firm and sure of itself. And since this organisation was supported by the thought that the Church was called to become the means of bring ing the salvation of redemption to all humanity, the religious edu cation of the barbarians was a task prescribed by its own nature. But the Church was all the more able to take this in hand, since in her inner life she had proceeded with the same certainty amid numerous deviating paths, and had attained the goal of a unified and completed system of doctrine. To this was further added the especially favourable circumstance, that at the threshold of the new epoch she was presented with the sum-total of her convictions, worked out into the form of a thorough scientific system by a mind of the first order, — Augustine.
Augustine was the true teacher of the Middle Ages. Not only do the threads of Christian and Neo-Platonio thought, the_irloBf el Urigen and ot Plotinus, unite in his philosophy, but he also concen- . trated tne entire thought of his time with creative energy about the need of salvation and the fulfilment of this need by the church community. His doctrine is the philosophy of the Christian Church. Herewith was given, in pregnant unity, the system which became the basis of the scientific training of the European peoples, and in this form the Romanic and Germanic peoples entered upon the inheritance of the Greeks.
But for this reason the Middle Ages retraced in the reverse direc- tlon the path which the Greeks had gone over in their relations to science. Jn antiquity science had arisen from the pure aesthetic joy in knowledge itself, and had only gradually entered into the service of practical need, of ethical tasks, and of religious longings. The Middle Ages begins with the conscious subordination of knowledge tS the great ends of faith ;_ it sees in science at the beginning only the task of the intellect to make clear to itself and express in
Mediaeval Philosophy. 265
Abstract thought that which it possesses surely and unassailably In feeling and conviction. Kut in the midst of this work the joy in knowledge itself wakes anew, at first timorously and uncertainly, then with ever-increasing force and self-certainty; it unfolds itself at first scholastically, in fields which seem to lie far distant from faith's unassailable sphere of ideas, and at the end breaks through victoriously when science begins to define her limits as against
faith, philosophy hers as against theology, and to assume a con scious independent position.
The education of the European peoples, which the history of the lihiliisophv of the Middle Ages sets forth, has then lur its startlng-
l«>int the Church doctrine, and for its goal the dev"1"pTMfinti "f
Mi. ,
Under such conditions it is easy to understand that the history of this education awakens psychological interest and an interest connected with the history of civilisation, rather than presents new ami independent fruits of philosophical insight. In the appropria tion of the presented material the peculiar personality of the disciple may assert itself here and there ; the problems and con ceptions of ancient philosophy may, therefore, find many fine trans
formations when thus taken up into the spirit of the new peoples, and in forging out the new Latin terminology in the Middle Ages acuteness and depth often contend emulously with pedantry and insipidity ; but in its fundamental philosophical thoughts, medieval philosophy remains enclosed within the system of conceptions of the Greek and the Hellenistic-Roman philosophy, — not only as
regards its problems, but also as regards their solutions. Highly as we must estimate the worth of its labours for the intellectual education of European peoples, its highest achievements remain in the last instance just brilliant productions of scholars or disciples, not of masters, — productions in which only the eye of the most refined detailed investigation can discover the gently germinating beginnings of a new thought, but which show themselves to be, on the whole, an appropriation of the world of thought of the depart ing antiquity. Mediaeval philosophy is, in its entire spirit, solely the continuation of the Hellenistic-Roman, and the essential dis tinction between the two is that what in the first centuries of our era had been coming into existence amid struggles was, for the Middle Ages, given and regarded as something in the main complete sad definitive.
t. -ifntitje •ijiixii_ The intellectual civilisation of antiquity is brought to modern peoples in the religious form which it assumed at its close, and develops in them gradually the maturity for prop- rrly scientific work.
• ^ .
w *$? " (^\0"
? /^/"
2t»6 Mediceval Philosophy. [Part III.
This period, in which the humanity of today was at school, lasted a full thousand years, and as if in systematically planned pedagogic steps its education proceeds toward science by the suc cessive addition of ancient material of culture. Out of the antith eses which appear in this material grow the problems of philosophy, and the ancient conceptions taken up and amplified give the form to the scientific theories of the world prevalent in the Middle Ages.
An original discord exists in this tradition between Xeo-PIatonism and the Church doctrine defended by Augustine, — a discord which indeed was not equally strong at all points, since Augustine in very essential points had remained under the control of Neo-Platonism, and yet a discord which amounted to an opposition with reference to the fundamental character of the relation of philosophy to faith. The system of Augustine is concentrated about the conception of the Church ; for it philosophy has as its main task to present the Church doctrine . is a scientific system, te pefohHoK TMA dm. ni^p a . in so far as it prosecutes this task mediaeval philosophy is the science of the schools, Scholasticism. The Xeo-PIatonic tendency, 6ft the contrary, takes the direction of guiding the individual, through knowledge, to blessed oneness of life with the deity : in. _so far as the science of the Middle Ages sets itself this end it is Mvsl i- cism.
Scholasticism and Mysticism accordingly supplement each other without being reciprocally exclusive. As the intuition of the Mystics may become a part of the Scholastic system, so the proclamation of the Mystics may presuppose the system of the Scholastics as its background. Throughout the Middle Ages, therefore, Mysticism is more in danger than Scholasticism of becoming heterodox ; but it would be erroneous to see in this an essential mark for distinguish- ing between the two. Scholasticism no doubt, in the main entirely orthodox but not only do the theories of the Scholastics diverge widely in the treatment of dogmas which are still in the process of formulation, but many of the Scholastics, even in the scientific investigation of the doctrines which were given, pro ceeded to completely heterodox theories, the expression of which brought them into more or less severe conflicts without and within. As regards Mysticism, the Neo-Platonic tradition often forms the theoretical background of the secret or open opposition offered to the monopolising of the religious life on the part of the Church;1
Cf. H. Keuter, Oeschichtt dtr religidsen Aufklarung im MitUlalter, vols. (Berlin, 1876-77). Cf. also H. v. Eicken, Oeschichte tier mittelalterlichen Welt anschauung (Stuttgart, 1888).
j? *
'
1
2
^T
;
is,
Mediaeval Philotophy. 267
bat we meet on the other hand enthusiastic Mystics who feel them selves called to take the true faith into their protection against the excesses of Scholastic science.
It appears thus to be inappropriate to give to the philosophy of the Middle Ages the general name of " Scholasticism. " It might rather prove, as the result of a more exact estimate, that in the maintenance of scientific tradition as well as in the slow adaptation and transformation of those philosophical doctrines which were effective for the after time, a part belongs to Mysticism which is at least as great as the part played by Scholasticism, and that on the other hand a sharp separation of the two currents is not practicable in the case of a great number of the most prominent philosophic thinkers of the Middle Ages.
Finally, it must be added that even when we put together Scholas ticism and Mysticism, we have in nowise exhausted the character istics of mediaeval philosophy. While the nature of both these tendencies is fixed by their relation to the religious presuppositions of thought, — in the one case the established doctrine of the Church,
in the other personal piety, — there runs along side by side with these, especially in the later centuries of the Middle Ages though noticeable still earlier, a secular side-current which brings in an in creasing degree the rich results of Greek and Roman experience of the world, to science building itself anew.
Here, too, at the outset the effort prevails to introduce organically into the Scholastic system this extensive material and the forms of thought which are dominant in it; but the more this part of the sphere of thought develops into an independent significance, the more the entire lines of the scientific consideration of the world become shifted, and while the reflective interpretation and rationalisation of the relig ious feeling becomes insulated within itself, philosophical knowl edge begins to mark off anew for itself the province of purely theoretical investigation.
From this multiplicity of variously interwoven threads of tradi tion with which ancient science weaves its fabric on into the Middle Ages, we can understand the wealth of colour in which the philosophy of this thousand years spreads out before historical research. In the fraquent exchange of friendly and hostile contact, these elements of a tradition changing in compass and content from century to century play back and forth to form ever new pictures ; a surprising fineness in the transitions and shadings becomes developed as these elements are woven together, and thus there is developed also a wealth of life in the work of thought, which manifests itself in a
considerable number of interesting personalities,
in an astonishing
>\
268 Mediaeval Philosophy. [Part III
amount of literary production, and in a passionate agitation of scien tific controversies.
Such living variety in form has as yet by no means everywhere received full justice at the hands of literary-historical research,1 but the main lines of this development lie before us clearly and dis tinctly enough for the history of philosophic principles, which nevertheless finds but a meagre field in this period for the reasons already adduced. We must, indeed, be on our guard against aiming to reduce the complex movement of this process to formulas that are all too simple, and against overlooking the multitude of positive and negative relations that have come and gone in shifting forms between the elements of ancient tradition which found their en trance in the course of centuries by irregular intervals into mediaeval thought.
In general, the, course of science among the European peoples of the Middle Ages proceeded along the following lines.
The profound doctrine of Augustine had its first efficiency, not in the direction of its philosophical significance, but as an authoritative presentation of the doctrine of the Church. Side by side with this a Neo-Platonic Mysticism maintained itself, and scientific schooling was limited to unimi>ortant compendiums, and to fragments of the Aristotelian logic. Nevertheless, a logico-metaphysical problem of great importance developed from the elaboration of the logic, and about this problem arose a highly vigorous movement of thought, which, however, threatened to degenerate into barren for malism in consequence of the lack in knowledge to form the content of thought. In contrast with this the Augustinian psychology began gradually to assert its mighty force ; and at the same time the first effects of contact with Arabian science disclosed themselves, a science to which the West owed, primarily at least, a certain stimulus toward employment with realities, and further a complete widening
1 The grounds for this tie, certainly in part, in the but gradually vanishing prejudices which long stood in the way of a just appreciation of the Middle Ages ; but in no less a degree they lie also in this literature itself. The circum stantial and yet for the most part sterile prolixity of the investigations, the schematic uniformity of the methods, the constant repetition and turning of the arguments, the lavish expenditure of acuteness upon artificial and sometimes absolutely silly questions, the uninteresting witticisms of the schools, — all these are features which perhaps belong inevitably to the process of learning, appro priating, and practising, which mediaeval philosophy sets forth, but they bring with them the consequence that in the study of this part of the history of phi losophy the mass of the material, and the toil involved in its elaboration, stand in an unfavourable relation to the real results. So it has come about that just those investigators who have gone deeply, with industry and perseverance, into mediieval philosophy have often not refrained from a harsh expression of ill- humour as to the o"bject of their research.
Mediaeval Philosophy. 269
and transformation of its horizon. This development was in the main attached to the acquaintance gained by such by-ways with the entire system of Aristotle, and the immediate consequence of this - acquaintance was that the structure of Church doctrine was pro- / jected in the grandest style and carefully wrought out in all its/ parts with the help of his fundamental metaphysical conceptionsj Meanwhile Aristotelianism had been accepted from the Arabians (and Jews) not only in their Latin translation, but also with their commentaries, and in their interpretation which was under strong Neo- Platonic influence ; and while by this means the Neo-Platonic elements in previous tradition, even in the Augustinian form, found vigorous confirmation in various directions, the specific elements of the Augustinian metaphysics were forced into sharper and more energetic expression, in violent reaction against the Neo-Platonic tendency. Thus while both sides lean upon Aristotelianism, a cleft in scientific thought is produced, which finds its expression in the separation of theology and philosophy. This cleft became widened by a new and not less complicated movement. Empirical research
in medicine and natural science had also made its way from the East, hand in hand with Aristotelianism ; it began now to rise also among the European peoples ; it conquered the domain of psychology not without assistance from the Augustinian current, and favoured the development of the Aristotelian logic in a direction which led far from the churchly Aristotelian metaphysics. And while thus the interwoven threads of tradition were separating on all sides, the fine filaments of new beginnings were already finding their way into this loosening web.
With such various relations of mutual support or retardation, and with such numerous changes of front, the thoughts of ancient philosophy move through the Middle Ages ; but the most important and decisive turn was doubtless the reception ofAristotelianism, which became complete about the year 1200. This divides the whole field naturally into two sections which in their philosophical import are so related that the interests and the problems, the antitheses and the movements, of the first period are repeated in broader, and at the same time deeper, form in the second. The relation of these two divisions, therefore, cannot be generally designated in this case by differences in the subject matter.
CHAPTER I. FIRST PERIOD.
(Until about 1200. ) i/oo - ife*°
W. Kaulicli, Geschichte der scholastichen Philotophie, I. Theil. Prague, 1863.
The line of thought in which mediaeval philosophy essentially moved, and in which it continued the principles of the philosophy of antiquity, was prescribed for it by the doctrine of Augustine. He had moved the principle of internality (Innerlkhkeit). which had been preparing in the whole closing development of ancient science, for tfrp fixat *iTM" '"+" th« p. nntrolling central position of philosophic thought, and the position to which he is entitled in the history of philosophy is that of the beginner of a new line of development. For the bringing together of all lines of the Patristic as well as' the Hellenistic philosophy of his time, which he com pletely accomplished, was possible only as these were consciously united in that new thought which was itself to become the germ of the philosophy of the future. But only of a more distant future : his philosophical originality passed over his contemporaries and the
,\ immediately following centuries without effect. Within the circuit jS\ J\ of the old civilisation the creative power of thought had become extinguished, and the new peoples could only gradually grow into
scientific work.
k ^ In the cloister and court schools which formed the seats of this
newly beginning civilisation, permission for instruction in dialectic by the side of the arts most necessary for the training of the clergy had to be conquered step by step. For this elementary logical instruction they possessed in the first centuries of the Middle Ages only the two least important treatises of the Aristotelian Organon, De Categoriis and De Interpretations, in a Latin translation with the introduction of Porphyry, and a number of commentaries of the Neo-Platonic time, in particular those of Boethius. For the material of knowledge (of the Quadrivium) they used the com- pendiums of departing antiquity, which had been prepared by Marcianus Capella, Cassiodorus, and-Isidorus of Sevilla. Of the
,v^\)J' ^Sv
270 "ice
Chap. 1. ]
First Period. 271
great original works of ancient philosophy, only the Platonic Timeeus in the translation of Chalcidius was known.
j "nder these circumstances, scientific activity in the schools was mainly directed toward learning and practising the schematism of rormal logic, and the treatment even of the material parts of knowl- edge, in particular of religious dogma which was indeed regarded as something essentially complete and in its contents unaftaa. ila. hlp, took the direction of elaborating and setting forth what was given and handed down by tradition, in the Forms and according to the rules ot the Aristoielian-Stoic logic, in this process the main em phasis must necessarily tail upon formal arrangement, upon the formation and division of class-concepts, upon correct syllogistic
conclusions. Already in the Orient the ancient school logic had been put into the service of a rigidly articulated development of Church doctrine by John Damascenus, and now this took place in the schools of the West also.
Meanwhile this pursuit, which had its basis in the conditions of the tradition, had not only the didactic value of a mental exercise in the appropriation of material, but also the consequence that the beginnings of independent reflection necessarily took the direction of an inquiry as to the significance of logical relations, and so we find emerging early in the Western literature, investigations as to the relation Of Llic UUlll'eption on the one hand, to the word, and on
tin- tlirrrgr
The problem thus formed became strengthened by a peculiar com
plication. By the side of the Church doctrine there persisted, half
tolerated and half condemned, a mystical transmission of Chris
tianity in Neo-Platonic form. It went back to writings which had
arisen in the fifth century, but which were ascribed to Dionysius
the Areopagite, and it gained wider extension when these writings
were translated in the ninth century by John Scotus Erigena, and
made the basis of his own doctrine. In this doctrine, however,
a main point was that identification of The different grades of ab-_ A
"■taction with the stages of metaphysical reality, which had been ««Iffanh propounded in the older flatonism and in Weo-riatonism
JeT**''
In consequence of these incitements the question as to the meta- ^ Vf <y vhfticai significance of logical genera l>ecame, duriny the next, centuries, jff
dkB centre of philosophic thought. About this were grouped the
otber logical and metaphysical problems, and the answer given to
this question decided the party position of individual thinkers. Amid the great variety of decisions given in this controversy over universal*, three tendencies are prominent :c3tealisrny which main-
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272 Mediaeval Philosophy. [Part III.
tains the independent existence of genera and species, is the doctrine of Anselm of Canterbury, of William of Champeaux, and of the Platonists proper, among whom Bernard- of Chartres is prominent ; Nominalism, which sees in universals only designations or terms
,vhich apply commonly, is defended in this period principally by
finally a mediating theory, which has been called 'onceptualism or' Sermonism, is attached principally to the name of
A^rJeTaT* '
"" xhese conflicts came to an issue principally in the endless dispu- tations at the Paris University, which for this period and on into the following period formed the centre of scientific life in Europe and these battles, conducted with all the arts of dialectical dexterity, exercised upon this age fascinating power like that which the disputes of the Sophists and Socratic circles had once exercised upon the Greeks. Here as there the unreflective life of the popular consciousness was awakened to thought, and here as there wider
•circles were seized by feverish thirst for knowledge, and by pas sionate desire to take part in such hitherto unwonted intellectual games. Far beyond the narrow circles of the clergy, who had pre-
Roscellinus^
\r viously been the transmitters of scientific tradition,, the impulse
toward knowledge, thus awakened, forced its way to the surface.
— But this excessive vigour in dialectical development found at the ' same time manifold opposition. In fact, hid within itself a seri
ous danger. This brilliant performance, in which abstract thought proved its power, lacked all basis of real knowledge. With its dis tinctions and conclusions was carrying on to a certain extent juggler's game in the open air, which indeed set the formal mental' powers into beneficial motion, but which, in spite of all its turns and windings, could lead to no material knowledge. Hence, from intelli- gent men like Gerbert, who had receivedTnformation from the empir ical studies of the Arabians, went out the admonition to abandon the formalism of the schools and turn to the careful examination of Nature and to the tasks of practical civilisation.
But while such call still echoed mainly unheard, dialectic met more forcible resistance in the piety of faith and in the power of the ChuxcJ*. —The result was inevitable that thfl1"(j;'"11 wnrlrj^g nvnr nf the metaphysics of the Church's faith, and the consequences which were developed ill tft~ Strife about SaSacaal^ — ajTTjTst-without any reference to their religious bearing, — should come into contradiction wit-. K~t. hft dngma. nf the flhnrchj and the more this was repeatea~"the more dialectic appeared not only superfluous for the simply pious mind, but also dangerous to the interests of the Church. In this spirit it was attacked, sometimes with extreme violence, by the
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Cm*-. 1. ] Firtt Period. 273
Orthodox Mvsticd. among whom the most combative was Bernard of Clairraux, while the Victorines turned back from the excesses of dialectical arrogance to the study of Augustine, and sought to bring out the rich treasure of inner experience which his writings con tained, by transferring the fundamental thoughts of his psychology from the metaphysical to the empirical sphere.
Aureliua Augustinus (364-430), born at Thagaste in Numidia, and educated for a jurist there and also in Madaura in Carthage, passed through in his youth almost all phases of the scientific and religious movement of his time. He sought at first in Manichsism religious relief for his burning doubts, then fell into the Academic Scepticism which he had early absorbed from Cicero, passed over from this gradually to the Neo-1'latonic doctrine, and was at last won by Ambrose, Bishop of Milan, for Christianity, whose philosopher he was to become.
As priest, and later as bishop at Hippo Regius, he was unwearied in practical and literary activity for the unity of the Christian Church and doctrine; his doctrinal system was developed especially in the Donatist and Pelagian contro versies. Among his works (in Migne's collection, 16 vols. , Paris, 1835 ff. [tr. ed. by Dods, 16 vols. , Edin. 1871-77 ; also in Schaffs lib. , Nicene and 1'ost- Nicene Fathers, Vols. 1-8, Buffalo, 1886-88]) those of chief importance for philosophy are his autobiographical Confessions, and further Contra Academi- cos, De Biota Vita, De Ordine, De Quantitate Animce, De Libero Arbitrio, De
Trinitate, Soliloquia, De ImmortaliUite Animas, De Civitatt Dei. — Cf. C. Binde- mann, Der. hlg. A. (3 Bde. 1844-186H). — Fr. Bohringer, Kirchengeschichte in Biographien, XI. Bd. in 2 Thl. (Stuttgart, 1877-78). — A. Dorner, A. (Berlin, 1873). — W. Dilthey, Einleituug in die Oeistesvnssenschaften, I. (Leips. 1883), pp. 322 ff. —J. 8torz, Die Pkilos. des hlg. A. (Freiburg, 1892).
The fUtayuyii tit Tit rariryopiai of Porphyry (ed. by Busse, Berlin, 1887), in iu translation by Boethius, gave the external occasion for the controversy over universal*. Boothloa (470-525), aside from this, exercised an influence upon the esxly Middle Ages by his translations and commentaries upon the two Aristotelian treatises, and upon a number of Cicero's writings. In addition to his books there were still others which circulated under the name of Augustine. Cf. Prantl, Geseh. d. Log. im Abendl. , II. , and A. Jourdain, Becherches critiques swr Page et I'origine des traductions latines cT Aristotle (Paris, 2 ed. , 1843).
Among the scientific encyclopedias of departing antiquity, Marcianus Capella (from Carthage, the middle of the fifth century), in his Saturicon (ed. by Eyssenhardt, Leips. 1866), after his whimsical introduction De Nuptiis Mercurii
et PhilologUz, treats the seven liberal arts, of which, as is well known, in the activity of the schools grammar, rhetoric, and dialectic formed the Trivium, arithmetic, geometry, astronomy, and music, including poetics, the Quadrivium. A valuable commentary on Capella was written later by Scotus Erigena (ed. by B. Hauresvu, Paris, 1861). — The Institutiones Dirinarum et Satcularium Lee- tionum and De Artibus ac Disciplinis Litterarum Liberalium of the Senator Cas- siodorus (480-670, Works, Paris, 1588), and the Originum sice Etymolngiarum, Lihri XX. (in Migne) of Isidnrut Hispalensis (died 03(1) are already completely upon theological ground. John Damascenus (about 7(H)) in his II>ry4) •y«A«»rt
While the storms of the national migrations were blustering upon the conti nent, scientific study had fled to the British Isles, in particular to Ireland, and later flourished to a certain extent in the school at York under the Venerable Bcde. From here learned education was won back to the continent through Alcuin, upon the inducement of Charles the Great ; beside the episcopal and the cloister schools arose the palatinal school, whose seat was fixed by Charles the Raid at Paris. The most important cloister schools were those of Fulda and Toon. At the former worked Rabanus (Khaban) Maurus (of Mainz, 776-866 ; D* Univcrto, Libri XXII. ), and Eric f Heiricus) of Auxerre; from it went out, at the end of the ninth century, Remlgius of Auxerre and the probable author
( Works, Venice, 1748) gave the classical example for the employment of the ancient school logic in the service of systematising the Church doctrines.
274 Mediaeval Philotophy. [Part III
of the commentary Super Porphyrium (printed in Cousin's Ouvrages Inedits d' Abelard, Paris, 1836). In Tours Alcuin was followed by the Abbot Frede- gisus, whose letter, De Nihilo et Tenebris, is preserved (in Migne, Vol. 105).
Later the cloister at St. Gall (Notker Labeo, died 1022) formed a principal seat of scientific tradition.
Cf. also for the literary relations, the Histoire Litteraire de la France.
The writings ascribed to the Areopagite (cf. Acts of the Apostles, 17 : 34), among which those of chief importance are repl /iwtucijs 9eo\oylas and irtpi rVjj Icpapxtas oipavlov (in Migne ; German by Engelhardt, Sulzbach, 1823), show the same mixture of Christian and Neo-Platonic philosophy which appeared fre quently in the Orient (the result of Origen's influence) and in an especially characteristic form in the Bishop Synesius (about 400 ; cf. R. Volkmann, S. von
Cyrene, Berlin, 1869). The above-named writings of the Pseudo-Dionysius, which probably arose in the fifth century, are first mentioned, 532, and their genuineness is there contested; nevertheless, this was defended by Maximus Confessor (580-662 ; De Variis Difficilioribus Locis Patrum Dionysii et Gregorii, ed. Oehler, Halle, 1857).
In connection with this Mysticism develops the first important scientific personality of the Middle Ages, John Scotus Erigena (sometimes Jerugena, from Ireland, about 810-880), of whose life it is certainly known that he was called by Charles the Bald to the court school at Paris, and was for a time active there. He translated the writings of the Areopagite, wrote against Gottschalk the treatise De Prizdestinatione, and put his own theories into his main work, De Divisione Naturae (German by Noack, Leips. 1870-76). The works form Vol. 122 in Migne's collection. Cf. J. Huber, J. S. E. (Munich, 1861).
Anselm of Canterbury (1033-1100) came from Aosta, was active for a long time in the Norman cloister at Bee, and was called to become Archbishop of Canterbury in 1003. Of his works (Migne, Vol. 155) the most important for philosophy besides the treatise Cur Deus Homo? are the Monologium and the Proslogium. The two latter are edited by C. Haas (Tlibingen, 1863), together with the refutation of a monk, Gaunilo (in the cloister Marmoutier near Tours), Liber pro Insipiente, and the reply of Anselm. Cf. Ch. Rfemusat, A. de C, tableau de la vie monastique et de la lutte du pouroir spirituel avec le pouvoir
tempnrel au ll"'
'William of Champeaux (died 1121 as Bishop of Chalons-sur'Marne) was a
Steele ed. , Paris, (2d
1868).
teacher who was much heard at the cathedral school in Paris, and established studies there in the August inian cloister at St. Victor. We are chiefly informed as to his philosophical views by his opponent A belaid ; his logical treatise is lost. Cf. E. Michaud, G. de Ch. et les ecoles de Paris au 12"" siecle (Paris, 1868).
The Flatonism of the earlier Middle Ages attached itself essentially to the Timmts, and under the influence of the Neo-Platonic interpretation gave to the doctrine of Ideas a form which did not completely correspond to the original sense. The most important figure in this line is Bernard of Chartrea (in the first half of the twelfth century). His work De Mundi Universitate sive Mega-
cosmus et Microcosmus has been edited by C. S. Barach (Innsbruck, William of Conches (Magna de Naturis Philosophia ; Dragmaticon Philoso
Roscellinus of Armorica in Brittany came forward as teacher at various places, especially at Locmenach where Abelard was his hearer, and was obliged to retract his opinions at the Council at Soissons. Of his own writings only a letter to Abelard is extant (printed in the Abhandl. der bair. Akad. , 1861) ;
the sources for his doctrine are Anselm, Abelard, John of Salisbury.
Abelard (Abeillard), the most impressive and energetic personality among the thinkers of this period, was born 1079 at Pallet, in the county of Nantes,
and was a pupil of William of Champeaux and of Roscellinus. His own activity as a teacher was developed at Melun and Corbeil, and most successfully in Paris at the cathedral school, and at the logical school St. Genevieve. The misfortune into which his well-known relationship to Heloise plunged him, and the conflicts into which his teaching brought him with the Church authority, chiefly at the instigation of his unwearied prosecutor, Bernard of Clairvaux
phic) and Walter of Montague are regarded as his disciples. Adelard of Bath also wrote in the same spirit (De Eodem et Diverso ; Questiones Xaturales).
1876).
Chap. I. ]
Fir »t Period.