Chapter IV: The Counter-Reformation (6)

3. In the 12th century mysticism assumed an independent place
alongside of dialectic, carried on a war of extermination
against the sceptical dialectic, and finally appeared in a
more peaceful aspect, contributing material to the positive
dogmatic dialectic.

4. In the 13th century dialectic scholasticism gained the
complete ascendency, and reached its highest glory in the
form of dogmatism in league with mysticism, and never, in
the persons of its greatest representatives, in opposition
to it.

§ 99.5. =The Canon Law.=--After the Pseudo-Isidore (§ 87, 2)
many collections of church laws appeared. They sought to render
the material more complete, intentionally or unintentionally
enlarging the forgeries and massing together the most
contradictory statements without any attempt at comparison
or sifting. The most celebrated of these were the collections
of bishops Burchard of Worms about A.D. 1020, Anselm of Lucca,
who died in A.D. 1086, nephew of the pope of the same name,
Alexander II., and Ivo of Chartres, who died in A.D. 1116. Then
the Camaldolite monk =Gratian= of Bologna undertook not only
to gather together the material in a more complete form than
had hitherto been done, but also to reconcile contradictory
statements by scholastic argumentation. His work appeared about
A.D. 1150 under the title _Concordantia discordantium canonum_,
and is commonly called _Decretum Gratiani_. A great impulse was
given to the study of canon law by means of this work, especially
at Bologna and Paris. Besides the _Legists_, who taught the Roman
law, there now arose numerous _Decretists_ teaching the canon
law and writing commentaries on Gratian’s work. Gregory IX.
had a new collection of Decrees of Councils and Decretals in
five books, the so-called _Liber extra Decretum_, or shortly
_Extra_ or _Decretum Gregorii_, drawn up by his confessor and
Grand-Penitentiary, the learned Dominican Raimundus [Raimund]
de Pennaforti [Pennaforte], and sent it in A.D. 1234 to the
University of Bologna. Boniface VIII. in A.D. 1298 added to
this collection in five parts his _Liber Sextus_, and Clement V.
in A.D. 1314 added what are called after him the _Clementinæ_.
From that time down to A.D. 1483 the decretals of later popes
were added as an appendix under the name _Extravagantes_,
and with these the _Corpus juris canonici_ was concluded.
An official edition was begun in A.D. 1566 by the so-called
_Correctores Romani_, which in A.D. 1580 received papal sanction
as authoritative for all time to come.[292]

§ 99.6. The Schoolmen as such contributed nothing to =Historical
Literature=. Histories were written not in the halls of the
universities but in the cells of the monasteries. Of these
there were three kinds as we have already seen in § 90, 9. For
workers in the department of Biblical History, see § 105, 5;
and of Legends of the Saints, § 104, 8. For ancient Church
History Rufinus and Cassiodorus were the authorities and the
common text books (§ 5, 1). An interesting example of the manner
in which universal history was treated when mediæval culture
had reached its highest point, is afforded by the _Speculum
magnum s. quadruplex_ of the Dominican =Vincent of Beauvais=
(_Bellovacensis_). This treatise was composed about the middle
of the 13th century at the command of Louis IX. of France as
a hand-book for the instruction of the royal princes. It forms
an encyclopædic exposition of all the sciences of that day in
four parts, _Speculum historiale_, _naturale_, _doctrinale_,
and _morale_. The _Speculum doctrinale_ breaks off just at
the point where it should have passed over to theology proper,
and the _Speculum morale_ is a later compilation by an unknown
hand.[293]

§ 100. THE _SÆCULUM OBSCURUM_: THE 10TH CENTURY.[294]

In contrast to the brilliant theological scholarship and the activity of religious life in the 9th century, as well as to the remarkable culture and scientific attainments of the Spanish Moors with their world-renowned school at Cordova, the darkness of the 10th century seems all the more conspicuous, especially its first half, when the papacy reached its lowest depths, the clergy gave way to unblushing worldliness and the church was consumed by the foulest corruption. During this age, indeed, there were gleams of light even in Italy, but only like a will o’ the wisp rising from swampy meadows, a fanatical outburst on behalf of ancient classic paganism. The literature of this period stood in direct and avowed antagonism to Christian theology and the Christian church, and commended a godless frivolity and the most undisguised sensuality. A grammarian Wilgard of Ravenna taught openly that Virgil, Horace, and Juvenal were better and nobler than Paul, Peter, and John. The church had still so much authority as to secure his death as a heretic, but in almost all the towns of Italy he had sympathisers, and that among the clergy as well as among laymen. It was only by the influence of the monks of Clugny, the reformatory ascetic efforts of Romuald (§ 98, 1) and St. Nilus the Younger, a very famous Greek recluse of Gaeta, who died in A.D. 1005, aided by the reformatory measures for the purification of the church taken by the Saxon emperors, that this unclean spirit was gradually driven out. The famous endeavours of Alfred the Great and their temporary success were borne to the grave along with himself. From A.D. 959 however, Dunstan’s reformation awakened anew in England appreciation of a desire for theological and national culture. The connection of the imperial house of Otto with Byzantium also aroused outside of Italy a longing after old classical learning. The imperial chapel founded by the brother of Otto I., Bruno the Great (§ 97, 2), became the training school of a High-German clergy, who were there carefully trained as far as the means at the disposal of that age permitted, not only in politics, but also in theological and classical studies.

§ 100.1. The degree to which =Classical Studies= were pursued
in Germany during the period of the Saxon imperial house is shown
by the works of the learned nun =Roswitha= of Gandersheim, north
of Göttingen, who died about A.D. 984. The first edition of her
works, which comprise six dramas on biblical and ecclesiastical
themes in the style of Terence, in prose interspersed with
rhymes, also eight legends, a history of Otto I., and a history
of the founding of her cloister in leonine hexameters, was
issued by the humanist Conrad Celtes, with woodcuts by Dürer
in A.D. 1501.--=Notker Labeo=, president of the cloister
school of St. Gall, who died in A.D. 1022, enriched the old
German literature by translations of the Psalms, of Aristotle’s
_Organon_, the _Moralia_ of Gregory the Great, and various
writings of Boethius [Boëthius].--In =England= the educational
efforts of =St. Dunstan= (§ 97, 4) were powerfully supported
by Bishop =Ethelwold= of Winchester, who quite in the spirit of
Alfred the Great (§ 90, 10) wrought incessantly with his pupils
for the extension and enrichment of the Anglo-Saxon literature.
Of his scholars by far the most famous was =Aelfric=, surnamed
Grammaticus, who flourished about A.D. 990. He wrote an
Anglo-Saxon Grammar, prepared a collection of homilies for all
the Sundays and festivals and a free translation from sermons of
the Latin Fathers, translated also the Old Testament heptateuch,
and wrote treatises on other portions of Scripture and on
biblical questions.[295]

§ 100.2. =Italy= produced during the second half of the century
many theologians eminent and important in their day. =Atto=,
bishop of Vercelli, who died about A.D. 960, distinguished
himself by his exegetical compilations on Paul’s epistles, and
as a homilist and a vigorous opponent of the oppressors of the
church during these rough times. Still more important was his
younger contemporary =Ratherius=, bishop of Verona, afterwards
of Liège, but repeatedly driven away from both, who died A.D. 974.
A strict and zealous reformer of clerical morals, he insisted
upon careful study of the Bible, and wrought earnestly against
the unblushing paganism of the Italian scholars of his age
as well as against all kinds of hypocrisy, superstition, and
ecclesiastical corruptions. This, and also his attachment to
the political interests of the German court, exposed him to
much persecution. Among his writings may be named _De contemptu
canonum_, _Meditationes cordis_, _Apologia sui ipsius_, _De
discordia inter ipsum et clericos_.--In =France= we meet with
=Odo of Clugny=, who died in A.D. 942, famed as a hymn writer
and homilist, and, in his _Collationum Ll. iii._, as a zealous
reprover of the corrupt morals of his age. In England and France,
=Abbo of Fleury= taught toward the end of the century. From
England, where he had been induced to go by St. Dunstan, he
returned after some years to his own cloister of Fleury, and by
his academic gifts raised its school to great renown. He wrote on
astronomy, mathematics, philosophy, and history. He also composed
a treatise on dialectics, in which he makes his appearance as
the first and most eminent precursor of the Schoolmen. Chosen
abbot of his monastery and exercising strict discipline over his
monks, he suffered a martyr’s death by the hand of a murderer in
A.D. 1004.--=Gerbert of Rheims=, afterwards Pope Sylvester II.
(§ 96, 3, 4), during his active career lived partly in France,
partly in Italy. Distinguished both for classical and Arabic
scholarship, he shone in the firmament of this dark century
as it was passing away († A.D. 1003) like a star of the first
magnitude in theology, mathematics, astronomy, and natural
science, while by the common people he was regarded as a magician.
Under him the school of Rheims reached the summit of its fame.

§ 101. THE ELEVENTH CENTURY.

During the 11th century, with the moral and spiritual elevation of the church, eager attention was again given to theological science. It was at first mainly prosecuted in the monasteries of the Cistercians and among the monks of Clugny, but afterwards at the seminaries which arose toward the end of the century. The dialectic method won more and more the upper hand in theology, and in the Eucharist controversy between Lanfranc and Berengar, as well as in the controversy between Anselm and Gaunilo about the existence of God, and between Anselm and Roscelin about the Trinity, Dogmatism obtained its first victory over Scepticism.

§ 101.1. =The Most Celebrated Schoolmen of this Century.=

1. =Fulbert= opens the list, a pupil of Gerbert, and
from A.D. 1007 Bishop of Chartres Before entering on
his episcopate he had founded at Chartres a theological
seminary. His fame spread over all the West, so that pupils
poured in upon him from every side.

2. The most important of these was =Berengar of Tours=,
afterwards a canon and teacher of the cathedral school
of his native city, and then again archdeacon at Angers.
He died in A.D. 1088. The school of Tours rose to great
eminence under him.

3. =Lanfranc=, the celebrated opponent of the last-named,
was abbot of the monastery of Bec in Normandy, and from
A.D. 1070 Archbishop of Canterbury (§ 96, 8). He died in
A.D. 1089. He wrote against Berengar _Liber de corpore et
sanguine Domini_.

4. Bishop =Hildebert of Tours=, who died in A.D. 1134, famous
as a writer of spiritual songs, was a pupil of Berengar.
But he avoided the sceptical tendencies of his teacher, and,
warned of the danger of dialectic and following the mystical
bent of his mind, he applied himself to the cultivation of
a life of faith, so that St. Bernard praised him as _tantam
columnam ecclesiæ_.

5. The monastic school of Bec, which Lanfranc had rendered
celebrated, reached the summit of its fame under his pupil
=Anselm of Canterbury=, who far excelled his teacher in
genius as well as in importance for theological science.
He was born in A.D. 1033 at Aosta in Italy, educated in the
monastery of Bec, became teacher and abbot there, was raised
in A.D. 1093 to the archiepiscopal chair of Canterbury, and
died in A.D. 1109. As a churchman he courageously defended
the independence of the church according to the principles
of Hildebrand (§ 96, 12). As a theologian he may be ranked
in respect of acuteness and profundity, speculative talent
and Christian earnestness, as a second Augustine, and
on the theological positions of that Father he based his
own. Though carrying dialectic even into his own private
devotions, there was yet present in him a vein of religious
mysticism. According to him faith is the condition of true
knowledge, _Fides præcedit intellectum_; but it is also with
him a sacred duty to raise faith to knowledge, _Credo ut
intelligam_. Only he who in respect of endowment and culture
is not capable of this intellectual activity should content
himself with simple _Veneratio_. His _Monologium_ contains
discussions on the nature of God, his _Proslogium_ proves
the being of God; his three books, _De fide Trinitatis et
de incarnatione Verbi_, develop and elaborate the doctrine
of the Trinity and Christology; while the three dialogues
_De veritate_, _De libero arbitrio_, and _De casu diaboli_
treat of the object, and the tract _Cur Deus homo?_ treats
of the subject, of soteriology. The most able, profound,
and impressive of all his writings is the last-named,
which proves the necessity of the incarnation of God in
Christ for the reconciliation of man with God. It was an
epoch-making treatise in the historical development of the
church doctrine of satisfaction on Pauline foundations.[296]
Anselm took part in the controversy of the Greeks by his
work _De processione Spiritus_ (§ 67, 4). He discussed the
question of predestination in a moderate Augustinian form in
the book, _De concordia præscientæ et prædest. et gratiæ Dei
cum libero arbitrio_. In his _Meditationes_ and _Orationes_
he gives expression to the ardent piety of his soul, as also
in the voluminous collection (426) of his letters.[297]

6. =Anselm of Laon=, surnamed Scholasticus, was the pupil
of Anselm of Canterbury. From A.D. 1076 he taught with
brilliant success at Paris, and thus laid the first
foundation of its university. Subsequently he returned
to his native city Laon, was made there archdeacon and
Scholasticus, and founded in that place a famous theological
school. He died in A.D. 1117. He composed the _Glossa
interlinearis_, a short exposition of the Vulgate between
the lines, which with Walafrid’s _Glossa ordinaria_
(§ 90, 4), became the favourite exegetical handbook of
the Middle Ages.

7. =William of Champeaux=, the proper founder of the University
of Paris, had already taught rhetoric and dialectic for
some time with great success in the cathedral school, when
the fame of the theological school of Laon led him to the
feet of Anselm. In A.D. 1108 he returned to Paris, and
had immense crowds listening to his theological lectures.
Chagrined on account of a defeat in argument at the hand
of Abælard, one of his own pupils, he retired from public
life into the old chapel of St. Victor near Paris, and there
founded a monastery under the same name for canons of the
rule of St. Augustine. He died in A.D. 1121 as Bishop of
Chalons.

8. The abbot =Guibert of Nogent=, in the diocese of Laon,
who died about A.D. 1124, a scholar of Anselm at Bec,
was a voluminous writer and, with all his own love of
the marvellous, a vigorous opponent of all the grosser
absurdities of relic and saint worship. He wrote a useful
history of the first crusade, and a work important in
its day entitled, _Liber quo ordine sermo fieri debeat_.
His great work was one in four books, _De pignoribus
Sanctorum_, against the abuses of saint and relic worship,
the exhibition of pretended parts of the Saviour’s body,
_e.g._ teeth, pieces of the foreskin, navel cord, etc.,
against the translation or distribution of the bodies
of saints, against the fraud of introducing new saints,
relics, and legends.

§ 101.2. =Berengar’s Eucharist Controversy,
A.D. 1050-1079.=--Berengar of Tours elaborated a theory of the
eucharist which is directly antagonistic to the now generally
prevalent theory of Radbert (§ 91, 3). He taught that while the
elements are changed and Christ’s body is really present, neither
the change nor the presence is substantial. The presence of His
body is rather the existence of His power in the elements, and
the change of the bread is the actual manifestation of this power
in the form of bread. The condition however of this power-presence
is not merely the consecration but also the faith of the receiver.
Without this faith the bread is an empty and impotent sign.
Such views were publicly expressed by him and his numerous
followers for a long while without causing any offence. But
when he formally stated them in a letter to his friend Lanfranc
of Bec, this churchman became Berengar’s accuser at the Synod
of Rome in A.D. 1050. The synod condemned him unheard. A second
synod of the same year held at Vercelli, before which Berengar
was to have appeared but could not because he had meanwhile
been imprisoned in France, in an outburst of fanatical fury
had the treatise of Ratramnus on the eucharist, wrongly ascribed
to Erigena, torn up and burnt, while Berengar’s doctrine was
again condemned. Meanwhile Berengar was by the intervention of
influential friends set at liberty and made the acquaintance of
the powerful papal legate Hildebrand, who, holding by the simple
Scripture doctrine that the bread and wine of the sacrament
was the body and blood of Christ, occupied probably a position
intermediate between Radbert’s grossly material and Berengar’s
dynamic hypothesis. Disinclined to favour the fanaticism of
Berengar’s opponents, Hildebrand contented himself with exacting
from him at the Synod of Tours in A.D. 1054 a solemn declaration
that he did not deny the presence of Christ in the Supper, but
regarded the consecrated elements as the body and blood of Christ.
Emboldened by this decision and still always persecuted by his
opponents as a heretic, Berengar undertook in A.D. 1059 a journey
to Rome, in order, as he hoped, by Hildebrand’s influence to
secure a distinct papal verdict in his favour. But there he found
a powerful opposition headed by the passionate and pugnacious
Cardinal Humbert (§ 67, 3). This party at the Lateran Council
in Rome in A.D. 1059, compelled Berengar, who was really very
deficient in strength of character, to cast his writings into
the fire and to swear to a confession composed by Humbert which
went beyond even Radbert’s theory in the gross corporeality of
its expressions. But in France he immediately again repudiated
this confession with bitter invectives against Rome, and
vindicated anew against Lanfranc and others his earlier views.
The bitterness of the controversy now reached its height.
Hildebrand had meanwhile, in A.D. 1073, himself become pope.
He vainly endeavoured to bring the controversy to an end by
getting Berengar to accept a confession couched in moderate
terms admitting the real presence of the body and blood in the
Supper. The opposite party did not shrink from casting suspicion
on the pope’s own orthodoxy, and so Hildebrand was obliged, in
order to avoid the loss of his great life work in a mass of minor
controversies, to insist at a second synod in Rome in A.D. 1079
upon an unequivocal and decided confession of the substantial
change of the bread. Berengar was indiscreet enough to refer
to his private conversations with the pope; but now Gregory
commanded him at once to acknowledge and abjure his error.
With fear and trembling Berengar obeyed, and the pope dismissed
him with a safe conduct, distinctly prohibiting all further
disputation. Bowed down under age and calamities, Berengar
withdrew to the island of St. Come, near Tours, where he lived
as a solitary penitent in the practice of strict asceticism, and
died at a great age in peace with the church in A.D. 1088. His
chief work is _De Cœna S. adv. Lanfr._--Continuation, § 102, 5.

§ 101.3. =Anselm’s Controversies.=

I. On the basis of his Platonic realism, Anselm of Canterbury
constructed the ontological proof of the being of God, that
there is given in man’s reason the idea of the most perfect
being to whose perfection existence also belongs. When he
laid this proof before the learned world in his _Monologium_
and _Proslogium_, the monk Gaunilo of Marmoutiers, who
was a supporter of Aristotelian realism, opposed him, and
acutely pointed out the defects of this proof in his _Liber
pro insipiente_. He so named it in reference to a remark
of Anselm, who had said that even the _insipiens_ who,
according to Psalm xiv. 1, declares in his heart that there
is no God, affords thereby a witness for the existence of
the idea, and consequently also for the existence of God.
Anselm replied in his _Apologeticus c. Gaunilonem_. And
there the controversy ended without any definite result.

II. Of more importance was Anselm’s controversy with
=Roscelin=, the Nominalist, canon of Compiègne. He in
a purely nominalistic fashion understood the idea of the
Godhead as a mere abstraction, and thought that the three
persons of the Godhead could not be _una res_, οὐσία, as
then they must all at once have been incarnate in Christ.
A synod at Soissons in A.D. 1092 condemned him as a
tritheist. He retracted, but afterwards reiterated his
earlier views. Anselm then, in his tract _De fide Trinitatis
et de incarnatione Verbi contra blasphemias Rucelini_,
proved that the drift of his argumentation tended toward
tritheism, and vindicated the trinitarian doctrine of the
church. For more than two centuries Nominalism was branded
with a suspicion of heterodoxy, until in the 14th century
a reaction set in (§ 113, 3), which restored it again to
honour.

§ 102. THE TWELFTH CENTURY.

In the 12th century dialectic and mysticism are seen contending for the mastery in the department of theology. On the one side stands Abælard, in whom the sceptical dialectic had its most eminent representative. Over against him stands St. Bernard as his most resolute opponent. Theological dialectic afterwards assumed a pre-eminently dogmatic and ecclesiastical character, entering into close relationship with mysticism. While this movement was mainly carried on in France, where the University of Paris attracted teachers and scholars from all lands, it passed over from thence into Germany, where Provost Gerhoch and his brother Arno gave it their active support in opposition to that destructive sort of dialectic that was then spreading around them. Although the combination of dogmatic dialectic and mysticism had for a long time no formal recognition, it ultimately secured the approval of the highest ecclesiastical authorities.

§ 102.1. =The Contest on French Soil.=

I. =The Dialectic Side of the Gulf.=--=Peter Abælard=, superior
to all his contemporaries in acuteness, learning, dialectic
power, and bold freethinking, but proud and disputatious,
was born at Palais in Brittany in A.D. 1079. His first
teacher in philosophy was Roscelin. Afterwards he entered
the school of William of Champeaux at Paris, the most
celebrated dialectician of his times. Having defeated
his master in a public disputation, he founded a school at
Melun near Paris, where thousands of pupils flocked to him.
In order to be nearer Paris, he moved his school to Corbeil;
then to the very walls of Paris on Mount St. Genoveva;
and ceased not to overwhelm William with humiliations,
until his old teacher retreated from the field. In order
to secure still more brilliant success, he began to study
theology under the Schoolman Anselm of Laon. But very soon
the ambitious scholar thought himself superior also to this
master. Relying upon his dialectical endowments, he took
a bet without further preparation to expound the difficult
prophet Ezekiel. He did it indeed to the satisfaction of
scholars, but Anselm refused to allow him to continue his
lectures. Abælard now returned to Paris, where he gathered
around him a great number of enthusiastic pupils. Canon
Fulbert appointed him teacher of his beautiful and talented
niece Heloise. He won her love, and they were secretly
married. She then denied the marriage in order that he
might not be debarred from the highest offices of the
church. Persisting in this denial, her relatives dealt
severely with her, and Abælard had her placed in the nunnery
of Argenteuil. Fulbert in his fury had Abælard seized during
the night and emasculated, so that he might be disqualified
for ecclesiastical preferment. Overwhelmed with shame, he
fled to the monastery of St. Denys, and there in A.D. 1119
took the monastic vow. Heloise took the veil at Argenteuil.
But even at St. Denys Abælard was obliged by the eager
entreaties of former scholars to resume his lectures. His
free and easy treatment of the church doctrine and his
haughty spirit aroused many enemies against him, who at
the Synod of Soissons in A.D. 1121 compelled him before the
papal legate to cast into the fire his treatise _De Unitate
et Trinitate divina_, and had him committed to a monastic
prison. By the intercession of some friends he was soon
again set free, and returned to St. Denys. But when he
made the discovery that Dionysius at Paris was not the
Areopagite the persecution of the monks drove him into
a forest near Troyes. There too his scholars followed him
and made him resume his lectures. His colony grew up under
his hands into the famous abbey of the Paraclete. Finding
even there no rest, he made over the abbey of the Paraclete
to Heloise, who had not been able to come to terms with
her insubordinate nuns at Argenteuil. He himself now became
abbot of the monastery of St. Gildasius at Ruys in Brittany,
and, after in vain endeavouring for eight years to restore
the monastic discipline, he again in A.D. 1136 resumed
his office of teacher and lectured at St. Genoveva near
Paris with great success. He wrote an ethical treatise,
“_Scito te ipsum_,” issued a new and enlarged edition of
his _Theologia christiana_, now extant as the incomplete
_Introductio ad theologiam_ in three books, and composed
a _Dialogus inter Philosophum, Judæum et Christianum_, in
which the heathen philosophers and poets of antiquity are
ranked almost as high as the prophets and apostles. In _Sic
et Non_, “Yes and No,” a collection of extracts from the
Fathers under the various heads of doctrine contradictory
of one another, the traditional theology was held up to
contempt.

§ 102.2.

=Abælard= maintained, in opposition to the
Augustinian-Anselmian theory, that faith preceded
knowledge, that only what we comprehend is to be believed.
He did indeed intend that his dialectic should be used not
for the overthrow but for the establishment of the church
doctrine. He proceeded, however, from doubt as the principle
of all knowledge, regarding all church dogmas as problems
which must be proved before they can be believed: _Dubitando
enim ad inquisitionem venimus, inquirendo veritatem
percipimus_. He thus reduced faith to a mere probability
and measured the content of faith by the rule of subjective
reason. This was most glaring in the case of the trinitarian
doctrine, which with him approached Sabellian modalism. God
as omnipotent is to be called Father, as all wise the Son,
as loving and gracious the Spirit; and so the incarnation
becomes a merely temporal and dynamic immanence of the Logos
in the man Jesus. The significance of the ethical element
in Christianity quite overshadowed that of the dogmatic. He
taught that all fundamental truths of Christianity had been
previously proclaimed by philosophers and poets of Greece
and Rome, who were scarcely less inspired than the prophets
and apostles, the special service of the latter consisting
in giving currency to these truths among the uncultured. He
turns with satisfaction from the theology of the Fathers to
that of the apostles, and from that again to the religion of
Jesus, whom he represents rather as a reformer introducing
a pure morality than as a founder of a religious system.
Setting aside Anselm’s theory of satisfaction, he regards
the redemption and reconciliation of man as consisting in
the awakening in sinful man, by means of the infinite love
displayed by Christ’s teaching and example, by His life,
sufferings and death upon the cross, a responding love of
such fulness and power, that he is thereby freed from the
dominion of sin and brought into the glorious liberty of
the children of God.[298]--Abælard’s fame and following
grew in a wonderful manner from day to day; but also
powerful opponents dragged his heresies into light and
vigorously combated them. The most important of these were
the Cistercian monk William of Thierry and St. Bernard, who
called attention to the dangerous tendency of his teaching.
St. Bernard dealt personally with the heretic, but when
he failed in converting him, he appeared in A.D. 1141 at
the Synod of Sens as his accuser. The synod condemned as
heretical a series of statements culled from his writings
by Bernard. Abælard appealed to the pope, but even his
friends at Rome, among whom was Card. Guido de Castella,
afterwards Pope Cœlestine II., could not close their
eyes to his manifest heterodoxies. His friendship for
Arnold of Brescia also told against him at Rome (§ 108, 7).
Innocent II. therefore excommunicated Abælard and his
supporters, condemned his writings to be burnt and himself
to be confined in a monastery. Abælard found an asylum
with the abbot Peter the Venerable of Clugny, who not
only effected his reconciliation with Bernard, but also,
on the ground of his _Apologia s. Confessio fidei_, in
which he submitted to the judgment of the church, obtained
permission from the pope to pass his last days in peace at
Clugny. During this time he composed his _Hist. calamitatum
Abælardi_, an epistolary autobiography, which, though
not free from vanity and bitterness, is yet worthy to be
ranked with Augustine’s “Confessions” for its unreserved
self-accusation and for the depth of self-knowledge which
it reveals. He died in A.D. 1142, in the monastery of
St. Marcellus at Chalons, where he had gone in quest of
health. He was buried in the abbey of the Paraclete, where
Heloise laid on his coffin the letter of absolution of Peter
of Clugny. Twenty-two years later Heloise herself was laid
in the same quiet resting place.[299]

§ 102.3.

II. =The Mystic Side of the Gulf.=--Abælard’s most famous
opponent was =St. Bernard of Clairvaux= (§ 98, 1), born
in A.D. 1091 at Fontaines near Dijon in Burgundy, died in
A.D. 1153, a man of such extraordinary influence on his
generation as the world seldom sees. Venerated as a miracle
worker, gifted with an eloquence that carried everything
before it (_doctor mellifluus_), he was the protector and
reprover of the Vicar of God, the peacemaker among the
princes, the avenger of every wrong. His genuine humility
made him refuse all high places. His enthusiasm for the
hierarchy did not hinder him from severely lashing clerical
abuses. It was his word that roused the hearts of men
throughout all Europe to undertake the second crusade,
and that won many heretics and schismatics back to the
bosom of the church. Having his conversation in heaven,
leading a life of study, meditation, prayer, and ecstatic
contemplation, he had also dominion over the earth, and by
counsel, exhortation, and exercise of discipline exerted
a quickening and healthful influence on all the relations
of life. His theological tendency was in the direction
of contemplative mysticism, with hearty submission to the
doctrine of the church. Like Abælard, but from the opposite
side, he came into conflict with the theory of Anselm;
for the ideal of theology with him was not the development
of faith into knowledge by means of thought, but rather
the enlightenment of faith in the way of holiness. Bernard
was not at all an enemy of science, but he rather saw in
the dialectical hair-splitting of Abælard, which grudged
not to cut down the main props of saving truth for the
glorification of its own art, the overthrow of all true
theology and the destruction of all the saving efficacy of
faith. Heart theology founded on heart piety, nourished and
strengthened by prayer, meditation, spiritual illumination
and holiness, was for him the only true theology. _Tantum
Deus cognoscitur, quantum diligitur. Orando facilius quam
disputando et dignius Deus quæritur et invenitur._ The Bible
was his favourite reading, and in the recesses of the forest
he spent much time in prayer and study of the Scriptures.
But in ecstasy (_excessus_) which consists in withdrawal
from sensible phenomena and becoming temporarily dead to
all earthly relations, the soul of the pious Christian
is able to rise into the immediate presence of God, so
that “_more angelorum_” it reaches a blessed vision and
enjoyment of the Divine glory and that perfect love which
loves itself and all creatures only in God. Yet even he
confesses that this highest stage of abstraction was only
attained unto by him occasionally and partially through
God’s special grace. Bernard’s mysticism is most fully set
forth in his eighty-six Sermons on the first two chapters
of the Song of Solomon and in the tract _De diligendo Deo_.
In his controversy with Abælard he wrote his _Tractatus de
erroribus Petri Abælardi_. To the department of dogmatics
belongs _De gratia et libero arbitrio_; and to that of
history, the biography of his friend Malachias (§ 149, 5).
The most important of his works is _De Consideratione_,
in 5 bks., in which with the affection of a friend, the
earnestness of a teacher, and the authority of a prophet,
he sets before Pope Eugenius III. the duties and dangers
of his high position. He was also one of the most brilliant
hymn writers of the Middle Ages. Alexander III. canonized
him in A.D. 1173, and Pius VIII. in A.D. 1830 enrolled him
among the _doctores ecclesiæ_ (§ 47, 22 c).--Soon after the
controversy with Abælard had been brought to a close by the
condemnation of the church, Bernard was again called upon
to resist the pretensions of dialectic. Gilbert de la Porrée
(Porretanus), teacher of theology at Paris, who became
Bishop of Poitiers in A.D. 1142 and died in A.D. 1154,
in his commentary on the theological writings of Boëthius
(§ 47, 23) ascribed reality to the universal term “God”
in such a way that instead of a Trinity we seemed to have
a Quaternity. At the Synod of Rheims, A.D. 1148, under
the presidency of Pope Eugenius III., Bernard appeared as
accuser of Porretanus. Gilbert’s doctrine was condemned,
but he himself was left unmolested.[300]

§ 102.4.

III. =Bridging the Gulf from the Side of Mysticism.=--At the
school of the monastery of St. Victor in Paris, founded
by William of Champeaux after his defeat at the hands
of Abælard, an attempt was made during the first half of
the 12th century to combine mysticism and dialectic in the
treatment of theology. The peaceable heads of this school
would indeed have nothing to do with the speculations of
Abælard and his followers which tended to overthrow the
mysteries of the faith. But the mystics of St. Victor
made an important concession to the dialecticians by
entering with as much energy upon the scientific study
and construction of dogmatics as they did upon the devout
examination of Scripture and mystical theology. They
exhibited a speculative power and a profundity of thought
that won the hearty admiration of the subtlest of the
dialecticians. By far the most celebrated of this school
was =Hugo of St. Victor=. Descended from the family
of the Count of Halberstadt, born in A.D. 1097, nearly
related to St. Bernard, honoured by his contemporaries
as _Alter Augustinus_ or _Lingua Augustini_, Hugo was one
of the most profound thinkers of the Middle Ages. Having
enjoyed a remarkably complete course of training, he was
enthusiastically devoted to the pursuit of science, and,
endowed with rich and deep spirituality, he exerted a most
healthful and powerful influence upon his own and succeeding
ages, although church and science had to mourn their loss by
his early death in A.D. 1141. In his _Eruditio didascalica_
we have in 3 bks. an encyclopædic sketch of all human
knowledge as a preparation to the study of theology, and
in other 3 bks. an introduction to the Bible and church
history.[301] His _Summa sententiarum_ is an exposition of
dogmatics on patristic lines, an ecclesiastical counterpart
of Abælard’s _Sic et Non_. The ripest and most influential
of all his works, and the most independent, is his _De
sacramentis christ. fidei_, in 2 bks., in which he treats
of the whole contents of dogmatics from the point of view
of the Sacraments (§ 104, 2). His exegetical works are less
important and less original. His mysticism is set forth _ex
professo_ in his _Soliloquium de arrha animæ_ and in the
series of three tracts, _De arca morali_, _De arca mystica_,
and _De vanitate mundi_. He makes Noah’s ark the symbol of
the church as well as of the individual soul which journeys
over the billows of the world to God, and, by the successive
stages of _lectio_, _cogitatio_, _meditatio_, _oratio_,
and _operatio_ reaches to _contemplatio_ or the vision of
God.--Hugo’s pupil, and from A.D. 1162 the prior of his
convent, was the Scotchman =Richard St. Victor=, who died
in A.D. 1173. With less of the dialectic faculty than
his master--though this too is shown in his 6 bks. _De
trinitate_, a scholastic exposition of the _Cognitio_
or _Fides quæ creditur_--he mainly devoted his energies
to the development on the mystico-contemplative side of
the “_Affectus_” or _Fides qua creditur_, which aims at
the vision and enjoyment of God. This he represents as
reached by the three stages of contemplation, distinguished
as _mentis dilatatio_, _sublevatio_, and _alienatio_.
Among his mystical tracts, mostly mystical expositions
of Scripture passages, the most important are, _De
præparatione animæ ad contemplationem, s. de xii.
patriarchis_, and the 4 bks. _De gratia contemplationis
s. de arca mystica_. These are also known as _Benjamin
minor_ and _B. major_. In Richard there appears the first
indications of a misunderstanding with the dialecticians
which, among the late Victorines, and especially in the
case of Walter of St. Victor, took the form of vehement
hostility.

§ 102.5.

IV. =Bridging the Gulf from the Side of Dialectics.=--After
Abælard’s condemnation theological dialectics came more
and more to be associated with the church doctrine and to
approach more or less nearly to a friendly alliance with
mysticism. Hugo’s writings did much to bring this about.
The following are the most important Schoolmen of this
tendency.

1. The Englishman =Robert Pulleyn=, teacher at Oxford
and Paris, afterwards cardinal and papal chancellor
at Rome, who died about A.D. 1150. His chief work is
_Sententiarum Ll. VIII._ Though very famous in its day,
it was soon cast into the shade by the Lombard’s work.

2. =Petrus [Peter] Lombardus [Lombard]=, born at Novara
in Lombardy, a scholar of Abælard, but powerfully
influenced by St. Bernard and Hugo St. Victor, was
Bishop of Paris from A.D. 1159 till his death in
A.D. 1164. He published a dogmatic treatise under
the title of _Sententiarum Ll. IV._; of which Bk. 1
treated of God, Bk. 2 of Creatures, Bk. 3 of Redemption,
Bk. 4 of the Sacraments and the Last Things. For
centuries this was the textbook in theological
seminaries and won for its author the designation
of _Magister Sententiarum_. He himself compared this
gift laid on the altar of the church to the widow’s
mite, but the book attained a place of supreme
importance in mediæval theology, had innumerable
commentaries written on it and was officially authorized
as the theological textbook by the Lateran Council of
A.D. 1215. It is indeed a well arranged collection of
the doctrinal deliverances of the Fathers, in which
apparent contradictions are dialectically resolved, with
great skill, and wrought up together into an articulate
system, but from want of independence and occasional
indecision or withholding of any definite opinion, it
falls behind Hugo’s _Summa_ and Robert’s _Sentences_.
It had this advantage, however, that it gave freer scope
to scholars and teachers, and so was more stimulating as
a textbook for academic use. The Lombard’s works include
a commentary on the Psalms and _Catenæ_ on the Pauline
Epistles.

3. The Frenchman =Peter of Poitiers= (_Pictaviensis_), one
of the ablest followers of the Lombard, was chancellor
of the University of Paris toward the end of the century.
He wrote 5 bks. of Sentences or Distinctions, which in
form and matter are closely modelled on the work of his
master.

4. The most gifted of all the Summists of the 12th
century was the German =Alanus ab Insulis=, born at
Lille or Ryssel, lat. _Insulæ_. After teaching long
at Paris, he entered the Cistercian order, and died
at an advanced age at Clairvaux in A.D. 1203. A man
of extensive erudition and a voluminous writer, he was
called _Doctor universalis_. He wrote an allegorical
poem _Anticlaudianus_, which describes how reason and
faith in union with all the virtues restore human nature
to perfection. His _Regulæ de s. theologia_ give a
short outline of theology and morals in 125 paradoxical
sentences which are tersely expounded. A short but able
summary of the Christian faith is given in the 5 bks.
_De arte catholicæ fidei_. This work is characterized
by the use of a mathematical style of demonstration,
like that of the later school of Wolf, and an avoidance
of references to patristic authorities, which would have
little weight with Mohammedans and heretics. He is thus
rather an opponent than a representative of dialectic
scholasticism. The _Summa quadripartita c. Hæreticos
sui temporis_ ascribed to him was written by another
Alanus.

§ 102.6. =The Controversy on German Soil.=--The provost
=Gerhoch= and his brother, the dean =Arno= of Reichersberg
in Bavaria, were representatives of the school of St. Victor
as mediators between dialectics and mysticism. In A.D. 1150
Gerhoch addressed a memorial to Eugenius III., _De corrupto
ecclesiæ statu_, and afterwards he published _De investigatione
Antichristi_. He found the antichrist in the papal schisms of
his times, in the ambition and covetousness of popes, in the
corruptibility of the curia, in the manifold corruptions of the
church, and especially in the spread of a dialectic destructive
of all the mysteries of the faith. The controversy in which
both of these brothers took most interest was that occasioned
by the revival of Adoptionism in consequence of the teaching
of French dialecticians, especially Abælard and Gilbert. It
led to the formulating of the Christological doctrine in such
a form as prepared the way for the later Lutheran theories
of the _Communicatio idiomatum_ and the _Ubiquitas corporis
Christi_ (§ 141, 9).--In South Germany, conspicuously in the
schools of Bamberg, Freisingen, and Salzburg, the dialectic of
Abælard, Gilbert, and the Lombard was predominant. Its chief
representatives were =Folmar of Triefenstein= in Franconia and
Bishop =Eberhard of Bamberg=. The controversy arose over the
doctrine of the eucharist. Folmar had maintained like Berengar
that not the actually glorified body of Christ is present in
the sacrament, but only the spiritual substance of His flesh
and blood, without muscles, sinews and bones. Against this gross
Capernaitic view (John vi. 52, 59) Gerhoch maintained that the
eucharistic body is the very resurrection body of Christ, the
substance of which is a glorified corporeity without flesh and
blood in a carnal sense, without sinews and bones. The bishop
of Bamberg took offence at his friend’s bold rejection of the
doctrine approved by the church, and so Folmar modified his
position to the extent of admitting that there was on the altar
not only the true, but also the whole body in the perfection
of its human substance, under the form of bread and wine.
But nevertheless both he and Abælard adhered to their radical
error, a dialectical dismemberment of the two natures of Christ,
according to which the divinity and humanity, the Son of God and
the Son of man, were two strictly separate existences. Christ,
they taught, is according to His humanity Son of God in no other
way than a pious man is, _i.e._ by adoption; but according to His
Divine nature He is like the Father omnipresent, omnipotent, and
omniscient. In respect of His human nature it must still be said
by Him, “My Father is greater than I.” He dwells, however, bodily
in heaven, and is shut in by and confined to it. Only His Divine
nature can claim _Latria_ or _adoratio_, worship. Only _Dulia,
cultus_, reverence, such as is due to saints, images, and relics,
should be given to His body and blood upon the altar. Gerhoch’s
doctrine of the Supper, on the other hand, is summed up in
the proposition: He who receives the flesh of the Logos (_Caro
Verbi_) receives also therewith the Logos in His flesh (_Verbum
carnis_). Folmar and Eberhard denounced this as Eutychian heresy.
A conference at Bamberg in A.D. 1158, where Gerhoch stood alone
as representative of his views, ended by his opponents declaring
that he had been convicted of heresy. In A.D. 1162 a Council
at Friesach in Carinthia, under the presidency of Archbishop
Eberhard of Salzburg, reached the same conclusion.

§ 102.7. =Theologians of a Pre-eminently Biblical and
Ecclesiastico-Practical Tendency.=

1. =Alger of Liège=, teacher of the cathedral school there,
was one of the most important German theologians in the
beginning of the 12th century. He resigned his appointment
in A.D. 1121, to spend his last years in the monastery of
Clugny, in order to enjoy the company and friendship of
its abbot, Peter the Venerable; and there he died about
A.D. 1130. The school of Liège, in which he had himself
been trained up in the high church Cluniac doctrine there
prevalent, flourished greatly during his rule of twenty
years. His chief works are _De Sacramentis corporis et
sanguinis Domini_ in 3 bks., distinguished by acuteness
and lucidity, and a controversial tract on the lines of
Radbert against Berengar’s doctrine condemned by the church.
In his _De misericordia et justitia_ he treats of church
discipline with circumspection, clearness, and decision.

2. =Rupert of Deutz=, more than any mediæval scholar before
or after, created an enthusiasm for the study of Scripture
as the people’s book for all times, the field in which the
precious treasure is hid, to be found by any one whose eyes
are made sharp by faith. He was a contemporary and fellow
countryman of Alger, and died in A.D. 1135. Though he
refers to the Hebrew and Greek texts, he cares less for
the literal than for the speculative-dogmatic and mystical
sense discovered by allegorical exegesis. In his principal
work, _De trinitate et operilus ejus_, he sets forth in
3 bks. the creation work of the Father, in 30 bks. the
revealing and redeeming work of the Son, from the fall
to the death of Christ, and in the remaining 9 books the
sanctifying work of the Holy Spirit, from the resurrection
of Christ to the general resurrection. He maintains in
opposition to Anselm (who was afterwards followed by Thomas
Aquinas) that Christ would have become incarnate even if
men had not sinned (a view which appears in Irenæus, and
afterwards in Alexander Hales, Duns Scotus, John Wessel,
and others). In regard to the Lord’s Supper he maintained
the doctrine of consubstantiation, and he taught like pope
Gelasius (§ 58, 2) that the relation of the heavenly and
earthly in the eucharist is quite analogous to that of the
two natures in Christ.[302]

3. The Benedictine =Hervæus= in the cloister of Bourg-Dieu,
who died about A.D. 1150, was distinguished for deep piety
and zealous study of Scripture and the fathers. He wrote
commentaries on Isaiah and on the Pauline Epistles, the
latter of which was ascribed to Anselm and so published
among his works.

§ 102.8.

4. =John of Salisbury=, _Johannes Parvus Sarisberiensis_,
was a theologian of a thoroughly practical tendency, though
a diligent student of Abælard and an able classical scholar,
specially familiar with the writings of Cicero. As the
trusted friend of Hadrian IV. he was often sent from England
on embassies to the pope. In Becket’s struggle against the
encroachments of the Crown upon the rights of the church
(§ 96, 16) he stood by the primate’s side as his faithful
counsellor and fellow soldier, wrote an account of his
life and martyrdom, and laboured diligently to secure his
canonization. He was made Bishop of Chartres in A.D. 1176,
and died there in A.D. 1180. His works, distinguished
by singularly wide reading and a pleasing style, are
pre-eminently practical. In his _Policraticus s. de
nugis Curialium et vestigiis Philosophorum_ he combats
the _nugæ_ of the hangers on at court with theological
and philosophical weapons in a well balanced system of
ecclesiastico-political and philosophico-theological
ethics. His _Metalogicus_ in 4 bks. is a polemic against
the prostitution of science by the empty formalism of the
schoolmen. His 329 Epistles are of immense importance for
the literary and scientific history of his times.

5. =Walter of St. Victor=, Richard’s successor as prior
of that monastery, makes his appearance about A.D. 1130,
as the author of a vigorous polemic against dialectic
scholasticism, in which he combats especially Christological
heresies and spares the idolized Lombard just as little
as the condemned Abælard.[303] He combats with special
eagerness a new heresy springing from Abælard and developed
by the Lombard which he styles “Nihilism,” because by
denying the independence of the human nature of Christ
it teaches that Christ in so far as He is man is not an
_Aliquid_, _i.e._ an individual.

6. =Innocent III.= is deserving of a place here both on
account of his rich theological learning and on account
of the earnestness and depth of the moral and religious
view of life which he presents in his writings. The most
celebrated of these are _De contemtu mundi_ and 6 bks.
_Mysteria evang. legis ac sacramenti Eucharistitæ_, and
during his pontificate, his epistles and sermons.

§ 102.9. =Humanist Philosophers.=--While Abælard was striving
to prove Christianity the religion of reason, and for this was
condemned by the church, his contemporary =Bernard Sylvester=,
teacher of the school of Chartres, a famous nursery of classical
studies, was seeking to shake himself free of any reference to
theology and the church. Satisfied with Platonism as a genuinely
spiritual religion, and feeling therefore no personal need of the
church and its consolations, he carefully avoided any allusion
to its dogmas, and so remained in high repute as a teacher
and writer. His treatise, _De mundi universitates. Megacosmus
et Microcosmus_, in dialogue form discussing in a dilettante,
philosophizing style natural phenomena, half poetry, half prose,
was highly popular in its day. It fared very differently with
his accomplished and like-minded scholar =William of Conches=.
The vehemence with which he declared himself a Catholic Christian
and not a heathen Academic aroused suspicion. Though in his
_Philosophia mundi_, sometimes erroneously attributed to Honorius
of Autun, he studiously sought to avoid any contradiction of the
biblical and ecclesiastical theory of the world, he could not
help in his discussion of the origin of man characterizing the
literal interpretation of the Scripture history of creation as
peasant faith. The book fell into the hands of the abbot William
of Thierry, who accused its author to St. Bernard. The opposition
soon attained to such dimensions that he was obliged to publish
a formal recantation and in a new edition to remove everything
objectionable.

§ 103. THE THIRTEENTH CENTURY.

Scholasticism took a new departure in the beginning of the 13th century, and by the middle of the century it reached its climax. Material for its development was found in the works of Aristotle and his Moslem expositors, and this was skilfully used by highly gifted members of the Franciscan and Dominican orders so that all opposition to the scholastic philosophy was successfully overborne. The Franciscans Alexander of Hales and Bonaventura stand side by side with the brilliant Dominican teachers Albert the Great and Thomas Aquinas. As reformers of the scholastic philosophy from different points of view we meet with Raimund Lull and Roger Bacon. There were also numerous representatives of this simple biblical and practical tendency devoted to Scripture study and the pursuit of the Christian life; and during this period we find the first developments of German mysticism properly so called.