History of Human Society

by Frank W. Blackmar

The scholastic philosophers did much to sharpen reason and to develop the mind, but they failed for want of data. Indeed, this has been the common failure of man, for in the height of civilization men speculate without sufficient knowledge. Even in the beginning of scientific thought, for lack of facts, men spent much of their time in speculation. The scholastic philosophers were led to consider many unimportant questions which could not be well settled. They asked the church authorities why the sacramental wine and bread turned into blood and flesh, and what was the necessity of the atonement? And in considering the nature of pure being they asked: "How many angels can dance at once on the point of a needle?" and "In moving from point to point, do angels pass through intervening space?" They asked seriously whether "angels had stomachs," and "if a starving ass were placed exactly midway between two stacks of hay would he ever move?" But it must not be inferred that these people were as ridiculous as they appear, for each question had its serious side. Having no assistance from science, they fell single-handed upon dogmatism; yet many times they busied themselves with unprofitable discussions, and some of them became the advocates of numerous doctrines and dogmas which had a tendency to confuse knowledge, although in defense of which wits were sharpened.

Lord Bacon, in a remarkable passage, has characterized the scholastic philosophers as follows:

"This kind of degenerate learning did chiefly reign among the schoolmen, who—having sharp and strong wits and abundance of leisure and small variety of reading, but their wits being shut up in the cells of a few authors (chiefly Aristotle, their dictator) as their persons were shut up in the cells of monasteries and colleges, and having little history, either of nature or of time—did, out of no great quantity of matter and infinite agitation of wit, spin out unto us those laborious webs of learning which are extant in their books. For the wit and mind of man, if it work upon matter which is the contemplation of the creatures of God, worketh according to the stuff and is limited thereby; but if it work upon itself, as the spider worketh its web, then it is endless, and brings forth indeed cobwebs of learning, admirable for the fineness of thread and work, but of no substance or profit."[[1]]

Scholasticism, as the first phase of the revival of learning, though overshadowed by tradition and mediaeval dogmatism, showed great earnestness of purpose in ascertaining the truth by working "the wit and mind of man"; but it worked not "according to the stuff," and, having little to feed upon, it produced only speculations of truth and indications of future possibilities. There were many bright men among the scholastic philosophers, especially in the thirteenth century, who left their impress upon the age; yet scholasticism itself was affected by dogmatism and short-sightedness, and failed to utilize the means at its hand for the improvement of learning. It exercised a tyranny over all mental endeavor, for the reason that it was obliged in all of its efforts to carry through all of its reasoning the heavy weight of dogmatic theology. Whatever else it attempted, it could not shake itself free from this incubus of learning, through a great system of organized knowledge, which hung upon the thoughts and lives of men and attempted to explain all things in every conceivable way.

But to show that independent thinking was a crime one has only to refer to the results of the knowledge of Roger Bacon, who advanced his own methods of observation and criticism. Had the scholastics been able to accept what he clearly pointed out to them, namely, that reason can advance only by finding, through observation, new material upon which to work, science might have been active a full century in advance of what it was. He laid the foundation of experimental science, and pointed out the only way in which the revival of learning could be made permanent, but his voice was unheeded by those around him, and it remained for the philosophers of succeeding generations to estimate his real worth.

Cathedral and Monastic Schools.—There were two groups of schools under the management of the church, known as the cathedral and monastic schools. The first represented the schools that had developed in the cathedrals for the sons of lay members of the church; the second, those in the monasteries that were devoted largely to the education of the ministry. To understand fully the position of these schools it is necessary to go back a little and refer to the educational forces of Europe. For a long period after Alexandria had become established as a great centre of learning, Athens was really the centre of education in the East, and this city held her sway in educational affairs down to the second century. The influence of the traditions of great teachers and the encouragement and endowments given by emperors kept up a school at Athens, to which flocked the youth of the land who desired a superior education.

Finally, when the great Roman Empire joined to itself the Greek culture, there sprang up what was known as the Greek and Roman schools, or Graeco-Roman schools, although Rome was not without its centre of education at the famous Athenaeum. In these Graeco-Roman schools were taught grammar, rhetoric, and dialectic, music, arithmetic, geometry, and astronomy. The grammar of that day frequently included language, criticism, history, literature, metre; the dialectic considered logic, metaphysics, and ethics; while rhetoric contemplated the fitting of the youth for public life and for the law.

But these schools, though dealing in real knowledge for a time, gradually declined, chiefly on account of the declining moral powers of the empire and the relaxation of intellectual activity, people thinking more of ease and luxury and the power of wealth than of actual accomplishment. The internal disorganization, unjust taxation, and unjust rule of the empire had also a tendency to undermine education. The coming of the barbarians, with their honest, illiterate natures, had its influence, likewise, in overthrowing the few schools that remained.

The rise of Christianity, which supposed that all pagan literature and pagan knowledge were of the devil, and hence to be suppressed, opposed secular teaching, and tended to dethrone these schools. Constantine's effort to unite the church and state tended for a while to perpetuate secular institutions. But the pagan schools passed away; the philosophy of the age had run its course until it had become a hollow assumption, a desert of words, a weary round of speculation without vitality of expression; and the activity of the sophists in these later times narrowed all literary courses until they dwindled into mere matters of form. Perhaps, owing to its force, power, and dignity, the Roman law retained a vital position in the educational curriculum. The school at Athens was suppressed in 529 by Justinian, because, as it had been claimed, it was tainted with Oriental philosophy and allied with Egyptian magic, and hence could not develop ethical standards.

It is easy to observe how the ideas of Christian learning came into direct competition with the arrogant self-assumption and the hollowness of the selfish teachings of the old Graeco-Roman schools. The Christian doctrine, advocating the development of the individual life, intimate relations with God, the widening of social functions, with its teachings of humility, and humanity, could not tolerate the instruction given in these schools. Moreover, the Christian doctrine of education consisted, on the one hand, in preparing for the future life, and on the other, in the preparation of Christian ministers to teach this future life. As might be expected, when narrowed to this limit, Christian education had its dwarfing influence. If salvation were an important thing and salvation were to be obtained only by the denial of the life of this world, then there would be no object in perpetuating learning, no attempt to cultivate the mind, no tendency to develop the whole man on account of his moral and intellectual worth. The use of secular books was everywhere discouraged. As a result the instruction of the religious schools was of a very meagre nature.