But here, also, the divine impulse from above encountered the usual partial or entire resistance from below. Accordingly, this new living wisdom, which, in its essence, is one with life, and which, therefore, the more it is developed only unfolds this unity the more universally and the more immutably, was not, at the first, universally adopted, or did not become every where predominant. Moreover, even where it was received, and its authority acknowledged, its reception was often little more than external. It was not admitted as a living principle into all the depths of the soul, or impressed on all the habits and tendencies of the mind [geist]. And even where, in some degree at least, it was adopted in the inner man with full and sincere love, it was often nothing more than an undeveloped germ of the future and of a higher life. Isolated by itself, and standing apart, it remained shut up within the inmost bosom, without at the same time penetrating, reanimating, and giving a new life and shape to all the other life-elements of the consciousness and the productions of human science.
Thus, then, it was only too possible for error to find its entrance even here also. And it is remarkable that both its principal forms, such as in varying shapes the history of philosophy is constantly presenting to us in the different epochs of its progress, here again most distinctly present themselves with all the features of their intellectual physiognomy plainly marked, and with the still more obvious contrast of their intrinsic diversity. A philosophy of nature more or less visionary and fanciful was the common basis of the various Gnostic sects. With their long series of imaginary emanations from the Deity, resembling in no slight degree the old heathen genealogies of the gods, they would, had they triumphed, have converted Christianity into a similar mythology, though of a more philosophical character. In the Arians, on the contrary, and other kindred sects before and after them, we recognize rather the spirit of rationalism, which, dwelling on some point of life, or theory, with a show of rigor and accuracy, while, apparently, it disputes only about words, is, in fact, undermining the foundation of the most essential ideas.
All these parties, however, as they originated, so they also disappeared, within the first five or eight centuries of our era. It was, therefore, impossible for their pernicious influence to gain a deep hold of life. At least it was neither universal nor permanent. Yet by them the ardor of a first love was cooled. And sad, indeed, has been the loss as regards the fullness of living energy, and even in respect of profounder wisdom.
The history of the middle ages again presents a rare and singular phenomenon. One great mind and writer of antiquity, whose influence in his own day was far from extensive, became at this date, in a most remarkable manner, the problem and center of scientific inquiry. For several centuries the human mind was laboriously engaged in disputing about the philosophy of Aristotle. And although men did not understand it—not, at least, its deeper meaning, for they lacked the first and most essential qualifications, and also the requisite means for such a purpose—this apparently aimless disputation, and this unsolved problem, was, nevertheless, not without great and manifold influence on their own and the following ages. It has had a permanent effect on the whole frame of man’s life and being.
Of the two wholly different aspects which, as we have already so often remarked, the philosophy of Aristotle presents, it was probably not its fruits of rationalism (for, at this period, such were generally regarded as forbidden) that throughout the great part of the then civilized world excited so incredible a fondness for this all-absorbing and all-understanding system. Its attraction lay rather in some great and mysterious knowledge of nature. And the desire for these intellectual treasures was not a little heightened by the fact, that, in general, they were inaccessible.
In the little intercourse subsisting, at this period, between distant nations and lands, and the almost total separation of the East from the West, it was only through the Arabic versions, or Latin translations molded again upon these, that any knowledge of this philosophy could be drawn. This must have led, it is obvious, to a wide deviation from the true sense and critical spirit of the author. Its original aim must have been generally missed. For, however highly we may be disposed to estimate the intellectual merits of the Arabians, as writers of their native history, or in poetry, or in any other science, they are notoriously deficient in the true critical spirit. Their total and universal want, in this respect, is especially evident when they are compared with the Greeks, among whom this critical acuteness, whether false or true, sprung up and reached its greatest height.
Strange, no doubt, and singular is it at first sight, to view this old master of philosophical thought and science, who, on the whole, is so perfectly heathen, suddenly received among the medieval theologians, and taking, as it were, his seat, and giving his voice among them. Still, if men of great mental powers and authority sought to make themselves masters of the whole matter—both of the much-disputed works of this writer, this Aristotle, so strangely disguised in his new motley dress of Arabic Latin, and also of the voluminous labors bestowed upon him—we must look upon this procedure as analogous to that of the thoughtful physician, who, in the midst of a wide-spread pestilence and inevitable contagion, prefers to inoculate it himself, in order the more safely to treat and to cure it. In short, as the case really stands, we must look on these illustrious men in two distinct lights. On the one hand we must see in them the Church’s venerable teachers, and the sagacious and discriminating theologians of the day; on the other, the scholastic interpreters of Aristotle, who had now become a necessary evil for the Christian middle ages.
This, however, and whatever else was the matter and object of such subtile disputes, was too soon forgotten. In these scholastic contests, after the fashion of the day, the combatants, horse and man, were armed cap-a-piè, incased and disguised in logical coats of mail, composed of countless rings of thought and chains of ideas. With this heavy panoply, the great object was to heave their antagonist out of the saddle. Often they recoiled from the shock without advantage on either side—so equally matched were they in their good lances and the weight of their armor—and often they swerved from the charge. Mostly, however, both of the philosophical knights found themselves, at the end of the strife, at their old station in the lists, or driven back, perhaps, to their original entry. This scholastic philosophy, in the form it now took, of a highly elaborate art of logical tourney in the philosophical schools, was, undoubtedly, an abiding evil in the age that immediately followed, and furnished an important element to the party disputes of later, and to the rationalism of these latest times.
The overthrow of the Grecian empire and the discovery of the new world, suddenly and at once introduced into Western Europe vast and varied treasures of historical, physical, and philosophical knowledge. In this brilliant epoch of the fifteenth century, a new world of thought was, as it were, laid open. A new era of science would have been founded, and a veritable reformation of the whole Christian life must have ensued, had not the moral corruption and the political disorders of the period been gross beyond description. But for all this, how much is there to admire in the Platonic writers of the fifteenth century, among whom Germany, after Italy, produced the most famous and the greatest number? When we take up, even now, any one of their works, and contemplate therein their comprehensive liberal pursuit of science, their mild, antique spirit, their noble form, and their quick recognition of the beautiful, we can not turn from them without regret to that new state of barbarism into which, during the sixteenth and part also of the seventeenth century, science was plunged by the rampant spirit of party and controversy.
At last, however, peace and quiet returned again to Christian lands and states, and slowly, and by degrees, to the minds also of men. And now was it, in the eighteenth century, and especially toward the middle of it, that out of this apparent and superficial peace, a new science, or a new light, or at least a new diffusion of it, seemed ready to arise. Simply regarded in a scientific point of view, this philosophical endeavor of the eighteenth century, and the most memorable of the systems to which it gave rise, occupied our attention in the very opening of these Lectures. Here the immediate object of our consideration is not this new science itself, whether true or false, but rather the influence on the age, and on life in general, of this modern mode of thinking, as generally diffused and prevalent.