§ 103.7. Reformers of the Scholastic Method.—Raimund Lull, a Catalonian nobleman of Majorca, born in A.D. 1234, roused from a worldly life by visions, gave himself to fight for Christ against the infidels with the weapons of the Spirit. Learning Arabic from a Saracen slave, he passed through a full course of scholastic training in theology and entered the Franciscan order. Constrained in the prosecution of his mission to seek a simpler method of proof than that afforded by scholasticism, he succeeded by the help of visions in discovering one by which as he and his followers, the Lullists, thought, the deepest truths of all human sciences could be made plain to the untutored human reason. He called it the Ars Magna, and devoted his whole life to its elaboration in theory and practice. Representing fundamental ideas and their relations to the objects of thought by letters and figures, he drew conclusions from their various combinations. In his missionary travels in North Africa (§ [93, 16]) he used his art in his disputations with the Saracen scholars, and died in A.D. 1315 in consequence of ill treatment received there, in his 81st year. Of his writings in Latin, Catalonian, and Arabic, numbering it is said more than a thousand, 282 were known in A.D. 1721 to Salzinger of Mainz, but only 45 were included in his edition of the collected works.
§ 103.8. Roger Bacon, an English monk, contemporary with Lull, worked out his reform in a sounder manner by going back to the original sources and thus obtaining deliverance from the accumulated errors of later times. He appealed on matters of natural science not to corrupt translations but to the original works of Aristotle, and on matters of theology, not to the Lombard but to the Greek New Testament. He prosecuted his studies laboriously in mathematics and the Greek language. Roger was called by his friends Doctor mirabilis or profundus. He was a prodigy of learning for his age, more in the department of physics than in those of philosophy and theology. He was regarded, however, by his own order as a heretic, and imprisoned as a trafficker in the black arts. Born in A.D. 1214 at Ilchester, he took his degree of doctor of theology at Paris, entered the Franciscan order, and became a resident at Oxford. Besides diligent study of languages, which secured him perfect command of Latin, Greek, Hebrew, and Arabic, he busied himself with researches and experiments in physics (especially optics), chemistry, and astronomy. He made several important discoveries, e.g. the principle of refraction, magnifying glasses, the defects of the calendar, etc., while he also succeeded in making a combustible material which may be regarded as the precursor of gunpowder. He maintained the possibility of ships and land vehicles being propelled most rapidly without sails, and without the labour of men or animals. Yet he was a child of his age, and believed in the philosopher’s stone, in astrology, and alchemy. Thoroughly convinced of the defects of scholasticism, he spoke of Albert the Great and Aquinas as boys who taught before they learnt, and especially reproached them with their ignorance of Greek. With an amount of brag that smacks of the empiric he professed to be able to teach Hebrew in three days and Greek in the same time, and to give a full course of geometry in seven days. With fearless severity he lashed the corruptions of the clergy and the monks. Only one among his companions seems to have regarded Roger, notwithstanding all his faults, as a truly great man. That was Clement IV. who, as papal legate in England, had made his acquaintance, and as pope liberated him from prison. To him Roger dedicated his Opus majus s. de emendandis scientiis.At a later period the general of the Franciscan order, with the approval of Nicholas IV., had him again cast into prison, and only after that pope’s death was he liberated through the intercession of his friends. He died soon after in A.D. 1291.[307]
§ 103.9. Theologians of a Biblical and Practical Tendency.
- Cæsarius of Heisterbach near Bonn was a monk, then prior and master of the novices of the Cistercian monastery there. He died in A.D. 1230. His Dialogus magnus visionum et miraculorum in 12 bks., one of the best specimens of the finest culture and learning of the Middle Ages, in the form of conversation with the novices, gives an admirable and complete sketch of the morals and manners of the times illustrated from the history and legends of the monks, clergy, and people.
- His younger contemporary the Dominican William Peraldus (Perault), in his Summa virtutum and Summa vitiorum, presents a summary of ethics with illustrations from life in France. He died about A.D. 1250, as bishop of Lyons.
- Hugo of St. Caro (St. Cher, a suburb of Vienne), a Dominican and cardinal who died in A.D. 1263, gives evidence of careful Bible study in his Postilla in univ. Biblia juxta quadrupl. sensum (a commentary accompanying the text) and his Concordantiæ Bibliorum (on the Vulgate). To him we are indebted for our division of the Scriptures into chapters. At the request of his order he undertook a correction of the Vulgate from the old MSS.
- Robert of Sorbon in Champagne, who died in A.D. 1274, was confessor of St. Louis and teacher of theology at Paris. He urged upon his pupils the duty of careful study of the Bible. In A.D. 1250 he founded the Sorbonne at Paris, originally a seminary for the education and support of the poorer clergy who aspired to the highest attainments in theology. Its fame became so great that it rose to the rank of a full theological faculty, and down to its overthrow in the French Revolution it continued to be the highest tribunal in France for all matters pertaining to religion and the church.
- Raimund Martini, Dominican at Barcelona, who died after A.D. 1284, was unweariedly engaged in the conversion of Jews and Mohammedans. He spoke Hebrew and Arabic as fluently as Latin, and wrote Pugio fidei contra Mauros et Judæos.[308]
§ 103.10. Precursors of the German Speculative Mystics.—David of Augsburg, teacher of theology and master of the novices in the Franciscan monastery at Augsburg, deserves to be named first, as one who largely anticipated the style of speculative mysticism that flourished in the following century (§ [114]). His writings, partly in Latin, partly in German, are merely ascetic directories and treatises of a contemplative mystical order, distinguished by deep spirituality and earnest, humble piety. The German works especially are models of a beautiful rhythmical style, worthy of ranking with the finest creations of any century. He is author of the important tract, De hæresi pauperum de Lugduno, in which the pious mystic shows himself in the less pleasing guise of a relentless inquisitor and heresy hunter.—A brilliant and skilful allegory, The Daughter of Zion, the human soul, who, having become a daughter of Babylon, went forth to see the heavenly King, and under the guidance of the virgins Faith, Hope, Love, Wisdom, and Prayer attained unto this end, was first written in Latin prose; but afterwards towards the close of the 13th century a free rendering of it in more than 4,000 verses was published by the Franciscan Lamprecht of Regensburg. Its mysticism is like that of St. Bernard and Hugo St. Victor.—In speculative power and originality the Dominican Theodorich of Freiburg, Meister Dietrich, a pupil of Albert the Great, far excelled all the mystics of this century. About A.D. 1280 he was reader at Treves, afterwards prior at Würzburg, took his master’s degree and taught at Paris, A.D. 1285-1289. About A.D. 1320, however, along with Meister Eckhart (§ [114, 1]), he fell under suspicion of heresy, and nothing further is known of him. Among his still unpublished writings, mostly on natural and religious philosophy, the most important is the book De beatifica visione Dei per essentiam, which marks him out as a precursor of the Eckhart speculation.—On Female Mystics, see § [107].
IV. The Church and the People.
§ 104. Public Worship and Art.
Public worship had for a long time been popularly regarded as a performance fraught with magical power. The ignorant character of the priests led to frequent setting aside of preaching as something unessential, so that the service became purely liturgical. But now popes and synods urged the importance of rearing a race of learned priests, and the carefully prepared and eloquent sermons of Franciscans and Dominicans found great acceptance with the people. The Schoolmen gave to the doctrine of the sacraments its scientific form. The veneration of saints, relics, and images became more and more the central point of worship. Besides ecclesiastical architecture, which reached its highest development in the 13th century, the other arts began to be laid under contribution to beautify the ceremonial, the dresses of the celebrants, and the inner parts of the buildings.
§ 104.1. The Liturgy and the Sermon.—The Roman Liturgy was universally adopted except in Spain. When it was proposed at the Synod of Toledo in A.D. 1088 to set aside the old Mozarabic liturgy (§ 88, 1), the people rose against the proposal, and the ordeals of combat and fire decided in favour of retaining the old service. From that time both liturgies were used side by side. The Slavic ritual was abandoned in Moravia and Bohemia in the 10th century. The language of the church services everywhere was and continued to be the Latin. The quickening of the monkish orders in the 11th century, especially the Cluniacs and Cistercians, but more particularly the rise of the Franciscans and Dominicans in the 13th century, gave a great impulse to preaching. Almost all the great monks and schoolmen were popular preachers. The crowds that flocked around them as they preached in the vernacular were enormous. Even in the regular services the preaching was generally in the language of the people, but quotations from Scripture and the Fathers, as a mark of respect, were made in Latin and then translated. Sermons addressed to the clergy and before academic audiences were always in Latin.—As a preacher of repentance and of the crusades, Fulco of Neuilly, † A.D. 1202, regarded by the people as a saint and a miracle worker, had a wonderful reputation (§ [94, 4]). Of all mediæval preachers, however, none can be compared for depth, spirituality, and popular eloquence with the Franciscan Berthold of Regensburg, pupil and friend of David of Augsburg (§ [103, 10]), one of the most powerful preachers in the German tongue that ever lived. He died in A.D. 1272. He wandered from town to town preaching to crowds, often numbering 100,000 men, of the grace of God in Christ, against the abuse of indulgences and false trust in saints, and the idea of the meritoriousness of pilgrimages, etc. His sermons are of great value as illustrations of the strength and richness of the old German language. Roger Bacon too (§ [103, 8]), usually so chary of praise, eulogises Frater Bertholdus Alemannus as a preacher worth more than the two mendicant orders together.