‘Thus he who questioned fate, to fate himself submitted,’
which shows that the time of his death must have been earlier than 1235, the date when Abrincensis composed his poem.[254]
The question is thus reduced to the narrow limit of five years; since Bacon says Scot was alive and busy in his great mission in 1230. Within this period he must have passed away, and probably his death happened nearer the earlier than the later date; considering the tone in which Henry d’Avranches speaks of the departed sage. He may well therefore have died while on the borders of Scotland. This idea agrees curiously with the fact that Italy has no tradition of his burial-place, while on the other hand northern story points to his tomb in Melrose Abbey, Glenluce, Holme Coltrame, or some other of the great Cistercian foundations of that country. Satchells, who visited Burgh-under-Bowness in 1629, found a guide named Lancelot Scot, who took him to the parish church, where he saw the great scholar’s tomb, and found it still the object of mysterious awe to the people there.[255] The resting-place of Michael Scot will never now be accurately known, but there is every reason to suppose that it lies not far from that of his birth, in the sweet Borderland, amid the green hills and flowing streams of immemorial story.
Here then we leave the life that has been the subject of our study, and not without the tribute of a certain envy paid to so happy a fate as that of Michael Scot. Like another and far greater man, whose sepulchre also was not known among his people, Scot died in the fulness of his powers and fame, while yet his sight was not dim, nor his natural force abated. He was denied indeed the entry to those broad kingdoms of knowledge which later times enjoy, but we may truly think of him as one who stood in his own day upon a height from which something of that fair land of promise could at least be divined, and manfully did his part in leading the progress of the human mind onward to those more perfect attainments now within the reach of every patient scholar.
We may recollect in closing this inquiry that the Abbreviatio Avicennae was published in 1232 at Melfi. This treatise, though it came in the Latin version from the hand of Scot, did not fall within the scope of the publication made so widely in 1230; since the Emperor’s object at that time was to acquaint the world with the commentaries of Averroës. The manner in which the Abbreviatio saw the light was somewhat remarkable. Henry of Colonia was the scholar selected by Frederick for the work of transcribing it from the imperial copy. A regular diploma passed the seals authorising him to do this work, and from that writ we find that he completed it at Melfi, on the vigil of St. Laurence in the house of Master Volmar the imperial physician.[256] We may surely see in these facts a further likelihood that by this time Scot was already dead. Another holds his place as court-physician, another wields his pen, or at least furnishes the copy from which the world at large first came to know one of his most important and characteristic works. May we not take it then, that in ordering this diploma to be drawn, Frederick desired to show his concern at hearing he had lost so faithful and able a servant, and his anxiety that no time should elapse before the publication of his remaining works? Thus regarded, the Abbreviatio was a wreath laid on the grave; a tribute to the translator’s memory, while in itself it was a seal set to the fame of Michael Scot as in his day the chief exponent of the mighty Aristotle, and one who by these labours succeeded in directing for many ages the course of study in the European Schools.
CHAPTER IX
THE LEGEND OF MICHAEL SCOT
Hitherto we have taken little notice of the fame by which Michael Scot is most widely known in literature; preferring to speak first of the authentic facts and real employments of his life, so far as these can now be ascertained. It would be improper, however, to close our investigation without taking some account of that darker reputation which has so long represented him to the world as a magician and dealer in forbidden lore. If we have deferred so long the consideration of this matter, the reason may be found in the fact that there seems to be no truth in such stories. They live only in legend, and in the literature of romance, and must therefore be held apart by a firm line from the domain of sober historical inquiry.
This conclusion, be it observed, is not based upon the prevailing opinion of the present day that such arts are impossible, nor has it thence been reached by way of the inference that because magic is impossible, therefore Michael Scot cannot have meddled in it. Such was not at all the view held in the thirteenth century. Then scholars as well as the unlearned, and clergy as well as laity, believed firmly in the possibility, nay, the reality, of what they regarded as an unwarrantable interference with the order of nature. This belief makes it a fair subject of discussion in regard to any one of that age whether or not he may have practised forbidden arts. The question in Scot’s case is a highly curious one, and, without further apology, we now proceed to examine it in detail.