“We must, in all cases, proceed from the known to the unknown; for thus only can we arrive at truth with any degree of facility. Sensations are nearest and best known to us; they are gathered up in the memory, where the mind transforms individual sensations into one general rule or experience; nor does it stop here, but it proceeds further, and from many united experiences arrives at universal truths. Therefore, true experience resolves itself into first principles—primary causations; it is speculative, free, and of the highest nature.”[143]
Savonarola’s definition of veracity, strikingly acute and clear, is one not likely to have been made by a man at all weak either in philosophy or moral principle. It is well worth attention: “By veracity we understand a certain habit by which a man, both in his actions and in his words, shows himself to be that which he really is, neither more nor less.” This, though not a legal, is a moral, duty, for it is a debt which every man in honesty owes to his neighbor, and the manifestation of truth is an essential part of justice. Savonarola was, in fact, the first to shake off the yoke of ancient authority in philosophy. He alone, if we except Lorenzo Valla, who spoke more as a grammarian than a philosopher, dared to declare against it. “Some,” he says, “are so bigoted, and have so entirely submitted their understandings to the fetters of the ancients, that not only dare they not say anything in opposition to them, but abstain from saying anything not already said by them. What kind of reasoning is this? What additional strength of argument? The ancients did not reason thus; why, then, should we? If the ancients failed to perform a praiseworthy action, why should we also fail?” And this sentiment he constantly presents in various forms; not in theory alone, moreover, but in practice; not only in the special discussion of philosophy, but in its practical application. His Triumph of the Cross[144] which is generally accepted as his greatest work, is an exposition of the whole Christian doctrine by reason alone. He thus states it in his preface: “As it is our purpose to discuss the subject of this book solely by the light of reason, we shall not pay regard to any authority, but will proceed as if there had not existed in the whole world any man, however wise, on whom to rest our belief, taking natural reason as our sole guide.” And he adds: “To comprehend things that are visible, it is not necessary to seek the acquaintance of things invisible, for all our knowledge of the extrinsic attributes of corporeal objects is derived from the senses; but our intellect, by its subtlety, penetrates the substance of natural things, by the consideration of which we finally arrive at a knowledge of things invisible.”
We have spoken of the large number of Savonarola’s published works. There would not be space in an article like this even for a list of his popular treatises on practical religious duties, of which four were published in one year alone (1492). These were On Humility, On Prayer, On the Love of Christ, and On a Widow’s Life. With all their pious fervor, they are marked by strong practical judgment, and it is but little wonder that the people of Florence should have been enthusiastic in their admiration of a priest who, in all the various lines of his duty as teacher, as confessor, and as preacher, was always equal to his high calling. His harshest critics have said of him that, so violent was the asceticism he taught and preached, he opposed matrimony, and would have turned Florence into a convent. They are more than answered by the following passage from A Widow’s Life—Libro della Vita Viduale:
“Widows are like children—under the special protection of the Lord. The true life for them to lead is to give up all worldly thoughts, and devote themselves to the service of God; to become like the turtle-dove, which is a chaste creature; and thus, when it has lost its companion, no longer takes up with another, but spends the rest of its life in solitude and lamentation. Nevertheless, if for the education of her children, or through poverty, or for other good and sufficient motive, the widow desire to marry again, let her do so by all means. This would be preferable to being surrounded by admirers, and so expose herself to the risk of calumnies and to a thousand dangers. Let the widow who is not inclined to maintain the strict decorum, the somewhat difficult reserve, becoming her position, rather return to the dignified life of a married woman; but let those who feel that they possess strength and temper of mind equal to the demands of their state become a model to other women. A widow ought to dress in sober attire, to live retired, to avoid the society of men, to be gravity itself, and to maintain such severity of demeanor that none may dare utter by word or show by a smile the least want of respect. By such a life, she will be a continual lesson to other women, and will render it unnecessary for a widow to use words of counsel by which to acquire influence over others. It is unbecoming a widow to be prying into the lives and failings of other persons; it is unbecoming for her to be or even appear to be vain, nor ought she, for the sake of others, to forget what is due to herself.”
SCHOLAR AND POET.
Mention has already been made of Savonarola’s devotion to the task of teaching the novices of the order, not only by his famous “damask rose-bush” lectures which all learned Florence crowded to hear, but his classes of the humanities and physical sciences. Not content with this, and desiring that the monks of his convent should live by the fruit of their own labors, he established schools in which they might learn painting, sculpture, architecture, and the art of copying and illuminating manuscripts. He also opened a department of oriental languages, where Greek, Hebrew, Turkish, and Chaldean were taught. In urging their cultivation, he said he hoped that he and his brethren would be sent by the Lord to spread the Gospel among the Turks.
When, after the expulsion of the Medici, the Florentine signiory, on account of the financial embarrassments of the republic, resolved to sell the Medicean library, there was great danger that this magnificent accumulation, then the most valuable collection of Greek and Latin authors known in Europe, and specially rich in the most precious MSS., would be either scattered or fall into the hands of strangers. There was no private citizen in Florence wealthy enough to purchase it. Savonarola, who fully appreciated its value, and who had already brought up the library of his own convent to a high standard, making it accessible to all, and the first free library in all Italy, resolved that these treasures should not leave the city. His first act of authority as prior had been to enforce the original rule of S. Dominic as to the poverty of the order. The saint’s last words were: “Be charitable, preserve humility, practise poverty with cheerfulness: may my curse and that of God fall upon him who shall bring possessions into this order!” Nevertheless, under certain so-called reformed rules, the convent at Florence had adopted the power of holding property, and its wealth in landed possessions had greatly accumulated. Savonarola’s first reform was to enforce the practice of poverty in the order, while the absence of landed income was to be supplied by the labors of the monks and a yet more rigid economy. It so happened that the sale of the convent property, in pursuance of this reform, had just been made, and Savonarola had at his command a sum of two thousand florins—a large amount for that period. His convent bought the library for three thousand florins, paying two thousand on account, and binding themselves to liquidate the balance, which was a claim held by a French creditor, in eighteen months. This transaction occurred precisely during the period of the celebrated bonfire of vanities, at which Savonarola is unjustly charged with having destroyed innumerable classical manuscripts.
Space fails us to speak of Savonarola as a poet. Like many other boys, he scribbled verses in his early youth, and wrote a poem, De Ruina Mundi, at the age of twenty. There is something anticipatory of Byron in the sadness and gloom of its tone:
“Vedendo sotto sopra tutto il mondo,
Ed esser spenta al fondo
Ogni virtute, ed ogni bel costume,
Non trovo un vivo lume,