Page:Catholic Encyclopedia, volume 12.djvu/417

 PREACHERS

361

PREACHERS

he treated theological questions. The "Sentences" of Peter Lombard, the "History" of Peter Comestor, the "Sum" of cases of conscience, were also, but secondarily, used as texts. In the large convents, which were not called stxuiia generalia, but were in the language of the times sludia solemnia, the teach- ing staff was more complete. There was a second master or sub-lector, or a bachelor, whose duty it was to lecture on the Bible and the "Sentences". This organization somewhat resembled that of the sludia generalia. The head master held pubhc disputations every fortnight. Each convent possessed a magister sludenlium, charged with the superintendence of the students, and usually an assistant teacher. These masters were appointed by the provincial chapters, and the visitors were obliged to report each j'ear to the chapter on the condition of academic work. Above the conventual schools were the studio gen- eralia. The first sturlium generate which the order possessed was that of the Convent of St. Jacques at Paris. In 1229 they obtained a chair incorporated with the university and another in 1231. Thus the Preachers were the first religious order that took part in teaching at the University of Paris, and the only one possessing two schools. In the thirteenth cen- tury the order did not recognize any mastership of theology other than that received at Paris. Usually the masters did not teach for any length of time. After receiving their degrees, they were assigned to different schools of the order throughout the world. The schools of St. Jacques at Paris were the principal scholastic centres of the Preachers during the Middle Ages.

In 1248 the development of the order led to the erection of four new sludia generalia — at O.xford, Cologne, Montpellier, and Bologna. When at the end of the thirteenth and the beginning of the four- teenth centurj- several provinces of the order were divided, other sludia were established at Naples, Florence, Genoa, Toulouse, Barcelona, and Salamanca. The sludium generale was conducted by a master or regent, and two bachelors who taught under his direction. The master taught the text of the Holy Scriptures with commentaries. The works of Albert the Great and St. Thomas Aquinas show us the nature of these lessons. Every fifteen days the master held a debate upon a theme chosen by himself. To this class of exercises belong the "Qutestionea Disputatse" of St. Thomas, while hia "Qua?stione3 QuodlibeticEe " represent extraordinary disputations which took place twice a year during Advent and Lent, and whose subject was proposed by the auditors. One of the bachelors read and commentated the Book of Sentences. The commentaries of Albert and Thomas Aquinas on the Lombard are the fruit of their two-year baccalaureate course as sentenliarii. The biblicus lectured on the Scriptures for one year before becoming a sententiarius. He did not com- mentate, but read and interpreted the glosses which preceding ages had added to the Scriptures for a better understanding of the text. The professors of the sludia generalia were appointed by the general chapters, or by the master general, delegated for that purpose. Those who were to teach at Paris were taken indiscriminately from the different provinces of the order.

The conventual schools taught only the sacred sciences, i. e. Holy Scripture and theology. At the beginning of the thirteenth century neither priests nor religious studied or taught the profane sciences. As it could not set itself against this general status, the order provided in its constitutions, that the master general, or the general chapter, might allow certain religious to take up the study of the liberal arts. Thus, at first, the study of the arts, i. e. of philosophy, was entirely individual. As numerous masters of arts entered the order during the early years, es-

pecially at Paris and Bologna, it was easy to make a stand against this private teaching. However, the development of the order and the rapid intellectual progress of the thirteenth century soon caused the organization — for the use of religious onlj' — of reg- ular schools for the study of the Uberal arts. Towards the middle of the century the provinces established in one or more of their convents the studj' of logic; and about 1260 the sludia naturalium, i. e. courses in natural science. The General Chapter of 1315 com- manded the masters of the students to lecture on the moral sciences to all the religious of their convents; i. e. on the ethics, politics, and economics of Aristotle. From the beginning of the fourteenth century we find also some religious who gave special courses in philosophy to secular students. In the fifteenth century the Preachers occupied in several universities chairs of philosophy, especially of metaphysics. Coming in contact as it did with barbaric peoples — principally with the Greeks and Arabs — the order was compelled from the outset to take up the study of foreign languages. The Chapter Generalissimo of 1236 ordered that in all convents and in all the prov- inces the religious should learn the languages of the neighbouring countries. The following year Brother Phillippe, Provincial of the Holy Land, wrote to Gregory IX that his religious had preached to the people in the different languages of the Orient, es- pecially in Arabic, the most popular tongue, and that the study of languages had been added to their conventual course. The province of Greece furnished several Hellenists whose works we shall mention later. The province of Spain, whose population was a mixture of Jews and Arabs, opened special schools for the study of languages. About the middle of the thirteenth century it also established a sludium arabicum at Tunu;; in 1259 one at Barcelona; be- tween 1265 and 1270 one at Murcia; in 1281 one at Valencia. The same province also established some schools for the study of Hebrew at Barcelona in 1281, and at Jativa in 1291. Finally, the General Chapter of 1310 commanded the master general to establish, in several jjrovinccs, schools for the study of Hebrew, Greek, and Arabic, to which each province of the order should send at least one student. In view of this fact a Protestant historian, Molinier, in WTiting of the Friars Preachers, remarks: "They were not content with profe-ssing in their convents all the divisions of science, as it was then understood; they added an entire order of studies which no other ChrLs- tian schools of the time seem to have taught, and in which they had no other rivals than the rabbis of Languedoc and Spain" ("Guillem Bernard de Gaillac et I'enseignement chez les Dominicains", Paris, 1884, p. 30).

This scholastic activity extended to other fields, particularly to the universities which were established througliout Eiu-ope from the beginning of the thir- teenth century; the Preachers took a prominent part in university life. Those universities, like Paris, Toulouse etc., which from the beginning had chairs of theology, incorporated the Dominican conventual school which was patterned on the schools of the sludia generalia. ^^'hcn a university was established in a city — as was usually the case — after the fountla- tion of a Dominican convent, which always possessed a chair of theology, the pontifical letters granting the establishment of the university made no mention whatever of a faculty of theology. The latter was considered as already existing by rea.son of the Domin- ican school and others of the mendicant orders, who followed the example of the Preachers. For a time the Dominican theological schools were simply in juxtaposition to the universities, which had no faculty of theology, ^\'hen these universities peti- tioned the Holy See for a faculty of theology, and their petition was granted, they usually incorporated