Page:Encyclopædia Britannica, Ninth Edition, v. 21.djvu/441

Rh SCHOLASTICISM 419 K"JC, Realists take opposite sides; and, exclusively logical as the point may at first sight seem to be, adherence to one side or the other is an accurate indication of philosophic tendency. The two opposing theories express at bottom, in the phraseology of their own time, the radical diver- gence of pantheism and individualism the two extremes between which philosophy seems pendulum-wise to oscil- late, and which may be said still to await their perfect reconciliation. First, however, we must examine the form which this question assumed to the first mediaeval thinkers, and the source from which they derived it. A single sentence in Porphyry's Isagoge or " introduction" to the Categories of Aristotle furnished the text of the pro- longed discussion. The treatise of Porphyry deals with what are commonly called the predicables, i.e., the notions of genus, species, difference, property, and accident ; and he mentions, but declines to discuss, the various theories that have been held as to the ontological import of genera and species. In the Latin translation of Boetius, in which alone the Isagoge was then known, the sentence runs as follows : " Mox de generibus et speciebus illud quidem sive subsistant, sive in solis nudis intellectibus posita sint, sive subsistentia corporalia sint an incorporalia, et utrum separata a sensibilibus an in sensibilibus posita et circa haec consistentia, dicere recusabo ; altissimum enim negotium est hujusmodi et majoris egens inquisitionis." The second of these three questions may be safely set aside; the other two indicate with sufficient clearness three possible positions with regard to universals. It may be held that they exist merely as conceptions in our minds (in solis nudis intellectibiis) ; this is Nominalism or Conceptualism. It may be held, in opposition to the Nominalistic view, that they have a substantial existence of their own (subsistentia), independent of their existence in our thoughts. But Realism, as this doctrine is named, may be again of two varieties, according as the substan- tially existent universals are supposed to exist apart from the sensible phenomena (separata a sensibilibus) or only in and with the objects of sense as their essence (in sensibilibus posita et circa haec consistentia). The first form of Realism corresponds to the Platonic theory of the transcendence of the ideas ; while the second reproduces the Aristotelian doctrine of the essence as inseparable from the individual thing. But, though he implies an ample previous treat- ment of the questions by philosophers, Porphyry gives no references to the different systems of which such dis- tinctions are the outcome, nor does he give any hint of his own opinion on the subject, definite enough though that ,was. He simply sets the discussion aside as too difficult for a preliminary discourse, and not strictly relevant to a purely logical inquiry. Porphyry, the Neoplatonist, the disciple of Plotinus, was an unknown personage to those early students of the Isagoge. The passage possessed for them a mysterious charm, largely due to its isolation and to their ignorance of the historic speculations which sug- gested it. And accordingly it gave rise to the three great doctrines which divided the mediaeval schools : Realism of the Platonic type, embodied in the formula universalia ante rem ; Realism of the Aristotelian type, universalia in re-, and Nominalism, including Conceptualism, expressed by the phrase universalia post rem, and also claiming to be based upon the Peripatetic doctrine. To form a proper estimate of the first stage of Scholastic discussion it is requisite above all things to have a clear idea of the appliances then at the disposal of the writers. In other words, what was the extent of their knowledge of ancient philosophy? Thanks to the researches of Jourdain and others, it is possible to answer this question with something like precision. To begin with, we know that till the 13th century the Middle Age was ignorant of Greek, and possessed no philosophical works in their Greek original, while in translations their stock was limited to the Categories and the De Interpretation of Aristotle in the versions of Boetius, and the Tim&us of Plato in the version of Chalcidius. To these must be added, of course, Boetius's translation of Porphyry's Isagoge already referred to. The whole metaphysical, ethical, and physical works of Aristotle were thus unknown, and it was not till the 12th century (after the year 1128) that the Analytics and the Topics became accessible to the logicians of the time. Some general information as to the Platonic doctrines (chiefly in a Neoplatonic garb) was obtainable from the commentary with which Chalcidius (6th cent.) accompanied his translation, from the work of Apuleius (2d cent.) De Dogmate Platonis, and indirectly from the commentary of Macrobius (c. 400) on the Somnium Scipionis of Cicero, and from the writings of St Augustine. As aids to the study of logic, the doctors of this period possessed two commentaries by Boetius on the Isagoge (Ad Porphyrium a Victorino translatum and In Porphyrium a se translatum), two commentaries by the same author on the De Interpretation and one on the Categories, as well as another, mainly rhetorical, Ad Ciceronis Topica. To these are to be added the following original treatises of Boetius : Introductio ad Categoricos Syllogismos, De Syllo- gismo Categorico, De Syllogismo Hypotlietico, De Divisione, De Definition, and De Differentiis Topicis, the last dealing almost exclusively with rhetoric. There were also in circu- lation two tracts attributed to St Augustine, the first of which, Principia Dialecticae, is probably his, but is mainly grammatical in its import. The other tract, known as Categoriae Decent, and taken at first for a translation of Aristotle's treatise, is really a rapid summary of it, and certainly does not belong to Augustine. To this list there must be added three works of an encyclopaedic character, which played a great part as text-books in the schools. Of these the oldest and most important was the Satyricon of Marcianus Capella (close of 5th century), a curious medley of prose and allegorical verse, the greater part of which is a treatise on the seven liberal arts, the fourth book dealing with logic. Similar in its contents is the work of Cassio- dorus (468-562), De Artibus ac Disciplinis Liberalium Literarum, of which the third work referred to, the Origines of Isidore of Seville (ob. 636), is little more than a re- production. The above constitutes without exception the Avhole material which the earlier Middle Age had at its disposal. The grandly conceived system of Erigena (see EEIGENA Erigena. and MYSTICISM) stands by itself in the 9th century like the product of another age. John the Scot was still acquainted with Greek, seeing that he translated the work of the pseudo-Dionysius ; and his speculative genius achieved the fusion of Christian doctrine and Neopla- tonic thought in a system of quite remarkable meta- physical completeness. It is the only complete and inde- pendent system between the decline of ancient thought and the system of Aquinas in the 13th century, if indeed we ought not to go further, to modern times, to find a parallel. Erigena pronounces no express opinion upon the question which was even then beginning to occupy men's minds; but his Platonico-Christian theory of the Eternal Word as containing in Himself the exemplars of created things is equivalent to the assertion of universalia ante rem. His whole system, indeed, is based upon the idea of the divine as the exclusively real, of which the world of individual existence is but the theophany ; the special and the individual are immanent, therefore, in the general. And hence at a much later date (in the begin- ning of the 13th century) his name was invoked to cover the pantheistic heresies of Amalrich of Bena. Erigena