Page:Illustrations of the history of medieval thought and learning.djvu/314

296 has, however, gone carelessly enough to work. After, for instance, changing s Constantini, which refers to the eleventh-century Carthaginian, into the plural t philosophorum, he has left secundum eum immediately after: and he suppresses the name u Johannitius, which indicates Honain ben-Isaac, a Jewish physician of the ninth century, while he leaves untouched the reference to this writer's v medical treatise known as the Isagoge, possibly through an ignorant confusion with the work of Porphyry which exercised so signal an influence on the learning of the middle ages. Yet the citations of classical and subclassical authors, some perhaps more obscure than Constantine, are as a rule correctly given. In one instance a reference has been obscured in 'Hirschau,' apparently in the interest of his authorship; it is suggested in 'Bede' and is given fully in 'Honorius':

5. Of the three recensions of the treatise, 'Bede' is by far the worst; as a rule it is inferior to 'Hirschau,' while the latter is perhaps slightly inferior to 'Honorius.' None of the three editions, however, is complete. 'Hirschau' breaks off first, just x after having introduced the subject of the soul, whereas 'Bede' proceeds from that point for a page and a-half further and 'Honorius' a few sentences further still, the additional matter consisting of nearly twelve chapters in 'Honorius.' This continuation is partly occupied with y the soul, which, however, is only cursorily treated. The author then passes on to z the ages of man and their characteristics, and thus arrives at the subject