Page:Illustrations of the history of medieval thought and learning.djvu/330

312 his masters, as well as the incontrovertible language of William of Conches' own writings, can only be reconciled with the second alternative: the first is altogether excluded by the known facts about William and Richard.

3. Taking first the testimony to be drawn from John of Salisbury's writings, we find that Richard l'Évêque remained through life a valued correspondent of his, and e was consulted by him on exactly those points of scholarship on which, if Richard's career were as is commonly supposed, John would be the least likely to trust him. William of Conches died before John had become conspicuous in the learned world, but John's recollections of master are uniformly honourable. f He couples William's name with those of Gilbert of La Porrée, Abailard, and others of his most respected teachers, just by virtue of William's steady hostility to the empty-headed crammers of his day. John also speaks of the jealousy which William and his friends excited in the latter; but of their yielding in consequence of it there is not a word.

4. It is precisely to these envious detractors that William constantly alludes in the prefaces to that Philosophia which, according to the Histoire littéraire, he condensed in deference to their opinion. The evidence of the prefaces to books i., ii., and iii. bears directly on the point; that of the two former, which I quote, is especially pertinent:

g Multos tamen nomen magistri sibi usurpantes, non solum hoc agere sed etiam aliis sic esse agendum iurantes, cognoscimus, nihil quippe de philosophia scientes, aliquid se nescire confiteri erubescentes, sive imperitiae solatium quaerentes, ea quae nesciunt nullius utilitatis minus cautis praedicant.

h Quamvis multos ornatum verborum quaerere, paucos veritatem scire [al. scientiae] cognoscamus, nihil tamen de multitudine sed de paucorum probitate gloriantes, soli veritati insudamus.

Another passage answers the allegation of the Histoire littéraire in a curiously exact manner. Speaking of the duties of a teacher, William says: