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 224 CHARLES S. MYERS : became transmitted to posterity forms a curious page in the annals of the history of philosophy. His scientific researches appear to have been preserved and diffused mainly by the activity of the Arabian school, while his metaphysics, reach- ing these Western shores some centuries before Arabian studies had spread hither, were already possibly because of their inherent theistic tendencies and denial of chance warmly debated in, if not embraced by, the early Christian Church. At an early date the Fathers of the Church found them- selves confronted with the difficulties of several perplexing questions concerning the nature of life. Accepting the biblical tradition of the ^v%?, they began to inquire into the further details of its nature. To Aristotle they turned as a guide ; and when they read the Stagirite's teaching that man had a constructive, a sensory, a rational and other souls, the question arose as to whether these were merely expressions (Bvvdfteu}) of a unitary soul or whether the biblical ^V-^TJ must be subdivided into these distinct com- ponents. This problem was debated with vigour, but the majority appear to have accepted the conception of a single soul, Origen, the Manichseans and the Gnostics being most prominent among their opponents. St. Gregory of Nyssa (fl. 370 A.D.) set up three degrees of life, dividing the 8wa/cu? (jam/ei? or vital force into the life of nutrition devoid of sensation, the life of sensation which is also nutritive, and the life of reason which being perfect includes the life of nutrition and sensation. The doctrine of the union of votJ? and "^vx^ found an able advocate in St. Basil (329-379 A.D.), who conceived intellect as something originally planted or sown (eyKareo-Trapfj.ei'ov) by the Holy Trinity within the soul. He thus believed the Soul to have a twofold power, vital (%iaTiicbv) and rational (oyiffTi/c6v) (3). St. Augustine of Hippo (354-430 A.D.), the great opponent of the Manichaean doctrine of the separate existence of good and evil souls, ranks as the ablest vindicator of the Aristotelian teaching concerning the nature of life. In the De qiiantitate anima, however, he adds to the souls of vegetable, animal, and intellectual activity, four other souls which culminate in the vision of God and in pure love. His cosmogony, more- over, is to a certain extent evolutionary ; for him, the anima vivificans stands at the lowest rung of the ladder of life. Philosophy thus merged with Theology, was destined to regain at length her former liberty. Stealthily secession