Page:Popular Science Monthly Volume 25.djvu/419

Rh being master of the Melekitic law, was appointed cadi of Seville in the year 1169, and for a quarter of a century occupied his time in similar offices in Cordova, Seville, and Morocco, belonging at the same time to the court of the reigning monarch Jusuf Almansur, who, it is said, was fond of engaging him in philosophic discussions in relation to the Islam faith.

The profound acquirements which he had made in all departments of learning, and particularly in scholastic philosophy, by which the name of Averroës had become famous, eventually resulted in his almost total ruin. He was accused of heresy, and his teachings were declared to be inimical to Moslem faith.

The charges were signed by a hundred witnesses, who testified that they had listened to heresies uttered from his own lips. The Caliph's fears of the populace, in a matter so vital to their religious belief, overpowered his love for Averroës, and drove him to rigid measures. He confiscated his property, deprived him of honors, offices, and emoluments, and banished him to a place outside the walls of Cordova, there to dwell with the Jews and other outcasts in the suburbs. Africanus goes on to say that the boys used to watch the opportunity of his going up to the city, at the hour of prayers, to pelt him with mud and stones. Such was the force of the fanatical indignation against poor Averroës, that everywhere he was subjected to the jeers and insults of a bigoted populace. All this occurred about the year 1195, at which time a general effort was made to destroy all liberal culture in Andalusia, reserving only such practical branches as would prove most useful to the people, including medicine, surgery, mathematics, and astronomy.

From all these misfortunes, ignominy, and degradation he at length escaped, and betook himself to Fez, whither he was soon pursued, arrested, and committed to prison. The royal council could not agree concerning the issue of his fate. Instant death was demanded by some, while others insisted on permitting him to live, and extorting from him a public recantation of his errors. The final decision was that he should be led out bareheaded, at the hour of prayer, and placed on the upper step at the entrance of the mosque, that every one as he passed in might have an opportunity of showing his holy wrath and indignation by spitting in the heretic's face. It is said that this contemptible treatment was submitted to with stoical indifference. When the service was ended, the judge and officers of the court came forward and listened to a public confession of his alleged heresies. Averroës was then permitted to return to Cordova, where he entered in privacy, and remained in poverty, rags, and wretchedness; scorned, neglected, with none for associates but the most degraded classes of society. Great, indeed, was the fall of Averroës! The limbo of Dante must at last have proved to him a paradise indeed!

This poor philosopher had not yet reached the end of his eventful