Page:The Great Didactic of John Amos Comenius (1896).pdf/407

 reference to self-love. How much pride and haughtiness there is in Plato! It seems to me that a self-sufficient character must inevitably imbibe faulty instincts from the ambition that pervades his writings. The teaching of Aristotle is nothing but one long struggle to prove himself worthy of a good place among the writers on practical philosophy” (System of Theology).

18. (ii) Again it is said: If they do not teach theology rightly, at any rate they teach philosophy, and this cannot be learned from the sacred writings, that have been given us for our salvation. I answer: The Word of God most high is the fountain of wisdom (Ecclesiasticus i. 5). True philosophy is nothing but the true knowledge of God and of His works, and this cannot be learned better than from the mouth of God Himself. For this reason St. Augustine, praising the Holy Scripture, says: “Here is philosophy, since the cause of everything that exists is in the Creator. Here are ethics, since a good and honest life can only be formed if those things are loved which ought to be loved, that is to say, God and our neighbour. Here is logic, since truth, the light of the rational soul, is God Himself. Herein is the salvation of the state; for the state can never be well guarded, or test on a foundation of confidence and peace, unless the common good be loved, and this, in its highest and truest sense, is God.” Recently, too, it has been pointed out by many that the foundations of all the sciences and philosophic arts are contained in Scripture, and more truly than elsewhere, so that the part played by the Holy Spirit in our education is indeed wonderful. For, though its first object is to instruct us in things invisible and eternal, it nevertheless unfolds the laws of nature and of art at the same time, teaching us how to reason wisely on all subjects and how to apply our reason in a practical manner. Yet of all this there is but a trace in the works of the pagan philosophers. A writer on theology has said that the marvellous wisdom of Solomon consisted in bringing the law of God into the families, the schools, and the public places,