Page:The Mediaeval Mind Vol 2.djvu/73

61 in every imaginable detail, and used acutely or absurdly by politicians and schoolmen from the eleventh century onward.

We turn to the symbolical explanation of the universe. In the first half of the twelfth century, a profoundly meditative soul, Hugo of St. Victor by name, attempted a systematic exposition of the symbolical or sacramental plan inhering in God's scheme of creation. Of the man, as with so many monks and schoolmen whose names and works survive, little is known beyond the presentation of his personality afforded by his writings. He taught in the monastic school of St. Victor, a community that had a story, with which may be connected the scanty facts of the short and happy pilgrimage to God, which made Hugo's life on earth.

When William of Champeaux, according to Abaelard's account, was routed from his logical positions in the cathedral school of Paris, he withdrew from the school and from the city to the quiet of a secluded spot on the left bank of the Seine, not far distant from Notre-Dame. Here was an ancient chapel dedicated to Saint-Victor, and here William, with some companions, organized themselves into a monastic community according to the rule of the canons of St. Augustine. This was in 1108. If for a time William laid aside his studies and lecturing, he soon resumed them at the solicitations of his scholars, joined to those of his friend Hildebert, Bishop of Le Mans. And so the famous school of Saint-Victor began. William remained there only four years, being made Bishop of Chalons in 1112, and thereafter figuring prominently in Church councils, frequent in France at this epoch.