Page:The history of medieval Europe.djvu/431

 THE MEDIEVAL REVIVAL OF LEARNING 381 Anselm whom he regarded as a mere rhetorician without ideas. He asked him many questions and was unable to get satisfactory answers. A favorite method in teaching theology then was for the lecturer to read some book of the Bible or work of a church father and make running com- ments upon it, not unlike the glosses of the Bolognese doc- tors of law. Soon Abelard was expounding difficult pas- sages in the Book of Ezekiel to Anselm's students instead of attending the master's lectures. Abelard now received a call to teach at the cathedral school of Paris, out of which was to develop a great univer- sity, and great crowds attended his lectures. But his tragic love affair with Heloise blighted the latter part of his career and his days were henceforth passed more in monasteries and hermitages then in the public eye, although he con- tinued to teach. St. Bernard made him considerable trouble by attacking some of his views as heretical. But the fact that those who displayed too much originality in expound- ing the mysteries of the faith were liable to be forced to retract their theories in no way diminished the fascination which theological discussion had for the medieval clergy. Abelard's chief contribution to the future of scholasti- cism, as, from its origin in the schools, the medieval study of philosophy and theology is called, was, aside The from the general enthusiasm which he aroused Slc et Non for clever discussion and the crowds of students that he drew to Paris, his method of investigation. Writers of the early Middle Ages, like undergraduates taking notes on collateral reading, often simply copied passages from Augus- tine's City of God and other works in their meager libraries. By stringing together a series of such quotations they flat- tered themselves that they had made a new book. But Abelard, instead of merely copying, meant to compare and criticize the writings and opinions of the past. This is well illustrated by his work called Sic et Non. In the introduc- tion he holds that there are many important theological questions still open to discussion, and that the best way to reach the truth is to adopt an open-minded, skeptical, and