Obstacles to Study

Posted on November 25, 2012 by Matthew Phillips

“There are three things above all which ordinarily provide obstacles for the studies of students: carelessness, imprudence, and bad luck (fortuna).  Carelessness arises when we simply omit, or when we learn less carefully, those things which are there to be learned.  Imprudence arises when we do not keep to a suitable order and method in the things we are learning.  Bad luck shows up in a development, a chance happening, or a natural occurrence, when we are kept back from our objective or even by a scarcity of professors, because either none can be found to teach us, or none can be found to teach us well.  But as to these three matters, in the first of them–carelessness, that is–the student needs to be admonished; in the second–imprudence, that is–he needs to be instructed; while in the third–bad luck, that is–he needs to be assisted.” Hugh of St Victor, Didascalicon, Bk 5, Chap. 5. [Italics in original]

Hugh’s students were fellow canons (clergy who lived together like monks) at St Victor in Paris.  Many of these students came to Paris to study at the growing cathedral school there.  This quote demonstrates Hugh’s understanding of pedagogy and learning.  Notice that two of the three obstacles can be corrected through a change in the student’s attitude and a professor’s instruction.  Only bad luck means that the student needs assistance and not admonishment or instruction.

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Hugh’s Hermeneutics

Posted on November 20, 2012 by Matthew Phillips

“First of all, it ought to be known that Sacred Scripture has three ways of conveying meaning–namely, history, allegory, and tropology….It is necessary, therefore, so to handle the Sacred Scripture that we do not try to find history everywhere, nor allegory everywhere, nor tropology everywhere but rather that we assign individual things fittingly in their own places, as reason demands.  Often, however, in one and the same literal context, all may be found together, as when a truth of history both hints at some mystical meaning by way of allegory, and equally shows by way of tropology how we ought to behave.”     Hugh of St Victor, Didascalicon, Bk 5, Chap. 2.

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The Politics of Deception

Posted on November 16, 2012 by Matthew Phillips

“So it follows that a prudent ruler cannot, and must not, honour his word when it places him at a disadvantage and when the reasons for which he made his promise no longer exist.  If all men were good, this precept would not be good; but because men are wretched creatures who would not keep their word to you, you need not keep your word to them.  And no prince ever lacked good excuses to colour his bad faith.  One could give innumerable modern instances of this, showing how many pacts and promises have been made null and void by the bad faith of princes: those who have known best how to colour one’s actions and to be a great liar and deceiver. Men are so simple, and so much creatures of circumstances, that the deceiver will always find someone ready to be deceived.” Niccolo Machiavelli, The Prince, trans. George Bull (London 1961), 55. [Emphasis added]

Niccolo Machiavelli, the (in)famous writer and political leader of Florence in the late 15th and early 16th century, applied his knowledge of domestic and foreign policy here.  He advises wise political leaders to be prepared to lie.  It’s that simple.  If you want to succeed as a politician you must be willing to deceive others.  Why? If you keep your word it will make you weak since others are lying to you.  Therefore, a prudent leader will act as circumstances dictate and break his word when it will benefit him or his state.

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Rulers Must Not Ignore History

Posted on October 27, 2012 by Matthew Phillips

“He who diligently examines past events easily foresees future ones in every country and can apply to them the remedies used by the ancients or, not finding any that have been used, can devise new ones because of the similarity of the events.  But because these considerations are neglected or are not understood by those who read or, if they are understood, are not known to rulers, the same dissensions appear in every age.” Niccolo Machiavelli, Discourses on Livy I. 39. trans. Allan Gilbert, Machiavelli: The Chief Works and Others, vol. 1 (Durham: Duke University Press, 1965), p. 278.

Niccolo Machiavelli, author of The Prince, wrote these Discourses on Livy during his exile from Florence after 1513.  In the Discourses Machiavelli examines Roman history and seek to apply lessons from those events to his own time.

 

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The Necessity of Historians

Posted on October 12, 2012 by Matthew Phillips

“Triumphal arches add to the glory of illustrious men only when the writing upon them informs in whose honor they have been reared, and why.  It is the inscription that tells the spectator that the triumphal arch is that of our own Constantine, liberator of his country and promoter of peace.  Indeed no one has gained permanent fame except as the result of what he has written or of what others have written of him.  The memory of fool or emperor is, after a brief lapse of time, the same unless it be prolonged by courtesy of writers.  How many great kings do you imagine there have been, with regard to whom there is nowhere in the world a thought given or a word uttered?  Therefore there is no wiser policy for those who crave glory than to cultivate sedulously the favor of  scholars and writers; for their own achievements, doomed to utter darkness unless illumined by the lamp of letters, avail them naught.”  John of Salisbury, Policratus, Bk I in The Great Tradition: Classic Readings on What It Means to Be An Educated Human Being, ed. Richard M. Gamble. Wilmington 2007, p. 269. [Emphasis added]

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The Foundation of the Liberal Arts

Posted on October 3, 2012 by Matthew Phillips

“Grammar takes its name from the written character, as the derivation of the word indicates.  The definition of grammar is this: Grammar is the science which teaches us to explain the poets and historians; it is the art which qualifies us to write and speak correctly. Grammar is the source and foundation of the liberal arts.  It should be taught in every Christian school, since the art of writing and speaking correctly is attained through it.” Rhabanus Maurus, “Education of the Clergy,” in The Great Tradition: Classic Readings on What It Means to Be An Educated Human Being, ed. Richard M. Gamble. Wilmington 2007, p. 251 [Emphasis added]

Rhabanus Maurus (c.776-856) lived in early medieval Germany.  He became a monk, schoolmaster, priest, abbot, and archbishop of Mainz.  Rhabanus was one of the main theologians and authors of the Carolingian Renaissance.  In this work he sought to define and preserve the liberal arts as a basis for the proper education of priests and pastors.

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Encouraging zeal for inquiry

Posted on September 5, 2012 by Matthew Phillips

“Eagerness to inquire relates to practice and in it the student needs encouragement rather than instruction.  Whoever wishes to inspect earnestly what the ancients in their love of wisdom have handed down to us, and how deserving of posterity’s remembrance are the monuments which they left of their virtue, will see how inferior his own earnestness is to theirs.  Some of them scorned honors, others cast aside riches, others rejoiced in injuries received, others despised hardships, and still others, deserting the meeting places of men for the farthest withdrawn spots and secret haunts of solitude, gave themselves over to philosophy alone, that they might have greater freedom for undisturbed contemplation insofar as they subjected their minds to none of their desires which usually obstruct the path of virtue.” Hugh of St. Victor, Didascalicon, Book 3, Chapter 14. 

In this quote we observe Hugh’s devotion to the ancients and their zeal for knowledge and wisdom.  He believed the ancients’ example should inspire students to make similar personal sacrifices for the sake of wisdom and virtue.

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Early Elementary Teaching

Posted on September 3, 2012 by Matthew Phillips

“One must lead the child to declensions and to conjugations at the same time as he is learning his letters.  Because, from the fact that the same word changes case and gender, that the first syllables remain and that the latter ones change, not hapharzardly, but according to rules, the teacher derives two advantages: the child learns without difficulty how to read and how to register in his memory that which he needs to retain and that which is necessary in order that the instructional edifice be solidly established.  We have said that in your class you must lay the foundation for studies as on a rock; your class must be so to speak a nursery for the finest trees, which you’ll not see rooted in soil nor standing in gardens nor orchards, but at the bar and in the senate (and) the courts of kings, and bearing abundant fruits of wisdom.” John Sturm, “Johann Sturm to Abraham Feis, Teacher of the Tenth Class. (1565),” trans. Lewis W. Spitz and Barbara Sher Tinsley, Johann Sturm on Education (CPH: St Louis, 1995), p. 264.  [Emphasis Added]

In this letter Johann Sturm describes the first level of education in a sixteenth-century school.  This level (tenth class) would be approximately equivalent to modern first grade.  Sturm instructs the teacher to simultaneously train the child with Latin vocabulary and the formation of nouns (declensions) and verbs (conjugations).  In this manner the child builds a solid foundation in his or her memory of the basic elements of Latin.  Sturm also compared the teacher to a gardener who tends to small trees which will grow up to have significant influence in legal work (at the bar), political service, and teaching.

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Contemplation, leisure, action, and bishops

Posted on August 18, 2012 by Matthew Phillips

“As for these three kinds of life, the life of leisure, the life of action, and the combination of the two, anyone, to be sure, might spend his life in any of these ways without detriment to his faith, and might thus attain to the everlasting rewards.  What does matter is the answers to those questions: What does a man possess as a result of his love of truth? And what does he pay out in response to the obligations of Christian love?  For no one ought to be so leisured as to take no thought in that leisure for the interest of his neighbour, nor so active as to feel no need for the contemplation of God.  The attraction of a life of leisure ought not to be the prospect of lazy inactivity, but the chance for the investigation and discovery of truth, on the understanding that each person makes some progress in this, and does not grudgingly withhold his discoveries from another.

In the life of action, on the other hand, what is to be treasured is not a place of honour or power in this life, since ‘everything under the sun is vanity’ (Ecclesiastes 1:14) but the task itself is achieved by means of that place of honour and that power–if that achievement is right and helpful, that is, if it serves to promote the well-being of the common people, for, as we have already argued, this well-being is according to God’s intention.  That is why the Apostle says, ‘Anyone who aspires to the episcopate aspires to an honourable task’ (I Timothy 3:1).   He wanted to explain what ‘episcopate’ means; it is the name of the task, not an honour….Hence a ‘bishop’ who has set his heart on a position of eminence rather than an opportunity for service should realize that he is no bishop.  So then, no one is debarred from devoting himself to the pursuit of truth, for that involves a praiseworthy kind of leisure.  But high position, although without it a people cannot be ruled, is not in itself a respectable object of ambition, even if that position be held and exercised in a manner worthy of respect.”   Augustine of Hippo, The City of God XIX. 19. trans. Henry Bettenson. (New York: Penguin Classics, 1984), p. 880. [Emphasis Added]

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Persevere in the study of literature

Posted on August 15, 2012 by Matthew Phillips

“To desert our studies shows want of self-confidence rather than wisdom, for letters do not hinder but aid the properly constituted mind which possesses them; they facilitate our life, they do not retard it.  Just as many kinds of food which lie heavy on an enfeebled and nauseated stomach furnish excellent nourishment for one who is well but famishing, so in our studies many things which are deadly to the weak mind may prove most salutary to an acute and healthy intellect, especially if in our use of both food and learning we exercise proper discretion.”  Petrarch, “To Boccaccio, May 28, 1362,” in The Great Tradition, ed. Richard M. Gamble (Wilmington: ISI, 2007), p. 307.

Francesco Petrarch, known as the father of Renaissance humanism, lived from 1304 to 1374.  Although he studied law, Petrarch spent his life reading the great literature of from antiquity and writing his own works.  He rediscovered Latin texts in monastic libraries and promoted the study of Latin according to Cicero’s style.  However, he also embraced the writings of the New Testament and the Latin Church Fathers (Augustine, Ambrose, Jerome, and Gregory the Great).  In this letter he encourages Boccaccio to persevere in the study of literature instead of renouncing it.  Petrarch defends the idea that one may be truly pious and well-read simultaneously.

 

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