Thus a Universal Science was established, with the authority of a Religious Creed. Its universality rested on erroneous views of the relation of words and truths; its pretensions as a science were admitted by the servile temper of men's intellects; and its religious authority was assigned it, by making all truth part of religion. And as Religion claimed assent within her own jurisdiction under the most solemn and imperative sanctions, Philosophy shared in her imperial power, and dissent from their doctrines was no longer blameless or allowable. Errour became wicked, dissent became heresy; to reject the received human doctrines, was nearly the same as to doubt the Divine declarations. The Scholastic Philosophy claimed the assent of all believers. The external form, the details, and the text of this philosophy, were taken, in a great measure, from Aristotle; though, in the spirit, the general notions, and the style of interpretation, Plato and the Platonists had no inconsiderable share. Various causes contributed to the elevation of Aristotle to this distinction. His Logic had early been adopted as an instrument of theological disputation; and his spirit of systematization, of subtle distinction, and of analysis of words, as well as his disposition to argumentation, afforded the most natural and grateful employment to the commentating propensities. Those principles which we before noted as the leading points of his physical philosophy, were selected and adopted; and these, presented in a most technical form, and applied in a systematic manner, constitute a large portion of the philosophy of which we now speak, so far as it pretends to deal with physics. 2. Scholastic Dogmas.-But before the complete ascendancy of Aristotle was thus established, when something of an intellectual waking took place after the darkness and sleep of the ninth and tenth centuries, the Platonic doctrines seem to have had, at first, a strong attraction for men's minds, as better falling in with the mystical speculations and contemplative piety which belonged to the times. John Scot Erigena may be looked upon as the reviver of the New Platonism in the tenth century. Towards the end of the eleventh, Peter Damien, in Italy, reproduced, involved in a theological discussion, some Neoplatonic ideas. Godefroy' also, censor of St. Victor, has left a treatise, entitled Microcosmus; this is founded on a mystical analogy, often afterwards again brought forward, between Man and the Universe. "Philosophers and theologians," says the writer, "agree in considering man as a little world; and as the world is composed of four elements, man is endowed with four faculties, the senses, the imagination, reason, and understanding." Bernard of Chartres", in his Megascosmus and Microcosmus took up the same notions. Hugo, 8 Ib. iv. 367. 7 Deg. iv. 35. 9 Ib. iv. 413. abbot of St. Victor, made a contemplative life the main point and crown of his philosophy; and is said to have been the first of the scholastic writers who made psychology his special study". He says the faculties of the mind are "the senses, the imagination, the reason, the memory, the understanding, and the intelligence." Physics does not originally and properly form any prominent part of the Scholastic Philosophy, which consists mainly of a series of questions and determinations upon the various points of a certain technical divinity. Of this kind is the Book of Sentences of Peter the Lombard (bishop of Paris), who is, on that account, usually called "Magister Sententiarum;" a work which was published in the twelfth century, and was long the text and standard of such discussions. The questions are decided by the authority of Scripture and of the Fathers of the Church; and are divided into four Books, of which the first contains questions concerning God and the doctrine of the Trinity in particular; the second is concerning the Creation; the third, concerning Christ and the Christian Religion; and the fourth treats of Religious and Moral Duties. In the second Book, as in many of the writers of this time, the nature of Angels is considered in detail, and the Orders of their Hierarchy, of which there were held to be nine. The physical discussions enter only as bearing upon the scriptural history of the crea"1 Deg. iv. 415. 11 tion, and cannot be taken as a specimen of the work; but I may observe, that in speaking of the division of the waters above the firmament, from the waters under the firmament, he gives one opinion, that of Bede, that the former waters are the solid crystalline heavens in which the stars are fixed", "for crystal, which is so hard and transparent, is made of water." But he mentions also the opinion of St. Augustine, that the waters above the heavens are there in a state of vapour (vaporaliter) and in minute drops; "if, then, water can, as we see in clouds, be so minutely divided that may be thus supported as vapour on air, which is naturally lighter than water; why may we not believe that it floats above that lighter celestial element in still minuter drops and still lighter vapours? But in whatever manner the waters are there, we do not doubt that they are there." it The celebrated Summa Theologiæ of Thomas Aquinas is a work of the same kind; and anything which has a physical bearing forms an equally small part of it. Thus, of the 512 Questions of the Summa, there is only one (Part I., Quest. 115) “on Corporeal Action," or on any part of the material world; though there are several concerning the celestial Hierarchies, as "on the Act of Angels," "on the Speaking of Angels," "on the Subordination of Angels," "on Guardian Angels," and the like. This, of course, would not be remarkable in a 12 Lib. ii. Distinct. xiv. De opere secundæ diei. treatise on Theology, except this Theology were intended to constitute the whole of Philosophy. We may observe, that in this work, though Plato, Avecibron, and many other heathen as well as Christian philosophers, are adduced as authority, Aristotle is referred to in a peculiar manner as "the philosopher." This is noticed by John of Salisbury, as attracting attention in his time; (he died A.D. 1182.) "The various masters of Dialectic," says he13, "shine, each with his peculiar merit; but all are proud to worship the footsteps of Aristotle; so much so, indeed, that the name of philosopher, which belongs to them all, has been pre-eminently appropriated to him. He is called the philosopher autonomatice, that is, by excellence." The Question concerning Corporeal Action, in Aquinas, is divided into six Articles; and the conclusion delivered upon the first, is, that "Body being compounded of power and act, is active as well as passive." Against this it is urged, that quantity is an attribute of body, and that quantity prevents action; that this appears in fact, since a larger body is more difficult to move. The author replies, that "quantity does not prevent corporeal form from action altogether, but prevents it from being a universal agent inasmuch as the form is individualized, which, in matter subject to quantity, it is. Moreover, the illustration deduced from the 13 Metalogicus, lib. ii. cap. 16. Summa, P. i. Q. 115. Art. 1. 14 |