§ 1. The judgments of many concerning philosophers and philosophy are, and formerly were, bitter. For I said above that they were driven from the state, and the books of others were burned. The books of Numa, king of the Romans, written in the Greek language, were burned in the sight of the Quirites by authority of the Senate. Lactantius, Book 1, chapter 22. By the same judgment the memorials of Labienus were burned, Seneca, Controversies, Book 10; and Tacitus, Book 4 of the Annals and the Life of Agricola, laments that the memorials of the most illustrious abilities were burned. Alcius and Philiscus were driven from Rome when Lucius Postumius was consul. Antiochus also drove philosophers from his kingdom, threatening hanging to their followers and grave penalties to their parents. In the year 593 of the city, by a decree of the Senate, they were ordered to depart from the city. In the year 615, the Chaldaeans were ordered to depart from the city and Italy within ten days. Cato judged that Carneades and Diogenes, the philosophical ambassadors of the Athenians, should either not be admitted into the city or be dismissed at once. Plutarch, Cato. Indeed, he judged that the Greeks should universally be expelled. “Whenever that nation shall give us its letters,” he says, “it will corrupt everything.” Concerning Lysimachus, Sophocles, Agrippa, Tiberius, Nero, Domitian, Vespasian, and the Messenians, our Laelius writes at length in Book 3, chapter 7.
§ 2. Next, philosophers are accused of innumerable vices: with great haughtiness they despise everyone and admire themselves. Third, they are seen not only to be vicious—
—but nothing is more vicious than a vicious philosopher, since they are not sophi but asoti, as Salvian says in Book 1, chapter 4, On the True Judgment and Providence of God. “Nothing,” he says, “is more shameful than a philosopher pursuing obscene vices, because, in addition to that deformity which the vices possess in themselves, the name of wisdom is still more disgraced.” But philosophers were most vicious—not only those concerning whom Plautus writes in Curculio, Act 2, Scene 3:
Then those cloaked Greeks, who walk with covered head, Who walk stuffed with books and with little baskets, Stand still and confer discourses among themselves like runaway slaves; They obstruct and stand in the way with their opinions; You may always see them drinking in the wine shop. There, what they have stolen, with covered head they drink hot, And go about gloomy and drunken;
but their leaders also. For apart from the fact that most of them learned the magical arts—as Pliny teaches concerning Pythagoras, Empedocles, Democritus, and Plato in Book 30, chapter 4—they went to the Egyptians and Chaldaeans, among whom there was little of purer philosophy and much of superstition. Concerning Pythagoras, Laertius certainly writes that he was seditious, furnished an occasion for sedition, and was desirous of tyranny. Indeed, how far from the precepts of philosophy is that which the same Laertius and Hermippus relate! For when he had come into Italy, in order to subdue the uncultivated peoples by imposture, he made an underground house. He instructed his mother to record upon tablets, with the time noted, whatever happened meanwhile among those above. And when, after a year, almost killed by filth and emaciation, he emerged and secretly read the tablets, he recounted everything to those who marveled, but lied that he had been among those below, so that by this method he might hunt after a reputation for divinity.
How destructive was Empedocles, who, through love of a famous death, cast himself headlong into burning Etna? Socrates also, if we believe Aristophanes, taught those tricks by which men are injured under an appearance of law—namely, to make τὸν ἥττω, τὸν κρείττω λόγον, to make a bad cause good by speaking. Porphyry, writing about him from Aristoxenus, says that he was lustful, accustomed to become most violently angry, burdensome to his parent, and most shameful in every vice. Plato, the pupil, was not much better than his master: a slave of foul lust, liable to anger, possessed of scurrilous sharp speech, initiated into the rites of Egyptian monsters, a reviler, abusive, vain, eager for glory—Athenaeus, Book 1, chapter 22—and finally a teacher of tyrants.
Aristotle possessed no smaller vices, if we believe Laertius. Through helplessness in his love of Hermias’s concubine, he sacrificed to her as though to Eleusinian Ceres. Shame certainly forbids us to speak concerning Diogenes the Cynic and that entire cohort of dogs and herd of Epicureans. In how great crimes of teaching and living were the Stoics themselves engaged? They bound God’s providence to fate and abolished freedom and every distinction in sin. Seneca the Stoic, who surpassed all philosophers in holiness of speech, is accused in Tacitus, Book 13 of the Annals, and in Dio’s Nero, of adulteries with princely women. Hence Lucian also, the mocker of all men and especially of philosophers, compares philosophy to a poison, which, when taken immoderately, kills like hemlock and other poisons; and thus, lest it be harmful, it ought merely to be tasted.
They next allege in summary the doctrines of the philosophers, as absurd and altogether abhorrent from civil government: such as the community of all things, even of wives, which is found in Plato. Next, they were judged inept for civil affairs; Antonius, in Cicero, Book 1 of On the Orator, thinks that Socrates was condemned on account of his inexperience in speaking. Finally, that case is pleaded in Seneca, On the Happy Life, chapter 17:
“Why do you speak more bravely than you live? Why do you submit your words to a superior, regard money as a necessary instrument for yourself, become moved by loss, let tears fall when you hear of the death of your wife or friend, look toward reputation, and become touched by malicious reports? Why is your country estate cultivated beyond what natural use demands? Why do you not dine according to your own prescription? Why is your furniture more splendid? Why is wine older than your own age drunk in your house? Why, moreover, is a house arranged? Why are trees which will give nothing beyond shade planted together? Why does your wife carry in her ears the valuation of a wealthy household? Why is your troop of young attendants girded in costly clothing? Why is ministering an art in your house? Why is the silver not set down casually and as one pleases, but service is rendered skillfully, and there is someone who is master of carving the provisions?
“Add, if you wish: Why do you possess property across the sea? Why do you possess more things than you know? Shamefully, you are either so negligent that you do not know your few slaves, or so luxurious that you possess more than memory suffices to know. I shall presently assist your reproaches and shall cast up against myself more than you suppose. For now I shall answer you this: I am not a wise man, and—to feed your malevolence—I shall not be one. Therefore I require of myself not that I be equal to the best, but that I be better than the bad. It is sufficient for me to remove something from my vices every day and to rebuke my errors. I have not arrived at health, nor indeed shall I arrive. For my gout I compose palliatives rather than remedies, content if it comes more rarely and gnaws less. Compared with your feet, however, I am a feeble runner.
“I do not say these things on my own behalf, for I am in the depth of all vices, but on behalf of that man in whom something has been accomplished. ‘You speak in one way,’ he says, ‘and live in another.’ This was cast up against Plato, cast up against Epicurus, cast up against Zeno, by most malicious heads hostile to every excellent man. For all those men said not how they themselves lived, but how one ought to live. I speak concerning virtue, not concerning myself; and when I reproach vices, I reproach my own first of all. When I am able, I shall live as I ought. Nor will that malice of yours, steeped in much poison, deter me from the best things. Not even that venom with which you bespatter others and kill yourselves will prevent me from persevering in praising the life not which I live, but which I know must be lived; from adoring virtue and following it, crawling at an immense distance.
“Am I, to be sure, to expect anything to remain inviolate from malevolence, to which neither Rutilius nor Cato was sacred? Why should anyone not seem too rich to those for whom Demetrius the Cynic is not poor enough? O most vehement man, fighting against every desire of nature! In this he is poorer than the other Cynics: although he forbade himself to possess, he also forbade himself to ask. They say that he is not sufficiently in need. Do you see? He professed not the knowledge of virtue but of poverty.
“They say that Diodorus, an Epicurean philosopher who within the space of a few days placed an end upon his life by his own hand, did not act according to the decree of Epicurus when he cut his throat. Some wish this deed of his to seem madness, others rashness. He meanwhile, happy and full of a good conscience, bore witness to himself as he departed from life, praised the repose of an age passed in harbor and at anchor, and said what you heard unwillingly, as though it must also be done by you:
I have lived, and completed the course which fortune gave.
“You dispute concerning the life of one man and the death of another; and at the name of great men distinguished by some exceptional praise, you bark like little dogs at the approach of unknown men. For it is expedient for you that no one should seem good, as though another’s virtue were a reproach of your offenses. Unwillingly you compare splendid things with your filth, nor do you understand at how great a cost to yourselves you dare to do it. For if those who follow virtue are avaricious, lustful, and ambitious, what are you, to whom the very name of virtue is hateful?
“You deny that anyone accomplishes what he says or lives according to the model of his speech. What wonder is it, since they speak brave and immense things which escape every human tempest, since they attempt to tear themselves loose from crosses into which each one of you himself drives his own nails? Those driven to punishment nevertheless hang upon single stakes. Those who exact punishment from themselves are torn apart by as many crosses as they have desires; and, abusive men, they are elegant in insulting another. I would believe them, were it not that some spit upon the spectators from their own gallows.
“Do philosophers not accomplish what they say? Nevertheless they accomplish much by saying it and by conceiving honorable things in their minds. For if they also did things equal to their words, what would be happier than they? Meanwhile there is no reason for you to despise good words and breasts filled with good thoughts. The pursuit of salutary studies is praiseworthy even short of the effect. What wonder if they do not ascend when they have assailed steep heights? But look up to men who attempt great things even if they fall. It is a noble thing, looking not to one’s own strength but to the strength of one’s nature, to strive after high things, to attempt them, and to conceive in the mind things greater than can be accomplished even by men endowed with an immense spirit.
“The man who has proposed this to himself: ‘I shall hear of death with the same countenance with which I shall see it. I shall submit to labors, however great they will be, supporting the body by the mind. I shall despise riches equally, whether present or absent: I shall not be sadder if they lie somewhere else, nor more high-spirited if they shine around me. I shall perceive fortune neither as it comes nor as it departs. I shall regard all lands as though mine, and mine as though belonging to all. I shall live as though I know that I was born for others, and I shall give thanks to the nature of things on this account. For in what better manner could it have conducted my affair? It gave me alone to all, and all to me alone.
“‘Whatever I shall possess, I shall neither guard sordidly nor scatter prodigally. I shall believe that I possess nothing more than what has been well given. I shall weigh benefits neither by number nor weight, nor by any valuation except that of the recipient. Nothing which a worthy man receives will ever be much to me. I shall do nothing for opinion, everything for conscience. Whatever I do with myself as witness, I shall believe to be done with the people as witness. The end of eating and drinking will be to extinguish the desires of nature, not to fill and empty the belly. I shall be pleasant to friends, mild and easy to enemies; I shall be persuaded before I am asked, and shall anticipate honorable requests. I shall know that the world is my fatherland, and that the gods stand above and around me, as judges of deeds and words.
“‘But whenever nature reclaims my breath or reason dismisses it, I shall depart having borne witness that I loved a good conscience and good studies; that no one’s liberty was diminished through me, least of all my own.’ The man who shall propose, wish, and attempt to do this will make a road to the gods.”
§ 3. The whole dispute comes back to this: ought the vices of philosophers to be prejudicial to philosophy? The answer is easy: they ought not. All things are full of evils; vices prevail publicly, but the vices of philosophers are noticed. The most cruel of tyrants and the most ruined of prodigals speak about Socrates, Plato, and Seneca.
Philosophy must therefore be retained, without which the state will end in barbarism. The Christian princes Theodosius and Valentinian embraced it. “And since we desire a glorious youth to be instructed not only in these arts, we also associate with the aforesaid masters authors of more profound knowledge and learning. We therefore wish one man to be added to the others who may search the secrets of philosophy.” For philosophy is a divine gift, the love of wisdom—indeed, divine love. Moses, Solomon, and others most practiced in it joined integrity of life to knowledge. Nor was the mind of the most holy men otherwise: Dionysius, Heraclas, Pantaenus, Clement, Athenagoras, Justin, Basil, Nazianzen, Nyssen, Jerome, Hilary, and Augustine, who were not only philosophers but also advanced toward virtue from the books of philosophers.
Augustine wrote most truly: “No one is ordinarily considered a philosopher other than a lover of God.” Theophrastus calls philosophy the guide of life and the expeller of vices; if someone should remove it from life, he would sin more than if he had extinguished the lamp at a banquet. Its advantages are many and frequently hidden. When the father of the Eretrian, threatening blows, imperiously demanded from his son, a pupil of Zeno, what he had learned, he was calmed by a prudent answer: the son declared that he owed this to philosophy, that he could bear his father’s anger with an even mind.
§ 4. Next, the decrees of philosophy are excellent; they reproach every vice, even the smallest. Few apprehend virtue without them. “What, then?” says Seneca in Epistle 95. “Have not some without subtle instruction become upright and attained great advancement, while obeying only bare precepts? I confess it. But theirs was a fortunate disposition, and they seized salutary things in passing. For just as the immortal gods learned no virtue, since they were born with every virtue and it is a part of their nature to be good, so certain men, having obtained an excellent disposition, arrive without prolonged teaching at those things which are customarily transmitted, and embraced honorable things as soon as they heard them. Whence are those abilities so rapacious of virtue, or fruitful from themselves? But from those who are either dull and obtuse or beset by bad custom, the rust of minds must long be rubbed away. Moreover, just as one who transmits to them the tenets of philosophy more quickly leads those who are inclined toward the good to the summit, so he will assist the weaker and draw them out of evil opinions. You may see how necessary these tenets are. Certain things reside within us which make us sluggish toward some things and rash toward others. Neither can this boldness be repressed nor that inertia aroused unless their causes—false admiration and false fear—are removed.”
Epistle 17, which sufficiently explains its power, should also be read. But now we dispute this question in vain, since the customs and laws of all Christian nations embrace philosophy. I must therefore explain how it is to be taught. For the state ought also to regulate it politically.
§ 5. At the outset, therefore, a state that loves philosophy will impose this law upon its professors, or even exact it by oath: that they teach philosophy in such a way that through it, as through aids, students may come to the more serious sciences—medicine, jurisprudence, politics, and theology. The Society chiefly regards theology, especially in its own members. Thus the first rule of the professor: “Since the arts or natural sciences dispose abilities toward theology, serve toward its perfect knowledge and use, and of themselves assist toward the same end, the teacher shall treat them with the diligence that is proper, sincerely seeking the honor and glory of God in all things, in such a way that he prepares his hearers, and especially ours, for theology, and above all arouses them to knowledge of their Creator.”
Thus also the Constitutions, Part 4, chapter 12, §3. Dialectic is necessary to all, physics to physicians, ethics to jurists, and metaphysics to theologians; yet every part of philosophy is both an aid and an ornament to every science.
And this is what Saint Thomas admonished: that philosophy should serve theology as a waiting-maid. Thus it was also customary of old to say that the Christian mysteries begin where the dogmas of the philosophers end, and that Plato’s summits are the threshold of Christians. Plato seems to have understood this through a shadow, since—as Augustine also recalls from him—he called a philosopher a lover of God. He said that the philosopher’s office is to know divine things excellently and so far as reason permits, but in no way to abandon human affairs; rather, to place labor and zeal in disposing them according to the norm of prudence.
The state will provide for this not only with greater caution but also by command and punishments, because philosophers are an unbelieving nation and weigh everything in the deceitful balance of the understanding, unless you subject the judgment of reason to divine censure. Otherwise empty philosophy knocks at truth but does not enter it. Tertullian speaks excellently against heretics in Prescription, chapter 7: “These are the doctrines of men and demons, born for itching ears from the ingenuity of worldly wisdom, which the Lord, calling foolishness, chose the foolish things of the world even to confound philosophy itself. For worldly wisdom is the material of those very heresies: a rash interpreter of the divine nature and dispensation. Finally, the heresies themselves are suborned by philosophy.
“From it came the Aeons, and certain forms, I know not what, and the trinity of man in Valentinus: he had been a Platonist. From it came Marcion’s better god, from tranquility: he had come from the Stoics. That the soul is said to perish is observed from the Epicureans. That the restoration of the flesh is denied is taken from the one school of all the philosophers. Where matter is made equal with God, it is the discipline of Zeno; and where anything is alleged concerning a fiery god, Heraclitus intervenes. The same subjects are rolled about among heretics and philosophers; the same reconsiderations are entangled. Whence is evil, and why? And whence is man, and how? And what Valentinus very recently proposed: whence is God? From an enthymesis, of course, and an ectroma.
“They insert Aristotle, who established dialectic for them: an artificer, changeable in form, of building and destroying; constrained in opinions, hard in conjectures, productive of contentions in arguments, troublesome even to itself, reconsidering everything lest it should have treated anything at all. Hence those fables and interminable genealogies, fruitless questions, and discourses creeping like a cancer. The Apostle, restraining us from these things, expressly testifies that philosophy must be guarded against, writing to the Colossians: ‘See that no one circumvent you through philosophy and empty seduction, according to the tradition of men, apart from the providence of the Holy Spirit.’ He had been at Athens and from its encounters had learned that human wisdom, the affecter and adulterator of truth, itself also divided into manifold heresies by the variety of mutually opposing sects.
“What, therefore, has Athens to do with Jerusalem? What has the Academy to do with the Church? What have heretics to do with Christians? Our institution is from the porch of Solomon, who himself had transmitted that the Lord is to be sought in simplicity of heart. Let those who have produced a Stoic, Platonic, and dialectical Christianity look to it. We have no need of curiosity after Christ Jesus, nor of inquiry after the Gospel.”
§ 6. If Aristotle and others possess anything contrary to the orthodox faith, let them seriously refute it. This has been diligently provided for among our professors in Rules 2, 3, and 4: “In matters of some importance, let him not depart from Aristotle unless something occurs alien to the doctrine which the academies everywhere approve, and much more if it opposes the orthodox faith. If there are arguments of his or of another philosopher against it, let him strive vigorously to refute them, according to the Lateran Council.
“Let him neither read nor bring into the school interpreters of Aristotle who have deserved badly of the Christian religion without great discrimination; and let him take care that the pupils are not disposed toward them.
“For that reason, let him not gather the digressions of Averroes—the judgment is the same concerning others of that kind—into any separate treatise. If anything good is to be brought forward from him, let him bring it forward without praise and, if it can be done, show that he took it from elsewhere.”
§ 7. But because contests of sects sometimes arise, it will be altogether fitting in every state that visitors and magistrates inquire what opinion each man teaches. For affection and admiration for those authors truly cast young men headlong into the dangers of empty and false opinions, magical impostures, and atheism. My mind shudders to remember Cardano, Massilio, and others whom an excessive eagerness for knowledge compelled to die doubtful concerning religion. “Depart from the heathen, heretic; give back to them their own opinions, because he too is not instructed from yours.” Cyril already showed in Catechesis 18 that offense was once committed in this matter. Why does it help to animate impiety and license concerning the atheism of the ancients? Why, so that you may hunt after the glory of subtle speaking, do you desire to derive a name from condemned names and errors? The memorials of so many holy philosophers are in our hands; do you reckon it a glory to approach the patriarchs of heretics?
Formerly the battle lines of sects were innumerable: the Eretrian, Epicurean, Cyrenaic, Megarian, Theodorean, Pyrrhonian, Stoic, Peripatetic, Old and New Academic, Cynic, Potamonian, and Eleian. It would be more fitting for them to assemble among clocks than among philosophers. Those which quickly raised their head quickly failed. The Old and Minor Academics left no leader; who is there who transmits the precepts of Pyrrho? That hateful crowd of the Pythagorean school found no teacher; the new sect of the Sextians, possessed of Roman strength, was extinguished amid its beginnings, although it had begun with great impetus. Therefore, whoever is entrusted with Christian youth must teach truth according to the opinion of pious philosophers and academies.
§ 8. Let him also recognize his office, which consists in life, not in disputation alone. Golden is the admonition of the Roman sage in Epistle 20: “But this, my Lucilius, I ask and exhort you to do: that you send philosophy down into your innermost breast and take proof of your advancement, not by speech or writing, but by firmness of mind and diminution of desires. Prove words by deeds. One purpose belongs to those who declaim and seek the assent of a surrounding crowd; another to those who detain the ears of the young and idle by varied or fluent disputation. Philosophy teaches doing, not speaking; and it exacts this: that each should live according to its law, lest life disagree with speech, and that the one life itself should be of one color throughout, without disagreement among its actions. This is both the greatest office and the greatest indication of wisdom: that deeds agree with words, and that a man should everywhere be equal to and the same as himself. Who will accomplish this? Few, yet some. This is difficult; nor do I say that the wise man will always proceed at one pace, but along one road.” Let him therefore live according to the law of philosophy and teach men to live thus.
For if the professor of philosophy corrupts morals, as did the Epicureans and Cynics, the discipline of the state will suffer, and he will give himself over to delights.
§ 9. Let the teacher diligently apply himself to this: that pupils of philosophy, while they inquire into everything, should not only refrain from disputing against divine laws but should also render honor to magistrates and obey political laws. It was formerly objected to the Stoics that magistracy and laws were despised by them; and it certainly was ready to think this concerning men who were accustomed to say that all were insane, that there was no praetor, no consul, and no king. It is charged against Rubellius Plautus in Tacitus, Book 14, that he had assumed the arrogance and sect of the Stoics, which makes men turbulent and eager for affairs.
Seneca answered in Epistle 73: “Those who judge men faithfully devoted to philosophy to be obstinate and refractory, and despisers of magistrates and kings or of those through whom public affairs are administered, seem to me to err. On the contrary, none are more grateful toward them, and not undeservedly; for they accomplish more for none than for those who are permitted to enjoy tranquil leisure. Therefore those for whom public security furnishes an approach to their purpose of living well must honor the author of this good as a parent—much more, indeed, than those restless men placed in the midst of affairs, who owe much to princes but also charge much against them, whose desires, which grow while they are fulfilled, no generosity can ever encounter so fully as to sate them.”
And in Book 2, chapter 5, of On Clemency: “I know that the Stoic sect has a bad reputation among the unskilled, as though it were excessively hard and would give counsel by no means good for princes and kings. For it is objected against it that it says that the wise man does not pity and does not forgive. These things, if set down by themselves, are hateful. For they seem to leave no hope for human errors, but to bring every offense to punishment.”
He excuses them, but I fear whether forcefully and truly; for Augustine accuses them of hardness. There are everywhere many examples of the obstinacy which they called fortitude. Therefore the professor of morals especially will inculcate this part and the foundations which nature itself laid down. The rule itself requires this of the professors of the Society: “Let him understand that it is in no way part of his institute to digress into theological questions, but, proceeding through the text, to explain briefly, learnedly, and gravely the principal heads of moral science which are contained in the ten books of Aristotle’s Ethics.”
The principal doctrine, however, is that in the state they should observe the lawful order of obeying, and finally recognize the virtues themselves.
§ 10. Flee contentions. For philosophy contains an investigation of truth, to which nothing is equally opposed as the cheap little glory of conquering and triumphing—yet it is a keen tyranny in the minds of sophists. With peace and charity preserved, citizens contend before the judge’s tribunal concerning estates and inheritances; philosophers declaim with fury concerning little words, beings of reason, and relations. Our professors are admonished in Rule 5 to teach not only their own doctrines but also to refute those of others with modesty: “In those questions in which it is free to follow either side, let one side be so defended that provision is made modestly and benevolently for the reputation of the other side also—and much more for that of the preceding professor, if he had taught the contrary. Indeed, if authors can be reconciled, it is desirable that this should not be neglected. Finally, in naming or refuting authors, let him conduct himself modestly.”
Let it therefore be your concern to possess philosophy, not to make a display of it. If you are more perspicacious than your colleagues in little questions, rejoice that your own ignorance has been taken from you; do not reproach others with theirs. If you wish to philosophize without envy, philosophize without parade. Hateful is the man who speaks in such a way that he seems to condemn whatever he himself does not teach.
§ 11. Novelty of opinions must also be avoided. For what is accustomed to happen in calamities—that novelty strikes us and adds weight to grief—is also accustomed to happen in this fickleness of opinions: they come with great impetus and applause, and then are rejected with rapid disgust. Men are long tormented by the difficulty and obscurity of common opinions, which even great abilities cannot overcome except by great labor; when they hear new things, they ponder within themselves not what they possess but what they desire. Therefore a desire for innovation is the summit of evil for the unskilled. Whatever novelty alone has made precious is rendered cheap when it is present, and an author is not esteemed when he has ceased to be new.
That novelty is seriously forbidden to us even in matters otherwise indifferent, in Common Rule 6: “Even in matters in which no danger to faith or piety is present, let no one introduce new questions in matters of some importance, nor any opinion for which there is no suitable author, without consulting those who preside; nor let him teach anything against the axioms of the Doctors and the common sense of the schools. Rather, let all follow the most approved Doctors and those opinions which, as the use of the times has borne, have been especially received in the Catholic academies.”
Indeed, I judge this matter to be so important that I think no one should be admitted to the profession of philosophy unless he is prepared to travel by the old and well-worn—that is, royal—road. For if he expounds to youth that philosophy which Aristotle, Pantaenus, Augustine, Saint Thomas, and innumerable others professed with great agreement and in which they became illustrious, the state already knows what young men are being taught. If he brings new things, although they might perhaps be good, they are nevertheless doubtful and dangerous; but the state desires its youth to be placed in safety. No novelty completes its work in a moment, nor is it on solid ground except through a space of time; new things must therefore be imperfect.
The Dutch have long attempted new routes across the Ocean through the Arctic regions; great hope and great rewards are proposed to those who hazard them. But no prudent man commits himself to an uncertain voyage when wind and wave furnish enough dangers upon the course of the known sea. Therefore this caution is fitting for the state: let them not entrust youth to new and unknown opinions unless it has first become established that some have attained erudition by that doctrine and method which is vaunted. When that has happened, novelty will already have ceased; for great things come forth slowly. And the man who admits the hazards of a new philosophy into himself acts no less imprudently than one who perceives that an experiment with an uncertain medicine is being made upon his own health.
§ 12. Not only new but also old and useless opinions, which bring philosophy into disrepute, must be avoided. Thus Common Rule 8: “Let him not adduce useless, obsolete, absurd, or manifestly false opinions.” Nevertheless, there is nothing so absurd that some philosopher has not thought and said it; and if their absurdities are frequently recalled to memory, they will at some time find a follower. Philosophers possess much that is superfluous and will never come into use; let them not only cut those things away but omit mention of them altogether, lest abilities be made to struggle with unnecessary matters. I spoke above concerning excessive subtlety, which is hostile to truth. Now I admonish only this: that it pertains to public ordering to keep watch lest time and life be passed in empty little disputes.
Philosophy is threefold: moral, natural,
and rational. The first orders the mind; the second searches the nature of things; the third, which is a part of eloquence, examines the properties and structure of words and arguments, lest false things creep in for true.
Let the industry of a good teacher be enclosed within these limits. Let him not draw in other matters—a thing which many will nevertheless neglect unless the care of their superiors restrains absurdities. Formerly it was done thus: philosophers descended even to distinctions of syllables and the properties of conjunctions and propositions, and envied grammarians and envied geometers. Whatever was superfluous in their arts, philosophers transferred into their own. Thus it was brought about that they knew more diligently how to speak than how to live. Indeed, even now many do not know how to speak, for while they entangle the mind in useless intricacies, they have not learned even to unfold and explain words.
§ 13. Let him cite illustrious philosophers, imitate them, and commend them to his pupils. Thus Common Rule 8: “In bringing forward the authorities of the Doctors, let him not be excessive. Yet if he possesses testimonies from more distinguished authors for confirming his opinion, let him recite the very words—as far as can be done, though few of them—and faithfully; much more those of the Sacred Scriptures, Councils, and holy Fathers.” Moreover, it belongs to the dignity of a master to bring forward almost no author whom he himself has not read.
Yet let him not report everything; let the hearers be referred to reading the authors themselves, as is stated in Rule 10: “If things contained in readily available authors must be adduced, let him explain rather than dictate them. Indeed, let him refer the hearers to those authors who have treated some subject copiously and accurately.”
§ 14. Let him exercise the young men in disputation: nothing is more destructive than Pythagorean silence. For five years, like mute fish, they heard no great wisdom. I wish the future philosopher to hear, reflect, and inquire assiduously and diligently. But because many things fall from memory, many doubts occur, and many reasonings arise in the opposite direction, it is necessary that hearers be exercised every day and have someone to whom they may propose doubts and whom they may consult. In one word a master explains what had to be sought by prolonged labor. Proud is the man who considers it more honorable to err than to have the road shown to him.
Our laws provide concerning this matter as follows. Rule 11: “After the lecture, let him remain in the school or near it for at least a quarter of an hour, so that the hearers may approach him to ask questions. And let him sometimes exact an account of the lectures and take care that they be repeated.”
The varied exercises in disputations in Rule 12 and the following rules also pertain here. “At home also, every day except Saturdays, vacations, and feast days, one hour is to be appointed in which our men repeat and dispute, so that by this means both their abilities may be exercised more and the difficult things which occur may be made more clear. Therefore, let one or two be forewarned to repeat from memory for no more than a quarter of an hour. Afterward let one or two likewise argue, with as many answering. If any time remains, let doubts be proposed. But so that it may remain, let the master strictly maintain the form of argumentation and cut off the argument when nothing new is brought forward.
“Toward the end of the year, the repetitions of past lectures are to be so arranged that, unless something prevents it, an entire month may be left free even from them, not only from lectures.
“On Saturday, or on another day which the custom of the academy requires, let them hold disputations in the schools for two hours—even longer where there is a great concourse of outsiders. But if two feast days, or one feast together with the weekly vacation, fall in any week, let there be no disputation, but a lecture on Saturday. Yet if this should continue for three weeks, let one disputation be interposed.
“Where the received custom of the academy does not prevent it, on some appointed day each month—except the final three summer months—or every other month if the hearers are few, let common disputations be held both before and after noon. As many hearers as there are masters shall defend, each one the questions of one master.
“As far as can be done, let other Doctors and professors of ours also attend the disputations, even those of different faculties. So that the contest may grow warmer, let them press the force of the arguments which are being discussed—provided that they do not undertake to pursue an argument upon which an arguer is still dwelling usefully and vigorously. Let it be permitted even to outside Doctors to accomplish this same thing; indeed, they can be invited expressly to argue, unless that custom is less approved somewhere.
“Among the hearers, let only the more learned dispute publicly; let the others be exercised privately until they are so instructed that they are not judged unworthy of that place.
“Let him judge the day of disputation no less laborious and fruitful than the day of lecture, and that all the utility and fervor of the disputation depend upon him. Let him so preside over it that he himself appears to be the one who contends in each contestant. Let him praise anything good that is brought forward and command everyone to attend. When some more serious difficulty has been proposed, let him continually suggest something brief by which he may either support the respondent or direct the arguer. Let him neither remain silent for long nor speak always, so that the pupils themselves may also bring forth what they know; but let him correct or polish what has been brought forth. Let him command the disputant to proceed while the difficulty retains force; indeed, let him himself increase the difficulty, and let him not conceal it if the one who argues has crept forward to another argument. Let him not permit either an argument nearly solved to be pressed longer or an answer which does not cohere well to be sustained for long; but after some contest, let him briefly define and explain the whole matter. Finally, if anything else is anywhere in use by which disputations are customarily rendered more frequent and more fervent, it is to be retained diligently.”
Let him sometimes deal with the assistant, or beadle, appointed by the rector, and question him concerning the condition of the whole class and the diligence and progress even of the outside hearers. Let him take care that the same man performs his office faithfully and accurately.
§ 15. Let the professor be such as Rule 20 describes: “Finally, in all things, with divine grace inspiring him, let him be diligent and assiduous, and devoted to the progress of the students both in lectures and in other literary exercises. Let him not show himself more familiar with one than with another. Let him despise no one. Let him provide equally for the studies of the poor and the rich, and procure particularly the progress of each one of his students.”
But in order that he may be such, let a learned man be chosen who fears God and loves the state. And although he is such, let the eyes of the nobles nevertheless be fixed upon him, lest at some time he be changed by weariness.