Part 17 (1/2)
Toes have been set forth, and lo, a third woe remains! The Faculties called liberal [ie, free] have lost their old ti-haired youths shamelessly possess themselves of the offices in these Faculties, and beardless boys sit in the seat of the Elders, and those who do not yet kno to be pupils strive to be named Doctors And they the and ith [their own] further drivellings, and not even seasoned with the salt of the philosophers
Neglecting the rules of the Arts and throwing away the standard works of the Makers of the Arts, they catch in their sophis phrases
Philosophy cries out that her garments are rent and torn asunder; she modestly covers her nakedness with certain carefully prepared reood s, O Father, demand the hand of Apostolic correction, that the present unsee may by your authority be reduced to definite forar attrition; that it may not be said on the corners, Lo! Here is Christ, or Lo! He is there! that sacred things s or pearls before swine to be trampled under their feet[77]
(b) _The Monastic View_
To many of the h reason were repellent In their view the way to spiritual truth was through retireious exercises This is the burden of a letter to John of Salisbury by Peter de la Celle, abbot of a ives his view concerning Paris
”Peter de la Celle to John of Salisbury concerning the perils that enco the true school of truth”
His own Abbot to his own clerk You have, htful exile, where joys, though they be vain, are in superabundance, where the supply of bread and wine exceeds in richness that of your own land where there is the frequent access of friends, where the dwelling together of comrades is common Who else besides you is there beneath the sky who has not thought Paris the place of delights, the garden of plantations, the field of first fruits?
Yet, though ss], you have said truly that where pleasure of the body is greater and fuller, there is the exile of the soul; and where luxury reigns there the soul is a wretched and afflicted hand-maid O Paris! Hoell-suited art thou to captivate and deceive souls! In thee are the nets of the vices, in thee the arrow of hell transfixes the hearts of the foolish!+ This my John has felt and therefore he has na behind that exile of yours just as it is, and were hastening to your native land not in word and tongue only but in very deed and truth! There, in the book of life would you be looking, not upon forms and elements, but upon divinity itself, as it really is, as upon truth--eye to eye, without labor of reading, without tediousness of seeing, without fallacies and , without fear of forgetting O blessed school, where Christ teaches our hearts with the words of his virtue, where without study and lecture we learn hoe should live happily to eternity! There no book is bought, no teacher of things written is hired, there is no circu in debate, no intricacy of sophisms, [but] a plain settlement of all questions, a full apprehension of universal reasons and arguments There life availsThere no one is shut in [ie, limited in freedom] save he who is shut out In a word; there every reproach is done aith in the answer given to him who evilly presents an evil life: ”Depart fro fire prepared for the devil and his angels;” and to hiood life: ”Come, ye blessed” &c
Would that the sons of men were as intent upon these better studies as they are on idle talking, on vain and base buffoonery!
Certainly they would harvest richer fruits, reater honors and beyond doubt would learn the end of all perfection,--Christ,--whom they will never find in these Farewell[78]
(c) _Letters fro to a period covering nearly four centuries The first gives an opinion of William of Champeaux in marked contrast to that of Abelard
(1) A CERTAIN D WRITES TO A CERTAIN PRIOR CONCERNING HIS STUDIES AT PARIS (1109-1112)
I am now in Paris in the School of Master Williareatest of all theWhen we hear his voice we think that no ; for the melody of his words and the profundity of his ideas transcends, as it were, human li my youth that I may not utterly succumb to those vices which, unless conquered, are wont, as a rule, to overturn this period of life Here I aht norance and the sin of the firstof wisdo of wisdohtly believed and considered by all men of discernment as the sure without charity puffeth up but, with charity edifieth: for it uproots vices and grafts in virtues; it instructs itself in its duty to itself, its neighbor, and its Creator; finally, by its presence, it fortifies and defends the ainst all the ills of this life that come to it from without[79]
(2) PHILIP OF HARVENGT TO HERGALD, A STUDENT AT PARIS (DATE BETWEEN 1154 AND 1181)
Know that I have both read carefully and when read, accepted gratefully the letters which your affection, with , led you to send to ress in learning Just as the Queen of Sheba is said to have coht of her own eyes she s whose faerly absorbed froe, caht for by many For here David strikes his harp of ten chords, here with mystic touch he co his prophecies are revealed; here the rest of the prophets present their diverse strains of harmonious melody Here the wisdoathered from all parts of the world; here his treasure house is thrown open to eager students Here to stireat a throng of clerks that it vies with the numerous multitude of the laity Happy city! in which the Sacred Codes are pored over with so ift of the outpoured Spirit, in which there is so ence on the part of the readers, and, in short, so e of Scriptures that it truly deserves to be called Cariath Sepher, that is The City of Letters Therein would I have you instructed like Gothoniel, not so rasp the Scriptures that youout their inner sweetness Farewell[80]
(3) DESCRIPTION OF PARIS ABOUT 1175 BY GUY DE BASOCHES
To a youth who is noble and so like himself as to be a second self, Guy de Basoches [seeks] to h-bred manners
My situation then is this: I am indeed in Paris, happy because of soundness of bothit too, and happiest had it but been my lot to have you with s, which not only holds, by the sweet delight of her natural dowry, those who are with her, but also alluringly invites those who are far away For as the moon by the majesty of its more brilliant mirror overwhelms the rays of the stars, not otherwise does said city raise its inity above the rest of the cities It is situated in the lap of a delightful valley, surrounded by a coronet of mountains which Ceres and Bacchus adorn with fervent zeal The Seine, no humble strea its two arms about the head, the heart, the very marrow of the city, forht and left, the less excellent, even, of which begets envy in envious cities Froes stretch over to the island and one of them which has been nalish Sea, while the opposite one, which opens towards the Loire, they call the Little Bridge
On this island Philosophy, of old, placed a royal throne for herself, Philosophy, who, despised in her solitude, with a sole attendant, Study, now possesses an enduring citadel of light and immortality, and under her victorious feet trae
On this island, the seven sisters, to wit, the Liberal Arts, have secured an eternal abiding place for the clarion of their nobler eloquence, decrees and laws are proclaiushes forth, and as it were evoking from itself three most lie of the sacred page into History, Allegory and Morals[81]
(4) JOHANN VON JENZENSTEIN TO MASTER BENESCH OF HORSCHOWITZ, CONCERNING PARIS (1375)
Master Bennessius, dearest cos at Paris are unknown to you, if the fecundity of pleasures, the abundance of all things edible, the manners of the men, the bountiful supply of all the sciences, even the clever teaching in very many material crafts,--if you could but see the uenerously enter into the aforesaid enjoyhts would renew their youth in these new sights
For here (says the writer sarcastically) are distinguished doctors of , and still others by crazy ways of acting, others, indeed, by inflicting wounds, and still others by abusive words, furnish enjoy; and (he adds more seriously) there are other Masters subtly trained in the seven liberal Arts, by whose exa the entire earth, like the heavens, is adorned with stars; and some of these masters are illuminated by the three trivials and some by the four quadrivials and some by both the trivials and the quadrivials