The fourth reason for this condition is the fact that the Latins up to the present time lack very many philosophical and theological works. For I have seen two books of the Maccabees in Creek, namely the third and the fourth, and Scripture makes mention of the books of Samuel and Nathan and Gad the seer, and of others which we do not have. And since the whole confirmation of sacred history is given by Josephus in his books on Antiquities, and all the sacred writers take the fundamentals of their expositions from those books, it is necessary for the Latins to have that work in an uncorrupted form. But it has been proved that the Latin codices are wholly corrupt in all places on which the import of history rests, so that the text is self-contradictory everywhere. This is not the fault of so great an author, but arises from a bad translation and from the corruption by the Latins, nor can it be remedied except by a new translation or by adequate correction in all fundamental points. Likewise the books of the great doctors like the blessed Dionysius, Basil, John Chrysostom, John of Damascus, and of many others are lacking; some of which, however, Master Robert, the aforesaid bishop, has turned into Latin, and others before him translated certain other works. His work is very pleasing to theologians. If the books of these authors had been translated, not only would the learning of the Latins be augmented in a glorious way, but the Church would have stronger supports against the heresies and schisms of the Greeks, since they would be convinced by their own sacred writers whom they cannot contradict.
Likewise almost all the secrets of philosophy up to the present time lie hidden in foreign languages. For as in many instances only what is common and worthless has been translated; and much even of this character is lacking....
The seventh reason why it is necessary that the Latins should know languages is particularly false interpretation, although the text be absolutely correct. For in both theology and philosophy interpretations are necessary, especially so in the sacred text and in the text of medicine and in that of the secret sciences, which are too obscure owing to the ignorance of interpretations....
Since I have now shown how a knowledge of languages is necessary to the Latins owing to the pure zeal for knowledge, I now wish to state why this should be secured because of the wisdom established for the Church of God, and the commonwealth of the faithful, and the conversion of unbelievers, and the repression of those who cannot be converted....
In the second place, a knowledge of languages is very necessary for directing the commonwealth of the Latins for three reasons. One is the sharing in utilities necessary in commerce and in business, without which the Latins cannot exist, because medicines and all precious things are received from other nations, and hence arises great loss to the Latins, and fraud without limit is practised on them, because they are ignorant of foreign tongues, however much they may talk through interpreters; for rarely do interpreters suffice for full understanding, and more rarely are they found faithful. A second reason is the securing of justice. For countless injuries are done the Latins by the people of other nations, the sufferers being the clergy as well as the laity, members of religious orders, and friars of the Dominicans and Franciscans who travel owing to the varied interests of the Latins. But owing to their ignorance of languages they cannot plead their cases before judges nor do they secure justice. The third reason is the securing of peace among the princes of other nations and among the Latins that wars may cease. For when formal messages along with letters and documents are drawn up in the respective languages of both sides, very often matters which have been set on foot with great labour and expense come to naught owing to ignorance of a foreign tongue. And not only is it harmful, but very embarrassing, when among all the learned men of the Latins prelates and princes do not find a single one who knows how to interpret a letter of Arabic or Greek nor to reply to a message, as is sometimes the case. For example, I learned that Soldanus of Babylonia wrote to my lord, the present king of France, and there was not found in the whole learned body in Paris nor in the whole kingdom of France a man who knew how satisfactorily to explain a letter nor to make the necessary reply to the message. And the lord king marvelled greatly at such dense ignorance, and he was very much displeased with the clergy because he found them so ignorant....
In the third place, the knowledge of languages is necessary to the Latins for the conversion of unbelievers. For in the hands of the Latins rests the power to convert. And for this reason Jews without number perish among us because no one knows how to preach to them nor to interpret the Scriptures in their tongue, nor to confer with them nor to dispute as to the literal sense.... Then the Greeks and the Rutheni and many other schismatics likewise grow hardened in error because the truth is not preached to them in their tongue; and the Saracens likewise and the Pagans and the Tartars, and the other unbelievers throughout the whole world.... Oh, how we should consider this matter and fear lest God may hold the Latins responsible because they are neglecting the languages so that in this way they neglect the preaching of the faith. For Christians are few, and the whole broad world is occupied by unbelievers; and there is no one to show them the truth.
From Opus majus of Roger Bacon, trans. R. B. Burke (Philadelphia : University of Pennsylvania Press, 1928).
Statute of the Council of Vienne on Languages
1312
CLEMENT, bishop, servant of the servants of God. In perpetual memory of the matter... imitating the example of Him whose place on earth we unworthily fill who wished the apostles to go throughout the world preaching the Gospel trained in every language, we desire Holy Church to abound in Catholics acquainted with the languages which the infidels chiefly use, who may come to know the infidels themselves, and be able to instruct them in sacred institutions, and add them to the company of worshippers of Christ by knowledge of the Christian faith and reception of baptism. Therefore, that linguistic ability of this sort may be obtained by efficacy of instruction, with the approval of this holy council we have provided for establishing courses in the languages to be mentioned, wherever the Roman curia happens to reside, also in the universities of Paris, Oxford, Bologna, and Salamanca, decreeing that in each of these places Catholics having sufficient knowledge of the Hebrew, Greek, Arabic, and Aramaic languages, namely, two trained in each tongue, shall offer courses there and, translating books faithfully from those languages into Latin, teach others those languages carefully and transfer their ability to these by painstaking instruction, so that, sufficiently instructed and trained in these languages, they may produce the hoped-for fruit with God’s aid and spread the faith salubriously to infidel nations. For whom we wish provision made: for those lecturing at the Roman curia by the apostolic see; in the university of Paris by the king of France; at Oxford by that of England, Scotland, Ireland, and Wales; in Bologna by Italy’s and in Salamanca by Spain’s prelates, monasteries, chapters, convents, colleges, exempt or not, and rectors of churches in competent stipends and expenses, imposing the burden of contribution according to the ability of each to pay regardless of any privileges and exemptions to the contrary, by which however we do not wish prejudice to be generated so far as other matters are concerned.
From Chartulary of the University of Paris, trans. L. Thomdike, University Records and Life in the Middle Ages.
An English Humanist
RICHARD DE BURY
Fourteenth century
ALTHOUGH the novelties of the moderns were never disagreeable to our desires, who have always cherished with grateful affection those who devote themselves to study and who add anything either ingenious or useful to the opinions of our forefathers, yet we have always desired with more undoubting avidity to investigate the well-tested labours of the ancients. For whether they had by nature a greater vigour of mental sagacity, or whether they perhaps indulged in closer application to study, or whether they were assisted in their progress by both these things, one thing we are perfectly clear about, that their successors are barely capable of discussing the discoveries of their forerunners, and of acquiring those thin
gs as pupils which the ancients dug out by difficult efforts of discovery. For as we read that the men of old were of a more excellent degree of bodily development than modern times are found to produce, it is by no means absurd to suppose that most of the ancients were distinguished by brighter faculties, seeing that in the labours they accomplished of both kinds they are inimitable by posterity.... But in truth, if we speak of fervour of learning and diligence in study, they gave up all their lives to philosophy; while nowadays our contemporaries carelessly spend a few years of hot youth, alternating with the excesses of vice, and when the passions have been calmed, and they have attained the capacity of discerning truth so difficult to discover, they soon become involved in worldly affairs and retire, bidding farewell to the schools of philosophy. They offer the fuming must of their youthful intellect to the difficulties of philosophy, and bestow the clearer wine upon the money-making business of life....
Admirable Minerva seems to bend her course to all the nations of the earth, and reacheth from end to end mightily, that she may reveal herself to all mankind. We see that she has already visited the Indians, the Babylonians, the Egyptians and Greeks, the Arabs and the Romans. Now she has passed by Paris, and now has happily come to Britain, the most noble of islands, nay, rather a microcosm in itself, that she may show herself a debtor both to the Greeks and to the Barbarians. At which wondrous sight it is conceived by most men, that as philosophy is now lukewarm in France, so her soldiery are unmanned and languishing....
While assiduously seeking out the wisdom of the men of old, according to the counsel of the wise man (Eccles. XXXIX) : the wise man, he says, will seek out the wisdom of all the ancients, we have not thought fit to be misled into the opinion that the first founders of the arts have purged away all crudeness, knowing that the discoveries of each of the faithful, when weighed in a faithful balance, makes a tiny portion of science, but that by the anxious investigations of a multitude of scholars, each as it were contributing his share, the mighty bodies of the sciences have grown by successive augmentations to the immense bulk that we now behold....
For as in the writers of annals it is not difficult to see that the later writer always presupposes the earlier, without whom he could by no means relate the former times, so too we are to think of the authors of the sciences. For no man by himself has brought forth any science, since between the earliest students and those of the latter time we find intermediaries, ancient, if they be compared with our own age, but modem if we think of the foundations of learning, and these men we consider the most learned. What would Virgil, the chief poet among the Latins, have achieved, if he had not despoiled Theocritus, Lucretius, and Homer, and had not ploughed with their heifer? What, unless again and again he had read somewhat of Parthenius and Pindar, whose eloquence he could by no means imitate? What could Sallust, Tully, Boëthius, Macrobius, Lactantius, Martianus, and in short the whole troop of Latin writers have done, if they had not seen the productions of Athens or the volumes of the Greeks? Certes, little would Jerome, master of three languages, Ambrosius, Augustine, though he confesses that he hated Greek, or even Gregory, who is said to have been wholly ignorant of it, have contributed to the doctrine of the Church if more learned Greece had not furnished them from its stores. As Rome, watered by the streams of Greece, had earlier brought forth philosophers in the image of the Greeks, in like fashion afterwards it produced doctors of the orthodox faith. The creeds we chant are the sweat of Grecian brows, promulgated by their councils, and established by the martyrdom of many....
One thing, however, we conclude from the premises, that the ignorance of the Greek tongue is now a great hindrance to the study of the Latin writers, since without it the doctrines of the ancient authors, whether Christian or Gentile, cannot be understood. And we must come to a like judgment as to Arabic in numerous astronomical treatises, and as to Hebrew as regards the text of the Holy Bible, which deficiencies, indeed, Clement V provides for, if only the bishops would faithfully observe what they so lightly decree. Wherefore we have taken care to provide a Greek as well as a Hebrew grammar for our scholars, with certain other aids, by the help of which studious readers may greatly inform themselves in the writing, reading, and understanding of the said tongues, although only the hearing of them can teach correctness of idiom.
From Philobiblon, trans. E. C. Thomas (London: Chatto and Windus, 1913).
In Defence of Liberal Studies
COLUCCIO SALUTATI
1378
AND now, my dear colleague, I will come to a matter in which you have stirred me up in no slight degree. I wrote to you asking you to buy for me a copy of Virgil, and you reply reproving me for not occupying myself with quite different matters and calling Virgil— to quote your own words—a “lying soothsayer.” You say that, since it is forbidden in the canon law to concern oneself with books of that sort, I ought not to burden you with such an errand, and you generously offer me a number of volumes of pious literature. I beg you, my dearest Giuliano, to pardon me if, in order that due supremacy of honour be maintained for the prince of Roman eloquence, the divinest of all poets, our own countryman, Virgil, and also that I may set you free from the error in which you seem to be involved, I address you in language rather more severe than is my wont.
I seem to feel a deep obligation to defend Virgil, of whom Horace says that earth never bore a purer spirit, lest he be shut out from the sanctuaries of Christians. I am bound also to clear up that error of yours which gives you such a horror of Virgil that you fear to be polluted by the mere purchase of the book.
How do you happen, my dear colleague, to have this dread of Virgil? You say that he records the monstrous doings of the gods and the vicious practices of men, and that, because he did not, as you say, walk in the way of the Lord, he leads his readers away from the straight path of the faith. But, if you think Virgil ought not to be touched because he was a heathen, why do you read Donatus, or Priscian, who was something far worse, an apostate? Or Job, to whom you yourself call attention, was he a Christian or was he of the circumcision? Or shall we give up Seneca and his writings because he was not renewed with the water of regeneration? If we throw aside the heritage of the Gentiles, whence shall we draw the rules of literary composition? Cicero is the fountain of eloquence, and everyone who since his day has handed on the art of rhetoric has drawn from that source. Read Augustine on Christian doctrine where he seems to touch [the heights of] eloquence, and certainly you will find the Ciceronian tradition renewed in the style of that great man. Not to read the inventions of the heathen out of devotion to the faith is a very weak foundation, especially when with their assistance you can the more easily combat the futilities of the Gentiles. Don’t imagine that I have ever so read Virgil as to be led to accept his fables about the heathen gods! What I enjoy is his style, hitherto unequalled in verse, and I do not believe it is possible that human talent can ever attain to its loftiness and its charm.
I admire the majesty of his language, the appropriateness of his words, the harmony of his verses, the smoothness of his speech, the elegance of his composition, and the sweetly flowing structure of his sentences. I admire the profundity of his thought and his ideas drawn from the depths of ancient learning and from the loftiest heights of philosophy.
In these days there is no mixture of heathenism among Christians throughout the civilized world; ... [those gods] whom that accursed blind superstition worshipped have vanished from their altars and their shrines and have abandoned their glory to the true God, to Christ our Lord. It may have been worth while to warn Christians against the study of the poets at a time when heathens still lingered among them, but since that pest has been exterminated, what harm can it be for consecrated men to have read the poets who, even if they are of [no] profit for the moral conduct of life, nevertheless cannot spread such poison for the destruction of our faith that we shall cease humbly to adore our Creator....
But you will say, that when we are reading these vain things we are wandering
away from the study of sacred literature, since—to continue the Psalm which I began elsewhere—that man is blessed, “whose delight is in the law of the Lord and in his law doth he meditate day and night.” I grant you, it is a more holy thing to apply oneself without ceasing to the reading of the sacred page; but these devices of the heathen, even the songs of the poets of which you have such a horror, if one reads them in a lofty spirit are of no little profit and incline us toward those writings which pertain to the faith and the reading of which you urge in your letters....
I have dwelt upon this at such length that you may not suppose the reading of Virgil to be a mere idle occupation if one is willing to take the right view of it and to separate the wheat from the tares. Not, indeed, that I believe one should look there for the teachings of our faith or for the Truth; but, as Seneca says of himself, I go over into the enemy’s camp, not as a guest or as a deserter, but as a spy. I, as a Christian, do not read my Virgil as if I were to rest in it forever or for any considerable time; but as I read I examine diligently to see if I can find anything that tends toward virtuous and honourable conduct, and as I run through the foreshadowings of his poetry, often with the aid of allegory and not without enjoyment, if I find something not compatible with the truth, or obscurely stated, I try to make it clear by the use of reason. But, when it is my good fortune to find something in harmony with our faith, even though it be wrapped up in fiction, I admire it and rejoice in it, and, since our poet himself thought it well to learn even from an enemy, I joyfully accept it and make a note of it....
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