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XII. PART II.

combating the Dialecticians, not only in hisc EN T. writings and his conversation, but also by his deeds; arming against them synods and councils, the decrees of the church, and the laws of the state. The renowned ABELARD, who was as much superior to St BERNARD in sagacity and erudition, as he was his inferior in credit and authority, was one of the first, who felt, by a bitter experience, the aversion of the lordly abbot to the scholastic doctors: for, in the year 1121, he was called before the council of Soissons, and before that of Sens in the year 1140, in both of which assemblies he was accused by St BERNARD of the most pernicious errors, and was finally condemned as an egregious heretic [s]. The charge brought against this subtile and learned monk was, that he had notoriously corrupted the doctrine of the Trinity, blasphemed against the majesty of the Holy Ghost, entertained unworthy and false conceptions of the person and offices of CHRIST, and the union of the two natures in him, denied the necessity of the divine grace to render us virtuous, and in a word, that his doctrines struck at the fundamental principles of all religion. It must be confessed by those who are acquainted with the writings of ABELARD, that he expressed himself in a very singular and incon◄ gruous manner upon several points of theology [t]; and this indeed is one of the inconveniences to which

[] See BAYLE's Dictionary, at the Article ABELARD.GERVAIS, Vie d'Abelard et d'Helvise.-MABILLON, Annal. Benedict. tom. vi. p. 63. 84. 324. 395.-MARTENE, Thesaur. Anecdotor. tom. v. p. 1139

[] He affirmed, for example, among other things equally unintelligible and extravagant, that the names Father, Son, and Holy Ghost, were improper terms, and were only used to express the fullness of the sovereign good; that the Father was the plenitude of power, the Son a certain power, and the Holy Ghost no power at all; that the Holy Ghost was the soul of the world, with other crude fancies of a like nature, mingled, however, with bold truths.

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CEN T.which subtile refinements upon mysterious doc trines frequently lead. But it is certain, on the other hand, that St BERNARD, who had much more genius than logic, misunderstood some of the opinions of ABELARD, and wilfully perverted others. For the zeal of this good abbot too rarely permitted him to consult in his decisions the dictates of impartial equity; and hence it was, that · he almost always applauded beyond measure, and censured without mercy [u].

XI. ABELARD was not the only scholastic divine who paid dear for his metaphysical refinement upon the doctrines of the gospel, and whose logic exposed him to the unrelenting fury of Poitiers, who had taught theology and philosophy at Paris, and in other places, with the highest applause, met with the same fate. Unfortunately for him, ARNOLD and CALO, two of his archdeacons, who had been educated in the principles of the ancient theology, heard him one day disputing, with more subtilty than was meet, concerning the divine nature. Alarmed at the novelty of his doctrine, they brought a charge of blasphemy against him before Pope EUGENIUS III. who was at that time in France; and, to give weight to their accusation, they gained over St BERNARD, and engaged him in their cause. The zealous abbot treated the matter with his usual vehemence,

[u] See GERVAIS, Vie d' Abelard, tom. ii. p. 162.—LE CLERC, Biblioth. Ancienne et Moderne, tom. ix. p. 352.-DIONY'S PETAV. Dogmata Theolog. tom. i. lib. v. cap. vi. P. 217. as also the works of BERNARD, passim. ABELARD, who, notwithstanding all his crude notions, was a man of true genius, was undoubtedly worthy of a better fate than that which fell to his lot, and of a more enlightened age than that in which he lived. After passing through the furnace of persecution, and having suffered affliction of various kinds, of which he has transmitted the history to posterity, he retired to the monastery of Clagni, where he ended his days in the year 1142.

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vehemence, and opposed GILBERT with the ut- C E N T. most severity and bitterness, first in the council pART II. of Paris, A. D. 1147, and afterwards in that which was assembled at Rheims the year following. In this latter council the accused bishop, in order to put an end to the dispute, offered to submit his opinions to the judgment of the assembly, and of the Roman pontif, by whom they were condemned. The errors attributed to GILBERT were the fruits of an excessive subtilty, and of an extravagant passion for reducing the doctrines of Christianity under the empire of metaphysic and dialectic. He distinguished the divine essence from the Deity, the properties of the three divine persons from the persons themselves, not in reality, but by abstraction, in statu rationis, as the metaphysicians speak; and, in consequence of these distinctions, he denied the incarnation of the divine nature. To these he added other opinions, derived from the same source, which were rather vain, fanciful, and adapted to excite surprise by their novelty, than glaringly false, or really pernicious. These refined notions were far above the comprehension of good St BERNARD, who was by no means accustomed to such profound disquisitions, to such intricate researches [w].

of moral

and prac

XII. The important science of morals was The state not now in a very flourishing state, as may be easily imagined when we consider the genius and tical the spirit of that philosophy, which, in this century, logy. reduced all the other sciences under its dominion, and of which we have given some account in the preceding sections. The only moral writer VOL. III. among

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[w] See Du BOULAY, Hist. Acad. Paris. tom. ii. p. 223. 232.-MAEILLON, Annal. Benedictin. tom. vi. p. 343. 415. 433.---Gallia Christiana Benedictin. tom. ii. p. 1175.---MATTH. PARIS, Histor. Major, p. 56.—PETAVII Dogmata Theologica, tom. i. lib. i. cap. viii.-LONGUEVAL, Histoire de l'Eglise Gallicane, tom. ix. p. 147.

CENT.among the Greeks, who is worthy of mention, is PART II. PHILIP, surnamed the Solitary, whose book, inti

XII.

Polemic

writers.

tled Dioptra, which consists in a dialogue between the body and the soul, is composed with judgment and elegance, and contains many things proper to nourish pious and virtuous sentiments.

The Latin Moralists of this age may be divided into two classes, the scholastics and mystics. The former discoursed about virtue, as they did about truth, in the most unfeeling jargon, and generally subjoined their arid system of morals to what they called their didactic theology. The latter treated the duties of morality in a quite different manner; their language was tender, persuasive, and affecting, and their sentiments often beautiful and sublime; but they taught in a confused and irregular manner, without method or precision, and frequently mixed the dross of Platonism with the pure treasures of celestial truth.

We might also place in the class of moral writers the greatest part of the commentators and expositors of this century, who, laying aside all attention to the signification of the words used by the sacred writers, and scarcely ever attempting to illustrate the truths they reveal, or the events which they relate, turned, by forced and allegorical explications, every passage of scripture to practical uses, and drew lessons of morality from every quarter. We could produce many instances of this way of commenting besides GUIBERT'S Moral Observations on the book of Job, the Prophecy of Amos, and the Lamentations of Fe

remiah.

XIII. Both Greeks and Latins were seized with that enthusiastic passion for dialectical researches, that raged in this century, and were thereby rendered extremely fond of captious questions and theological contests, while, at the same time, the

XII.

love of controversy seduced them from the paths C E N T. that lead to truth, and involved them in laby-PART II. rinths of uncertainty and error. The discovery of truth was not, indeed, the great object they had in view; their principal design was to puzzle and embarrass their adversaries, and overwhelm them with an enormous heap of fine-spun distinctions, an impetuous torrent of words without meaning, a long list of formidable authorities, and a specious train of fallacious consequences, embellished with railings and invectives. The principal polemic writers among the Greeks were CONSTANTINUS HARMENOPULUS, and EUTHYMIUS ZIGABENUS. The former published a short treatise De Sectis Hæreticorum, i. e. concerning the Heretical Sects. The latter, in a long and laboured work, entitled Panoplia, attacked all the various heresies and errors that troubled the church; but, not to mention the extreme levity and credulity of this writer, his manner of disputing was highly defective, and all his arguments, according to the wretched method that now prevailed, were drawn from the writings of the ancient doctors, whose authority supplied the place of evidence. these authors were sharply censured in a satirical poem composed by ZONARAS. The Latin writers were also employed in various branches of religious controversy. HONORIUS of Autun wrote against certain heresies; and ABELARD Combated them all. The Jews, whose credit was now entirely sunk, and whose circumstances were miserable in every respect, were refuted by GILLERT DE CASTILIONE, ODO, PETRUS ALFONSUS, RUPERT of Duytz, PETRUS MAURITIUS RICHARDUS A Sro. VICTORE, and PETRUS BLESENSIS, according to the logic of the times, and EUTHYMIUS, with several other divines, directed their polemic force against the Saracens.

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