NICOLAS
16
NICOLAS
that ho may have been one of the disciples of this ilUis- trioiis master. We have few other hints regarding the life of Nicolas d'Araiens. A letter of Alexander III tells us that about the year 11G5 he still possessed no benefice. A prebend had been promised to Nicolas by Thierrv, bisliop of Amiens, anil when Thierry was sud- denly removed by death, the pope ordered his successor, Kobcrt, to fullil immediately this promise. Nicolas en- joyed great credit at Rome. I5ut by what services he had gained the powerful i)atronage of Alexander we are luiable to say. Nicolas died after 1204. His writings now known are a Cliroiiiqite, signalized by Mountfaucon in the library of the Vatican, and a treatise contained in the same library, also in the imperial library at Paris, under the title of .1 rsjidci catholicce. This treatise has never been published. It is contained in M.S. No. G50C. It commences with these words: " Incipit prologus in A riemjidei calhulicm, editam a Nicolao Andranensi." In the prologue the author addresses himself to pope Clem- ent III (1187 to 1191), which tells us at what date Nic- olas d' Amiens composed his book. The object of the work is to oppose a barrier to the invasion of heresies, and the. author declares that he will use only arguments of a logical onler to combat them. Formerly, it is true, they were confuted by the autliority of the Scriptures. But the Scriptures have fallen into contempt; henceforth everything must be proved according to the principles of Aristotle, and to make faith agree with reason. It is an undertaking from which the author does not shrink. He divides his treatise into five books: the first is upon the Supreme Cause; the second, upon the world, the angels, the creation of man, and free will ; the third, upon the Son of (iod; the fourth, upon the sacraments; the fifth, upon the resurrection. At the commencemeut of each book, following a procedure peculiar to himself, he places several series of definitions, of theses, of univer- sally ailmitted propositions (communes animi concep- tiones), which shall serve as foundations to his theorems. Then he reasons in this manner. The definition of Cause is thus conceived : " Cause is that which gives being to another object called the Caused." The first universally admitted proposition is this : " Everything derives its being from the generating ]irinciple of the Cause." The first theorem is this: "All tliat which is the cause of the cause is the cause of the caused ; either, for example, the caused A, its cause B, or the cause of B C." In first declaring the definition of Cause, he infers the hypothesis, the first proposition twice repro- duced, and again the definition of Cause. Thus the theorem is demonstrated. That said, the author passes to the following theorem, which he demonstrates in still briefer terms. His fourth theorem (book first) is thus conceived: " Neque subjectam materiam sine forma, iie(4ue formam sine subjecta materia actu posse esse." This is a rash proposition. It conforms, it is true, to the principles of Aristotle; Aristotle does not admit the actuality of the first of forms, the soul, to the state of a separate suljstance : but is Nicolas d' Amiens of the same opinion? No, undoubtedly not. Here, then, he de- clares a proposition, all the consequences of which he does not suspect. At the same time it is certain that he rejects the thesis of matter without form, considered as anterior in order of generation to unformed matter; which is the thesis of the I'latonicians, reproduced later by Duns Scotus. Nicolas d'Amiens is a very moderate realist, inasmuch as realism had just been condemned by the Church in the person of his master, (iilbert de la Porree. He prudently expresses himself upon tlie tlie- orem of the divine attributes: '-Dens est potentia (pia dicitur potens, sapientia (jua dicitur sapiens, caritas (pia diligens; caiteraque nomina quas divinsv natunc dicuntur competere, de Deo licet improprie predicant divinam es- sentiam." These arc the express terms of St. Bernard arguing against (;ill)ert de la I'orri^e before the Council of Hheims. See Hixl. lift, de la France, xvii, 1.— Hoefer, Xo/ir. liioi/. Generah', xxxvii, 983.
Nicolas Cabasilas. See Cabasilas.
Nicolas Die Champagne, a French Benedictine monk, was born in tlie beginning of the r2th centurv. After having embraced a religious life in the abbey of Moulicr-Hamey, near Troyes, he went to Clairvaux in 1145, and there became one of the secretaries of St. Ber- nard. He was an able man, educated, learned, who expressed himself in Latin with much elegance; but, according to St. Bernard, he made a bad use of bis knowledge and his talent. At last, after having com- mitted numberless thefts, lie left Clairvaux in 1151, and the illustrious abbe was obliged to denounce him to pope Eugenius as a robber of books and of money, and as a forger. His jirincipal artifice was, according to this re- port, to write letters in the interest of persons who paid him for his services, and to affix to these letters false seals. It is believed that he retired to England. He, however, afterwards turned up in jNIoutier-Ramey, en- joying there the best reputation. He was patronized, recommended, and spoken of in the most honorable terms by popes Hadrian IV and Alexander HI, and became secretary or chancellor of the count of Champagne, Henry the Liberal. Possibly he was wrongfully accused b)' St. Bernard, whose habitual vivacity may well be suspected of some anger, and consequently of some injustice. Nic- olas died after 1 17G. We liave of his works Lettres, to the number of fifty-five, which have been published in the BihUotheqiie des Peres, vol. xxi. His Sermons, to the number of nineteen, are found in the Biblioth. de Citeaux, vol. iii. See St. Benuwdi Epistohe, passim ; Hist. litt. de la France, xiii, 553. — Hoefer, Nour. Biog, Generale, xxxvii, 982.