THE MIDDLE AGES. A.D. 1049-1294.
archbishop was murdered. He had urged the archbishop not to enter his church. In 1176 he was made bishop of Chartres. He says he crossed the Alps no less than ten times on eccle siastical business.
By his reminiscences and miscellanies, John contributed, as few men did, to our knowledge of the age in which he lived. He had the instincts of a Humanist, and, had he lived several centuries later, would probably have been in full sym pathy with the Renaissance. His chief works are the Metalogicus, the Polycraticus, and the Historia pontificalis. The Polycraticus is a treatise on the principles of government and philosophy, written for the purpose of drawing attention away from the trifling disputes and occupations of the world to a consideration of the Church and the proper uses of life.1 He fortified his positions by quotations from the Scriptures and classical writers, and shows that the Church is the true conservator of morality and the defender of justice in the State. He was one of the best-read men of his age in the classics.2
In the Metalogicus, John calls a halt to the casuistry of Scholasticism and declares that the reason is apt to err as well as the senses. Dialectics had come to be used as an ex hibition of mental acumen, and men, like Adam du Petit Pont, made their lectures as intricate and obscure as possible, so as to attract students by the appearance of profundity. John declared that logic was a vain thing except as an instru ment, and by itself as useless as the " sword of Hercules in a pygmy's hand." He emphasized the importance of knowl edge that can be put to use, and gave a long list of things about which a wise man may have doubts, such as providence and human fortune, the origin of the soul, the origin of
1 Schaarschmidt calls it " the first great theory of the state in the literature of the Middle Ages." In view of the variety of its contents, Poole, p. 218, says that " it is to some extent an encyclopaedia of the cultivated thought of the middle of the twelfth century."
2 Poole says, " No writer of his age can be placed beside him in the extent and depth of his classical reading." Dict.ofNatl. Biog., XXIX. 441. Schaar schmidt speaks of his marvellous acquaintance with the classics — eine staunenswerthe Vertrautheit.
§ 102. PETER THE LOMBARD AND THE SUMMISTS. 631
motion, whether all sins are equal and equally to be punished. God, he affirmed, is exalted above all that the mind can con ceive, and surpasses our power of ratiocination.1
The Hutoria pontificalia is an account of ecclesiastical mat ters falling under John's own observation, extending from the council at Rheims, 1148, to the year 1152.
§ 102. Peter the Lombard and the Summists.
LITERATURE: Works of P. Lombard, Migne, vols. 191, 192. — PROTOIS, P. Lomb. son epoque, sa vie, ses ecrits et son influence, Paris, 1881. Contains sermons not found in Migne. — KOGEL : P. Lomb. in s. Stellung zur Philos. des Mittelalters, Leip., 1897. — *O. BALTZER : D. Sentenzen d. P. Lomb., ihre Quellenund ihre dogmengeschichtl. Bedeutung, Leip., 1902. — *DKNIFLE : D. Sentenzen Abcelards, etc., in Archiv, 1885, pp. 404 sqq. — Arts. Lombardus, in Wetzer-Welte, IX. 1916-1923, and * Herzog, by Seeberg, XL 630-642. — STOCKL, Philos. des Mittelalters, I. 390-411. The Histories of Doctrine of SCHWANE, pp. 160 sqq., BACH, HARNACK, FISHER, etc.
Peter the Lombard is the father of systematic theology in the Catholic Church. He produced the most useful and popular theological text-book of the Middle Ages, as Thomas Aquinas produced the most complete theological system. In method, he belongs to the age of the great theologians of the thirteenth century, when Scholasticism was at its height. In point of time, he has his place in the twelfth century, with whose theologians, Bernard, Abselard, Gilbert, Hugo of St. Victor, and others, he was personally acquainted.
Peter was born at Novara, in Northern Italy, and died in Paris about 1164. 2 After studying in Bologna, he went to France and attended the school of St. Victor and the cathedral school in Paris, and came under the influence of Abselard. He afterwards taught in Paris. Walter Map, describing his experiences in France, calls him " the famous theologian." In 1159 he was made bishop of Paris.
1 Metalog., VII. 2.
2 This is the date given on an ancient epitaph in Paris, but the date is made uncertain by the appointment of a bishop of Paris as the Lombard's successor, 1160. This would seem to indicate his death occurred at that time unless he was deposed on the charge of simony, of which, as Walter of St. Victor says, he was guilty. Migne. 19'X 1140.