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41 the PHILOSOPHY of ROGER BACON. in Asking You to Turn 41 THE PHILOSOPHY OF ROGER BACON. By R. J. RYLE, M.A. IN asking you to turn from the examination of vital philosophical problems to the works of Friar Bacon, I feel that I am inviting you to a study of which the interest is almost wholly antiquarian. Downloaded from The problems with which Roger Bacon concerned himself, when the scope of his universal learning led him to attack questions of philosophical (as distinguished from scientific) importance, have ceased to rank as living specimens. They are fossils. And if it be true, as some say it is, that the problems with which the human mind busies itself are fundamentally the same in all uges, http://aristotelian.oxfordjournals.org/ and appear merely to change because men invest them with changing shapes to accord with changes in life and language, still we cannot regard Roger Bacon as one who has played any part in the historical development of philosophical speculation. His position has always been one of curious isolation. In part this isolation may be attributed to the fact that (although he was much less indifferent than is generally supposed to the theological and peripatetic mode of thought of his age), his favourite studies were scientific rather than philosophical. In part it may be attributed to the fact that he was not a professor. Like Schopenhauer in recent times, his ways were by guest on June 8, 2016 not their ways, and he treated Albertus Magnus and Alexander of Hales very much as the great pessimist treated the salaried university teachers of his time. But still more, the isolation which marked the life of Roger Bacon and extended, its influence over his works long after the death of their author, may be attributed to the fact that on some ground or other (as to the exact nature of which we can only speculate) he became obnoxious to the spiritual authorities of his order, who seem to have done their best to suppress, and did in fact partly suppress, both the man and his writings. For there is some reason to believe that Roger Bacon had in view the composition of an encyclopaedic " Compendium Philosophise" in which he would have expounded in detail his whole system of philosophy. Had he been able to accomplish such a work, the task of discovering his opinions on the philosophical questions of his age would have been much simplified. As it is, we are left to form our conclusions from fragments and digressions which probably represent opinions expressed by him in different connections and at different times of his long life. 1) 42 The materials which are practically accessible are as follows :— 1. The Opus Majus.—This is a large folio volume published first by subscription in 1733, under the editorship of Dr. Jebb. The work has been called by Whewell " at once the encyclopaedia and the Novum Organum of the 13th century," and it is by far the most important of Bacon's writings. 2. A volume edited by the late Professor Brewer in the Rolls Series, and called Opera Inedita. 3. A very full and careful monograph on the Life aud Writings of Roger Bacon by Professor Emile Charles, who is probably better known Downloaded from as editor of Arnauld's Fort Royal Logic. This work contains the result of much labour among the various libraries of Europe, and includes some account of several fragments of Bacon's which probably no other human being has ever examined. It is a thoroughly appreciative memoir, and perhaps if it has a fault it is that the author sometimes http://aristotelian.oxfordjournals.org/ seems to attribute to the Friar of the 13th century too decided an anticipation of the thoughts of the 16th and 17ch. The Opus Majus is the work upon which, the reputation of Bacon chiefly rests. It is divided into seven parts, which deal with the following subjects:— 1. The four Universal Causes of all Human Ignorance. 2. That there is but one perfect wisdom and that this is contained in the Scriptures. 3. On the Usefulness of Language and Grammar. 4. On the Usefulness of Mathematics as shown respectively in — by guest on June 8, 2016 (u) Human affairs, including astrology. (6) Divine affairs, especially Biblical Chronology. (c) Ecclesiastical affairs, correct settlement of Easter and other feast days. (d) In matters geographical, political, and nautical. 5. On perspective, or more correctly, On Vision and the geometry of Radiation in general. 6. On Experimental Science. 7. On Morals. This last portion of the Optis Majus is not included in Dr. Jebb's edition of that work. It has, I believe, been subsequently published by Professor Ingram of Dublin. I have not seen this treatise, but from the analysis which Professor Charles gives of it in his monograph it would seem that it was a kind of miscellany composed in part of Scriptural and patristic, and in part of secular learning, in which the Bible, and St. Augustine, Aristotle, Cicero, and Seneca, are somewhat crudely mingled. The Opus Majus, bulky though it was, was not, it must be remembered, a learned treatise written for serious students. It was 43 written and sent to Pope Clement IV. in answer to a request from the latter for some acccount of the views and discoveries of which the Pope had heard reports. So far from being an abstruse work it is remarkable for the clearness of its explanation, and for a rather studied avoidance of technicalities, so that Roger Bacon may fairly claim to be regarded not only as one of the first devotees to Natural Science but also as one of its first popular writers. Having completed it, he lost no time in following it up by another work (the Opus Minus), which was intended as an explanatory sum­ mary to the Opus Majus, and this again he followed by the Opus Downloaded from Tertium, which bears to the preceding books the relation of Prolegomena. The latter work (Op. Tert.), which is published in Dr. Brewer's Opera Inedita is the most readable of Bacon's writings. It contains much autobiographical material and is burdened by less diffuse style and a smaller quantity of historical, geographical, and http://aristotelian.oxfordjournals.org/ numerical details. It is in fact an epitome of the Opus Majus, with additions, of which the object was to emphasise what Roger Bacon thought to be the most important discussions in the larger work, and to supplement certain expositions which he had there given more briefly. Like Francis Bacon, the old Friar opens his chief work with a short summary of the lessons he thinks mankind should learn con­ cerning the path of wisdom. As to Sapientia, or Wisdom, he says " we have to study both what is required for its attainment, and what are its bearings on practice. For in truth, Wisdom is that by which the Church of God is ordered, by guest on June 8, 2016 the republic of the faithful is governed, the conversion of the Infidel is brought about, and by which those who refuse to be converted are expelled and repelled better than by the shedding of Christian blood." Of the difficulties which hinder its attainment we must first consider those which are the product of our own mental constitution. These may all be classed under four heads:— 1. Fragilis et indignae auctoritatis exemplum. 2. Consuetudinis diuturnitas. 3. Vulgi sensus imperiti. 4. Proprise ignorantiae occnltatio cum ostentation® Sapientiae. Of these " Offendicula," as he calls them, the first three are in the mouth of everybody. We are always being told,— Hoc exemplificatum est. Hoc consuetum est. Hoc vulgatum est. But the most baneful of all the "offendicula" is the last,—the D2 44 concealment of our own ignorance with the display of apparent wisdom. By an ingenious little stroke of social psychology he even shows this fourth stumbling-block to be the real source of the other three ; for, in the first place, in our anxiety to make the most of our own opinion and to conceal our real ignorance we are too ready to lean upon some insufficient authority (i.e., we meet the first offendiculum). In the second place, from a natural love for our own views we readily erect our opinion into a habit, " trahimus in consuetudinem " (second offendiculum). In the third place, since no one errs by himself alone, Downloaded from but each delights to scatter his own views abroad, others are quickly infected; whence arises Sensus Vulgi (third offendiculum). On reading this summary of the " offendicula " which prevent the attainment of Wisdom, it is impossible not to be reminded of the Idola of Francis Bacon; and looking superficially at the groups of http://aristotelian.oxfordjournals.org/ offendicula on the one hand, and of Idola on the other, we are at once struck by a certain resemblance between them. In Francis Bacon's earlier work, Advancement of Learning, the three which he there enumerates, viz., Idola Tribus, Idola Specus, and Idola Fori, inevitably suggest the Auctoritatis exemplum, the Consuetidinis diuturnitas, and the Sensus Vulgi of his predecessor. The resem­ blances, however, diminish on closer examination. The Idola of the later writer form a systematic and comprehensive classification capable of very general application, but the Offendicula of the earlier writer are, I think, conceived in a far narrower spirit, although they are set forward in language of rather magniloquent generality. They by guest on June 8, 2016 are put in the forefront of the treatise, but are not either fully or precisely elaborated in the sections which follow.
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