A Man, an Age, a Book

MARCO FORLIVESI A Man, an Age, a Book 1. A man Bartolomeo Mastri was born in Meldola, near Forlì, on 7th December, 1602, into the lower aristocracy of the town. He en- tered the Order of Friars Minor Conventual in about 1616 and was educated at the Order’s studia in Cesena, Bologna, and Naples. After a brief period of teaching logic in the studia of the Order in Parma and Bologna, he completed his period as a stu- dent in the ‘Collegio di S. Bonaventura’ in Rome in the years 1625-1628. From 1628 to 1638 he was Regent, together with his fellow Brother Bonaventura Belluto from Catania, of the Order’s studia in Cesena and Perugia. In 1638 he was promoted, together with Belluto, to the post of Regent of the ‘Collegio di S. Antonio’ in Padua, a post he retained until 1641. From that year, which according to the customs of the time marked the end of his ca- reer as a teacher, until 1647 he resided alternately either in Mel- dola or Ravenna, a city where he held the post as private theolo- gian to Cardinal Luigi Capponi. In the meantime, together with Belluto, from 1628 to 1647 he planned, wrote and published his first great work: a cursus of Scotist philosophy articulated into logic, physics, and metaphysics. In 1647 he was elected Minister of his Order for the Province of Bologna. When this assignment was completed, in 1650, he returned to Meldola, where he lived until 1659 and compiled most of his theological works. From that year, until 1665, he was frequently a member of the retinue of the General Minister of his Order, Giacomo Fabretti from Ra- “Rem in seipsa cernere”. Saggi sul pensiero filosofico di Bartolomeo Mastri (1602-1673). Atti del Convegno di studi sul pensiero filosofico di Bartolomeo Mastri da Meldola (1602-1673), Meldola - Bertinoro, 20-22 settembre 2002, ed. by M. Forlivesi, (Subsidia mediaevalia Patavina, 8), Padova: Il Poligrafo, 2006. – ISBN 88-7115-534-3 24 Marco Forlivesi venna. In particular, in 1662 he held the post of General Vicar. On failing to be elected as General Minister in 1665, he returned to Meldola, where he concluded the compilation of his theological works. He died on 11th January, 1673. Mastri was the author of four works. The first, of an explic- itly philosophical nature, was planned and, to a large extent, written in collaboration with Belluto. It was published in seven quarto tomes divided according to subject matter from 1637 to 1647 (tomes which were partly revised from 1644 to 1652 by Mastri alone) and was reprinted after the deaths of its authors under the title of Philosophiæ ad mentem Scoti cursus integer. A second work, of a polemical nature, aimed at his fellow friar Matteo Frće, was published in a single quarto volume in 1650 entitled Scotus et scotistæ Bellutus et Mastrius expurgati a probrosis querelis ferchianis. A third work was published in four folio volumes from 1655 to 1664 and is generally referred to as Dispu- tationes theologicæ in quatuor libros Sententiarum. The last is a weighty Theologia moralis, published in a single folio volume in 1671. The title of the first work fully corresponds to its contents: it is a philosophical treatise divided into logic, physics, and metaphysics. The titles of the last two works, on the other hand, do not express equally as clearly their contents, since they incor- porate philosophical themes both as tools for argumentation and in the matters discussed.1 There are many sides to Bartolomeo Mastri, both as a person and as a writer. Pleading and obsequious in the letters of the summer of 1646 to Olimpia Aldobrandini Jr., even going as far as to say, “rephrasing” a passage from the Bible, that «il core de principi è in mano di Dio», he, however, also presents himself in the same letters as «uno dei primi soggetti» of his Order.2 In the final years of his life, this high self-esteem, along with a concept of government posts also as a form of remuneration for merits 1. For Mastri’s life and the editions of his works, cf. M. FORLIVESI, “Scoti- starum princeps”. Bartolomeo Mastri (1602-1673) e il suo tempo, (Fonti e studi francescani, 11), Padova: Centro studi antoniani, 2002. For Belluto, cf. Fr. CO- STA, “Il p. Bonaventura Belluto, OFMConv (1603-1676)”, in Miscellanea france- scana, 73 (1973), pp. 81-136 e 387-437; 76 (1976), pp. 125-208. 2. Cf. FORLIVESI, “Scotistarum princeps”..., pp. 191-199. A Man, an Age, a Book 25 achieved in other fields, becomes a protest at not having been conferred dignitates: «Ut vero desideria tua [i.e.: of the reader] labore meo sint tandem adæquata, remanet ultimus, et supremus moralis theologiæ tomus complendus, ac in lucem edendus (...). Eius tamen compositioni iam incumbo, exordio a prævijs dispu- tationibus de conscientia, et legibus auspicato, et sine intermis- sione prosequar, si vita, et sanitas supererint, nec aliud obvenerit regiminis impedimentum, ut plane pluribus de causis non obven- turum opinor; sed præsertim ob rationem politicam a doctissimo p. Fabro nostro adductam 4. d. 45. de restitutione cap. 5. n. 138. et experientia ab ipso comprobatam, ubi ait quod Religiones quæ- dam litteratis velut equis, et mulis utuntur, idest, solum ad labores, ad dignitates autem, et regimina dicunt esse ineptos, quasi litteræ, et virtutes in Religionibus sint præcipua ad dignitates consequen- das impedimenta».3 In his works he does express praise for other scholars but also, and perhaps more frequently, blame. He is often caustic. When stigmatizing the “neoteric” Jesuits’ habit of not comparing themselves with authors of other Orders, he concludes: «hanc scribendi rationem noviter adinventam superbiam in eis arguere, dum cum exteris disserere renuunt, vel timorem».4 When setting about confuting some of the Theatine Zaccaria Pasqualigo’s ar- guments, he writes: «quamvis plurimæ eius rationes coincidant, ut eius moris est in arguendo, omnes tamen referam, quæ minus coincidunt, ne ullam subterfugere videamur».5 At times Mastri is even scornful, for example, when addressing his fellow friar Francesco Pontelonghi, without mentioning him by name, he in- vites him to go along the «Pontem longum, et arctum asinorum, a dialecticis pro tardioribus ingeniis erudiendis institutum»;6 else- where, referring to the scanty attention he had paid to the criti- cism made of him by another co-religionary, Alessandro Rossi, he writes: «Aquila quam mea ostentant gentilicia, muscas <non> ca- 3. MASTRIUS, Lectori benevolo, in IDEM, In IV Sent., Venetiis 1664, cc. a3v-4r; his italics. On this topic, see FORLIVESI, “Scotistarum princeps”..., pp. 254-256. 4. MASTRIUS – BELLUTUS, In De gen., disp. 5, q. 3, a. 1, n. 78, Venetiis 1640 (archetypal edition Venetiis 21652), p. 259a. 5. MASTRIUS, In Met., disp. 2, q. 2, n. 40, 2 vol., Venetiis 1646-47, vol. I, p. 98b. 6. MASTRIUS, Ad lectorem, in IDEM, In I Sent., Venetiis 1655, c. a3r-v. 26 Marco Forlivesi pit».7 However, it is the Irish Recollect, John Punch, and the Dalmatian Conventual, Matteo Frće, who arouse this author’s most irate tones. This is Mastri, in a single quæstio dedicated to Punch, protesting mockingly: «rationes adduco quibus Poncius non respondebit, si annos Mathusalæ viveret». He then exclaims disconsolately: «bone Deus, quomodo talis compositio imperfec- tionem non involvet, si est ex actu, et potentia?». Finally he concludes indignantly: «restat ergo ut hæc potentia passiva perfec- tionem dicens, non nisi ex tenebris sui cerebri in lucem prodi- ret».8 Frće is even the object of an entire polemical work, published moreover without the consent of the General Minister of the Order: this is the previously mentioned Scotus et scotistæ Bel- lutus et Mastrius expurgati a probrosis querelis ferchianis.9 On the speculative level, we find in Mastri’s texts indications that are surprisingly modern (taking the term perhaps more in a moral than in an historical sense). First of all are the passages that I have quoted as epigraphs to this volume. The first shows a view of truth that opens the way to a hermeneutic conception of it (obviously not in the Heideggerian sense): «formalitas veritatis non consistit in simplici adæquatione, sed in similitudine qua- dam intentionali; sed similitudo suo modo dicitur suscipere ma- gis et minus; ergo et veritas».10 The second features the craving of the mind zu den Sachen selbst: «evidentia, et claritas perficit ac- tum intellectus secundum naturalem eius exigentiam, quæ talis est, ut suum assensum præbere quærat ex proprio, et non ex alie- no testimonio rem in seipsa cernendo, et intuendo, unde experi- mur intellectum nunquam quiescere, quousque rem in seipsa cer- nat, et intueatur».11 Moreover, in Mastri’s works there is a conception of the scientist as an artifex, who chooses «ex suo arbi- trio» to «assumere aliquam rerum seriem declarandam», and of 7. MASTRIUS, Ad lectorem, in IDEM, In III Sent., Venetiis 1661, c. a4v. Re. the disputes between Mastri and Pontelonghi, and between Mastri and Rossi cf. FORLIVESI, “Scotistarum princeps”..., pp. 244-252. 8. MASTRIUS, In I Sent., disp. 2, q. 8, a. 2, n. 327, p. 159a e n. 329, p. 160a. On the dispute with Punch, cf. FORLIVESI, “Scotistarum princeps”..., pp. 208-218. 9. Cf. Id., pp. 202-207. 2 10. MASTRIUS – BELLUTUS, In Org., disp. 10, q. 2, a. 4, n. 47, Venetiis 1646, p. 788b. 11. MASTRIUS, In I Sent., disp. 1, q. un., a. 1, n. 17, p. 6b. A Man, an Age, a Book 27 science as a scientifica fabrica, whose unity is that of a «unum quoddam artificiosum».12 Further, there is a reference to the es- sential role of language in philosophical enquiry, to the connec- tion between the object and

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