Realism and Anti-Realism

Article i. Realism and Anti-Realism

a) Roscelin; b) St. Anselm; c) William of Champeaux;

d) Odo of Tournai; e) Abelard; f) The School of Chartres;

g) Remarks.

a) Roscel in (about 1050-1121).

Life: Roscelin was born at Compïègne, a town on the River Oise about fifty miles northeast of Paris. He was educated in the Schools of Soissons and Rheims. He was a monk, and a Canon of the Cathedral Chapter of his diocese. He taught at Compïègne, Loches, Besançon, and Tours. Abelard, of whom we have yet to speak, was his most famous pupil. Roscelin was a notable teacher, who attracted multitudes of students by his learning and eloquence.

Works: The only writing of Roscelin’s that survives is a Letter to Abelard. What we know of the character of his teaching is gathered from the testimony of those who opposed him in controversy, notably St. Anselm, Abelard, and John of Salisbury.

Doctrine: Roscelin is called a Nominalist, and even “The Father of Nominalism” ; but all that can be said of him with certainty is that he took a definite stand against Ultra-Realism. He did not believe that Genera and Species exist as things, universal realities, of which individuals are but the manifestations or participants. He declared that every reality sufficient in itself for existence is individual. Roscelin used, indeed, expressions savoring of Nominalism, and Abelard said of him, “I recall that my teacher, Roscelin, held the silly doctrine that nothing is made of parts, for parts like species are only matters of words.” (Opera inedita d’Abelard, by Cousin, Liber de def. et divis., p. 471.) Still, this may mean that Roscelin merely insisted upon the fact that individuals are individuals, not mere groupings of separable and even separate things; in other words, it may merely mean that Roscelin insisted upon the substantial unity of individuals as such. It is likely that his hostility towards the doctrine of Ultra-Realism made him incautious in his choice of expressions and somewhat inaccurate in his declarations of anti-realistic doctrine. His forerunners, the anonymous John the Sophist and Raimbert of Lille, taught Dialectic in nominalistic fashion, and Roscelin’s terminology may have been borrowed from them. At all events, Roscelin was an Anti-Realist. Whether he was a Nominalist, Conceptualist, or imperfect Moderate Realist is hard to determine. In any case, his importance as a partisan in the controversy on Universals is vastly overestimated. What really called attention to Roscelin was his philosophical teaching on the subject of the Blessed Trinity. He is said to have taught that the Three Divine Persons are not one God, but three Gods {Tritheism}. Some historians, however, say that he did not actually teach Tritheism, but merely said that he did not understand how one Divine Essence could be common to three Persons. Roscelin was forced to retract his heretical doctrine—or what was charged against him as his heretical doctrine—at the Council of Soissons in 1092. There is a historical account of a second abjuration of heresy made by Roscelin before the Council of Rheims in 1094; but this account is not quite reliable. At all events, Roscelin was restored to his standing in the Church, and was allowed to teach after the time of the Rheims Council.

Remarks: The enthusiasm of this energetic Anti-Realist may have carried him too far, but no one may say how far. Certainly, he did a positive service for philosophy in his antagonism to Ultra-Realism, and his strong partisanship brought the whole question of Universals insistently to the attention of subsequent philosophers. On the other hand, Roscelin did an injury to philosophy inasmuch as he brought discredit upon it as an instrument for the exposition of matters of Faith. His Tritheism (real or imputed) wrent to confirm the suspicion already haunting the minds of many that philosophy, and especially dialectic, had no service to render to theology. Predecessors of Roscelin—among whom were Fulbert of Chartres (d. about 1030), Otloh of Regensburg (d. 1083), St. Peter Damian (998-1073), and Lanfranc, Archbishop of Canterbury (d. 1089)—had condemned the use of dialectic in theology. And Berengarius of Tours (999-1086), condemned by four councils for his heterodox views on Tran-substantiation, had served theology ill by his dialectic. Now Roscelin, by his supposedly nominalistic teaching on the Blessed Trinity, brought further suspicion upon dialectic as an instrument suited to the needs of scientific theology. To this extent, Roscelin hampered the progress of the Scholastic movement.

b) St . Ansel m (1033-1109).

Life: Anselm was born of patrician parents at Aosta in Lombardy, northern Italy. At the age of 27 he entered the Benedictine Order at the great Abbey of Bee, in Normandy. Here he studied under Lanfranc (1005-1089), whom he afterwards succeeded in the office of Abbot. Called from his monastery to the archbishopric of Canterbury, in England, he spent himself in the service of God, laboring tirelessly for the welfare of souls, the advancement of learning, and the proper recognition of the rights of the Church by the secular power.

Works: Anselm wrote Monologium, a treatise on the essence of God as shown by reason; Proslogium, a treatise expounding a special proof for the existence of God—a proof called the ontological proof; Against Gaunilo, a rebuttal of the attacks of the monk Gaunilo on the Proslogium; On the Trinity and the Incarnation; certain philosophical dialogues; and the famous Cur Deus Homo?, a study of the Catholic doctrine of the Incarnation.

Doctrine: St. Anselm, while using the rational method in his philosophical inquiries, had the greatest reverence for Revelation and for the authority of the Fathers, particularly St. Augustine. He accurately discerned that the occasion of much confusion and controversy among philosophers was the lack of a clear line of distinction between the proper fields ot theology and philosophy, and also the fact that the theologianphilosophers did not accurately determine the extent to which reason might go in investigating and expounding the dogmas of Faith. St. Anselm tried, with partial success, to avoid the faults here condemned. In treating questions that plainly belong to philosophy, he proceeded from self-evident rational principles; while in studying matters of pure theology he proceeded from the facts of Revelation in forming his argument. He expressed the relation of philosophy to theology in the formulas, Credo xit intelligam (“I believe that I may understand,” i. e., I do not seek to understand things in order to justify my Faith; on the contrary I find my Faith a light without which I cannot acquire full science of other things) and Fides quaerens intellectum (“Faith seeking to understand”). In his book Cur Deus Homo? (“Why a God-Man?”) St. Anselm seeks to prove from reason alone that the Redemption and all facts incidental to it had necessarily to occur just as Revelation shows that they did occur. In his Proslogium St. Anselm developed a new argument for the existence of God, an argument which, while certainly invalid, has caused an enormous amount of discussion and controversy since his time. This is the so-called a priori or Ontological Argument. Anselm fully acknowledged the conclusive power of the a posteriori arguments for God’s existence (i. e., such arguments as proceed from consideration of certain effects to the necessary and adequate First Cause), but he believed this truth also capable of splendid proof a priori. This Ontological Argument may be stated as follows: God means the most perfect being that can be thought of. But the most perfect being that can be thought of must exist (else, lacking the perfection of existence, it is not the most perfect being conceivable!). Therefore God must exist.

The argument amounts to this : the very fact that we have a thought of God as the most perfect being conceivable asserts the actual existence of God; that we can think of God proves that there is a God. The Ontological Argument is faulty and inconclusive. If we regard it as a mere logical analysis of the idea of God, we must condemn it because it contains a “leap” from the order of ideas (logical order) to the order of extramental reality (ontological order). Such a leap spoils continuity, and brings sophistry into the argument. We can think of a being as most perfect, and therefore as existing, whether such a being actually exists or does not exist. In the order of ideas the concept of the most perfect being conceivable does imply existence, i. e., implies the note of existence in the idea; but the idea or concept of the most perfect being conceivable does not necessarily imply the existence of that being in the order of extramental reality. It may be said that this criticism misses the point because St. Anselm did not mean to prove God’s existence from a dry logical analysis of the idea of God. Perhaps, it may be said, the Saint proceeded in his argument from the assumption that there is in the soul an intimate and vivid presence of God, and that the first vague idea of God arises from this presence, and demands as its explanation the existence of the indwelling God who gives origin to the idea. This interpretation of St. Anselm’s Ontological Argument, while proposed by some critics of high standing, seems alien to the mind of the Saint. In his Monologium St. Anselm asserts the spirituality and immortality of the human soul, although, strangely enough, he does not argue its immortality from the fact that it is spiritual. Lie concludes that the soul is immortal from the fact that it is made to love God perpetually. His argument is essentially the same as that which is founded on man’s desire for endless happiness. St. Anselm does not deal professedly with the question of the union of soul and body in man, but incidentally he shows himself inclined to the Platonic theory of accidental and non-substantial union. Still, he does not make the soul independent of the body in the acquiring of ideas, for he teaches plainly that ideas are formed by abstraction from sensations.

Remarks: St. Anselm did something new and constructive for philosophy : he tried to show the scope of philosophy as distinct from theology; he studied the truths of the Faith in the light of reason alone, and in the same light defended these truths against heretics. Roscelin, Berengarius, and others had attacked revealed truths by dialectical reasoning; with their own arms St. Anselm routed them. It is easy to understand, therefore, why Anselm was a powerful influence upon subsequent philosophers. He may truly be called the link that joins the greatest of the Fathers (St. Augustine) with the greatest Scholastic (St. Thomas). He was, indeed, called “The last Father and the first Scholastic,” and “The Augustine of the Eleventh Century.” On the one hand he is closely associated with St. Augustine, for he borrows from this great Father most of his philosophical and theological doctrine ; and, on the other hand, he approaches St. Thomas in the method of his attack, and in the abundance of rigid reasonings he brings to the study of the problems he discusses. St. Anselm has been called an Ultra-Realist, but unfairly. Some of his expressions do, indeed, admit of ultra-realistic interpretation, but the whole tenor of his philosophical writings shows that the Saint was inclined towards Moderate Realism. The only reason for hesitancy in stating plainly that he was a Moderate Realist is the want of accurate terminology in his works—but it must be remembered that this terminology had not yet been formulated in Anselm’s day. The critics who call him an Ultra-Realist appeal to the Ontological Argument, saying that it indicates a transference outside the mind of the real as conceived by the mind. Granting the force of this one 197 instance, we may safely assert that the whole body of doctrine taught by the Saint shows him rather a Moderate Realist than an Ultra-Realist.

c) William of Champeaux (1070-1120).

Life: William was born in the little French town of Champeaux, near Melun. At an early age he went to Paris to study under the master Manegold. Afterwards he went to Roscelin’s School in Compiègne and to the School of Laon. In 1103 he began teaching in the Cathedral School of Paris. Bitterly attacked by Abelard, his pupil, for his doctrine on Universals, William hesitated, shifted his position, and finally retired from the arena of controversy. He became a monk of the Order of St. Benedict in the Abbey of St. Victor in Paris. Subsequently he became Bishop of Chalons. No one enjoyed greater fame for learning in his time than did William of Champeaux.

Works: We have only a fragment of William’s work On the Soul, and some portions of his Book of Sentences and his Dialogue Between a Certain Christian and a Jew; but we learn much of his doctrine from Abelard, his pupil and bitter opponent.

Doctrine: At first William was an Ultra-Realist. He held the theory of identity, maintaining that the individuals of the same species have one and the same essence numerically, and differ one from the other only accidentally. Thus Tom, Dick, Harry, et al., are not properly individuals at all, for they have one and the same essence numerically. The whole human essence, said William, is present in each and every individual man. The same is true of individuals of every species. Ridiculed by Abelard for this opinion, William changed it for a theory of indifference, a vague doctrine that comes close to expressing negatively what his former teaching expressed positively. Afterwards William adopted a theory of similarity, teaching that individuals of a species have each an essence similar to that of the others. In a word, William of Champeaux began as a pronounced Ultra-Realist, and veered from his position into an unstable sort of Anti-Realism. In his work On the Origin of the Soul William refutes the doctrine that souls are somehow derived through generation from the souls of parents (Traducianism), and defends the true doctrine that each soul is directly created by Almighty God (Creationism). He rightly teaches that the soul is a simple spiritual substance. He wrongly identifies the soul and its faculties; for there is what Scholastics call a real distinction (not separation, nor separability) between any agent substance and its faculties or capacities for operation.

Remarks: William of Champeaux was the first European philosopher to take an unhesitating stand on the doctrine of the soul’s origin : he taught pure Creationism. He also contributed to philosophy by the fact that he was a notable contestant in the controversy on Universals. Although his own doctrine in this matter was unstable, and William seemed confused about the whole question, he really helped towards a solution because he was regarded as a great and a learned man, and his interest in a question could not fail to bring it forcibly to the attention of subsequent philosophers. As a contemporary of St. Anselm, William suffers by comparison, for his worth in the development of philosophy is dwarfed by the power and influence of the great Archbishop of Canterbury. The History of Philosophy associates with William of Champeaux two professors of philosophy at Paris, Adelard of Bath (early 12 century), and Walter of Mortagne (died 1174), who developed his indifference or non-difference theory in a manner that can be regarded as a step towards the doctrine of Moderate Realism.

d) Odo of Tour nai (died 1113).

Life: Odo (Otto, Odon) was a famous teacher at the Cathedral School of Tournai in the second half of the 11 century.

About 1093 he founded in Tournai the monastery of St. Martin, and was made its first Abbot. Afterwards he became Bishop of Cambrai. He was devoted in youth to the study of Plato, but upon reading an apologetic treatise of St. Augustine he abandoned his favorite study for theology. In his theology he makes quaint application of philosophical doctrine.

Works: Odo’s chief work is a treatise On Original Sin.

Doctrine: Odo is an Ultra-Realist. Using Ultra-Realism in the explanation of the doctrine of Original Sin, he argues thus : The human race is one specific substance. At first, this substance was found in only two persons. They sinned, and being the whole human substance, this entire substance was vitiated by their sin. Lienee Original Sin is transmitted by natural necessity to all human individuals. New births are not productions of new substances, but are merely new properties of the already existing human substance. Individual men differ only accidentally.

Remarks: Odo is regarded as one of the principal defenders of Ultra-Realism during the 11 and early 12 centuries. His contribution to the cause of Ultra-Realism is not found in the content of his written doctrine, but came of his wide influence as a teacher. Herman, Abbot of Tournai after Odo’s death, declared in 1127 that “people seemed to abandon everything for the sake of studying philosophy” under Odo’s direction. A name to remember as associated with the School of Odo is that of Hildebert of Lavardin.

e) Pet er Abelar d (1079-1142).

Life: Abelard was born in Brittany, in the little town of Le Pallet near the city of Nantes. He studied under Roscelin at Compiègne, and under William of Champeaux at Paris. William’s doctrine on Universals was not acceptable to Abelard, and he argued so successfully with his master that William confessed himself defeated. Only 22 at the time, Abelard was hailed as an invincible master of dialectic. He went to study theology under Anselm of Laon (not the Archbishop and Saint of Canterbury) and then, in 1114, returned to Paris as Master of the Cathedral School. Here he was so famed, so admired, so attractive a teacher, that multitudes flocked to hear him and hung upon his words. Abelard, drunk with applause, declared himself the only philosopher of his time! He had an unfortunate and disgraceful affair with one Héloise, and, as a result of it, was forced to leave Paris. In 1119 he entered the Benedictine monastery of St. Denis. He was summoned before the Council of Soissons in 1121, and made to retract his heterodox teachings on the Blessed Trinity. For a time he held the office of Abbot in one of the monasteries of his Order, but relinquished this, and went into retirement at a retreat called Le Paraclet. Between 1136 and 1140 he taught at the School of St. Genevieve in Paris, and here his old fame revived. He was still the zealous, hot-headed, impetuous philosopher, and his extravagances brought a second condemnation of certain of his doctrines by the Council of Sens in 1141. After this, Abelard definitively retired from public view. Peter the Venerable, Abbot of the great Benedictine Monastery of Cluny, received him, and he died a pious death in a priory of this monastery (St. Marcellus) in 1142.

Works: Of the many works of Abelard we mention the following: Commentaries on the Logical Works of Aristotle and Porphyry; A Dialogue Between a Christian Philosopher and a Jew; Sic et Non (i. e., Pros and Cons) ; Christian Theology; Introduction to Theology; an ethical work called Scito Teipsum (“Know thyself!”). The edited and inedited works of Abelard were collected and published in Paris during the late 19 century by Victor Cousin.

Doctrine: Abelard rightly maintains that dialectic (philosophical reasoning) is not worthless in the exposition of matters of Faith, but is, on the contrary, most useful for this service. Some critics call Abelard a Rationalist, declaring that he believed all mysteries of the Faith fully explicable by the use of reason alone. But, although Abelard allowed his impetuosity to carry him into extravagances in expression, he nevertheless declares plainly that not all the truths of Faith can be investigated and explained by reason alone. He says, for example, in his Introduction to Theology (Book II, col. 1050) that the Unity of God, and the distinction of Persons in the Divine Trinity, are matters beyond the complete grasp of human understanding. Thus it is unfair to call Abelard a rationalist. It is true, however, that while asserting the value of reason in investigating revealed truth, he did not accurately trace the limits to which reason may go. In Logic Abelard is to be classed as a Nominalist. He had for teachers Roscelin the Anti-Realist, and William of Champeaux the Ultra-Realist, and he heartily disagreed with both of them. He declared that substantial existence belongs to individuals and not to genera and species. But, even while he asserts that genera and species are more than names, he professes Nominalism, for he says that Universals signify collections of individuals; that the Universal is no more one than a people made up of many individuals is one. Thus he makes Universals only group names (mental names) of collections of individuals. True, he agrees with Moderate Realism inasmuch as he declares that nature in reality is individual and not universal; but all Anti-Realists profess as much. Professor De Wulf says that Abelard may justly be regarded as the founder of Moderate Realism, and that the doctors of the 13 century did little more than present a logical development of his doctrine. It is difficult to concur in this view, considering the fact that Abelard plainly confuses the Universal idea with the collective concept (cf. Opera inedita d’Abelard, by Cousin, p. 524). Still, in calling Abelard a Nominalist, we do not class him with the Positivist Nominalists of recent times, who reject the objective validity of our knowledge. Abelard certainly asserted the objective value of ideas. His doctrine is defective in its psychological aspect, wherein it accounts for the genesis and character of the Universal itself. Nor is this a matter for wonder, for psychological processes were little studied in Abelard’s day. Abelard’s metaphysical doctrine is concerned largely with the question of God’s essence. He declares that the Divine Essence cannot be adequately conceived and defined since God is outside the categories. God is, in the highest sense, self-existent, but He is not to be called a “substance,” for substance is susceptible of contraries, taking on the character and function of a supporting-subject for non-substances (i. e., accidents) ; and there can be no accidents in God. Therefore, all expressions we use to signify the Divine Attributes are but figures of speech, and are not to be taken literally, as though there could be a similitude between God and creatures. Abelard declares that creation was a necessary act on the part of God. For, he says, being is better than non-being, and creation is better than non-creation ; and God is compelled by His infinite Goodness to choose the better course in all things. Thus God had to create. And by the same reasoning Abelard concludes that God had to make the world the best world possible (optimisin’). Abelard was one of the very few n and 12 century philosophers who dealt expressly with matters of Ethics. He declares that God is the ultimate end of man. For man must strive for happiness, and God is the object the possession of which constitutes man in subjective happiness. God is to be possessed by knowledge and love. In his ethical work, Scito Teipsum, Abelard makes a distinction between vice and sin and between both of these and evil action. Vice is that which inclines us to evil, making us prone to sin ; sin is contempt of God and consent to that which we know we are bound to avoid; evil action is the act and operation of sin; it is not sin itself, but the matter of sin. As to the Norm of Morality, Abelard has two opinions : ( 1 ) God’s arbitrary decision marks off the limits of good and evil; (2) the intention of the agent (i. e., the person acting) renders an act good or bad; acts being in themselves indifferent.

Remarks: We have listed Abelard as a Nominalist. Learned critics have called him a modified Nominalist, and even a Moderate Realist. In his Metaphysics he allows curious reasoning about the infinite God to lead him into extravagances, chief of which is his doctrine that God (the perfectly free) is forced by His Goodness to create, and to create the best world possible. God did not create the best world possible, for that would mean that infinite power and wisdom was exhausted, and that the illimitable was extended to its limits —an obvious contradiction. The world was suited perfectly at creation for the end for which God made it, and in that sense it is the best world. God was in no sense forced to create, but from eternity freely decreed to create. In Ethics Abelard proposes two Norms of Morality, neither of which is the true one. From eternity God’s will, the Divine Reason (which is one with the Divine Essence), directed all creatures to their proper end, which is, ultimately, God Himself. The order thus constituted is not, to speak humanly, a whim on the part of God, not an arbitrary decision, but the result of infinitely perfect Reason. The Divine Reason determining from eternity the order of all things and of all activities, is the ultimate Norm of Morality; and that is good which harmonizes with this divine order, this “eternal law,” while that which is out of agreement with it is evil. The second Norm of Morality proposed by Abelard is not the true one either; for the intention of the agent cannot make a good action out of that which is in itself (i. e., objectively) evil. Perhaps Abelard merely meant by his “intention-of-agent” theory that the external activity of man takes its morality from the will, i. e., from within ; for it is the will that consents to evil before the external or rather the subordinate powers of mind or body carry the action into execution. Abelard was unquestionably the foremost dialectician and controversialist of his age. Yet he allowed himself to be carried by enthusiasm and impetuosity into subtleties and sophistries. Too obviously, Abelard was a man bent on winning an argument at any cost. We cannot admit that a man of his keen mind and swift reasoning was deceived by many of his own extravagances. Triumph and truth were, it seems, his object; and when the two could not be had together, Abelard would have triumph. Hence, with the undoubted abilities of this fiery man we must associate a certain levity and fickleness which balked the possibility of large and lasting achievement. There was no philosophical subject that he did not touch upon, just as there was none in which he sounded any depths. Still, he deserves a place of prominence in the History of Philosophy, for his very diffuseness, his swift and superficial flights over the whole field of philosophy, brought many a question to the attention of subsequent philosophers. And his very errors, championed with such burning zeal, aroused interest with opposition and moved the current of speculation to full and rapid flow.

f) The School of Char t r es. The ancient city of Chartres, situated on the River Eure about fifty miles southwest of Paris, was the scene of great philosophical activity in the 12 century. The School there was founded by Fulbert of Chartres (died 1029). Its most famous teacher was Bernard of Chartres (died about 1130). Bernard propounded a Platonic explanation of Universals which makes him an out-and-out Ultra-Realist. His doctrine is but vaguely expressed in detail, but he seems to say that ideas are outside God and perhaps also outside the things which participate them. Generic and specific essences exist, and individuals are only accidents of a specific nature. Bernard’s opinions were adopted by many who attended the School, chief of whom was his younger brother Thierry or Theodoric of Chartres (died 1155). William of Conches (about 1080—1154) was another prominent protagonist of Bernard’s doctrine on Universals. These philosophers carried Bernard’s Ultra-Realism to the verge of pantheism. Theodoric taught that the Divine Essence is in things, albeit not their formal cause; and William went so far as to make the Holy Ghost the form or soul of the world. William, however, afterwards abjured this heresy. Thus the School of Chartres was ultra-realistic. Applying the doctrine of Ultra-Realism to God and the world, the members of this School reached erroneous and absurd conclusions. Still, the School helped materially to keep alive the controversy which was threshing out, slowly but surely, the true doctrine on Universals. Of the School of Chartres, but not of its spirit, was the friend of Bernard and a professor at the School, the AntiRealist, Gilbert de la Porree. Gilbert approaches Moderate Realism in his doctrine on Universals. With Gilbert de la Porrée must be mentioned one who felt his influence in a marked degree, Otto of Freising (1114-1158), historian of philosophy, and popularizer of Aristotle’s logical doctrine in Germany.

g) Remar ks.—In the present Article we have seen that the question of Universals was induced by the prominence of dialectical study and by the application of dialectic to matters of theology. Controversy on the subject divided philosophers into two main camps: that of the Realists (Ultra-Realists), and that of the Anti-Realists. At this time the Anti-Realists were not clearly distinguished as Moderate Realists, Conceptualists, and Nominalists; such classification of doctrines and doctrinaires came later. But in view of the classification we may retrospectively assign Bernard of Chartres to the UltraRealist class; call Anselm (with Adelard of Bath, Walter of Mortagne, and Gilbert de la Porrée) a Moderate Realist; and declare Abelard rather a Nominalist than a Moderate Realist.

The other philosophers of the Period of Development defy more accurate classification than that of Ultra-Realist or AntiRealist. The best mind of the Period, and the mind of most widespread and lasting influence, was that of St. Anselm. Perhaps Abelard, skimmer though he was, comes next in importance. The hesitant William of Champeaux may be listed after Abelard, for his influence was enormous, due to his wide reputation as a scholar and teacher. Roscelin, while notable, must not be overestimated ; his actual influence was not so great or lasting as some historians seem to believe it to have been.