Distinction XXXVII

GRATIAN. Part I. But it is asked whether they ought to be instructed in secular letters. Concerning these things it is written thus in the Fourth Council of Carthage [c. 16]:

Let a bishop not read the books of the gentiles, but those of heretics according to necessity or occasion.

Likewise Jerome to Damasus, On the Prodigal Son [epistle CXLVI]. We see priests of God, leaving aside the Gospels and the Prophets, read comedies, sing the amorous words of bucolic verses, hold Virgil, and make in themselves a crime of pleasure that which in boys is a matter of necessity.

The same [commentary on c. 4 of the epistle to the Ephesians, Book II]. Does one not appear to you to walk in vanity of understanding and obscurity of mind who is tormented day and night in the dialectical art? Who, an investigator of nature, lifts his eyes beyond heaven and sinks beyond the depth of the earth and the abyss into a certain void? Who burns over the iamb? Who studiously distinguishes and amasses so great a forest of meters in his heart? And, that I may pass to the other side, who seeks riches by right and wrong? Who flatters kings, hunts after the inheritances of others, and gathers wealth that he does not know to whom he will leave in a moment?

The same, on Isaiah. Those who understand the sacred Scriptures badly and pervert them are intoxicated with wine; with strong drink, those who misuse secular wisdom and the snares of dialecticians, which ought to be called not so much bonds as phantasms—that is, certain shadows and images that quickly perish and are dissolved. The same: §1. According to the tropological sense, we ought to understand as pseudo-prophets those who receive the words of the Scriptures otherwise than the Holy Spirit sounds them, and as diviners those who, by the conjecture of their own mind, pronounce the uncertainties of future things as though true without the authority of the divine words. The same: §2. Whoever does not understand the Scriptures as the truth of the matter holds eats a sour grape.

The same [Book III, at c. 6], in the epistle to the Ephesians. Let bishops and priests read this, who instruct their sons in secular letters and make them read comedies and sing the shameful writings of mimes, perhaps instructing them from ecclesiastical expenditures. And that which a virgin or widow, or any poor person pouring out all his substance, had offered into the treasury for sin, the grammarian and orator turns into a New Year’s gift for the Kalends, a Saturnalian present, and a Minerval gift, or into domestic expenses, temple contributions, or filthy profit. Eli himself was a holy priest; but because he did not instruct his sons in every discipline and correction, he fell backward and died.

[PALEA.

Heretics establish all the force of their poisons in dialectical disputation, which by the judgment of philosophers is defined as having not the power of constructing but the zeal of destroying. But it did not please God to save his people through dialectic. For the kingdom of God is in simplicity of faith, not in contention of speech.]

Likewise Rabanus, On Ecclesiastical Afflictions. We read concerning blessed Jerome that, when he was reading a book of Cicero, he was reproved by an angel because, although a Christian man, he devoted himself to the fabrications of the pagans. GRATIAN. Hence also that prodigal son in the Gospel is reproved who wished to fill his belly from the husks that the swine ate. §1. Hence Origen also understands the gnats and frogs with which the Egyptians were struck as the vain garrulity of dialecticians and sophistical arguments. From all these things it is gathered that skill in secular letters is not to be sought by ecclesiastics. §2. But to the contrary it is read that Moses and Daniel were instructed in all the knowledge of the Egyptians and Chaldeans. It is also read that the Lord commanded the children of Israel to despoil the Egyptians of gold and silver, morally instructing that, whether we find the gold of wisdom or the silver of eloquence among poets, we should turn it to the use of salutary instruction. §3. In Leviticus we are also commanded to offer to the Lord the first fruits of honey, that is, the sweetness of human eloquence. §4. The Magi too offered three gifts to the Lord, in which certain persons wish the three parts of philosophy to be understood. §5. Finally, as Cassiodorus testifies in the exposition of the Psalter, all the splendor of rhetorical eloquence, all the modes of poetic speech, and every variety of becoming pronunciation took their origin from the divine Scriptures. §6. Hence Ambrose also says upon the epistle to the Colossians: “Every principle of heavenly knowledge or of earthly creation is in him who is their head and author, so that one who knows him seeks nothing beyond him, because he is perfect power and wisdom; whatever is sought elsewhere is found perfectly here. In Daniel and Solomon he shows to the unbelievers that he is the author of all wisdom. The unbelievers do not think this because they do not read in the Gospels and Prophets astrology and other things of this kind, which are despised because they avail nothing for salvation but send persons into error, and, while they study these things, they have no care for the soul. But one who knows Christ finds the treasure of wisdom and knowledge, because he knows that which is useful.” Hence Bede also says in [Book II] of Kings [c. 9, in the allegorical expositions of Samuel]:

One who thinks that readers are to be prohibited in every way from reading all secular books disturbs their acuteness and compels it to fail; if any useful things are found in these books, it is lawful to take them as one’s own. Otherwise Moses and Daniel would not have permitted themselves to be instructed in the wisdom and letters of the Egyptians and Chaldeans, although they abhorred both their superstitions and their delicacies. Nor would the teacher of the gentiles himself have inserted certain verses of the poets into his writings or sayings. Part II. GRATIAN. Why, therefore, are those things prohibited from being read that are proved so reasonably to be read? But some read secular letters for pleasure, delighted by the fabrications of the poets and the ornament of words; others learn them for instruction, so that by reading they may detest the errors of the gentiles and devotedly turn the useful things they find in them to the use of sacred instruction. Such persons laudably learn secular letters. Hence blessed Gregory did not reprove a certain bishop because he had learned them, but because, contrary to the episcopal office, he expounded grammar to the people in place of a reading from the Gospel. Hence Ambrose also writes upon Luke [in the explanation of the proem]:

We read certain things lest they be read; we read lest we be ignorant; we read not to retain but to repudiate.

Likewise Jerome upon the epistle to Titus. If anyone knows the grammatical art or dialectic so that he may possess a principle of speaking correctly and judge between false and true things, we do not disapprove. §1. Geometry, arithmetic, and music, however, possess truth in their knowledge, but that knowledge is not the knowledge of piety. The knowledge of piety is to read the Scriptures and understand the Prophets, to believe the Gospel, and not to be ignorant of the Apostles. §2. The doctrine of grammarians, however, can advance toward life when it has been taken up for better uses.

Likewise. Those who refuse to eat from the king’s table and wine lest they be polluted—assuredly, if they had known that the wisdom and doctrine of the Babylonians was a sin, they would never have acquiesced in learning what was unlawful. But they learn not to follow but to judge and convict, just as anyone who wishes to write against astrologers while unskilled in astrology lies open to ridicule, as does one disputing against philosophers if he is ignorant of the doctrines of the philosophers. They therefore learn Chaldean doctrine with the mind with which Moses too had learned all the wisdom of the Egyptians. The same: §1. If at any time we are compelled to recall secular letters and to learn some of those things that we once omitted, this is not of our will, but, so to speak, of the gravest necessity, so that we may prove that the things foretold by the holy prophets many ages before are contained in the letters of the Greeks, the Latins, and other nations.

Likewise from the Synod of Pope Eugenius [II, c. 34]. It is reported to us concerning certain places that neither masters nor care for the study of letters is found. Therefore let all bishops exercise altogether care and diligence among the peoples subject to them and in other places where necessity occurs, so that masters and doctors may be established who continually teach the studies of letters and the doctrines of the liberal arts, because in these especially the divine commandments are manifested and explained.

Likewise Augustine, Against the Manichaeans [Book XIII, c. 15]. If the Sibyl, Orpheus, or other seers or philosophers of the gentiles are reported to have foretold anything true concerning God, this indeed avails something for convicting the vanity of the pagans, but not for embracing their authority. For as great as is the distance concerning the coming of Christ between the preaching of angels and the confession of demons, so great is that between the authority of prophets and the curiosity of sacrilegious persons.

Likewise Clement [Pope Clement I, epistle V to his disciples]. Part III. It has been reported to us that certain persons dwelling in your regions oppose sound doctrines and, as it seems to them, teach not according to the tradition of the fathers but according to their own understanding. For, as we have heard, certain ingenious men of your regions grasp many semblances of truth from the things they read. And therefore it must be diligently observed that, when the law of God is read, it should not be read or taught according to the understanding of one’s own ability. For there are many words in the divine Scriptures that can be drawn to that meaning which each person voluntarily presumes for himself, but this ought not to be. For you ought not to seek an alien and foreign meaning from outside so that in any way you may confirm it from the authority of the Scriptures, but to grasp the meaning of truth from the Scriptures themselves. And therefore one must learn knowledge of the Scriptures from one who preserves it as handed down to him according to truth by his elders, so that he himself may competently assert what he rightly received. For when anyone has received from the divine Scriptures an integral and firm rule of truth, it will not be absurd if he also brings something from common instruction and the liberal studies that perhaps he touched upon in childhood to the assertion of true doctrine, yet in such a way that, where he has learned true things, he avoids false and feigned ones.

Likewise Isidore in Book [III] of the Sentences [On the Supreme Good, c. 13]. Part IV. A Christian is prohibited from reading the fabrications of poets because through the enticements of their tales they stir the mind too greatly toward the incentives of lusts. For persons sacrifice to demons not only by offering incense, but also by receiving their sayings more willingly. Part V. GRATIAN. Thus, as appears from the foregoing authorities, lack of skill ought always to be opposed to priests, since, when those blinded by ignorance begin to provide leadership to others, both fall into the pit. Hence it is said in the Psalm: “Let their eyes be darkened so that they do not see, and bend their back always.” For when those who go before are darkened, those following are readily inclined to bear the burdens of sins. Priests must therefore labor to cast ignorance away from themselves as a kind of pest. For although a servant who does not know his lord’s will and does not do it is said to be beaten with few blows, this is nevertheless not understood generally concerning all. For as the Apostle says, “One who is ignorant will be ignored.” This is to be understood concerning the one “who was unwilling to understand so that he might act well.” Hence Augustine says in the Book of Questions [of the Old and New Testament, question 67]:

Not every ignorant person is immune from punishment. For that ignorant person who found no one from whom he could learn can be excused from punishment. But this cannot be forgiven to those who, having someone from whom they could learn, gave no effort.