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Worth of Freedom.

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nature's law? Nowhere. The voice of all the world thus adjudges slavery to be a wrong to humanity. Freedom, we say, is our nature's birthright. We are called to liberty" by the voice of Heaven, and now, emphatically, of earth also. A cry has gone through the world, saying, "Up, and demand justice! Up, and be free!" Justice! Empires are shaken, thrones tremble, kings grow pale at that word. Justice! It is the stability of the universe; it is the throne of Heaven; it is the guardianship of the world; it is the law of all time; it is the empire of eternity!

If we have detained our readers long, the importance of the subjects upon which we have been engaged must be our apology. This is a time for clear, discriminating, fixed, and firm opinion and decision. Never were the moral elements of the world in such commotion as now; and they are all tending to one point, — the enfranchisement of humanity from all unjust bonds. Freedom! the moralist's, poet's, sage's theme in all ages, we do not yet know, perhaps, how precious is this boon to our very nature. No commendation, no boasting, can tell or explain what it is to us. Free speech, free thought, free action! Speech, thought, action, are nothing without this living element. Friendship is free, and retired life is free, and leisure after success is free; and more than half the charm of them lies in this. Whatever befalls us, whatever calamity, affliction, or sorrow, O, let us be free! Put no manacle upon our hand, put no dogma in our head, put no superstition in our heart. The trees wave in freedom on the hills; the streams flow in freedom; beast, bird, and insect are free; the creation is the theatre of freedom: shall man sigh in it, as a dungeon-slave? One bond there is for him, bond to lawful headship in the family and the state, bond to justice, bond to the infinite Rectitude; but that bond is perfect freedom.

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SCOTUS ERIGENA has, perhaps, exerted as great an influence on the course of philosophy as any man since the days of Aristotle. His name has lain for centuries in darkness, condemned to oblivion by the judgment of Popes and Councils. But his books were eagerly read by those who durst not quote them, and proved the fruitful seed that brought forth both the scholasticism and the mysticism of the Middle Ages. We propose, in the present article, to give a brief sketch of his system, as unfolded in his great work, De Divisione Naturæ. But, first, it may be proper to say a few words of his life and writings, taking for our authority Schlüter's preface to his edition of this work.

John Scotus Erigena, an Irishman by birth, born probably about the year 828, in a country then celebrated for the culture of letters, was learned in all polite branches, and especially in Greek philosophy and literature. Having perfected himself in these studies, and being consecrated to the priesthood, he went, like many of his countrymen, to France, where Charles the Bald appointed him teacher of mathematics and logic in his famous school at Paris. His natural goodhumor, with his witty and lively conversation, greatly pleased the king, whose friendship aided him in promoting sound learning in France. He soon, however, fell into a controversy with the Saxon monk, Godeschalk, concerning predestination. His work defending the Archbishop Hincmarsh, who had condemned Godeschalk, is yet extant. But the Pope Nicolas I. approved the doctrines of Remigius, a defender of Godeschalk, and confirmed the canons of the Council of Valence, which condemned the dogmas of Erigena. After this, Charles induced him to translate the works of the pseudo Dionysius the Areopagite, which Michael Balbus had, A. D. 827, given to Louis the Pious. But when Scotus had finished the translation, he found his only reward from the

* 1. JOHANNIS SCOTI ERIGENE De Divisione Naturæ Libri Quinque. Editio recognita et emendata. Accedunt Tredecim Auctoris Hymni ad Carolum Calvum, ex Palimpsestis Angeli Maii. Monasterii Guestphalorum Typis et Sumptibus Libraria Aschendorffianæ. 1838. 8vo. pp. 610. [With a preface in Latin, by C. B. Schlüter.]

2. Scot Érigène et la Philosophie Scholastique. Par M. SAINT-RENÉ TAILLANDIER, Professeur suppléant à la Faculté des Lettres de Strasbourg. Strasbourg et Paris. 1843. 8vo. pp. 331.

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Commentators and Critics.

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Church in a rebuke from the Pope, for publishing without license from the Pontiff works so liable to be misunderstood. Afterwards, in the year 870, he joined in the controversy with Radbert, concerning the eucharist. His writings on this point were, in Schlüter's opinion, lost before the eleventh century. The date of his writing the great work, De Divisione Naturæ, is not known. But when, in the thirteenth century, the Albigenses appealed to it, and sheltered themselves under the authority of Erigena, Honorius III. ordered the work to be collected and burned. Fortunately, however, copies escaped the Papal fire, and we have the precious volume in a perfect state.

Wearied at length by the perpetual attacks of French priests, and oppressed by the displeasure of Nicolas, he accepted, according to Schlüter, about the year 883, the invitation of Alfred the Great, and became teacher of mathematics and logic at Oxford. Afterwards being made Abbot at Malmesbury, he was slain by his scholars with their writingstyles, in some sudden tumult. A miraculous light shone over his grave, or, at least, so it is said, until they gave him an honorable sepulture near the altar of the cathedral. On this account, as well as from the integrity of his life, he was enrolled in the French and English martyrologies. So holy was his life, that never was a whisper raised against his character.

Taillandier considers the stories of his return to England, and his death there, as evidently false; nor does he admit that we have any knowledge of Erigena's life after he left the court of Charles. He is not positive whether Scotus belonged to any ecclesiastical order, yet thinks it highly improbable that so much learning should have been acquired in that age by one of the laity. From his remarkable knowledge of Greek, it has been conjectured that he travelled and spent some time in Greece. One glaring defect in his Latin style is the copious use of Greek idioms, constructions, and even words.

The most important modern writers on Erigena are Thomas Gale, who published an edition of De Divisione at Oxford, in 1681; Dr. Peter Hjort, professor of German Literature in Sorö, in Denmark, who published, in 1823, an essay on Erigena and the rise of Christian philosophy; Staudenmayer, Professor of Theology at Friburg; and Taillandier, who bases his criticism of the doctrine on the edition of Schlüter. Hjort's and Taillandier's books have the same

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general plan, a threefold division, in which the first part is devoted to the history of the times and the life of Erigena, the second to the exposition of his doctrines, and the third to an estimate of their value and their influence on the thought of the Middle Ages. The estimate which is put upon him by those who know him is well expressed in an extract (giv en in Schlüter's preface) from Albert Kreutzhage, part of which we will attempt to transfer from his " elegant and untranslatable" German to our English page.

"I have just finished, my dear friend, the little folio of Scotus Erigena, De Divisione Naturæ, and thank the chance which brought this splendid and rare work into my hands. In the treatise upon primordial causes, in the second book, we must continually perceive that here may be found, in its fulness, the primordial cause of unnumbered philosophical ideas, which since, divided among whole philosophical systems, have served for their life-principle and centre. Indeed, it is clear, that, if many modern philosophers would be frank, they would be obliged to confess that Erigena had given them their principal thoughts; that from the fulness of his deep and penetrating mind they drew their system-pulse in many varying channels.

"The basis of the new researches into self-consciousness and its trinity, into the deeper insight which has been thence obtained in relation to the being of God, to the meaning of many important teachings of Christianity, to the creation, and to knowledge,in short, the basis of the most important researches in modern philosophy, was long before uttered by Erigena in the words, Mens etenim et notitiam sui gignit, et a seipsa amor sui et notitia sui procedit, quo et ipsa et notitia sui conjunguntur.'

"The rare union of the greatest acuteness and depth in Erigena appears also in his remarkable, life-breathing style, so that one who reads him in certain moods is entranced, as though he found himself in a temple or holy grove, full of wonderful forms and spirit-voices, prophesying of life's inmost mysteries. .

"Günther is disposed to classify the system of Erigena as pantheistic, and indeed we cannot well deny that it often nearly approaches pantheism. To this limit all purely spiritual systems approach, indeed they pass into pantheism, when the stand-point of self-consciousness is considered the highest; the laws of thought are then transferred to the world as creative agents, while phenomena consist only in their relations; thus the spirit is made all in all. Erigena, however, preserves the boundary line between pantheism and creation. For even when he approaches this limit most nearly, for example, in the deification of the saints, he clearly distinguishes between the Creator and the

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His Works.

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creature, as may be seen in his strikingly fit illustration of the light which fills the air, and appears to be wholly identified with it, while yet the distinction remains. Erigena's primordial causes, constituting by their procession and return the universe, with the subsistence of the particulars in the universal, remind one, indeed, of Hegel; but Erigena does not mean a return by absorp tion, consequently not an identity, but simply the indwelling of the creature in the Creator. The next development of them, the categories of Erigena, (which in their objective reality form and constitute the world, while the subjective categories of Kant destroy it,) appears like the pointing out of the conditions under which the ideal, the substance, passes into the phenomena; and through the categories, as identical with substance and its phenomena, their identity also shall be shown.

"With a precise knowledge of the stand-points of physical philosophy, of mathematics, and astronomy in his own time, armed also with a knowledge of the past, intimately acquainted with the old literature of Greek philosophers and the works of the fathers of the Church, Erigena sought to discover the pure treasure of truth in a severely scientific Christian philosophy. He obtained the most extraordinary results, and shows everywhere in a superior manner, equalled in acuteness by none of the later scholastic philosophers except Thomas Aquinas, that the true relation of philosophy to Christianity is not that of hostility, but that only in closer league can they attain their mutual aim of finding the truth; in order that through knowledge the life-giving truth may penetrate us, and we may live by it. If, on the contrary, religion and philosophy become separated, and removed from each other, philosophy rises only into barren, rocky heights, where the higher she goes, the more completely does she lose the substance of truth, and ponder over her own shadow in the empty air, while Christianity is benumbed by dogma, as if it were materialized into an outward form, and the weak and timid eyes of the gazers (who, indeed, take their shoes from their feet in the holy city, but also draw a veil over their eyes) are no longer able to see its rich inner life, to understand the revelation which it makes concerning the highest questions of our existence, to perceive its fulness of truth. The truth, however, can give life and freedom only when we know her, and through her ourselves; know through her what we were, what we are, and what we shall again attain; what is the problem of our being, and in what relations we stand to the universe and to God."

It may also be of interest to copy from Taillandier a list of the writings of Erigena still extant, although several of his. works have been already mentioned.

VOL. XLVI. 4TH S. VOL. XI. NO. I.

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