Christian philosophers, but he had little influence in his own time, and was not, to my mind, so
scientific as is sometimes thought. English writers used to say that he invented gunpowder, but
this, of course, is untrue.
Saint Bonaventura ( 1221-1274), who, as General of the Franciscan order, forbade Bacon to
publish, was a man of a totally different kind. He belonged to the tradition of Saint Anselm,
whose ontological argument he upheld. He saw in the new Aristotelianism a fundamental
opposition to Christianity. He believed in Platonic ideas, which, however, only God knows
perfectly. In his writings Augustine is quoted constantly, but one finds no quotations from Arabs,
and few from pagan antiquity.
Matthew of Aquasparta (ca. 1235 -1302)was a follower of Bonaventura, but less untouched by the
new philosophy. He was a Franciscan, and became a cardinal; he opposed Saint Thomas from an
Augustinian point of view. But to him Aristotle has become "The Philosopher"; he is quoted
constantly. Avicenna is frequently mentioned; Saint Anselm is quoted with respect, as is the
pseudo-Dionysius; but the chief authority is Saint Augustine. We must, he says, find a middle way
between Plato and Aristotle. Plato's ideas are "utterly erroneous"; they establish wisdom, but not
knowledge. On the other hand, Aristotle is also wrong; he establishes knowledge, but not wisdom.
Our knowledge--so it is concluded--is caused by both lower and higher things, by external objects
and ideal reasons.
Duns Scotus (ca. 1270 -1308) carried on the Franciscan controversy with Aquinas. He was born in
Scotland or Ulster, became a Franciscan at Oxford, and spent his later years at Paris. Against Saint
Thomas, he defended the Immaculate Conception, and in this the University of Paris, and
ultimately the whole Catholic Church, agreed with him. He is Augustinian, but in a less extreme
form than Bonaventura, or even Matthew of Aquasparta; his differences from Saint Thomas, like
theirs, come of a larger admixture of Platonism (via Augustine) in his philosophy.
He discusses, for example, the question "Whether any sure and pure truth can be known naturally
by the understanding of the wayfarer without the special illumination of the uncreated light?" And
he argues that it cannot. He supports this view, in his opening argument, solely by quotations from
Saint Augustine; the only difficulty he