quia impedit motum. sicut oratio Iosuae, fecit sistere Solem. Sic
fortior influentii stellarum, fortior anima, quae sine cibo non
sustentat corpus: sed oratio sine cibo, longo tempore sustentavit
sanctos, in Helia, Mose, et aliis. Item fortior omni creatura, quia
nulla potest transformare in creatorem creaturam: sed oratio
consecratis transfert.^52To which Jewel wrote in his margin, Ridiculum. At other places where
Cusanus treats Eucharistic matters Jewel’s marginalia comments with
‘fatuum’ and ‘blasphemis’.^53 Both of these were taken from Cusanus’s
sermons. As opposed to Nicholas of Cusa’s sermons, there is no evidence
whatsoever that Jewel read any of the sermons of Bede, for there are no
marks on any of them. The Cusanus volume represents one of the most
marked of Jewel’s works. Though the mathematical treatises are
neglected, the philosophical ones are not, with a good bit of marginalia
in the text of De docta ignorantia, along with some 12 crosses in
the margins next to specific passages. There is only one place noted in
De visione dei, though this would go well with Jewel’s aversion to
images:
Homo non potest iudicare, nisi humaniter. Quando enim homo, tibi
faciem attribuit, extra humanam speciem illam non quaerit; quia
iudicium eius, est infra(m) humanam naturam contractum, et huius
contractionis passionem, in iudicando non exit. Sic si leo faciem tibi
attribuerat, non nisi leoninam iudicaret, et bos, bovinam, et aquila,
aquilinam. O Domine, quam admirabilis est facies tua, quam si
iuvenis concipere vellet, invenilem fingeret, et vir, virilem, et senex
senilem.^54LIFE AS A BISHOP IN SALISBURY 221
(^52) ‘Namely prayer is stronger than all creatures. For the angels or intelligences move the
spheres, the sun and the stars; but prayer is stronger, since it impedes their motion. Thus
the prayer of Joshua made the sun stand still. Thus by the influencing of the stars, the soul
is stronger, which without food cannot sustain the body; but prayer without food has
sustained for a long time the pious, in Elijah, Moses, and others. Likewise it is stronger
than all creatures, since none is able to transform the creature into the creator; but the
prayer of consecration performs this transformation.’ Nicholai de Cusa Opera Omnia
(Basel, 1565) p. 549. Magdalen shelf mark, I. 9. 14.
(^53) Ibid., pp. 522, 584. ‘Substantia panis, in confessione sacramenti, debet in superiorem
substantiam Christi translumi, alioqui non esset perfectum sacramentum, in quo debet
contineri, omni modo possibili, transsubstantiatio [The substance of the bread, in the
confession of the sacrament, ought to be transfigured into the superior substance of Christ,
in other respects it is not able to be a perfect sacrament, in which is necessary to be
contained in every way possible, transubstantiation {or, ‘the transubstantiated thing’}.]
(522, fatuum).’ ‘Sic hoc sacramentum, est verum manna, et regnum coelorum, Hierusalem
supercoelestis (584, blasphemis).’
(^54) Ibid., p. 185. Chapter VI of De Visione dei. ‘A human can only judge humanly. For
if a man attributes a face to You, he does not seek a face other than this human species,
since his judgement is bound by human nature, and in judging cannot escape the passion
of this contract. thus if a lion attributed a face to You, it would not think of it except as a