The Intermountain Catholic. (Salt Lake City [Utah] ;) 1899-1920, 1902-09-06
CHAPTER VI-Continued.

| pose that l am slave to scnolastism
or the dry and barren forms of logic
| What passes for scolastiSm is mere
analysis, a mere dissection of its sub
ject, and seldom gives us more thar
a mere skeleton of it's truth, and the
skeleton itself is only as disjointed ano
scattered bones. 1 love and revere as
much as any man can the great schol-
astics of. the middle ages. The summa
theologia of the angel of the schools
has for me as many miracles as arV-
cles, and, when studied as it should
be, it gives one the sum of all theology
and of all philosophy. But, after all
few study it with sufficient care and
| diligence to seize its theology in its
unity and totality. The method OF
treatment is analytic, that of division,
which is exhaustive. The subject is
first divided into parts, then the parts
are divided into questions, and then
| the questions are subdivided into art1-
cles. Nothing in the world can be more
/ convenient for the learner or the pro-
| fessor; but the student, If not on his
| guard, is liable, in thus studying a
| subject to lose sight of unity and syn
| thesis, and to master it only in it's de-
| tails. st. Thomas had himself studied
and seen theology in it's unity and syn
| thesis, and seldom, if ever, for a mo-
ment loses sight of the truth in its
unity and integrity; but this cannot
| always be said of feebler minds, who
! follow him, and still less of feebler
| minds yet, who follow them, and con-
suit him only on special questions or
in special articles, and even that is
second or third hand. These often mas
ter all the theology and philosophy in
their detail, without ever having d
single conception of them in their unity
and integrity, in their mutual relations,
connections and dependencies.
'Scholastieism has, undoubtedly, in
troduced just and accurate distinctions
and favored clearness, exactness and
at the same time, led to a neglect of
synthesis, and intended to enfeeble,
rather than to invigorate, thought. 1t
has not little to do in producing, in
directly, that frivoleZza so universal in
the last century, and not wholly I'M
known in the present, and which made
the philosophical, scientific and literary
world regard as it's representative the
shallow Voltaire, prince of persif1age,
superficial erudition, and still more SUI
perficial thought. While insisting on
exactness in detail, while valuing the
analytic method in its place, and con-
tinuing and extending the study of the
great scholastics, l would, if it were
my business, urge. upon those students
who wish to qualify themselves to meet
the scientific wants of our age, and to
act powerfully on the public mind and
heart, to go back and study the works
OF the great fathers of the third, fourth
and fifth centuries, those real masters
of the human race who stood at the
summit of human science and revealed
theology; and study these great faith
ers, not merely in the prefaces and
indexes of the Benedictines, but in
their works themselves as handed
down to us from their authors. Then
we should not have the truth in mere
detail, as a mere hortus siccus, but in
its unity and integrity, as living, WV
flying and productive whole"
Revelation is complete, and truth
changes not, and the dogma is fixed
and unalterable; but modes and proc
esses of investigation, study, and ex7
position may change with time, and
vary with varying wants and tastes of
the age. The scholastic method was
in accordance with the tastes and
wants of the epoch when it was adopt
ed, and must be always more or less
the method pursued when only scholars
are to be addressed, and the object is
to act only on professional readers. But
times with US have changed. Cues
tons which were formerly discussed
only by school men, in the bosom of
the schools and monasteries, are now
brought before the public at large, and
the profoundest principles of theolog-
ical science have to be discussed for
the laity, because the laity, no longer |
docile, and content to receive in hui
mility the simple teachings of the cat
achism. and the practical instructions |
Of their pastors, have imbibed a habit |
Of questioning everything, and of de- |
1ying everything which they do not !
1t has become necessary |
20 become truly theological when we
;pead ad populum, as well as when we
speak ad clerum. But for the people, |
he scholastic method will not answer,
or they have neither the time nor the
patience to go through with all the
ong and fine-spun analyses in which it
Heights. They turn away unedified,
and even Disguised, from
is distinguos, concedos, negos, pro-
Jos, respondeos, objectiones and OBJ
ectiones solventures. To them, the
ruth must be presented. not in it's
but in it's synthetic form; not
n separate details, but as a whole in
is living principle as it is really, not
8 we make it for the conveniences of
tudy. They whose Office it is to teach,
nd to meet the insurgent errors of the
ines, which in our days assume almost
laical form, must be accustomed
o contemplate truth in it's synthetic
haracter or they will find themselves
npotent before the enemies of truth,
S they undeniably were before the ter
ible errors preached, and so widely
nd fiercely propogated, in the eight
enth century.
These are times when something
lore than a knowledge of details,
more than mere scholastic
Kinds, something more than respecta-
ell mediocrity, or men of mere routine,
; demanded. We want men of strong
ynthetic minds, who grasp truth in its
fundamental principles, and have been
ccustomed to contemplate it in it's
wing unity, and its several parts in it's
cal, theological relations to one an
Their and to it as a whole-men who
mink, who comprehend, not merely re-
lember and repeat-men of free, orig
lal, bold, and vigorous thought, who
y their own mental and spiritual ac-
on have made the truth their own.
nd are able to apply it to the insurgent
TOR as soon as it raises its head above
lie wave. Such a man Gioberti might
ave been, had it not been for his
ride, his ambition and his worldly af-
,ctions; such man to some extent
as the excellent Balmes, and such a
ian was beginning to be the late bril-
ant and lamented Donoso Cortes; such
man Is the Jesuit Passaglia, and, in
'ite of his early training and his the
y of development, such man will
i'm out to be John Henry Newman"