The Catholic bulletin. [volume] (St. Paul, Minn.) 1911-1995, 1921-03-12
CONTINUED
PANEGYRIC ON SAINT THOMAS

and to bring the rival streams to-
gether. The result of their work was
by no means final, for we find the
same attempt repeated by the great
SystematizerS of the thirteenth CEN
fury, Alexander OF Hales and Alber-
tus Magnus. Finally, as though by
some special favor of Providence,
came the mind which transcribed all,
the mind OF ST. Thomas Aquinas, who
with his powerful, comprehensive ge-
Mus directed the great streams of
Scholasticism to the mighty ocean of
his immortal Summa, and thus left
to pesterity an eXhaustless reservoir
from which they might draw spiritual
sustenance and enlightenment.
A SANITY Scholar.
The Church in her long catalogue
of Saints and scholars boasts of no
more scholarly saint or saintlier schol-
ar than the immortal Thomas of
.AQuin. Perhaps never have nature
and her God been more generous to
a human creature than they were to
Thomas, and never perhaps were nat
ural gifts and divinely given talents
more sedulously applied or made to
reap so rich a harvest Within a pow
erful physical frame, that seemed
made to bear endless eXertions, was
imprisoned soul of almost supernat-
ural power and brilliance. Thomas
of Aquin attended the best schools
and studied under the most learned
men of his age, anSge that has scarce
ny been surpassed for its learning or
its scholars. He was himself the
crest of the intellectual wave that had
been gathering volume for almost 300
years. The natural keenness of his
intellect was whetted by the opposi-
tion it encountered in the Christian
and Pagan Rationalism of his day
The angelic purity of his life clarified
and exalted his mental vision, so that
it reached heights from which it scan
ned the whole wide ranges of knowl-
edge. With untiring zeal he ransack-
ed the treasure troves Of antiquity,
and with unfailing judgment separat-
ed the gold from the dross. Into the
vast storehouse of his mind he drew
all that was worth while of Plato and
Aristotle, the wealth of patristic lore,
. and the long accumulated hoard of the
ScholasticS; and as he gathered he
tested each accretiOn not only by the
light of his own searching reason, but
by the clearer light of divinely reveal
ed truth. With this enormous fund
of knowledge at his disposal he pro-
ceeded to compose his intellectual
structure, tempering reason by Faith,
and supporting Faith by reason. The
result was the Summa Theological,
which he, with characteristic modes
ty, considered a manual of Christian
Doctrine for students, but which a
grateful posterity regards as the most
monumental work ever constructed by
the mind of man.
Thomas the Magnetic.
1t is not to be wondered at that a
genius so transcendent should have
received general recognition in an age
which was learned enough to esteem
AOIS llOChSu W
him than had crowded the lecture
halls OF his learned preceptor, Alder
tus Magnus. Universities We'd with
one another for his services, and we
find him successfully at Paris, Anagni,
Rome, Bologna, Orvieto, Viterbo, Per
ugia, and again at Paris. The general
chapters of his order solemn councils
and Roman pontiffs summoned him to
their deliberations, that they might
profit by the depth of his learning
and the sureness of his judgment.
The high esteem in which his own
age and generation held him was not
lessened by the more mature appre-