DUNS
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DUNS
manded Abraham to sacrifice his son. But the pre-
cepts of the second table also are far more binding
than the other positive laws of God. In the present
order of things God cannot permit manslaughter uni-
versally, takfng the property of others, and the like.
There are also indifferent actions in individuo. Abso-
lutely speaking, man should direct all his actions
towards God; but God does not require this, because
He does not wish to burden man with so hea\-}' a yoke.
He obliges man only to observe the Decalogue ; the rest
is free. Social and legal questions are not treated
by Scotus ex projesso; his works, however, contain
sound observations on these subjects.
Relation between Philosophy and Theology. — Scotus does not, as is often asserted, maintain that science and faith can contradict each other, or that a proposition may be true in philosophy and false in thcology and vice versa. Incorrect, also, is the state- ment that he attaches little importance to showing the harmony between scientific knowledge and faith and that he has no regard for speculative theology. Quite the contrarj-, he proves the dogmas of faith not only from authority but, as far as possible, from rea- son also. Theology presupposes philosophy as its basis. Facts which have God for their author and yet can be known by our natural powers, especially miracles and prophecies, are criteria of the truth of Revelation, religion, and the Church. Scotus strives to gain as thorough an insight as possible into the truths of faith, to 'disclose them to the human mind, to establish truth upon truth, and from dogma, to prove or to reject many a philosophical proposition. There is just as little warrant for the statement that his chief concern is humble subjection to the authoritjr of God and of the Church, or that his tendency a priori is to depreciate scientific knowledge and to resolve speculative theology into doubts. Scotus simply be- lieves that many philosophical and theological proofs of other scholars are not conclusive; in their stead he adduces other arguments. He also thinks that many philosophical and theological propositions can be proved which other Scholastics consider incapable of demonstration. He indeed lays great stress on the authority of Scripture, the Fathers, and the Church; but he also attaches much importance to natviral knowledge and the intellectual capacity of the mind of angels and of men, both in this world and in the other. He is inclined to widen rather than narrow the range of attainable knowledge. He sets great value upon mathematics and the natural sciences and especially upon metaphysics. He rejects every un- necessary recourse to Divine or angelic intervention or to miracles, and demands that the supernatural and miraculous be limited as far as possible even in mat- ters of faith. Dogmas he holds are to be explained in a somewhat softened and more easily intelligible sense, so far as this may be done without diminution of their substantial meaning, dignity, and depth. In Scripture the literal sense is to be taken, and freedom of opinion is to be granted so far as it is not opposed to Christian Faith or the authority of the Church. Sco- tus was much given to the study of mathematics, and for this reason he insists on demonstrative proofs in philosophy and theology; but he is no real sceptic. He grants that our senses, our internal and external experience, and authority together with reason, can furnish us with absolute certainty and evidence. The diHieultv which many truths present lies not so much in ourselves as in the objects. In itself everything knowable is the object of our knowledge. Reason can of its own powers recognize the existence of God and many of His attributes, the creation of the world out of nothing, the conservation of the world by God, the spiritualitv, in<livicluality, substantiality, and unity of the sold, as well as its free will. In many of his writings he asserts lli.it mere rea.scm can come to know the immortality and the creation of the soul; in
others he asserts the direct opposite; but he never
denies the so-called moral evidence for these truths.
Theology with him is not a scientific study in the strictest sense of the word, as are mathematics and metaphysics, because it is not based upon the evidence of its objects, but upon revelation and authority. It is a practical science because it pursues a practical end: the possession of God. But it gives the mind perfect certainty and unchangeable truths; it does not consist in mere practical, moral, and religious activity. Thus Scotus is removed from Kant and the modern Gefuhlstheologen, not by a single line of thought but by the whole range of his philosophical speculation. Sco- tus is no precursor of Luther; he emphasizes ecclesias- tical tradition and authority, the freedom of the will, the power of our reason, and the co-operation with grace. Nor is he a precursor of Kant. The doctrine regarding primacy of the will and the practical char- acter of theology has quite a different meaning in his mind from what it has in Kant's. He values meta- physics highly and calls it the queen of sciences. Only as a very subtle critic may he be called the Kant of the thirteenth century. Nor is he a precursor of the Mod- ernists. His writings indeed contain many entirely modern ideas, e. g. the stress he lays on freedom in scientific and also in religious matters, upon the separ- ateness of the objective world and of thought, the self- activity of the thinldng subject, the dignity and value of personality; yet in all this he remains within proper limits, and in opposition to the Modernists he asserts very forcibly the necessity of an absolute authority in the Church, the necessity of faith, the freedom of the will ; and he rejects absolutely any and every monistic identification of the world and God. That he has so often been misunderstood is due simply to the fact that his teaching has been viewed from the standpoint of moiiern thought.
Scotus is a genuine Scholastic philosopher who works out ideas taken from Aristotle, St. Augustine, and the preceding Scholastics. He is universally rec- ognized as a deep thinker, an original mind, and a sharp critic; a thoroughly scientific man, who without personal bias proceeds objectively, stating his own doctrines with modesty and with a certain reserve. It has been asserted that he did more harm than good to the Church, and that by his destructive criticism, his subtleties, and his barbarous terminology he pre- pared the ruin of Scholasticism, indeed that its down- fall begins with him. These accusations originated to a great extent in the insufficient understanding or the false interpretation of his doctrines. No doubt his diction lacks elegance; it is often obscure and unin- telligible; but the same must be said of many earlier Scholastics. Then too, subtle discussions and dis- tinctions which to this age are meaningless, abound in his works; yet his researches were occasioned for the most part, by the remarks of other Scholastic philoso- phers, especially by Henry of Ghent, whom he attacks perhaps even more than he does St. Thomas. But the real spirit of scholasticism is perhaps in no other Scholastic so pronounced as in Scotus. In depth of thought, which after all is the important thing, Scotus is not surpassed by any of his contemporaries. He was a child of his time; a thorough .\ristotelean, even more so than St. Thomas; but he criticizes sharply even the Stagirite and his commentators. He tries always to explain them favourably, but does not hesi- tate to differ from them. Duns Scotus's teaching is orthodox. Catholics and Protestants have charged him with sundry errors and heresies, but the Church has not condemned a single proposition of his; on the contrary, the doctrine of the Immaculate Conception which ho so strongly advocated, has been declared a dogma.
MiiLLKlj, Biographuiches ilbcr D. Scoliw (CoIoRnc. 18S1), ProKramm; Little, The Grey Friars in Oxford (Oxfonl. 1.S92), 210 sqq.; Uk.na.n, //w(. liu. dc la FraiKX CJS09). XXV. 10^-
