But still, at the universities the friars produced the great intellectual leaders of the century. Thomas Hales, a Franciscan friar, was the teacher of Bonaventura and of Duns Scotus. Of the great schoolmen whom the two orders of friars produced, the chief among the Dominicans was Thomas Aquinas, and the chief among the Franciscans was Bonaventura. These two men, being contemporaries, naturally raised the repute of the friars to such a height, that it was impossible for the universities to make head against them. But it was noticeable that from the very beginning there were two great tendencies in the Franciscan Order, one being represented by Bonaventura, who was a Platonist and a mystic, and the other by Duns Scotus and Occam, who were strongly rationalistic and sceptical in tendency. Strange as it may seem, both these tendencies had their root in Francis himself. He was a mystic in sentiment, but always exceedingly critical of the ecclesiastical system, and in favour of individual liberty in thought and life. He may be said to have been at once a mystic and a freethinker, and, unconsciously to himself, to have made a compromise between the two. The Franciscan Order, all through its history in mediæval times, bore traces of these two sides of its founder's character.
It was through Thomas Aquinas that the Dominicans chiefly influenced thought and learning, and his influence was enormous. He may be said to have been the great organiser of the theology of the mediæval Church. He carried the spirit of Dominic into the region of theological speculation. He was the organiser and arranger of all that had been
