his Book of the Six Principles, a supplement to the Categories of Aristotle, was accepted through the middle ages as second only in authority to the works of the founder of logic (among which, both in manuscript and print,[1] it held its place until the Latin versions of Aristotle were exchanged in general use for editions of the Greek), and it was made the basis of extensive commentaries by Albert the Great and several other schoolmen. Gilbert is thus the first medieval writer who was at once taken as a recognised authority on logic, the immediate successor of Boëthius and Isidore; for Alcuin's Dialectic, although a very popular text-book, had only been admitted as a convenient summary, and had by this time been rendered practically obsolete by the higher proficiency which was now expected of logical students: and even if Gilbert's treatise is hardly worthy of its reputation, it undoubtedly indicates a remarkable advance in the notions men had of scientific necessities, that anyone should venture to complete a section of a work of so unapproachable an eminence as Aristotle's Organon.
If dialectics made Gilbert's lasting fame, theology was the rock upon which his fortunes were nearly shipwrecked. He is the one man whom saint Bernard of Clairvaux unsuccessfully charged with heresy. This singular experience may be conveniently treated in another connexion; at present it will suffice to notice the few facts which are known about his life. Born in Poitiers about the year 1075,[2] he left his native city to become successively the scholar of Bernard of Chartres and of the illustrious Anselm of Laon.[3] It was doubtless the attraction of the former teacher that recalled him to Chartres, where he
- ↑ I have used the Venice folio of 1489.
- ↑ John of Salisbury, writing of the year 1148, speaks of Gilbert as one who 'circiter annos 60 expenderat in legendo et tritura litteraturae:' Historia pontificalis viii. Pertz 20. 522.
- ↑ M. Hauréau, Histoire de la Philosophie scolastique 1. 489. [following Mabillon, praef. in Bernardi Opp. i. § lviii.], rightly exposes the error by which Otto of Freising describes Hilary of Poitiers as Gilbert's first master. Saint Hilary was in fact the father to whose writings Gilbert constantly professes himself peculiarly indebted.
