378 THE HISTORY OF MEDIEVAL EUROPE Canons (Concordantia discordantium canonum), but it was usually more briefly called the Decretum. Of ecclesiastical courts and canon law we have already treated. European universities to-day still give courses in canon law and grant the degree of "doctor of both laws," J.U.D. (juris utriusque doctor). North of the Alps in the early twelfth century teachers had become much more numerous than before. Indeed, one Ed ti n wr iter of the time, William of Conches in Nor- outside mandy, complained bitterly that education had already become too popular, that many were teaching without adequate preparation, that most students took easy courses with popular professors instead of with the truly profound and original scholars, and yet that every teacher's time was so occupied with classes that he had scant leisure left for research and publication. This ten- dency to criticize existing educational conditions was one of the marks of the new age, and we shall meet further instances of it. What were the subjects taught in these schools north of the Alps? One of William's contemporaries speaks of him A brief as a teacher °f "Grammar"; that is, of Latin classical literature. We also know that about this time there was a school at Chartres devoted especially to the literary study of the Latin classics and to the culti- vation of a good Latin style. North as well as south of the Alps, however, the new development was to be of a learned rather than a literary character. William's extant work, for example, deals with philosophy and astronomy, although it occasionally quotes classical literature. To a great extent William follows the ancient Greek phil- osopher Plato in his interpretation of the world, although he Platonic also cites Christian writings and various books and° 8 ° P y °f astronomy. Yet he probably knew Plato's astronomy doctrines only indirectly through other writers and through Latin translations of some of Plato's works. William's little book begins by defining philosophy and describing its method of inquiry; he then argues that the
