234 PHYSICAL SCIENCE IN THE MIDDLE AGES. 



of abstract terms is a curious question, and some remarkable exper- 

 iments in their use bad been made by the Latin Aristotelians before 

 this time. In the same way in which we talk of the quantity and 

 quality of a thing, they spoke of its quiddity} 1 



We may consider the reign of mere disputation as fully established 

 at the time of which we are now speaking ; and the only kind of phi- 

 losophy henceforth studied was one in which no sound physical science 

 had or could have a place. The wavering abstractions, indistinct 

 generalizations, and loose classifications of common language, which 

 we have already noted as the fountain of the physics of the Greek 

 Schools of philosophy, were also the only source from which the 

 Schoolmen of the middle ages drew their views, or rather their argu- 

 ments : and though these notional and verbal relations were invested 

 with a most complex and pedantic technicality, they did not, on that 

 account, become at all more precise as notions, or more likely to lead 

 to a single real truth. Instead of acquiring distinct ideas, they mul- 

 tiplied abstract terms ; instead of real generalizations, they had recourse 

 to verbal distinctions. The whole course of their employments tended 

 to make them, not only ignorant of physical truth, but incapable of 

 conceiving its nature. 



Having thus taken upon themselves the task of raising and discuss- 

 ing questions by means of abstract terms, verbal distinctions, and logi- 

 cal rules alone, there was no tendency in their activity to come to an 

 end, as there was no progress. The same questions, the same answers, 

 the same difficulties, the same solutions, the same verbal subtleties, — 

 sought for, admired, cavilled at, abandoned, reproduced, and again ad- 

 mired, — might recur without limit. John of Salisbury 18 observes of 

 the Parisian teachers, that, after several years' absence, he found them 

 not a step advanced, and still employed in urging and parrying the 

 same arguments ; and this, as Mr. Hallam remarks, 19 " was equally ap- 

 plicable to the period of centuries." The same knots were tied and 



i? Deg. iv. 494. 



18 He studied logic at Paris, at St. Genevieve, and then left them. " Duodecen- 

 nium mihi elapsurn est diversis studiis occupatum. Jucundum itaque visum est 

 veteres quos reliqueram, et quos adhuc Dialectica detinebat in monte, (Sanctae 

 Genovefae) revisere socios, conferre cum eis super ambiguitatibus pristinis ; ut 

 nostrum invicem collatione mutua commetiremur profectum. Inventi sunt, qui 

 fuerant, et ubi ; neque enim ad palmam visi sunt processisse ad quaestiones pris- 

 tinis dirimendas, neque propositiunculam unaui adjecerant. Quibus urgebant 

 stimulis eisdem et ipsi urgebantur," &c. Metalogicus, lib. ii. cap. 10. 



19 Middle Ages, iii. 537. 



