60 PHILOSOPHIC SCIENCES. 



However, the scholastic spirit had not quenched the ardour for research, 

 and St. Thomas, notwithstanding his immense authority, had more than one 

 opponent. The dispute took place, it is true, upon the ground of philosophy, 

 between the Orders of St. Dominic and St. Francis. Alhertus Magnus, by 

 declaring himself the enemy of the realists, had excited the hostility of the 

 Franciscans, who adhered to the opinion of their first doctor, Alexander of 

 Hales. St. Thomas, out of respect for his master, Albert, had joined the 

 camp of the nominalists, but he was often at variance with them, and could 

 not follow Albert the Great in all his conclusions of doctrine. Thus, not- 

 withstanding his deep study of the natural sciences, he had less inclination 

 for physics than for metaphysics, and his favourite subjects of discussion were 

 those relating to the spiritual substance, its faculties, its functions, and its 

 acts. When it was a question of explaining the nature of ideas, he inclined 

 towards realism. A disciple of St. Augustine, and, through him, of Plato, 

 he held that ideas are distinct forms, which exist in permanency in the Divine 

 intellect ; they are, according to him, substantial entities forming part of 

 a world which is the pattern of the external and the intellectual world 

 (Fig. 45). 



The philosophical doctrine of St. Thomas Aquinas was not attacked in 

 earnest until after his death, though the questions were mooted while he was 

 alive. Henry of Ghent and Roger Bacon had warmly espoused the cause of 

 the Franciscans and the doctrine of Alexander of Hales, which was pure 

 realism. St. Bonaventure (Fig. 46), who died at about the same time as 

 St. Thomas Aquinas, had waged war more against rationalism than nomi- 

 nalism. He belonged to the Order of St. Francis, and he had certain mystic 

 tendencies, urging his hearers to avoid the schools and despise science. The 

 detractors of philosophy ranged themselves to the banner of John of Wales, 

 who was also a Franciscan ; and this was not the only defection in their 

 ranks, for Richard of Middleton professed nominalism at the University of 

 Paris, but he met a stout adversary in William of Lamarre, who advocated 

 the Franciscan doctrine against the Dominicans. And so the struggle went 

 on. The best supporter of the doctrine of St. Thomas was his pupil and 

 fellow-countryman, Egidio Colonna, who acquired in this war of the schools 

 the curious nickname of Doctor fundamcntanm, his partisans having 

 ascribed to him the honour of having laid the foundation of nominalist 

 science. 



