University of Santa Clara - Redwood Yearbook (Santa Clara, CA)

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THE REDWOOD 17 ably did more than anyone else to make their principle clear, and establish them upon a mathematical basis. He taught the principle of aberration of light ; and claimed, though he could not have known it by experiment, that light does not travel instantaneously but at a fixed rate contrary to the opinion of everyone of the time. Albertus Magnus was a great scien- tist and theologian. Though his theo- logical works are very valuable it is on his scientific achievements that his fames rests. He experimented in chem- istry and physics and made some ob- servations in botany. Humboldt, the distinguished German naturalist says, His works contain some exceedingly acute remarks on the organic struct- ure and physiology of plants. He also gave some attention to astronomy and decided that the Milkj Way was nothing but a vast assemblage of stars. He made some remarks on the reflec- tion of solar rays and noticed the power of refraction in certain crystals. It is interesting to note in view of recent discoveries in chemistry that the theory of the Mediaeval Alchemists concerning the possibility of the trans- mutation of elements may not be whol- ly wrong. Lithium can be derived from copper. Ramsey, the great Eng- lish chemist, declares that he has ob- tained carbon from zirc onium, silicon and some other rarer elements, and that he can obtain silver from lead. It is the matter of common knowledge that radium, to all appearances an ele- ment, yields emanations of a distinctly different substance, helium. This has led many famous chemists to the con- clusion that all things are composed of the same essential matter, and that the difference among the elements is due to different manifestations of the primary matter. This was the theory of St. Thomas Aquinas when he said, That everything consisted of, 1st. Matter, and 2nd Form. The matter he considered as always the same, but the form may be different. There are many indications pointing to the adop- tion of this theory of the Dark Ages. Passing to the literature of the Mid- dle Ages, we come to what is probably its greatest glory. Time has placed its masterpieces in the very front rank of classics. The following names and works alone should be sufficient to free the Middle Ages from any contempt: Dante, St. Thomas Aquinas; The Song of Roland , The Cid , the Nibel- ungenlied . Dante is without doubt the greatest of Mediaeval poets and also one of the greatest of all times. Only Shakespeare and Homer are men- tioned with his name. There is no need of my praising his universally known works. Next comes St. Thomas, of whom something has been said of the Universities. The Middle Ages also saw the com- position of several great national epics. The first of these is The Song of Ro- land, a heroic legend, which formed about one of the chieftains of Charle- magne. Critics have accorded it the place of a classic. Later in Germany came the Nibelungenlied . This was

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16 THE REDWOOD Silk was first cultivated in France during the twelfth century. The postoffice may be said to haA e originated in the Middle Ages. To fa- cilitate communication between the students and their parents, the large universities established regular carrier routes on which mails were carried at a fixed rate. This system extended and amplified resulted in Modern postal service. But the industries were not so ard- ently cultivated as at present and there is not reason to look down upon the age on this score. In the fine arts, which are of as much importance as industrial arts, the thirteenth century surpassed us. Most people exulting in the glory of the Renaissance forget that many art- ists were infusing culture, developing the people ' s taste and in every way preparing for the Eevival. It is a max- im of history that no great age owes its greatness to what itself alone has made, but rather to giving a fitting climax to what has been done before. In one re- spect Mediaeval art is superior to that of the Renaissance. In the Middle Ages, art had a purpose, which was the same as that of the whole human race, to glorify God. Art for art ' s sake alone was unknown. The archi- tecture, painting, sculpture of the pe- riod reflected the love and v orship of the Lord. With the Renaissance, a utilitarian spirit set in which has waxed stronger ever since resulting in the blight of true art. As Ruskin said, This pesky Renaissance has over- whelmed everything artistic. But the Middle Ages did not despise what was useful. The maxim of he who com- bines beauty with utility gains every- thing, well expresses the sentiment of the best part of the Mediaeval pe- riod. A consideration of the cathedrals, of the development of painting and of the minor arts, of the fact that when all this was done Europe did not have one-twentieth as many people as it now has, so that the proportional number of geniuses developed must have been far greater than at present, should do much to vindicate the Middle Ages. Before taking up Mediaeval litera- ture a few words should be said of Mediaeval science which made its greatest progress during the thirteenth century. Foremost among the scien- tists was Roger Bacon. He is the fath- er of inductive reasoning and in his writings he strenuously advocated a greater devotion to experiment and ob- servation in gaining knowledge, and not too much trust in what is accepted as true. Though he did not discover explosives he must have been ac- quainted with them, for in his Opus Magnum we find a statement that one may call to burst forth from bronze thunderbolts more formidable than those produced by nature. He also an- ticipated the use of explosives as a source of power and declared that it was possible to construct a boat and a carriage which would move without oarsmen or horses. Though Bacon was not the discoverer of lenses, he prob-

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18 THE REDWOOD a recital of the adventures of Sieg- fried, a hero embodying many German ideals, but not without human weak- ness. Although some persons doubt as to whether one man composed this work, recent criticism makes it ap- pear probable that it is at least the conception of a single individual. The Nibelungenlied furnished the scenes for Wagner ' s operas. The Spanish Cid was written at about the same time. Cid , the hero, -is a chivalrous champion of the Span- ish Christians in their war with the Moors. This poem is more widely known than either of the two foregoing ones. Anyone who lays claim to ac- quaintance with Spanish literature must have read the Cid and Don Quixote. ' ' It is also during the Middle Ages that the Arthurian legends were gath- ered by Walter Map, an English cler- gyman of the thirteenth century. Map is considered to have corrected and given a unity to these legends. Prob- ably he invented the character of Launcelot. If this is so he is, according to Professor Saintsbury, a great man indeed, a man second to Dante among the men of the Middle Ages. ' ' The possession of such a rich and varied literature is of course a valua- ble proof that the Middle Ages were not dark. Besides being wonderful achievements in themselves they show that the spirit of the Age could not have been base and sordid. Dante, the Troubadours, Trouveres, Minnisingers, that preceded and accompanied him, could not have been the product of an ignorant and uncultured age. No great literary genius has lived in a time un- favorable to his development. The illustrious Greek authors are clustered about the Golden Age of Athens ; Vir- gil and Cicero lived in Rome when she was at the height of her civilization, Shakespeare wrote just as England awoke to her prowess and made won- derful progress in many lines. Classics give adequate expression to the thoughts and the emotions of their great authors. The age in which a per- son lives naturally effects his thoughts ; if it is a barbaric period we cannot expect such a wonderful production of poetry as Dante ' s nor such philosophy as that of St. Thomas. The atmosphere in which such works are written must be enlightened. A masterpiece of lit- erature is not only the work of an in- dividual, the age in which it is written is partly responsible for it. The poet ' s ideals and emotions are similar to the majority of his contemporaries. How could the age that produced the Cid , the Nibelunglied , The Song of Roland , The Divine Comedy , The Summa , have been a dark one? Surveying the Middle Ages, we be- hold Christianity infused into the hearts of the barbarians civilizing and quieting them, we see women no longer the chattels of men, but their helpers and mates. Those who labor have been elevated from slaves to freemen. Thou- sands of eager students are flocking to the universities. We trace back to the Middle Ages the beginnings of our