THE THEOLOGICAL TRACTATES AND THE CONSOLATION OF PHILOSOPHY

INTRODUCTION

Anicius Manlius Severinus Boethius, of the famous Praenestine family of the
Anicii, was born about 480 A.D. in Rome. His father was an ex-consul; he
himself was consul under Theodoric the Ostrogoth in 510, and his two sons,
children of a great grand-daughter of the renowned Q. Aurelius Symmachus,
were joint consuls in 522. His public career was splendid and honourable,
as befitted a man of his race, attainments, and character. But he fell
under the displeasure of Theodoric, and was charged with conspiring to
deliver Rome from his rule, and with corresponding treasonably to this end
with Justin, Emperor of the East. He was thrown into prison at Pavia, where
he wrote the _Consolation of Philosophy_, and he was brutally put to death
in 524. His brief and busy life was marked by great literary achievement.
His learning was vast, his industry untiring, his object unattainable--
nothing less than the transmission to his countrymen of all the works of
Plato and Aristotle, and the reconciliation of their apparently divergent
views. To form the idea was a silent judgment on the learning of his day;
to realize it was more than one man could accomplish; but Boethius
accomplished much. He translated the [Greek: Eisagogae] of Porphyry, and
the whole of Aristotle's _Organon_. He wrote a double commentary on the
[Greek: Eisagogae] and commentaries on the _Categories_ and the _De
Interpretatione_ of Aristotle, and on the _Topica_ of Cicero. He also
composed original treatises on the categorical and hypothetical syllogism,
on Division and on Topical Differences. He adapted the arithmetic of
Nicomachus, and his textbook on music, founded on various Greek
authorities, was in use at Oxford and Cambridge until modern times. His
five theological _Tractates_ are here, together with the _Consolation of
Philosophy_, to speak for themselves.

Boethius was the last of the Roman philosophers, and the first of the
scholastic theologians. The present volume serves to prove the truth of
both these assertions.

The _Consolation of Philosophy_ is indeed, as Gibbon called it, "a golden
volume, not unworthy of the leisure of Plato or of Tully." To belittle its
originality and sincerity, as is sometimes done, with a view to saving the
Christianity of the writer, is to misunderstand his mind and his method.
The _Consolatio_ is not, as has been maintained, a mere patchwork of
translations from Aristotle and the Neoplatonists. Rather it is the supreme
essay of one who throughout his life had found his highest solace in the
dry light of reason. His chief source of refreshment, in the dungeon to
which his beloved library had not accompanied him, was a memory well
stocked with the poetry and thought of former days. The development of the
argument is anything but Neoplatonic; it is all his own.

And if the _Consolation of Philosophy_ admits Boethius to the company of
Cicero or even of Plato, the theological _Tractates_ mark him as the
forerunner of St. Thomas. It was the habit of a former generation to regard
Boethius as an eclectic, the transmitter of a distorted Aristotelianism, a
pagan, or at best a luke-warm Christian, who at the end cast off the faith
which he had worn in times of peace, and wrapped himself in the philosophic
cloak which properly belonged to him. The authenticity of the _Tractates_
was freely denied. We know better now. The discovery by Alfred Holder, and
the illuminating discussion by Hermann Usener,[1] of a fragment of
Cassiodorus are sufficient confirmation of the manuscript tradition, apart
from the work of scholars who have sought to justify that tradition from
internal evidence. In that fragment Cassiodorus definitely ascribes to his
friend Boethius "a book on the Trinity, some dogmatic chapters, and a book
against Nestorius."[2] Boethius was without doubt a Christian, a Doctor and
perhaps a martyr. Nor is it necessary to think that, when in prison, he put
away his faith. If it is asked why the _Consolation of Philosophy_ contains
no conscious or direct reference to the doctrines which are traced in the
_Tractates_ with so sure a hand, and is, at most, not out of harmony with
Christianity, the answer is simple. In the _Consolation_ he is writing
philosophy; in the _Tractates_ he is writing theology. He observes what
Pascal calls the orders of things. Philosophy belongs to one order,
theology to another. They have different objects. The object of philosophy
is to understand and explain the nature of the world around us; the object
of theology is to understand and explain doctrines delivered by divine
revelation. The scholastics recognized the distinction,[3] and the
corresponding difference in the function of Faith and Reason.

THE THEOLOGICAL TRACTATES AND THE CONSOLATION OF PHILOSOPHY