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IT will be difficult in one short chapter to crowd an account of Lull's philosophy, which for two centuries after his death perplexed the genius of Europe, and to enumerate even a small number of the vast library of books. which have Lull for their author. One does not know which to admire most, the versatile character of the genius, or the prodigious industry of the author.

Raymund Lull was from his youth a

master of Catalan and wrote in it long before his conversion. Of his works in that language there exists no complete catalog. One of Lull's biographers states that the books written by Lull number four thousand! In the first published edition of his works (1721), two hundred and eighty two titles are given; yet only fortyfive of these, when printed, took up ten large folio volumes. To understand something of the scope and ambition of this genius intellect, one must read the partial list of his books given in the bibliography at the close of this volume. Lull was a philosopher, a poet, a novelist, a writer of proverbs, a keen logician, a deep theologian, and a fiery controversialist. There was not a science cultivated in his age to which he did not add. The critical historian Winsor states that in 1295 Lull wrote a handbook on navigation which was not superseded by a better until after Columbus.

Dr. George Smith credits Lull with the independent invention of the mariners compass; and not without reason, for we find repeated references to the magnetic needle in his devotional books.¹ Rewrote a treatise on "the weight of the elements" and their shape; on the sense of smell; on astronomy, astrology, arithmetic, and geometry. One of his books is entitled, "On the squaring and triangulation of the circle." In medieval medicine, jurisprudence, and metaphysics he was equally at home. His seven volumes on medicine include one book on the use of the mind in curing the sick! And another on the effect of climate on diseases.

¹ See "Liber de Miraculis Coeli et Mundi," part vi., on Iman. Calamita.

As the needle naturally turns to the north when it is touched by the magnet so it is fitting," etc. - "Liber Contemplationis in Deo"

In his treatise "Fenix des les Maravillas del Orbes." pub lished in 1286, he again alludes to the use of the mariner's compass. See Humboldt: "Cosmos," ii., 630 n.

He was a dogmatic theologian, and wrote sixty-three volumes of theological discussion, some of which are so abstruse as to produce doubt whether their author earned the title of "Doctor Illuminatus," given him by his contemporaries. Other titles among his theological writings there are which awaken curiosity, such as: "On the Most Triune Trinity"; "On the Form of God"; "On the Language of the Angels," etc.

Among the sixty-two books of meditation and devotion which are preserved in the lists of Lull's writings, there are none on the saints, and only six treat of the Virgin Mary. This is one of the many proofs in Lull's books that he was more of a Catholic than a Romanist, and that he esteemed Christ more than all the saints of the papal calendar. One of his books of devotion is entitled, "On the One Hundred Names of God," and was evidently

prepared for the use of Moslems who were seeking the light.¹

Raymund Lull wrote or collected three books of proverbs, one of which contains six thousand popular sayings and maxims. Here are a few out of many beautiful gems to be found in this collection:

Among Lull's works there are twenty on logic and metaphysics. One of the latter has the title, "On the Greatness and the Littleness of Man." Among his sermons and books on preaching there is only one commentary. That, in accord with Lull's

¹ According to Moslem teaching, Allah has one hundred beautiful names. The Moslem's rosary has one hundred heads, and to count these names is a devotional exercise.

mission and character, is a commentary on the prolog of John's Gospel.

Of making many controversial books there was no end in the days of Lull. His writings in this department, however, are not, as are those of his contemporaries, against heretics to condemn them, with their errors, to ecclesiastical perdition. Even the titles of his controversial writings show his irenic spirit and his desire to convert rather than to convince. All through his books there runs the spirit of earnest devotion; even his natural philosophy is full of the world to come and its glories. At the end of one of his books he bursts out with this prayer: "O Lord, my help I till this work is completed thy servant can not go to the land of the Saracens to glorify Thy glorious name, for I am so occupied with this book which I undertake for Thine honor that I can think of nothing else. For this reason I beseech Thee for that

grace, that Thou wouldst stand by me that I may soon finish it and speedily depart to die the death of a martyr out of love to Thee, if it shall please Thee to count me worthy of it."

In 1296 he concluded a work on the logic of Christianity with this seraph-song to the key of world-wide missions: "Let Christians consumed with burning love for the cause of faith only consider that since nothing has power to withstand truth, they can by God's help and His might bring infidels back to the faith; so that the precious name of Jesus, which in most regions is still unknown to most men, may be proclaimed and adored." And again: "As my book is finished on the vigils of John the Baptist, who was the herald of the light, and pointed to Him who is the true light, may it please our Lord to kindle a new light of the world which may guide unbelievers to conversion, that with us they

may meet Christ, to whom be honor and praise world without end." This is not the language of pious rhetoric, but the passionate outcry of a soul hungry for the coming of the Kingdom.

Lull was a popular author. He wrote not only in learned Latin, but in the vernacular of his native land. Noble calls him the Moody of the thirteenth century. He tried to reach the masses. His influence on popular religious ideas in Spain was so great, through his Catalan hymns and proverbs and catechisms that Helffierich compares him to Luther and calls him a reformer before the Reformation.¹ He made the study of theology popular by putting its commonplaces into verse, so that the laity could learn by heart the summary of the Catholic faith and meet Moslems

¹ "Der Protestantismus in Spanien zur Zeit der Reformation." Prot. Monatsblätter v. H. Gelzer. 1856, S. 133-168. Also his Raymund Lull. u.z.w. pp, l53-154

and Jews with ready-made arguments. Scholasticism was for the clergy; the "Lullian method" was intended for the laity as well. Raymund Lull had become discontented with the methods of scientific inquiry commonly in use, and so set himself to construct his "Ars Major," or Greater Art, which by a series of mechanical contrivances and a system of mnemonics was adapted to answer any question on any topic. This new philosophy is the key-note of most of Lull's treatises. All his philosophical works are but different explanations and phases of the "Ars Major." In his other books he seldom fails to call attention to this universal key of knowledge which the great art Supplies. What is the method of Lull's philosophy? The most complete account and the most luminous explanation of its abstruse perplexities is given by Pantl in his "History

of Logic" (vol. iii., [145-147). This is a summary of it:

The reasonableness and demonstrability of Christianity is the real basis of his great method. Nothing, Lull held, interfered more with the spread of Christian truth than the attempt of its advocates to represent its doctrines as undemonstrable mysteries. The very difference between Christ and Antichrist lies in the fact that the former can prove his truth by miracles, etc., while the latter can not. The glory of Christianity, Lull argues, is that it does not maintain the undemonstrable, but simply the supersensuous. It is not against reason, but above unsanctified reason. The demonstration, however, which Lull seeks is not that of ordinary logic. He says that we require a method which will reason not only from effect to cause, or from cause to effect, but per aquiprantiam, that is, by showing the contrary attributes can exist

together in one subject. This method must be real, and not altogether formal or subjective. It must deal with the things themselves, and not merely with second intentions.

Lull's great art goes beyond logic and metaphysic: it provides a universal art of discovery, and contains the formulae to which every demonstration in every science can be reduced-being, in fact, a sort of cyclopedia of categories and syllogisms. Lull's "Ars Major" is a tabulation of the different points of view from which propositions may be framed about objects. It is a mnemonic, or, rather, a mechanical contrivance for ascertaining all possible categories that apply to any possible proposition. Just as by knowing the typical terminations or conjugations of Arabic grammar, for example, we can inflect and conjugate any word; so, Lull reasons, by a knowledge of the different types of existence

and their possible relations and combinations we should possess knowledge of the whole of nature and of all truth as a system. "The great art, accordingly, begins by laying down an alphabet according to which the nine letters from B to K stand for the different kinds of substances and attributes. Thus in the series of substances B stands for God, C, angel, D, heaven, E, man, and so on; in the series of absolute attributes B represents goodness, D, duration, C, greatness; or, again, in the nine questions of scholastic philosophy B stands for utrum, C, for quid, D, for de quo, etc." By manipulating these letters in such a way as will show the relationship of different objects and predicates you exercise the "new art." This manipulation is effected by the help of certain so called "figures" or geometrical arrangements. Their construction differs in various books of Lull's

philosophy, but their general character is the same. Circles and other figures are divided into sections by lines or colors, and then marked by Lull's symbolical letters so as to show all the possible combinations of which the letters are capable. For example, one arrangement represents the possible combinations of the attributes of God; another, the possible conditions of the soul, and so on. These figures are further fenced about by various definitions and rules, and their use is further specified by various "evacuations" and "multiplications" which show us how to exhaust all the possible combinations and sets of questions which the terms of our proposition admit. When so "multiplied," the "fourth figure " is, in Lull's language, that by which other sciences can be most readily and aptly acquired; and it may accordingly be taken as no unfair specimen of Lull's method. This "fourth figure" is simply

an arrangement of three concentric circles each divided into nine sections, B, C, D, etc., and so constructed of pasteboard that when the upper and smaller circle remains fixed the two lower and outer revolve around it. Taking the letters in the sense of the series we are then able, by revolving the outer circles, to find out the possible relationships between different conceptions and elucidate the agreement or disagreement that exists between them Meanwhile the middle circle, in similar fashion gives us the intermediate terms by which they are to be connected or disconnected.

This Lullian method, of a wheel within a wheel, seems at first as perplexing as the visions of Ezekiel and as puerile as the automatic book-machine in "Gulliver's Travels." But it would be unfair to say that Lull supposed "thinking could be reduced to a mere rotation of pasteboard circles," or that his art enabled men "to talk

without judgment of that which we do not know." Lull sought to give not a compendium of knowledge but a method of investigation. He sought a more scientific method for philosophy than the dialectic of his contemporaries. In his conception of a universal method and his application of the vernacular languages to philosophy he was the herald of Bacon himself. In his demand for a reasonable religion he was beyond his age. And, in applying this system, weak tho it was, to the conversion of infidels, he proved himself the first missionary philosopher. He perceived the possibilities (tho not the limitations) of comparative theology and the science of logic as weapons for the missionary. Nothing will so clearly illustrate the versatile and brilliant character of Lull's genius as to turn from his "Ars Major" to his religious novel," Blanquerna," the great allegory of the Middle Ages, and the predecessor

of Bunyan's "Pilgrim's Progress."¹ In fact, Raymund Lull was the first European who wrote a religious story in the vernacular The romances of the days of chivalry were doubtless well known to him before his conversion, and what was more it natural than that the missionary knight should write the romance of his new crusade of love against the Saracens? "Banquerna" is an allegory in four books. Its sub-title states that it is a mirror of morals in all classes of society, and treats of matrimony, religion, prelates, the papacy, and the hermit's life." It is the story of the pilgrimage of Enast, the hero, who marries Aloma, the daughter of a wealthy widow. Their only child, Blanquerna, desires to be a monk, but falls in love with a beautiful and pious maiden, Dona Cana by name.

¹ Helfferich, pp. 111-122. He holds that the allegory was first written in Arabic and then put into Catalan. Several manuscripts of it are extant in the archives of Palma. It was first printed in 1521.

Both, however, decide to remain ascetics. Blanquerna enters a monastery and his fair sweetheart turns nun. The allegory relates the experiences of these characters in their different surroundings-the pilgrim, the monk, and the abbess. To borrow words in another book from Lull himself, "we see the pilgrim traveling away in dis tant lands to seek Thee, tho Thou art so near that every man, if he would, might find Thee in his own house and chamber. The pilgrims are so deceived by false men, whom they meet in taverns and churches, that many of them when they return home show themselves to be far worse than they were when they set out." Dona Cana, the abbess, disputes with her sister nuns the authority of the priest to bind the conscience, and even draws in question some of the doctrines of the Church! The various characters bear allegorical names. When Blanquerna reaches Rome the Pope

has a court-jester called "Raymund the Fool," who is none other than Lull himself, and who tells the cardinals some rare truths. The four cardinals bear the names, "We-give-thee-thanks," "Lord-God-heavenly-King, We-glorify-Thee," and "Thou-only-art-Holy" Blanquerna -finally becomes Pope and uses his authority in sending out a vast army of monk-missionaries to convert Jews and Mohammedans.

In various parts of the book songs of praise and devotion occur, while the missionary idea is never absent This remarkable allegory, as well as many other works of Lull, deserves to be rescued from oblivion. The arrival of Blanquerna before the door of the Enchanted Castle, over whose gateway the Ten Commandments are written, and, within, the solemn conclave of gray-beards who discourse on the vanity of the world, are two scenes that show a genius

equal to that of John Bunyan. There are other resemblances between these two pilgrims rescued from the City of Destruction and describing their own experiences in allegory; but to present them here would make this chapter too lengthy. Who would know more of Lull the philosopher and the author is referred to the bibliography and to the writings themselves.

Raymund Lull
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