view of nature

THE MEDIEVAL VIEW OF NATURE
Virginia C. Raguin

BOETHIUS: FIFTH CENTURY PHILOSPHER AND GOVERNMENT OFFICIAL
Hymn to God as Source of All Good, Beauty, and Harmony

Oh, God, Maker of heaven and earth, Who govern the worlds with eternal reason, at your command time passes from the beginning, You place all things in motion, though You yourself are without change. No external causes impelled You to make this work from chaotic matter. Rather it was the form of the highest good, existing within You without envy, which caused You to fashion all things according to the eternal exemplar. You who are most beautiful produce the beautiful world from your divine mind and, forming it in your image, You order the perfect parts in a perfect whole.
You bind the elements in harmony so that cold and heat, dry and wet are joined, and the purer fire does not fly up through the air, nor the earth sink beneath the weight of water.
You release the world-soul throughout the harmonious parts of the universe as your surrogate, threefold in its operations, to give motion to all things. That soul, thus divided, pursues its revolving course in two circles, and, returning to itself, embraces the profound mind and transforms heaven to its own image.
In like manner You create souls and lesser living forms and, adapting them to their high flight in swift chariots, You scatter them through the earth and sky. And when they have turned again toward You, by your gracious law, You call them back like leaping flames.

Grant, Oh Father, that my mind may rise to Thy sacred throne. Let it see the fountain of good: let it find light, so that the clear light of my soul may fix itself in Thee. Burn off the fogs and clouds of earth and shine through in Thy splendor. For Thou art the serenity, the tranquil peace of virtuous men. The sight of Thee is beginning and end: one guide, leader, path, and goal.
Boethius, The Consolation of Philosophy, Book III, Poem 9, trans. Richard Green (Macmillan: New York, 1962), 60-61.

The Four Elements (Earth, Air, Fire, and Water)

If you wish to discern the laws of the high and mighty God, the high thunderer, with an unclouded mind, look up to the roof of highest heaven. There the stars, united by their just agreement, keep the peace. . . .. Concord rules the elements with fair restraint: Moist things yield place to dry, cold and hot combine in friendship: flickering fire rises on high, and gross earth sinks down. Impelled by the same causes, the flowering years breaths out its odors in warms spring; hot summer dries the grain and autumn comes in burdened with fruit; then falling rain brings in wet winter.
Boethius, The Consolation of Philosophy, Book IV, Poem 6, trans. Richard Green (Macmillan: New York, 1962), 96-97.

HILDEGARD OF BINGEN
12TH CENTURY WRITER - SCIENTIST - COMPOSER - MYSTIC

Hildegard of Bingen (1098-1179) was a remarkable woman, a "first" in many fields. At a time when few women wrote, Hildegard, known as Sybil of the Rhine," produced major works of theology and visionary writings. When few women were accorded respect, she was consulted by and advised bishops, popes, and kings. She appears to have been one of the most documented sufferers from migraine, which she overcame in a remarkably productive and long-lived career. She used the curative powers of natural objects for healing and wrote treatises about natural history and medicinal uses of plants, animals, trees and stones. She is the first composer whose biography is known. She founded a vibrant convent, where her musical plays were performed. Although not yet canonized, Hildegard has been beatified, and is frequently referred to as St. Hildegard. Revival of interest in this extraordinary woman of the Middle Ages was initiated by musicologists and historians of science and religion.
The manuscript image showing the Human Universals described by Hildegard of Bingen predates
Leonardo da Vinci's Vitruvian Man by some 350 years. The author is seen at the lower left. See Hildegard of Bingen Websites: Hildegard by Bonnie Duncan, English Department, Millersville University (much on music) and The Life and Works of Hildegard von Bingen (1098-1179), by Kristina Lerman, University of California at Santa Barbara.

QUADRATIC PRINCIPLES OF ORDER Before the 17^th century, and the development of the modern concept of the elements and atomic weight, the elements were conceived of as perfectly balanced opposites. The four elements, fire and water, earth and air, matched the four humors, four cardinal directions, binaries of male and female, hot and cold, wet and dry,. All ultimately depended on a concept that the science of geometry, a reflection of the perfect harmony of God, is the tool for understanding the structure of the universe. The individual person, the microcosm was linked or "attuned" to the structure of the cosmos (the macrocosm) where all opposites or "contractions" are harmonized. Music, like philosophy, or the study of nature, is a search for human order and balance.

1. God as Architect of the World, designing world with calipers. Moralized Bible, Paris, Bibliothèque nationale, 1230.

2. Astrological Man; Très Riches Heures of the Duke of Berry (1412-16)

3. Diagram of Astrological Man; Très Riches Heures of the Duke of Berry (1412-16) diagram. To the right, the female is cold and showing the melancholic and phlegmatic humors. To the left the male is hot and showing the sanguine and choleric humors.

4. Albrecht Dürer Creation of Adam and Eve (1504), engraving. The four animals represent the four humors. The Elk as melancholic, the rabbit as sanguine, the cat as choleric, and the ox as phlegmatic. Before the fall, Adam and Eve possessed all four humors in equilibrium and therefore were not destined to die. The animals were mortal because of their imbalances. After their sin, Adam and Eve became more like the animals, and less like the angels, and so mortal.

5. Albrecht Dürer The Four Apostles (1525), oil on panel Alte Pinakotek. John, the New Church is sanguine, Peter behind him with keys is phlegmatic. Paul, in white, is melancholic and behind him Mark (Venice) is choleric. Dürer's panting, which he gave as a gift to the city of Nuremberg, shows the Italian cities (and the Old Roman Christianity) being supplanted by the cities in the North and the Reformed Christianity of Luther.