Various - Donahoe's Magazine, Volume 15, No. 4, April, 1886

During the ninth century there lived few more remarkable men in Western Europe than John Scotus Erigena, the celebrated Irish theologian, philosopher and poet. Little beyond mere conjecture is known of his birth and early education. Indeed, the first well-authenticated facts in connection with his life is that in the year 851 he held the offices of rector and professor of dialectics in the famous Royal School of Paris, and that he occupied at the same time apartments in the palace of Charles the Bald, son of Louis le Débonnaire, and grandson of the Emperor Charlemagne. It may, however, be interesting to see what historical critics have to say of his birth and early antecedents.

Almost all writers of weight are agreed that John Scotus Erigena was an Irishman. In fact, there is hardly any room for doubt on the subject. If all other evidences of the fact were absent his very name furnishes proof enough that John was a son of the Emerald Isle. John Scotus Erigena simply means John the Irish Scot – Erigena being a corruption of a Greek word, the translation of which is "of the sacred isle," and every school boy knows that Ireland was known at that time throughout the nations of the earth as the " insula sanctorum et doctorum ," the "island of saints and sages."

It was in 851 that he published his famous work on "Predestination." Long before that time, however, his name was well known in France, so that it may be safely assumed that he came to that country about the year 845. At this calculation we may place his birth somewhere about the year 820.

Prudentius, his colleague in the Scolia Palitina, or Royal School of Paris, says that he was the cleverest of all those whom Ireland sent to France. Te solum omnium acutissimum galliæ transmisit Hibernia. When we consider that Prudentius was so intimately connected with him as to style himself his " quasi frater ," any doubts that might remain as to Erigena's nationality should entirely vanish.

But, it may be asked, why did this great man leave Ireland to seek shelter and patronage from a foreign king? Had he not at home a field wide and fertile enough for even his towering intellect in the numerous monasteries and schools which were at this time the pride and glory of Erin? The cause of his departure from his home and friends was probably the inroads of the Danes, who, in the year 843, under their brutal leader Turgesius, "plundered Connaught, Meath and Clonmacnoise with its oratories," and thus rendered a residence in the country anything but desirable for the holy monk and erudite scholar.

We have seen that John published his work "De Prædestinatione" about the year 851. In combating the errors of Gottschalk, he unfortunately broached new errors of his own, and thus incurred the displeasure of the Holy See.

The most precious volume in the Royal Library at Paris was a Greek copy of the works of "Pseudo Dionysius the Areopagite." Many unsuccessful attempts had been made to translate this work, and when Charles the Bald found that the erudite rector of the Royal School could translate Greek, he ordered him to furnish a translation which he did. It was published in 861, and a copy sent to Pope Nicholas I. The Sovereign Pontiff, who was not inclined to look with great favor on the author of "De Prædestinatione," did not approve of the translation, and as a consequence of some farther negotiations between Charles and the Holy See, Scotus was, in 861, dismissed from his position in the Scolia Palitina. He did not, however, just then cease to be connected with the Royal Palace. His principal works are – "De Divisione Naturæ," "Liber de Divine Prædestinatione," Translation of the Ethics of Aristotle and of the writings of "Pseudo Dionysius the Areopagite," and a "Commentary on the Gospel of St. John." That John Scotus Erigena erred and erred gravely, no one can for a moment deny; but we should remember with the learned and distinguished Coadjutor Bishop of Clonfert (the Most Rev. Dr. Healy), "That he erred not in the spirit of Luther and Calvin, but of Origen and St. Cyprian."

How long he remained in Paris after his dismissal from the Royal School cannot be determined, nor do we know how he ended his days. Some assert that "he was murdered by a band of infuriated students at Oxford or Malmesbury," but this is by no means certain.

Jan. 18th, 1885.

The Austro-Bavarian Alps are perhaps unsurpassed in number and average height by any group of mountains in the world. There is always more or less snow on their summits, and as they are continually attracting the clouds and causing a changeable, capricious climate in their neighborhood, they may be said, like fashionable ladies, to have a different dress for every day in the week, and to look beautiful in whichever dress they choose to wear. They are beautiful when they stand out clear and sublime in the perfect sunlight of a cloudless day. They are beautiful in the night when the moonlight grows even more silvery from its contact with the snow upon their tops, or when there is no moon and the stars are rivalled by the bonfires which merry climbers have kindled upon their well-wooded sides. They were beautiful in the only thunder-storm I have seen during my residence among them, – their tops hidden by the clouds and the lightning flashing furiously down their sides, as if the thunderer of Olympus himself were hurling his bolts into the valley, while "a million, horrible, bellowing echoes" bounded and rebounded from mountain to mountain. And they were very beautiful on the day when I first heard this little legend which I am about to put into writing. It was raining in the valley, but yet it was possible to see more or less of all the mountains, and the summit of one of them was perfectly visible above the clouds that covered its sides. This was Frau Hütt, a peak whose shape bears a remarkable resemblance to that of a monstrous woman on horseback; and this is its legend as it was told to me by a very obliging kellnerin in the cosey little inn where I was sitting: