Petrarch was not a professional philosopher. And yet, he was to influence the further development of the history of philosophy, since in his above-mentioned mature work De sui ipsius et multorum ignorantia he presented a revolutionary program.
It consists of two complimentary elements. On the one hand, Petrarch broadly and drastically criticized the intellectual status quo, on the other hand, he voiced the principles of a radical, advanced change of paradigms.
Petrarch identified two characteristic features of the status quo: depressingly low standards and an intellectual misorientation caused by the ‘‘insane and clamoring hordes of scholastics” (De ign., 1114). Since they lacked creativity but had an overt urge to write, they simply used other people’s thoughts and transformed them into their own, noisily advertising them as individual ideas and overstocking the world with a flood of commentaries on the Sententiae of Peter Lombard or the works of Aristotle (De ign., 1112/1114). These professional commentators, who gave themselves the airs of theologians or philosophers, had managed to substitute originality with sterile exegesis, attaining control over the ‘‘market of opinions’’. But there was more to it: the countless treatises were written in a miserable Latin, lacking any stylistic artistry whatsoever (De ign., 1032/1034).
Petrarch was especially resentful of the multitude of Aristotelian exegetes, who were active everywhere, but especially dominant at the universities of France and Italy (De ign., 1106). These had ludicrously made Aristotle their God, substituting the lex Christiana with the lex aristotelica (De ign., 1040, 1048)! In their blind enslavement to Aristotle, they had committed three fundamental mistakes: (a) They concentrated on amassing heaps of insights from the field of natural philosophy, which were often unproven and often unprovable or even faulty. They certainly were completely irrelevant, since they did not even touch on the central questions concerning man’s nature, origins, and destination (De ign., 1038/1040, 1062, 1066). (b) They offered theoretically unsatisfactory and practically ineffective ramblings on essential topics such as morals or felicity (De ign., 1062/1064, 1104/ 1106). (c) While Aristotle should best have been avoided in the field of metaphysics, his followers daringly spread their master’s theories, which were profoundly wrong and highly dangerous (Deign., 1090/1092, 1098, 1102).
In short, Petrarch scathingly criticized the entire habitus, contents, and verbal presentation of the ‘‘scholastic’’ philosophy and theology which had developed since the mid-twelfth century.
But his overall attack was not only directed at the ‘‘scholastics’’, it basically aimed at their spiritus rector, Aristotle himself. To start with, Petrarch deemed his style worthy of criticism (Deign., 1104). Then, Aristotle was the founder of natural philosophy whose results were not only highly questionable but also completely superfluous, as they lacked solutions for the existential problems of mankind (De ign., 1038/1040, 1062). Furthermore, Aristotle had also failed in the field ofmoral philosophy: On the one hand, he had spoken extensively about felicity although he had an inadequate idea of it since his thoughts were not founded on the Christian faith (De ign., 1062/1064). On the other hand, while educating his readers on the nature of virtue, he did not achieve any practical effects since he was unable to create a love of virtue or, respectively, a hatred of sinful behavior (De ign., 1106/1108). That is why he was not, on any account, to be listed in the canon of ‘‘true moral philosophers and helpful teachers of virtue’’ (De ign., 1108/1110). But most of all, the Aristotelian metaphysics were to be avoided (De ign., 1102) since, especially, the thesis of the eternity of the world stood in striking opposition to both the truth and the Christian faith (De ign., 1092, 1098-1104).
Accordingly, Petrarch’s overall judgment was entirely negative: Aristotle had occupied himself extensively with minor matters while misperceiving the decisive truths both in the human and divine nature (De ign., 1062, 1068,1102). As such, his philosophy was simply dangerous and had already led many ‘‘into the pits of delusion’’ - thus Petrarch drew a full circle to the scholastics (De ign., 1066).
Petrarch’s revolt against the reigning spirit of his time, which was based on Aristotle and supported by ‘‘the scholastics’’, rested on four leitmotifs concerning style and rhetoric, moral philosophy, metaphysics, and Christianity. In each of the four cases, Petrarch propagated a general change of paradigm.
In the field of style and rhetoric, Petrarch was an energetic advocate of using Cicero as a model. Since his adolescence Petrarch had admired the eloquence of Cicero, who to him surpassed every other author in this field, no matter of which origin (De ign., 1068, 1082, 1122). However, this orientation was not to lead to losing one’s own creative voice, so while concisely defining his own position as ‘‘ciceronianus sum’’, Petrarch simultaneously and explicitly warned against slipping into a blind, unreflective ‘‘imitatio’’ of the model (De ign., 1122).
In the field of moral philosophy, Petrarch presented luminaries which he referred to as ‘‘ours’’ (De ign., 1106). These are mainly Cicero and Seneca, as well as Horace (De ign., 1106), all three ‘‘true moral philosophers’’, since they had not only achieved superficially educating the mind through the power of their words, but had managed to correctly form the readers’ willpower (‘‘voluntas’’) by instilling in them a love of virtue, and respectively a hatred of sin, which then led to good actions and a virtuous life (De ign., 1106-1110). After all, goodwill was a more dependable basis for moral action than intellect, however well developed it might be (De ign., 1110).
Concerning metaphysics, Plato was to be the alternative source. Plato was the true ‘‘princeps philosophiae’’ since among all philosophers he had come closest to truth in matters of religion (De ign., 1104,1112,1118). On the one hand, his ‘‘Timaios’’ had presented a theory of divine creation of the world that was compatible with the Christian faith, on the other hand he had developed the theory of ideas (De ign., 1092, 1118).
In matters of faith, Petrarch suggested a basic humble faith, the ‘‘fides humilis’’ (De ign., 1046/1048, 1064/1046). Faith to him constituted the ‘‘highest, most certain, and finally also the most felicitous of all sciences’’ (De ign., 1126). More concisely, this meant following the examples of the Church Fathers St Jerome, St Ambrose, and, first and foremost, the ‘‘great St Augustine’’ (De ign., 1064, 1100, 1114, 1124/1126).
But the paramount position of highest religious authority was not the only role that Augustine played for Petrarch. Moreover, St Augustine functioned as spiritus rector in Petrarch's entire spiritual universe. He was the authority for raising the importance of Plato as the new ‘‘princeps philosophorum’’ (De ign., 1112/1124, 1118); he had successfully retaliated Aristotle's envious attack on Plato’s theory of ideas (De ign., 1118); he authenticated the turn to new models in the field of moral philosophy, such as Cicero or Seneca (De ign., 1106/1108, 1122); he legitimized raising the status of Cicero to become a paradigm of style and rhetoric (De ign., 1122); he vouchsafed the eminent moral philosophical relevance of eloquence (De ign., 1108); and, finally, he consolidated Petrarch's conviction that only the mishap of an overly early birth had prevented both Plato and Cicero from being true and proper Christians, which he deemed them to be in spirit (De ign., 1122/1124).
To sum up, De ignorantia presented the following key positions:
1. The miserable Latin of the ‘‘scholastics’’, which entirely lacked style and eloquence, was to be substituted by a return to the ‘‘classic’’ Latin as exemplified by Cicero.
2. Natural philosophy, which had been followed with expansive effort by Aristotle and his adepts, had produced a wealth of unproven, unprovable, or faulty results and had distracted mankind from the basic essentials. It was, therefore, not only useless but exceedingly dangerous and thus to be abandoned definitively.
3. Scholars should concentrate on specifically human issues, which were later coined with the term ''studia humanitatis”. For this end, a practically effective moral philosophy was required, brushing away the dominant intellectualistic Aristotelian influence and substituting it by an orientation on Roman models such as Cicero and Seneca.
4. In metaphysics, the predominance of the dangerous Aristotelian theories was to be abolished once and for all. It was to be replaced by the Platonic philosophy, which harmonized much more with the Christian faith.
5. In the field of religion, the Summae and the innumerable commentaries on the Sententiae were to be relinquished. In their place, a simple faith and a return to the thoughts of the eminent Church Fathers, especially St Augustine, was propagated.
6. Irrespective of whether it concerned matters of style and rhetoric, moral philosophy, metaphysics, or religion, only “classic” authors were deemed worthy models. To counter “scholasticism” based on the Greek, Aristotle, an entirely new canon of “classic” authors was propagated. With the exception of Plato, who was introduced in the canon on account of being vehemently praised by the Roman St Augustine, this new canon consisted exclusively of Roman authors, whose luminaries were Cicero and, beyond all bounds, St Augustine.
7. A certain basic attitude was to be taken in the face of the Roman models. Irrespective of admiration and enthusiasm, one was to be attentive not to drop into sterile imitation. Rather, the goal was to develop a creative appropriation of the “classical” heritage.
8. With pride and rather lovingly, Petrarch referred to the Roman authors as “ours” and thus created a “national” tradition in the field of intellectual history, paving the way for the construction of a specifically Italian identity.
However, there were two eminently important aspects of the ''studia humanitatis”, which Petrarch did not mention in De ignorantia-. history and politics. In fact, however, he did make important contributions to both.
World History
