Works

Vital’s output was large. As a lector in the Franciscan schools he commented on the Sentences, although only

A reportatio of his lectures on the fourth book has been found. He held disputations on psychology, epistemology, and metaphysics, and his three Quodlibeta attest to his standing in the Franciscan educational system. He also wrote sermons, biblical commentaries, polemical and doctrinal works. An encyclopedic treatise on medicine is attributed to him. Besides his scholarly production, as provincial minister and cardinal he contributed to the ecclesiastical literature of the Order.

His scholarly works survive mainly in four manuscripts: Rome Vat. Lat. 1095, Todi Bibl. com. 95, Rome Vat. Borghese 192, Rome S. Isidore 1/15. The list of Vital’s work is given in Delorme, 1947.

1.  Memorialia quaestionum, Todi 95, ff. 8a-13d, 22a-24b (abbreviated questions of the English friar Joannes de Persora, of Vital himself and of Peter John Olivi).

2.  Quodlibet I (18 questions): Todi 95, ff. 12d, 14a-18a. All three Quodlibeta in Delorme, 1947.

3.  Quaestiones disputatate de rerum principio, S. Isidore 1/15, ff. 1r-35r. A late hand attributed these questions to John Duns Scotus. They have been edited in the Wadding edition of Scotus’ works: Lyon, 1639, t. III; Paris, 1891, t. VI, 267-346.

4.  Quaestiones breves de rerum principio, Todi 95, ff. 18a-22a. Ed. Delorme F, Sophia 10 (1942), 290-327.

5.  Quaestio de productione creaturarum, Todi 95, ff. 24b-27c.

6.  De anima et eius potentiis, S. Isidore 1/15, ff. 35r-95r; Todi 95, 27r-51b. In the Wadding edition of Scotus’ works: Lyon, 1639, t. III; Paris, 1891, t. VI, 346-493.

7.  Quaestiones super IV libro sententiarum reportatae in Montepessulano, Rome, Vat. Lat. 1095, ff. 1-66.

8.  Quodlibet II (14 questions): Todi 95, ff. 51b-58b.

9.  Quaestiones de cognitione (8 questions), Todi 95, ff. 58b-89a; S. Isidore 1/15, ff. 95r-125r (incomplete). Ed. Delorme F, Le Cardinal Vital du Four. Huit Questions disputees sur le probleme de la connaissance. AHDLMA 2 (1927), 151-337.

10.  Quodlibet III (14 questions): Todi 95, ff. 89b-104d.

11.  Quaestiones de numeris, tempore et instanti (9 questions), S. Isidore 1/15, ff. 126r-201r; Borghese 192, ff. 93r-129r. In the Wadding edition of Scotus’ works: Lyon, 1639, t. III; Paris, 1891, t. VI, 555-710.

12.  Abbreviatura qq. 28 G. de Fontibus, S. Isidore 1/15, ff. 203r-205r (incomplete); Borghese 192, ff. 130r-145v.

13.  Comm. super librum de sex principiis, ed. Gondras AJ. AHLMA 50 (1975), 196-317.

14.  Treatise Pro conservanda sanitate tuendaque prospera valetudine, ad totius humani corporis morbos et aegritudines salutarium remediorum curationumque liber utilis, [Apud Ivonem Schoeffer] Mainz 1531 (an encyclopedia of medical knowledge with 343 separate entries).

15.  Speculum morale totius sacrae scripturae, ed. Lyon 1513; Venice 1594 (a moralizing exposition of the Old and New Testament, written in Toulose around 1305).

16.  Super Apocalypsim, Venice 1600, Paris 1647, Trento 1773 (in Supplementum operum omnium S. Bonaventurae. II, 5).