Dear y'all,
I've been quiet for far too long (lucky you!), but I've got a problem
that I hope someone on the list might be able to solve.
I'm putting the final touches on a little article that has taken a
disproportionate amount of time to write. (Don't they all?) It's for
*Medieval Sermon Studies*, and includes a transcription/edition of a
sermon by James of Viterbo, an Augustinian who, after time in Paris
became Archbishop of Naples, dying c. 1308. The sermon is a unique copy
from his autograph ms, Citta' del Vaticano, Biblioteca Apostolica
Vaticana, Archivio San Pietro D. 213; and as Celia Gaposchkin can
attest, James fails in penmanship! Anyway, toward the end of the sermon,
James is wrapping up his thoughts on the word 'descendens' as it appears
in the Epistle of James, 1:17: Omne datum optimum et omne donum
perfectum desursum est, descendens a Patre luminum. Our bishop says (in
apparently schematic form):
Hoc autem modo sumendo descensum, dupliciter aliud procedit ab alico.
Vno modo secundum existentiam, ut quia est ei causa essendi; alio modo
secundum innotescentiam, ut quia est ei causa innotescendi, sicut
secundum Augustinum, dupliciter [del in ms.: a causa] dicitur aliquid
fieri in scripturis: uno modo quando accipit esse, alio modo quando
innotescit, quia etiam tunc accipit esse quoddam non in natura propria,
sed in aliorum notitia.
I have been unable to track this down in Augustine. Might one of you be
able to do so -- or know if this comes from one of the zillions of
pseudo-Augustines?
Many thanks, now and in the acknowledgments in my article!
Best wishes,
George
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George Ferzoco, Director of Italian Studies, University of Leicester
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