ortal; while to this were added the
further questions, if and how the Aristotelian view could be reconciled
with the Church doctrine, which demanded a continued personal existence.
The most eminent Aristotelian of the Renaissance, Petrus Pomponatius (_De
Immortalite Animae_, 1516; _De Fato, Libero Arbitrio, Providentia et
Praedestinatione_), was on the side of the Alexandrists. Achillini and
Niphus fought on the other side. Caesalpin (died 1603), Zabarella, and
Cremonini assumed an intermediate, or, at least, a less decided position.
Still others, as Faber Stapulensis in Paris (1500), and Desiderius Erasmus
(1520), were more interested in securing a correct text of Aristotle's
works than in his philosophical principles.

* * * * *

Among the Anti-Aristotelians only two famous names need be mentioned, that
of the influential Frenchman, Petrus Ramus, and the German, Taurellus.
Pierre de la Ramee (assassinated in the massacre of St. Bartholomew,
1572), attacked the (unnatural and useless) Aristotelian logic in his
_Aristotelicae Animadversiones_, 1543, objecting, with the Ciceronians
mentioned above, to the separation of logic and rhetoric; and attempted a
new logic of his own, in his _Institutiones Dialecticae_, which, in spite
of its formalism, gained acceptance, especially in Germany.[1] Nicolaus
Oechslein, Latinized Taurellus (born in 1547 at Moempelgard; at his death,
in 1606, professor of medicine in the University of Altdorf), stood quite
alone because of his independent position in reference to all philosophical
and religious parties. His most important works were his _Philosophiae
Triumphus_, 1573; _Synopsis Aristotelis Metaphysicae_, 1596; _Alpes Caesae_
(against Caesalpin, and the title punning on his name), 1597; and _De Rerum
Aeternitate_, 1604.[2] The thought of Taurellus inclines toward the ideal
of a Christian philosophy; which, however, Scholasticism, in his view, did
not attain, inasmuch as its thought was heathen in its blind reverence
for Aristotle, even though its faith was Christian. In order to heal this
breach between the head and the heart, it is necessary in religion to
return from confessional distinctions to Christianity itself, and in
philosophy, to abandon authority for the reason. We should not seek to be
Lutherans or Calvinists, but simply Christians, and we should judge on
rational grounds, instead of following Aristotle, Averroes, or Thomas
Aquinas. Anyone wh