St. Augustine and Christian Platonism by A. Hilary Armstrong, and: Augustine and the Greek Philosophers by John F. Callahan, and: Great Thinkers on Plato ed. by Barry Gross (review)

166 BOOK REVIEWS St. Augustine and Christian Platonism (The St. Augustine Lecture 1966). By A. HILARY ARMSTRONG. Villanova University Press, 1967. Pp. 66. $2.25. Augustine and the Greek Philosophers (The St. Augustine Lecture 1964). By JoHN F. CALLAHAN. Villanova University Press, 1967. Pp. 117. $3.50. Great Thinkers on Plato. Ed. by BARRY GRoss. New York: Putnam, 1968. Pp. 345. $6.95. The series of annual St. Augustine lectures at Villanova University is designed to show the relevancy of aspects of St. Augustine's thought for our own time. Through the work of specialists, the lectures are in general aimed at a non-specialist public and, as such, two of them have fallen into the hands of a non-specialist reviewer. The lecture by Professor Armstrong is the more immediately interesting of the two. Though overtly concerned with Augustine, it constitutes in fact a rather convincing plea for the re-introduction of Platonism as a vitalizing force in Christian theology. Students of Christian spirituality in particular should find it of absorbing interest. At a time when traditional approaches to spirituality are being called into question on the grounds that they are to a large extent tributaries of a Plotinian-Platonic world-view that is basically un-Christian, it is refreshing to find such an eminent Plotinian scholar as Professor Armstrong underlining the deep harmony that exists between many aspects of the Christian and the Platonic approach to the life of the spirit. He also stoutly maintains at times that, if there are certain narrownesses in the theology and spirituality of such great Christian Platonists as Gregory of Nyssa and Augustine, this, far from being the result of Platonic corruption, is due rather to an incomplete grasp and faulty assimilation of rich elements in the Platonic tradition. There are points, of course, on which the differences between Christianity and Platonism are irreducible; the merit of Professor Armstrong's little work is to emphasize how few in fact these are. In the lecture of Professor Callahan we have a scholar speaking primarily to scholars, and the non-specialist will find the going somewhat heavier. The first section, which suggests that the ontological argument of St. Anselm be grand-fathered on St. Augustine, will be of interest to the theologian. The third and final section, which shows us Augustine wrestling with the problem of time and traces the genesis of his psychological approach to the question, is of more general interest. Over and above the detailed questions discussed, Professor Callahan's lecture is of value in that it shows us how even a thinker as original as St. Augustine remains a man BOOK REVIEWS 167 with a history, and how such giants of the spirit are more aptly described as builders rather than creators. The third volume under review is an anthology of critical comments on Plato by great philosophers from Aristotle to our own time. I would recommend it as an ideal bedside book for a Platonist. For those of us who feel more at home with 'Vodehouse, the volume, assuredly the result of painstaking research, serves at least to back up the contention of Whitehead that " the safest general characterization of the European philosophical tradition is that it consists of a series of footnotes to Plato." St. Charle's Seminary Nagpur, India NoEL MoLLOY, 0. P. Medieval Philosophy, from St. Augustine to Nicholas of Cusa. Ed. by JoHN F. WIPPEL & ALLAN B. WoLTER, O.F.M. New York: The Free Press; London: Collier-Macmillan Limited, 1969. Pp. 487. $3.95 paper. For many years the only available collection of readings in medieval philosophy in English translation was Richard McKeon's Selections from Mediaeval Philosophers (19:29). Today the student of medieval philosophy has a choice of several good volumes of translated texts, varying in range and interest. The latest of these, edited by Fathers Wippel and Wolter, is particularly suited for undergraduate students in medieval philosophy and the general reader who is looking for information about the subject. It covers a thousand years of philosophical speculation, from St. Augustine to Nicholas of Cusa. Selections have been made from twenty-four of the most important thinkers of this period. The volume has...