This slightly revised dissertation, tightly focused on a manageable body of data, offers the first published monographic introduction in English to the life and writings of Nicholas de Clamanges (1363/64-1437), the rhetorically gifted contemporary of the much better known Parisian reformers Pierre d'Ailly and Jean Gerson. Interpretively it locates Nicholas de Clamanges generally within the framework of Gerhart Ladner's "idea of reform". The book's 135 pages of text offer us a clearer and more comprehensive portrait of de Clamanges than hitherto available in English, but makes no claim to deliver the thorough delineation of his attitude toward church reform vis- a-vis Gerson and D'Ailly, to say nothing of Petrarch or Bernardine of Siena, that those working in this field might have wished for.
Given his outstanding skills with the Latin language, Nicholas has customarily been studied against the background of renaissance humanism. Bellitto deliberately sets out to study his concept of church reform, concluding that he gave priority to the personal reform of the image of God in the human soul, as the key to institutional and clerical reform. Gerson's more "top-down" approach (p. 127, cf. p. 50) serves briefly as a foil.
Bellitto's de Clamanges advocated
with rhetorical flair . . . a foundational reformatio personalis, a personal path to reform that must be presupposed if the Church in capite et in membris was to be reformed in a lasting and meaningful way. Relying on the "activist spirituality" of the late Middle Ages, especially the imitatio Christi devotions, Clamanges identified the personal path to reform as a via purgativa that would temper the soul and pave the way toward heaven. Clamanges' plans for personal reform did not end with the individual; they moved forward into a broader program of Church reform. Personal reform, though key and indispensable, was the means to greater goal of reforming pastoral care within the Church. He built outwards from the interior core of a reformatio personalis to consider its next logical progression: the improvement of pastoral care and service through the institutional reform of the Church. His criticism of simony, hypocrisy, failures in the cura animarum, and the irrelevancy of late medieval scholastic education were all ultimately aimed at reemphasizing the fact that the primary task of pope, bishop, and priest was to shepherd God's flock. (2)
Drawing on Ladner's exposition of the patristic focus on reformatio personalis (an idea of institutional reform did not arise until the Gregorian movement of the eleventh century), Bellitto argues that de Clamanges's use of this commonplace was unique in placing it "squarely at the center of his ideas". (3) At the end of his monograph Bellitto tentatively suggests that this approach foreshadowed Trent more than Luther (pp. 128, 133), a more significantly interesting claim than his general thesis, given the fact that the earliest collection of de Clamanges's writings was assembled by an early seventeenth-century Protestant, J. Lydius, who viewed de Clamanges as a forerunner of the Protestant Reformation. Unfortunately such a trajectory leading to Trent receives no development in the work at hand.
Bellitto's method is to arrange systematically a series of summaries, paraphrases, and quotations culled from de Clamanges's writings. As such it serves as a useful index to the reformer's oeuvre, though focusing primarily on a small number of key texts, notably De prosperitate adversitatis (summarized pp. 60-73, or ten percent of the book). The book really has only two chapters on de Clamanges's views of church reform: "The Foundation: Reformatio Personalis" (ch. 3, pp. 59-90) and "Pastoral Reform in Head and Members" (ch. 4, pp. 91-110). After an introduction setting forth his overall thesis and surveying previous scholarship on de Clamanges, Bellitto gives us a very good summary of the tangled politics of France during the later years of the Hundred Years' War, the royal family, and the university of Paris together with the conciliar movement's effort to overcome the Western Schism from the 1380s to the Council of Constance, into which he interweaves Nicholas de Clamanges's biography. De Clamanges served as a redactor for the university faculty and as secretary to Benedict XIII before, disillusioned by both sides, retreating into several periods of "active exile" from which he fired strident letters and exhortations to reform at popes, kings, and the delegates to the Council of Constance. After 1423 he was able to return to Paris where he once more taught in the Arts faculty, worked on editions of his writings, and produced a long but unfinished commentary on Isaiah as well as a work on the Antichrist and on the need to resist the Turkish threat.
Part I of the book concludes with a chapter consisting largely of summaries of major reform tractates, notably De ruina et reparatione Ecclesiae (1402) and Contra prelatos symoniacos, combined with a summary of Gerhart Ladner's "idea of reform" refined by reference to R. W. Southern's "scholastic humanism" and Charles Trinkaus's renaissance rediscovery of the human self made in God's image (pp. 38-41). This sets the stage for two central chapters on Clamanges's "idea of reform" (ch. 3-4). The concluding bracket (part III) for the heart of the book consists of "The Reform of Scholastic Education" (ch. 5, pp.111-126) and a very brief conclusion: "Clamanges's Place in the History of Reform" (ch. 6, pp. 127- 34).
In Bellitto's view, de Clamanges's rhetorically strident denunciation of abuses in the Church should not be permitted to disguise his fundamental belief that reform is possible, that God expects humans to do their part. Drawing on Southern and Ladner regarding the patristic and scholastic emphasis on the dignity of human nature, despite the fall into sin, Bellitto highlights what he sees as de Clamanges's high priority on man's personal growth as prerequisite for pastoral reform in Clamanges. Yes, the resolution of the Schism is God's task, not man's and God is the only doctor who can heal this wound (42), but man "must accept divine aid and get to work without making excuses that the times are wicked". (44)
Continuing in this vein for several pages, Bellitto weaves quotations from disparate periods in Clamanges's life into a useful yet unsettlingly general pastiche of typical medieval exhortation. Simple transitions connect a series of generic paraphrases: "Clamanges forcefully applied this theme of human action in a 1416 letter sent to delegates attending the general council at Constance. Breaking from his prior reliance on divine action at Constance, he spurred the delegates to innovative efforts. Filled with the purifying grace of God, they should not be broken by adversity, grow lukewarm, permit delay, or leave the glorious tasks of God uncompleted." (46) The reader, while most grateful for this arranging of de Clamanges's thoughts along topical lines, vainly hopes for a richer exposition of the precise theological or historical significance of these thoughts.
To integrate another choice thought from de Clamanges into the fabric, Bellitto employs the fact that it contains two classical references as his transition point: "Clamanges used two classical references to illustrate his point" (46; referring to allusions to Aristotle's Nichomachean Ethics and Terence's The Lady of Andros). The point Gerson was illlustrating is the centrality of epikeia-- de Clamanges is telling the delegates at Constance to be flexible rather than stand rigidly on principles (47). But opening up that theme would distract from Bellitto's concern in this section: the interplay between human and divine action, so a brief discussion of the centrality of epikeia in Gerson's, not de Clamanges's, thinking takes place in a footnote. Had the question of epikeia in Gerson and de Clamanges been built into a major section of this or another chapter, the reader might have come away with a clearer delineation of the differences (or similarities?) between Gerson's and de Clamanges's thought.
Throughout the monograph the reader is never sure where Clamanges's own voice speaks and where he largely echoes Gerson and D'Ailly. When, nearing the end of part I, Bellitto summarizes de Clamanges's self-differentiation from Gerson/d'Ailly and Clamanges, we discover that it has to do with external circumstances: de Clamanges says his colleagues are better placed to accomplish things, so he will merely write tracts from his exile (50). Yet he faults them for cautious moderation (51). Patience, he says, won't work; because the situation is too grave. One cannot escape the impression that Nicholas de Clamanges was a typical sidelines radical, hot head--to use Bellitto's own word, a self-professed gadfly (52- 3). Perhaps he has justly been ignored in comparison to Gerson and others?
When we move to the heart of the book, which expounds de Clamanges's views on personal and institutional reform, we find him insisting that genuine personal reform means renouncing simony and other abuses and taking on genuine cura animarum (59). But how does this differ from Gerson and others, who also insisted on interior reform? Bellitto suggests that de Clamanges concentrated on it first, as the key to all other reform: a personal interior reform, a via purgativa that must be grounded in fear and humility of God, preferably in physical solitude, away from the distractions of the cities (60). One wishes here for some reflection on whether de Clamanges was marginalized because he lacked a vision for the way a monastic, solitary personal reform needed adaptation in order to be employed in the world, a vision that animated Gerson. Once more an opportunity to develop a very competent monographic dissertation into a book was, for understandable reasons and undoubtedly reluctantly, set aside.
The rest of chapter 3 offers summaries of De prosperitate adversitatis (pp. 60-73) and De fructu heremi (pp. 75-90), explained as a combination of patristic plus scholastic humanism. More attention to the monastic tradition and to Petrarch could have been a fruitful path for development. A section on Scripture's role in the journey to personal reform (not specifically in the question of solitude) is somewhat artificially interpolated here, based on de Clamanges's comment that Scripture is the bread of the eremitical life (pp. 85ff). The chapter concludes with a section titled "Devotional Influences," largely restricted to the imitatio Christi, more or less identified with the Devotio Moderna. The Meditationes Vitae Christi tradition receives brief mention but no development..
In chapter 4 we learn that de Clamanges did eventually turn to the reform of Church, not merely personal reform (93), excoriating abuses at the papal court and elsewhere. As time went on, de Clamanges turned more and more to bishops as keys to reform, which permits a discussion of a letter from de Clamanges to Bishop Reginald of Soissons (99). Under the rubric reform in membris (101ff) we find de Clamanges's critique of bad shepherds and hireling priests (107-110). Once more, we wish to know how Clamanges differed from or resembled others who took up this refrain.
"The Reform of Scholastic Education (ch. 5, pp. 111-126) offers little that is remarkable. Surprisingly, Bellitto seems not to have employed Christoph Burger's or Brian McGuire's work on Gerson's efforts to reform theological education, though he has drawn on Leonard Boyle, Steven Ozment, and Louis Pascoe on the general late medieval framework. The chapter offers some limited comparison with Gerson and briefly mentions but does not offer comparison with Bernardino of Siena and Vincent Ferrer (119), concluding by grounding de Clamanges against the context of Devotio Moderna (125ff). In chapter 6 we learn that the keys to personal reform for de Clamanges are fear and humility and that these are deeply patristic and monastic, though we also see in Clamanges the humanist and spiritual movements of his day--all quite reasonable and compelling rubrics for this fifteenth-century reformer. But could not much the same be said for Gerson? In the end it seems that the only differences between de Clamanges and his contemporary Parisian reformers are circumstantial--Clamanges lived in exile, Gerson stayed involved in politics. Was Clamanges simply timid? Bellitto admits he seems to have had a love-hate relationship with centers of power (129-30). One could wish for a bit more psycho-history here, despite its very real pitfalls.
The monograph is fluently written, though occasionally slipping into cliches ( "next logical progression" [2] , "highest echelons of ecclesiastical politics" and "troika" [11]) or suffering from lapses in precision: "in the rigid academic tradition of Gerhart Ladner" (ix) might more fairly have employed "rigorous" and de Clamanges "self-righteously took comfort in applying to himself Jesus' statement that a prophet is not without honor except in his own country" (25) seems a bit overwrought--he quite clearly had his moments of self-pity, but how can one know that he was self-righteous? "Exalts" undoubtedly was intended as "exults" on p. 68, and 1402-1414 would seem to require 1412-1414 on p. 27. The quality of production by Catholic University of America Press, with properly placed footnotes, is outstanding.
One faults an author unfairly and ungratefully for not writing the book the reviewer wants him to have written. We can be pleased that this thematic index to de Clamanges's writings on reform saw print so expeditiously, and Bellitto's book surely belongs in every college and university library. A truly comprehensive study of de Clamanges in the context of his era's efforts at church reform remains to be written. When it is, Christopher Bellitto's work will provide essential aid to its author.
Even so, having chosen this eminently defensible route to publication instead of several years' post-dissertation research to permit development into a major study of de Clamanges and his world, including the world of early French humanism, even the present work would have been strengthened by more extensive quotations from Clamanges's writings in the footnotes. Bellitto, with a few exceptions, gives simple highly abbreviated page references to the two critical editions containing Clamanges's writings. Since both of these are found in unpublished dissertations by Dario Cecchetti and Francois Berier, they are not readily accessible to most readers of Bellitto's monograph. Moreover, the abbreviated citation system, omitting titles of treatises, requires the reader to consult the book's bibliography to be sure which work by Clamanges is being referred to or to memorize the page ranges in C (Cecchetti) and L (Lydius) for de Clamanges's major works.