Giordano Bruno

Transcriber's Note:
                          ###################

This e-text is based on the 1903 edition of the original
book. Minor punctuation errors have been tacitly corrected.
Inconsistencies in hyphenation, ligatures, and accented
forms, such as 'sun-flower/sunflower', 'formulæ/formulae',
'Combinatoriâ/Combinatoria', etc., have been retained. Missing footnote
numbers have been added according to sequence.

The Table of Contents has been changed regarding the content
of the first section 'Biographies, Works, and Essays.'

Italic text in the original version has been placed between underscores
(_italic_); passages in small caps have been symbolised by forward
slashes (/small caps/). [oe] represents the respective ligature,
^{text} signifies a superscript passage.

The following passages have been corrected:

    # p. 16: 'Beza' --> 'Béza'; 'before Venetian tribunal' --> 'before
    the Venetian tribunal'
    # p. 18 (sidenote): 'Circuæs' --> 'Circæus'
    # p. 30: 'Artic' --> 'Arctic'; 'terrestial' --> 'terrestrial'
    # p. 37: 'Mauvissère' --> 'Mauvissière'
    # p. 64: 'aquaintance' --> 'acquaintance'
    # p. 71: 'bann' --> 'ban'
    # p. 131: 'fanastic' --> 'fantastic'
    # p. 252: 'philosphy' --> 'philosophy'
    # p. 295: 'allmighty' --> 'almighty'
    # p. 330: 'intuites' --> 'intuits'
    # p. 348: 'docrine' --> 'doctrine'
    # p. 353: 'Carriére' --> 'Carrière'
    # Index, Bartholmèss, Christian:  ' 2, 16, 20, ...' -->
    '5, 16, 20, ...'




                            GIORDANO BRUNO




                            [Illustration]




                   [Illustration: _Giordano Bruno._

                     _Statue by Ettore Ferrari._]




                            GIORDANO BRUNO


                                  BY

                           J. LEWIS McINTYRE

      M.A. EDIN. AND OXON.: D.SC. EDIN.: ANDERSON LECTURER IN THE
                        UNIVERSITY OF ABERDEEN


                                London
                     MACMILLAN AND CO., /Limited/
                    NEW YORK: THE MACMILLAN COMPANY
                                 1903

                         _All rights reserved_




                                  To

                                MY WIFE




PREFACE


This volume attempts to do justice to a philosopher who has hardly
received in England the consideration he deserves. Apart from the _Life
of Giordano Bruno_, by I. Frith (Mrs. Oppenheim), in the English and
Foreign Philosophical Library, 1887, there has been no complete work
in our language upon the poet, teacher, and martyr of Nola, while his
philosophy has been treated only in occasional articles and reviews.
Yet he is recognised by the more liberal-minded among Italians as
the greatest and most daring thinker their country has produced. The
pathos of his life and death has perhaps caused his image to stand out
more strongly in the minds of his countrymen than that of any other of
their leaders of thought. A movement of popular enthusiasm, begun in
1876, resulted, on 9th June 1889, in the unveiling of a statue in Rome
in the Campo dei Fiori, the place on which Bruno was burned. Both in
France and in Germany he has been recognised as the prophet, if not as
the actual founder, of modern philosophy, and as one of the earliest
apostles of freedom of thought and of speech in modern times.

The first part of the present work--the _Life of Bruno_--is based
upon the documents published by Berti, Dufour, and others, and on the
personal references in Bruno's own works. I have tried to throw some
light on Bruno's life in England, on his relations with the French
Ambassador, Mauvissière, and on his share in some of the literary
movements of the time. I have, however, been no more successful than
others in finding any documents referring directly to Bruno's visit to
England.

In the second part--_The Philosophy of Bruno_--I have sought to give
not a systematic outline of Bruno's philosophy as a whole under the
various familiar headings, which would prove an almost impossible
task, but a sketch, as nearly as possible in Bruno's own words, of the
problems which interested this mind of the sixteenth century, and of
the solutions offered. The first chapter points out the sources from
which Bruno derived the materials of his thinking. The succeeding
chapters are devoted to some of the main works of Bruno,--the _Causa_
(Chapter II.), _Infinito_ and _De Immenso_ (Chapters III. and IV.), _De
Minimo_ (Chapter V.), _Spaccio_ (Chapter VI.), and _Heroici Furori_
(Chapter VII.),--and contain as little as possible of either criticism
or comment, except in so far as these are implied in the selection
and arrangement of the material. I have adopted this method partly
because Bruno's works are still comparatively unknown to the English
reader, and partly because his style, full as it is of obscurities,
redundances, repetitions, lends itself to selection, but not easily to
compact exposition.