Today, April 4th, is the memorial of Saint Isidore of Seville (560-636) a bishop and doctor of the Church during a tumultuous age, when civilization was crumbling, coming apart at its very seams (sound familiar?), guiding his diocese for three fruitful decades which he assumed after the death of his brother, and fellow bishop, Leander.  But grace, through figures like Leander and Isidore, abounded all the more.

Called the most learned man of his time, Isidore was truly remarkable, famous for many things, the holiness of his life, the prudence with which he oversaw his flock, the shoring up of education – in the trivium and quadrivium, what was known as the ‘liberal arts’, beginning what we now know as universities and colleges – and for his voluminous writings, the most famous of which were his Etymologies, a twenty volume (!) early encyclopedia/dictionary summarizing all the knowledge that was then known, much used right up until the early Middle Ages, and oft-quoted by Saint Thomas Aquinas in his Summa Theologica.  This remarkable work of erudition (containing, as a contemporary put it, everything one needed to know, albeit, with some ‘etymologies’ that were a bit fanciful) provided the basis for all the encyclopedias, summaries and anthologies that were to dot the intellectual landscape in the centuries to follow, culminating, if one wants to think in such terms, in the vast body of knowledge known as ‘Wikipedia’.

That, one may infer, is why Saint Isidore is the patron saint of the Internet, or the world wide web – invented a millennium and a half after his death – but a very fitting patron, again, for our age.

It is a curious paradox (so sayeth the aformentioned Wikipedia article!) that although Isidore’s Etymologies preserved the substance of ancient works that have been irrevocably lost, the work also helped lead to the same very loss of those works.  That is, so it goes, scholars relied so much on Isidore’s summaries, that many works were not copied, or copied enough to be handed on to posterity.

The same could be said for the modern internet, upon which we rely, perhaps, too heavily, ignoring the very primary and secondary sources that they summarize, describe and collate.  It is far easier to read a summary of Sea Wolf, the Iliad, any of Jane Austen’s romantic escapades, or, dare I say it, even the Fathers of the Church, the Summa, and, yes, the Holy Scripture themselves, than it is to read the actual works. But the latter are so much more fruitful and rewarding.

I suppose the moral is to use what tools we may for the purpose for which they were created.  Bishop Isidore of course meant for his readers to have read or read the works he summarized, if at all possible. And the internet which he now oversees from heaven should be used for the same purpose:  To lead us to deeper knowledge, to appropriate what we read, and make it our own, and not take the too easy path too often taken. As I mentioned in my recent podcast, to cultivate a magnanimous mind and soul, that sees the broader and wider, even the eternal perspective, and not focus only on the hic et nunc, the here and now, as pusillanimity would have it.

As Alexander Pope would warn in 1709:

A little learning is a dangerous thing;
drink deep, or taste not the Pierian spring:
there shallow draughts intoxicate the brain,
and drinking largely sobers us again.

So, in this time of isolation – upon which more is to be said – strive to immerse oursevles in that ‘bigger picture’, and part of that is to pull yourself away from the news – how much of that is true, and true in what way? – pick up those books you’ve always wanted to read, pore over them, take the time to read and absorb, and live a little of the spirit of Saint Isidore, and have your children do the same.

Who knows what small role you may have in saving our culture and civilization, even in our children, how home, whom we, by God’s grace, may inspire?

 

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