which, however, is no valid proof. When a youth he joined the minorite friars of Newcastle, who sent him to Oxford, where he was admitted to Merton college. His proficiency as a student must have been great. He is said to have been eminent for knowledge in the civil and canon law, in logic, natural philosophy, metaphysics, mathematics, and astronomy. On the removal of William Varron to Paris, Duns was chosen to supply his place in the theological chair at Oxford. Among the apocryphal stories told of him there is one, that thirty thousand scholars came to be his hearers. He removed to Paris probably in 1301, was chosen regent of the monks of his order at a meeting at Toulouse, and about the same time took the presidency of the theological school at Paris. Here he first inculcated the doctrine of the immaculate conception against the dominicans, refuting two hundred objections, and supporting it by many arguments. In consequence of his representations the members of the university embraced his opinion, and instituted the feast of the immaculate conception. On this occasion the title of the "Subtle Doctor" was first conferred upon him. In 1308 he was commanded by Gonsalvo, the general of the minorites, to go to Cologne to dispute against the Beghards. It is reported that the citizens met him in solemn pomp and conducted him into the city. Soon after he was seized with apoplexy, and died on 8th November, 1308, in the forty-third year of his age. Jovius' account of his death is legendary. According to it he fell down of apoplexy, and was immediately interred as dead; but afterwards coming to his senses, he languished in his coffin, beating his head and hands against its sides till he expired. In 1474 the English franciscans printed several of his works. At length the "speculativa "of them were collected by Luke Wadding, an Irishman, and illustrated with notes, to which a life of the author was prefixed. This edition was published at Lyons in 1639, 12 vols., folio. The "positiva" works were intended for a future publication, which never appeared. Wadding's life is interlarded with legendary matter. It was reprinted at Mons, 12mo, 1644. Another life was written by John Colgan of the Irish minorites of Padua, 12mo, Antwerp, 1655. The best of Duns Scotus' works consist of questions or commentaries on the Sentences of Peter Lombard, and on the physical, logical, and metaphysical writings of Aristotle. In a more enlightened age such abilities as he possessed might have done great and lasting good; but the subtleties of the age were unpractical things. Duns found scholasticism in its full development; and he built up his philosophical and religious system in opposition to Anselm and Richard St. Victor, but particularly against Thomas Aquinas and his immediate disciples. The two rival parties among the schoolmen were the Scotists and Thomists. The leading tenet of the former was the immaculate conception of Mary. In philosophy the Scotists were opposed to the Occamists. The former maintained that general terms are expressive of real existences. The latter held them to be nothing more than names. Thus, the one party was called realists; the other nominalists. Theology was set above philosophy by Duns Scotus; it is only the former, according to him, which is the right knowledge of all that is knowable. Hence he denies to philosophers a true knowledge of theological matters. There are no proofs, he says, for the existence of God; because God is not known to us in himself. He opposes, therefore, Anselm's ontological proof. In like manner he denies the possibility of a natural proof of the Trinity. It is only the believer who perceives a trace of it in history. Man attains to redemption by the love of God. The means of happiness are adventitious; God might have chosen others than the incarnation of Christ. God has manifested himself as the unchangable object of man's will; and it is only the means which lead to this object which depend on his own choice. Duns recognized man as an individual created by the Holy Ghost, and therefore pure and free in his original condition. He held predestination in the strictest sense; though he softened it by requiring us to think of it in its relation to the will of the creatures, not as a thing which preceded that will in time. In opposition to Aquinas he denied the dependence of the will on the understanding; because nothing but the will itself can be the total cause of the will. Like all the schoolmen, he distinguished moral and theological virtues, and three classes of good works—good works in general; good works arising out of moral impulses and love to the divine laws; good works occasioned by grace and grounded in love to God himself. The first two classes have no claim to merit and reward. The third only, i.e., theological virtue, has such claim. In the sacraments he assumes a supernatural power, but one which is incomplete. His ideas of immortality and the resurrection of the body are the same as those commonly held by christians; but they are based in his own way. Thus the metaphysical idea of the body lies at the basis of his doctrine of the resurrection. He attaches, of course, great importance to the church. Indeed he takes up his position there, making the credibility of the scriptures themselves depend upon the authority of the church. All true divine intuition, all right knowledge, life, and the forgiveness of sin, are found there only. Those who wish to study Duns Scotus will be greatly assisted by the Summa theologica ex Scoti operibus, published by the franciscan Jerome de Fortino, in 6 vols., folio; and by Albergoni's Resolutio doctrinæ Scoticæ, Lugdun., 1643, 8vo. The Spanish franciscan, De Rada, drew up a summary of the theological points in debate between Scotus and Aquinas—Controversiæ theologicæ inter S. Thomam et Scotum, &c., Venet., 1599, 4to. On the theology of Scotus, the best treatise is Baumgarten's De Theologia Scoti, Jena, 1826, 4to. The best account of his philosophy is given by Ritter, in the eighth volume of his Geschichte der Philosophie.—S. D.
DUNSTABLE, DUNSTAPLE, DONSTABLE, or DONSTABUS, John of, a musician, died in 1458; the date of his birth is uncertain. He was born at the town in Bedfordshire from which he takes his name, and was buried in the church of St. Stephen Walbrook. An epitaph from his gravestone is preserved in Weever's Funeral Monuments, and another epitaph upon him, the composition of John Whethamsted, abbot of St. Albans, is also given in Fuller's Worthies, both of which speak in unmeasured terms of his merit. According to the first of these, he was no less eminent as a mathematician and an astronomer, than as a musician; and a further proof of his scientific attainments is a geographical tract of his writing, in MS., in the Bodleian library. Ravenscroft, Franchinus, and other early writers quote a tract by this author entitled "De Mensurabilis Musica," which appears to have been a work of remarkable erudition for its time, but founded rather upon researches in the treatises of earlier writers than upon original discovery. Franchinus attributes to John of Dunstable the first employment of passing-notes in music, and there is no reason to question this authority; but Tinctor, who lived immediately after Dunstable, falsely ascribes to him the origination of counterpoint; unmindful that Adam de la Hale had, many years earlier, composed music for several voices, and that the art of writing in parts, though in a very crude state, had long been practised before the period when Dunstable lived. Tinctor is followed in his error by Sebald Haiden, and the mistake has derived an appearance of authenticity, from the confusion of the musician's name with that of St. Dunstan, abbot of Canterbury, in the latter part of the tenth century, who was famed for his skill in music, and who is falsely supposed to have introduced the organ into this country. The fact is that Dunstable did much in his practice to advance the art of counterpoint, but his music had less merit than that of Dufay or Binchois, who were his contemporaries. The only specimen of his composition that is known to exist is a "Veni Sancte Spiritus," printed by Franchinus. Whatever his qualities of musicianship, the fact of the high esteem in which these were held in this country and on the continent, in and immediately after his own time, proves that music must have been assiduously cultivated in England at the period, and its practitioners warmly encouraged.—G. A. M.
DUNSTAN, Archbishop of Canterbury, was born in the neighbourhood of Glastonbury about 925. He received his first education in that far-famed abbey, where his abilities excited general attention, so that he was called to court by Athelstan. Here his talents made him the object of envy and persecution. By the advice of his relation Ælfheag, bishop of Winchester, he now renounced the world, and entered Glastonbury as a monk. Here he subjected himself to the severest discipline of the monastery. After Edmund became king he summoned Dunstan to court, giving him a place among the nobles of the empire. But he was again driven from his honourable position. The king, repenting of the injustice, made him subsequently abbot of Glastonbury. Edred respected him quite as much as Edmund. It was under Edred that he set himself with vigour to the work of reformation. The best instrument for carrying out his plans appeared to be the rule of St. Benedict,
