and as the one cui nihil Hispania clarius habuit, ¹
expressions which reveal only too plainly how
great must have been the darkness in which an
Isidore could seem brilliant.

Such is the genealogy of the patriarchs of the
liberal arts, and of these Boethius, Cassiodorus and
Isidore became the acknowledged authorities in
the schools, while Martianus Capella, though at
first unacknowledged, was also influential. The
learning they handed over did not attain to the
dignity of a systematic exhibit of the learning
of the ancients, but contained at best a general
outline of its school studies imperfectly filled in
and often faultily modified. It cannot be too
plainly insisted on that what they gave to the
Middle Ages was enclosed in a very few books and
that this scanty store constituted practically the
whole substance of instruction up to the eighth
century, not being completely displaced until the
Renaissance. Isidore stands last in the list, clos-
ing the development of Christian school learning
in the midst of a barbarism that was extinguishing
not only learning but civilized society in Western
Europe. The darkness that followed his time
for over a century was profound and almost uni-
versal. Rome itself had become barbarian, and
only in distant Britain and Ireland was the lamp
of learning kept lighted, not to shine agai
n on the
Continent until brought thither by the hand of
Alcuin.

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