30
E
UR
A
MERICA
In this regard, Chaucer concurs with John of Salisbury in
believing in the superiority of writers over performers in other arts
in preserving, albeit not permanently, the stupendous achievements
of human beings. The idea that letters can immortalize not only
poets but also those celebrated by poets is also found in John of
Salisbury’s
Policraticus
.
36
Though
Policraticus
is generally hailed as
the first treatise on political theory in the Middle Ages (Nederman,
1990: xv), in the prologue John of Salisbury lists the advantages of
“the pursuit of letters”: “it excludes all annoyance stemming from
differences of time and place, it draws friends into each other’s
presence, and it abolishes the situation in which things worth
knowing are not experienced” (1990: 3). Most crucially, the heroic
exploits of our ancestors would be unknown to us unless writers
“triumphed over idleness” and transmitted the heritage to posterity
(3). For John of Salisbury letters are the real salvation, since arts,
laws, faith, and other things are all vulnerable to the ravages of
time (3). Writers thus become preservers of civilization responsible
for chronicling human triumphs meriting the reverence of posterity,
since without them even the names of Alexander or Caesar would
fall into oblivion (3). Similarly, but for the authors of the Bible, the
impeccable paragons of the apostles and prophets could not have
been passed down for posterity to follow; in short, “no one would
ever be illuminated by perpetual glory unless he himself or
someone else had written” (3). Like Horace, John of Salisbury
believes that without the service of writers or scribes, there would
be little difference between the final fate of a fool and that of an
emperor after their death: both would fall into obscurity. John
concludes that for those who aspire to posthumous glory, their
36
John of Salisbury (ca. 1115-1180) is generally acknowledged by modern scholars
as one of the foremost Latinists of his time, and in his
Policraticus
he intended to
demonstrate that his coevals were “defecting from the true task of humanity”
in
both their thought and actions (John of Salisbury, 1993).
Policraticus
, it should
be further noted, is a work with which Chaucer has generally been considered to
have some familiarity (Windeatt, 1992: 39).
