The world urgently needs to return to humanism, the emancipatory movement born in the Renaissance and founded on a surge of critical thought, a return to ancient sources, and the development of universities – a notion which seems to some obsolete, to others politically appropriated... This book is a compass for the mind. Lire la suite
The world urgently needs to return to humanism, the emancipatory movement born in the Renaissance and founded on a surge of critical thought, a return to ancient sources, and the development of universities – a notion which seems to some obsolete, to others politically appropriated. Researchers and professors at UCLouvain say that university education, beyond the seven liberal arts which comprise the mastery of figures and letters, can only be humanist, today like yesterday: its goal is to forge citizens who use their talents and skills to serve others and in whom intelligence is inseparable from ethical awareness.
In 1425, the institutional bull of the University of Louvain expressed in surprisingly simple and visionary terms the university's founding principles, as well as its vocation, its rootedness in society, and the unique bonds that unite its students, researchers and professors. Thanks to Guido Latré, this modest
volume includes a previously unpublished English translation of this essential document of the late Middle Ages.
This book is a compass for the mind.
Preface 7
Cédrick Fairon
Foreword 12
Charles Doyen
Introduction 16
Humanism: an indispensable modern concept
Marco Cavalieri
In praise of useless knowledge 27
Nuccio Ordine
The founding of the University of Louvain 52
A turbulent, unwritten history
Sapientiae Immarcescibilis 55
Founding bull of Studium Generale at Louvain, 9 December 1425
Previously unpublished translation by Guido Latré
Humanists of the University of Louvain 65
Photography credits 132