## 1. Life and Work



Biographical information for much of the life of Gregory of Rimini
(a.k.a. de Arimino, Ariminensis, the "Torturer of
Infants," the *Lucerna splendens*, and the
*Doctor* *acutus* or *authenticus*) derives from
a letter of Pope Clement VI, dated 12 January 1345, requesting
Gregory's promotion to Master of Theology at the University of
Paris:



> 
> Gregory of Rimini, of the Order of the Friars Hermits of Saint
> Augustine, Parisian bachelor of theology, has now studied for
> twenty-two years, namely six straight years at Paris, and afterwards,
> returning to his native soil, he held the main chair at Bologna,
> Padua, and Perugia, and it has now been four years since he returned
> to Paris to lecture on the *Sentences*, lectures he has
> completed there commendably (Delucca 2003, 50).
> 



According to the letter, then, Gregory first studied theology at Paris
from 1322 or 1323 until 1328 or 1329. Working backwards, we can
estimate that Gregory was born in Rimini around 1300, joined the
mendicant order of the Hermits of Saint Augustine (OESA), and received
his basic education before going to Paris. There he was exposed to the
latest developments in philosophical theology, especially the ideas of
the Franciscan Peter Auriol, who had died in early 1322. Assuming that
the sequence in the papal letter is strictly chronological, Gregory
then taught theology at various Augustinian *studia* in Italy,
first at Bologna, where he is attested as *lector* in documents
of late 1332, 1333, and early 1337. Perhaps he was transferred to
Padua at the Augustinians' General Chapter meeting in Siena in
1338, and then he was shifted to Perugia. Almost certainly while he
was in Italy, Gregory came into contact with the works of Oxford
scholars from the 1320s and 1330s, most notably William of Ockham,
Adam Wodeham, Richard Fitzralph, and Walter Chatton. Pope
Clement's letter suggests that Gregory returned to Paris in late
1340 or in 1341 in order to lecture on the *Sentences*, but
perhaps the "four years" refers to the date of his
order's General Chapter of Montpellier, 1341, which may have
been the occasion when Gregory was assigned to return to Paris. The
prevailing view is that Gregory went to Paris in 1342 for a year of
preparation for his lectures on the *Sentences*, which were
given in 1343-44, but given that our records of these lectures
were subject to revision, there is a degree of uncertainty. With help
from the pope's letter, Gregory probably became Master of
Theology in 1345, holding at least one quodlibetal disputation at
Paris, but he continued to revise his written *Sentences*
commentary until 1346, removing certain passages that were formerly
considered later *additiones*. In late 1346 Master Gregory was
in Rimini and the following year we find him teaching again in Padua,
where he stayed until 1351 when the General Chapter at Basel sent him
to teach at the recently established *studium* in Rimini. He
remained there at least until late 1356, but on 20 May 1357, at the
General Chapter in Montpellier, he was elected the Augustinians'
prior general, succeeding the late Thomas of Strasbourg. Gregory died
in Vienna toward the end of 1358 (see V. Marcolino's chapter in
Oberman 1981, 127-94; Lambertini et al. 2002; Delucca 2003).



Gregory's most important writing by far is his commentary on the
first two books of the *Sentences*. Book I survives in some
twenty complete manuscripts, while there are about a dozen for book
II. The work was printed several times from 1482 to 1532, reprinted in
1955, and finally received a modern critical edition in six volumes in
1979-84 (Rimini 1979-84; Bermon 2002). Parts have been or
are being translated into French, German, and English. The status of
Books III and IV is unclear. It has been argued that they never
existed and that Gregory chose not to comment on them (Bermon 2002,
274; Mandarella 2016, 198). However, Gregory explicitly says that he
will defer the treatment of certain questions to Book III (Girard
2017, 241). In addition to scriptural commentaries, smaller writings
have been ascribed to Gregory, including a work usually known as
*De usura*, printed in 1508 and again in 1622 (see below,
section 6), and some *tabulae* of Augustine's works (see
Bermon 2007, 24-25 and Bermon forthcoming). His tract on the intension
and remission of forms, *De intensione et remissione formarum
corporalium*, carries the incipit "Circa secundum partem
huius distinctionis" and is, therefore, just an excerpt of the
*Sentences* commentary, book I, distinction 17, part 2 (see
Loewe 2014, 274). Finally, from his brief term as his order's
prior general we have his correspondence, which has been published
(Rimini 1976).


## 2. Position in the History of Philosophy



Although Gregory of Rimini has received considerable attention from
historians of medieval thought, understanding his position in the
history of philosophy has been made difficult by several problems that
have plagued the historiography of fourteenth-century scholasticism.
He flourished at a time that has been judged by historians as on the
whole decadent, fideistic, and radically skeptical, in contrast to the
period in which, for example, Thomas Aquinas worked (d. 1274); this
historical viewpoint already made difficult an objective evaluation of
Rimini. Historians also labeled Gregory a "nominalist," a
term so broad and vague when applied to fourteenth-century thinkers
that, when it was used without qualification, it tended to mislead and
to obscure the differences among them, as for example between Ockham
and Gregory. Finally, unlike Aquinas, Henry of Ghent, and John Duns
Scotus, Gregory was active in a relatively understudied period, so
that placing Gregory in his context is difficult and statements about
Gregory's originality are precarious. The history of
Gregory's own University of Paris in the quarter century before
his *Sentences* lectures, in contrast to that of Oxford in the
same years, is particularly unclear. Few scholars realize, moreover,
that from the 1330s until the onset of the Great Schism in 1378,
decades when the traditional leaders of European thought, the
Franciscans and Dominicans, were in decline, Gregory was the leading
light in an era in which his own Augustinian Order dominated, with
such towering figures as Thomas of Strasbourg, Alphonsus Vargas of
Toledo, and Hugolino of Orvieto, and a number of other important
authors. Only careful diachronic studies of specific philosophical
problems can provide a precise picture of Gregory's role in the
history of philosophy, and few such studies have been accomplished
thus far. There are some, however, and natural philosophy,
epistemology, foreknowledge, and predestination are examples of topics
about which we know quite a bit (see below).



Generally, what has been learned so far is that Gregory was really the
first to introduce to the University of Paris the exciting ideas
developed at English schools between William of Ockham (ca. 1319) and
Thomas Bradwardine (ca. 1344). Beginning with Gregory the names of
Adam Wodeham, Richard Fitzralph, Walter Chatton, William Heytesbury,
Thomas Buckingham, Richard Kilvington, Robert Halifax and others
became common knowledge among Parisian scholars. Gregory was also
deeply influenced by recent thinkers at his own university, both
negatively and positively. The impact of Peter Auriol has long been
recognized to be great, but recent studies have made clear that other
figures, such as Francis of Marchia, Thomas of Strasbourg, Gerard
Odonis, and Michael of Massa, had an influence on Gregory. The
question of Gregory's relationship to his Parisian predecessors
needs to be investigated more fully.



More clear is Gregory's importance in the late Middle Ages and
Reformation, even if much of this period has received relatively
little attention. Gregory's impact is obvious, because many
scholastics after 1350 copied large passages from his works, including
such prominent figures as the Cistercian James of Eltville, Pierre
d'Ailly, and Henry of Langenstein. Other important thinkers,
such as Hugolino of Orvieto OESA, the Cistercian Pierre Ceffons,
Marsilius of Inghen, and Peter of Candia OFM (Pope Alexander V) knew
Gregory's ideas well and cited them often. Few if any
philosophers in the later fourteenth century can have been unaffected
by his ideas, and for many he was their main inspiration.
Gregory's impact both inside and outside the Augustinian Order
continued into the fifteenth century. The common *Sentences*
commentary (the so-called *Quaestiones communes*) of the
University of Vienna in the first half of the century was largely
based directly or indirectly on Gregory's thought, often
duplicating his words (see recently, Schabel 2020). In the celebrated
quarrel over future contingents at the University of Louvain
(1465-1474), several of the participants cited Gregory's
position or even adopted it without attribution. Of course, the fact
that only books I and II of Gregory's commentary circulated
means that Gregory's direct impact is to be found in topics
discussed in those books rather than in issues covered in books III
and IV, such as the Immaculate Conception and the Eucharist, which had
their own philosophical sub-issues.



Perhaps the most central element of Gregory of Rimini's thought
and influence is his adherence to Augustine and the nature of that
adherence. For one thing, Gregory simply read Augustine more carefully
and extensively than most previous thinkers, and so, for example,
Gregory was able to attack Peter Auriol for his faulty citations and
quotations of Augustine. Gregory's interest in the works of
Augustine has been seen as central to the development of a
"historico-critical" method in philosophical theology,
especially in the Augustinian Order, partly foreshadowing modern
scholarly methods. In connection with this historico-critical method,
Gregory was part of a general attempt to establish reliable texts of
Augustine and to separate authentic works from the pseudo-Augustinian
corpus. Quotations from Augustine, moreover, were cited with great
accuracy and detail in Gregory's writings, and so his
*Sentences* commentary, when not plagiarized for his own ideas,
was often used as a source for Augustinian quotations (Trapp
1956).



Not surprisingly, Gregory's ideas are often Augustinian.
Gregory's brand of doctrinal Augustinianism, influenced rather
by the Franciscan and Oxonian tradition than the more Dominican (and
Parisian) variety of Giles of Rome, soon dominated the Augustinian
Hermits' philosophy and theology. Thus by the early 16th century
*Aegidistae* and *Gregoriistae* schools of thought
existed, and a recognized *via Gregorii* was present in many
universities such as Wittenberg, the university of Gregory's
fellow Augustinian Hermit Martin Luther (McGrath 1987). The fact that
Gregory's extreme Augustinian views on predestination became
virtually official doctrine at the University of Vienna, and each book
of his *Sentences* commentary was printed six times between
1482 and 1532, further helps explain why some of Gregory's ideas
often resemble those of Luther and Jean Calvin. Gregory's
thought had a life after the reformation, perhaps influencing
Francisco Suarez, but certainly having an impact on
seventeenth-century debates over such topics as predestination.



A list of Gregory's philosophical positions would perhaps not be
difficult to make, and neither would it be hard to describe his
relation to Ockham on various topics (e.g. Smith 1999, Mandrella
2016). In natural philosophy, for example, in agreement with Ockham,
Gregory was a nominalist and employed "Ockham's"
razor in denying that sudden change, motion, and time are independent
entities (Brown 1998b). Gregory also claims that the world could have
been eternal. But in this case one would like to know better the
stances of Gregory's immediate predecessors, especially
Parisians like Francis of Marchia, in order to determine the possible
sources and degree of originality of Gregory's ideas. On the
eternity of the world, for example, Gregory's view was not very
strange in his day. Otherwise, a list of Gregory's ideas is just
that, a mere list. Consequently the focus here shall be on a few of
the issues on which the theories of Gregory and his predecessors have
been investigated in some depth.


## 3. Theology



In many ways Gregory was a philosopher's theologian, because he
began with propositions from Scripture as premises for his arguments
and proceeded deductively (Brown 1998b, 200-201). In his deductive
theology, Gregory devoted much time and space to defining his terms
and exploring exhaustively the implications of possible solutions, a
practice that makes his *Sentences* commentary a joy to read
and a philosophical classic.



Gregory's approach to trinitarian questions has been described
as one of "radical minimalism" (Friedman 2013, 847). Like
Walter Chatton, Robert Holkot and William of Rubio before him, Gregory
adopts Praepositinianism: the divine persons are distinct by
themselves, they are not constituted, and there are no properties
distinct from the persons. As a result, divine simplicity is
preserved, at the expense of explanation (Friedman 2013, 853-854). In
this context, Gregory 's trinitarian theology is radically
minimalist because he went further than other defenders of
Praepositinianism (Friedman 2013, 867) in thoroughly rejecting any
principle of divine operations, therefore clearly dismissing what
Friedman calls the "psychological model," according to
which the intellect and the will, as divine attributes, would play the
part of such principles.



In distinctions 38-41 of book I, Gregory tackled the general
problem of divine foreknowledge and future contingents and the
specific dilemma of predestination and free will. Gregory's
positions on these questions have already been the subject of study
for many decades, and recently historians have attempted to put
Gregory into his immediate Parisian and Oxonian context. Moreover,
Gregory's nickname, "the Torturer of Infants," stems
in part from his stance on predestination. A discussion of
Gregory's thought on these issues, therefore, provides a
convenient introduction both to his noetic and to his position in
history.


### 3.1 Foreknowledge and Contingency



Gregory's treatment of divine foreknowledge and future
contingents is aimed primarily at Peter Auriol and secondarily at
Oxford theologians (Vignaux 1934, ch. 4; Hoenen 1993, 196-214;
Schabel 2000, 264-274; Fiorentino 2004; Ciammetti 2011). In
order to preserve the contingency of events stemming from human free
will, Auriol claimed that propositions about future contingents are
neither true nor false, but rather neutral, and so God does not know
that the Antichrist will exist, since "the Antichrist will
exist" is neither true nor false. Although like Ockham and
Rimini later, Auriol maintained that exactly how God knows the future
is incomprehensible to us, he did give a sophisticated explanation and
defense of God's knowledge of our future. Gregory, however,
chose to focus on the above-mentioned elements in Auriol's
position. Gregory recognized that Auriol's theory of
future-contingent propositions relies on Aristotle's stance in
chapter 9 of *On Interpretation*. Interestingly, although
Gregory denied the truth of the position itself, he nevertheless held
that it was in fact Aristotle's. Indeed he rejected any attempt
to interpret Aristotle differently, in the way that many medieval and
modern philosophers have tried to do:



> 
> [This] is apparently a friendly excuse, but in truth it is more of an
> accusation, because the fact that absurdities ensue [from this
> position] does not convince us that [Aristotle] did not think that,
> but convinces us that he ought not to have thought that... Moreover,
> some modern theologians [i.e., Auriol], great teachers, said that the
> conclusion [denying determinate truth to future-contingent
> propositions] not only was the Philosopher's intention, but also
> that it is very true and even demonstrated... (Rimini 1979, 243).
> 



So for Gregory, Auriol was correct that Aristotle denied the Principle
of Bivalence when applied to propositions about future
contingents.



Auriol set up two basic rules for such propositions: (1) if a
proposition about the future, say, "Socrates will run," is
true, it is true immutably and inevitably, since no instant can be
found when it would be false. (2) The significate of such a
proposition will inevitably and necessarily be put into being. The
foundation for Auriol's claim is his modal theory: immutability
and necessity are the same thing. If something is immutable, it cannot
be different from what it is, and so it necessarily is the way it
is.



Gregory answered with a rigorous and lengthy defense of Bivalence and
an alternative modal theory. His defense of Bivalence includes a
detailed set of rules for propositions. It is significant that this
section of Gregory's text, some seven pages, stems from Francis
of Marchia's refutation of Auriol's position, a refutation
adopted and extended by Gregory's own Augustinian predecessor at
Paris, Michael of Massa. In short, Gregory argued that the Principle
of Bivalence applies universally, and Aristotle was wrong to make an
exception in the case of future-contingent propositions. Although this
was his basic disagreement with Auriol, Gregory was so careful a
philosopher that before he refuted Auriol on this point he corrected
his Franciscan predecessor on details and in so doing made
Auriol's own theory more precise.



Auriol placed greater emphasis on divine simplicity and necessity than
on divine freedom and contingency when he was wrestling with one of
the fundamental problems of Christian philosophical theology: given an
absolutely simple and necessary God, what is the source of
contingency? Auriol's own explanation lies in God's
relationship with events in time, but this explanation was not of
interest to Rimini, who was convinced by Scriptural prophecy that God
does in fact know the future, and convinced by logic that the
Principle of Bivalence holds universally. So the problem becomes, if
God knows that Socrates will run, and the proposition "Socrates
will run" is true, will not Socrates run necessarily?



Rimini's answer is a version of the *opinio communis*, a
position with roots in Scotus and the Parisian tradition but which
Ockham and later Oxford scholars refined with their focus on
propositions. (It is possible that Ockham was influenced by Auriol in
his concentration on future-contingent propositions, as some have
held, but there is nothing specific to indicate that Ockham knew
Auriol's treatment, and after Scotus it was natural for
theologians to focus their attention on the truth of future-contingent
propositions anyway.) The *opinio communis* relies on
God's freedom to save contingency in the world: everything other
than God is ultimately contingent, because God wills and acts freely
and contingently in creating, and so it is logically possible for the
things in the world not to have been or to have been otherwise. At the
same time, the common position affirms God's immutability and
determinate knowledge of such things. The upshot is that true
propositions about future contingents have always been true and are
immutably true, even determinately true, but that they are only
contingently true and not necessarily so. So Gregory denies
Auriol's equation of necessity and immutability.



Gregory's position relies on interesting uses of common logical
devices and distinctions developed at Paris and Oxford over the
preceding century, such as the distinction between the composite and
divided senses of propositions, and that between conditional and
absolute necessity. The purpose of these distinctions was to offer a
way of explaining the contingency of events, but in doing so they
assumed the ultimate contingency of everything except God. However,
far from being an affirmation of the "radical contingency"
of the world, as some historians have claimed, it was in fact the only
way for most theologians to save at least some contingency from the
threat of absolute logical and divine determinism. In fact, Gregory
and others admitted that, assuming God's knowledge of the
future, the future was necessary *ex suppositione*, although
not absolutely, because it is logically possible for immutable God to
know otherwise. Peter Auriol, and later Peter de Rivo, Pietro
Pomponazzi, and Martin Luther, would consider these efforts feeble and
deluded. The three Peters resorted to alternative theories that others
considered equally feeble and deluded, whereas Luther simply accepted
the conclusion that all attempts to save meaningful contingency
governed by human free will were doomed to failure.



What is interesting about Gregory's treatment, again, is not his
originality, but the clarity and precision with which he presented the
common position. He even pointed out problems in the discussions of
those with whom he broadly agreed, such as Ockham. True, almost all of
what Rimini said could be found in Marchia, Massa, Ockham, Landulph
Caracciolo, Adam Wodeham, and others, but not in such an organized
fashion.



One final element of Gregory's stance on modal matters that
deserves our attention is the contingency or necessity of the past.
The *opinio communis* maintained that the past is somehow
necessary in a strong sense, even though it is not absolutely
necessary. It seems that Gregory did not go so far as to say that the
past is necessary (beyond the normal necessity *ex
suppositione*), but he does make some sort of modal distinction
between the past and the future. Thus we can say that Gregory did not
think God can change the past, although there has been some
disagreement on this issue (Courtenay 1972-73; Schabel 2000,
271-2). Suffice it to say that the time has come for a long and
careful treatment of the modal status of the past in medieval thought,
to determine whether any thinker ever really thought the past could be
changed. The probable answer is negative.


### 3.2 Predestination



Predestination was the traditional subject of distinctions 40-41
of commentaries on book I of the *Sentences*. This was a more
purely "theological" subset of the more
"philosophical" topic of foreknowledge and future
contingents treated in distinctions 38-39. As in the case of
foreknowledge, Gregory proceeded slowly and carefully, defining his
terms and outlining the possible positions. Gregory's
Augustinian bent shows through more clearly in predestination than in
foreknowledge. Gregory quoted Augustine's words no less than 43
times in this context, and cited him still more often. Frequent
scriptural quotations, carefully chosen, provide the ultimate basis
for his theory. From Romans 9.13, where Paul comments on Malachi 1.2,
"Jacob I have loved, but Esau I have hated," Gregory took
his position that from eternity, God actively elects to damn some and
to save others, a theory called Double Predestination or Double
Particular Election (Vignaux 1934, ch. 4; Schuler 1934; Halverson
1998, 143-157; Schabel 2002).



The main issue is what the causal connection is between humans'
willing and acting and their salvation or damnation, and
predestination or reprobation: do humans participate in or contribute
to their own salvation and damnation, or is God's will the sole
cause? Traditionally the answer had been that humans are the cause of
their deserved damnation, but that salvation depended solely on
God's will. Although there were various interpretations of this
traditional stance, Peter Auriol seems to have been the first
important university scholar to provide a real alternative. Auriol had
already sought to distance God from the everyday details of the
world's existence, in order to preserve divine necessity and the
contingency of things. Auriol now applied his general theory to the
specific issue of soteriology and claimed that God sets up general
rules by which certain sets of people will be damned and other sets
saved, without actively choosing to save or damn specific individuals.
This maintained divine immutability but had the added bonus of
providing symmetry for reprobation and predestination: the determining
factor is the presence or absence of an obstacle to grace (*obex
gratiae*). For Auriol, while someone's obstacle to grace is
indeed a positive cause of reprobation, the absence of such an
obstacle, however, is merely a *negative* or privative cause of
predestination. Thus Auriol thought he could avoid charges of
Pelagianism by simply denying a *positive* cause of
predestination in the elect. Ockham appears to have adopted the main
elements of Auriol's stance, while Walter Chatton at Oxford and
Gerard Odonis and Thomas of Strasbourg at Paris went further and
posited a positive cause of predestination in the elect, which would
appear to approach the condemned Pelagian doctrine.



Gregory reacted by charging that both the theory of the privative
cause and the notion of the positive cause of predestination in those
who are predestined are Pelagian. Instead Gregory returned to the
traditional view as it concerned predestination: it stems only from
God's merciful will. However, Auriol's criticism of the
asymmetry of the traditional position led Gregory to claim that not
only do the predestined play no causal role in their salvation, but
neither do the reprobate contribute to their damnation. In short,
there is no reason either for one person's salvation or for
another person's damnation except the inscrutable will of God:
we do not know why some are saved and others damned. This, after all,
Gregory believed, was the theory of Paul and of Augustine.



One has to admire Gregory's consistency here, mirroring that of
his opponent, Peter Auriol. In the case of divine foreknowledge,
Auriol provided an alternative to the traditional position because he
claimed that the common defense of contingency failed. Auriol's
theory allowed him to preserve the causal role of humans in
reprobation, at the expense perhaps of involving humans in
predestination and therefore coming close to Pelagianism. There were
problems with Auriol's stance, but it was consistent. Gregory,
on the other hand, agreed with the common position on divine
foreknowledge, but when it really counted, in soteriology, Gregory
took this common position to what he (and Auriol) thought was its
logical conclusion. Since God's free creation and action is
really the only source of contingency in the world, then God's
free will is the only real cause of salvation and damnation. Salvation
and damnation are contingent like anything else, but not contingent
upon human free will, but merely on God's will. No doubt for
Gregory, everyone else who held the *opinio communis* should
also have held to Double Predestination or Double Particular Election.
Indeed, at least one of Gregory's immediate predecessors, the
Carmelite Guy Terrena, appears to have agreed (Schabel 2015). Luther
and Calvin agreed with Gregory, but they saw no reason for the logical
devices of the *opinio communis*, which for them as for Auriol
could not save the contingency of human willing.


## 4. Cognition



Epistemology is another subject in which Gregory's thought has
received much attention (e.g. Elie 1937; Dal Pra 1956; Gal
1977; Eckermann 1978; V. Wendland's chapter in Oberman 1981,
242-300; Tachau 1988, 358-71; Bermon 2007; Mandrella 2016;
Girard 2017). Gregory maintains a non-realist position that universals
are formed by the soul and only after the mind has previous
apprehensions of singular things. Thus sensory experience plays a
major role in intellectual cognition. For simple cognition Gregory
adopts the common terminology of the dichotomy between intuitive and
abstractive cognition, although the difference between the two is
based on the objects rather than the modes of cognition. For Gregory,
intuitive cognition terminates immediately at the extramental object,
but abstractive terminates at the object's species in the soul.
The fact that Gregory made room for such species in his theory of
cognition has not gone unnoticed (Corvino 1978; Spruit 2013, 309-313;
Mandrella 2016, 220-223). It has been described as the only difference
between Ockham and Rimini in the epistemology of simple cognition
(Mandrella 2016, 223). Still, Gregory's use of species
conditions his take on universal concepts to such an extent that he
embraces a view Ockham explicitly rejected as especially irrational,
namely the view that universal concepts are qualities really distinct
from mental acts and that remain in the soul independently of whether
a mental act is directed at them or not (Girard 2017, 263).



Inspired by some of Ockham's successors, Gregory argues against
the Venerable Inceptor's claim that via intuitive cognition one
could determine whether a thing does exist or not (Tachau 1988, 363).
In agreement with Auriol against most contemporaries, however, Gregory
also holds that one can have an intuitive cognition of an object that
does not exist, as for example when we see a "broken"
pencil in a glass of water, when there is only an unbroken pencil in
reality. But Auriol is wrong in claiming that this is an instance of
an intuitive cognition of something absent (Tachau 1988, 361), because
for Gregory the cognition is really caused by the species of some
present object, although perhaps not the object that the mind thinks
it is. Therefore Gregory does not adopt Auriol's definition of
intuitive cognition as the cognition when the soul merely thinks that
the object is present. In any case the dichotomy is different for
Gregory because he maintains that abstractive cognition is also
somewhat intuitive, since the species of the object is known
immediately and therefore intuitively.



When it comes to the object of complex cognition, or scientific
knowledge, Gregory's inspiration was Adam Wodeham, who built on
some of Walter Chatton's ideas in developing the *complexe
significabile*. Ockham held that the object of scientific
knowledge is the conclusion of a syllogism, and Gregory rejects this.
Chatton's alternative was that scientific knowledge has as its
object things outside the mind. Gregory also denies this, because



> 
> if this were the case, many sciences would be about contingent things
> that could be different than they are, whereas for strict science the
> object must be eternal and necessary. Every being, however, besides
> God is contingent and not necessary. If things outside the mind were
> the objects of the sciences, then many sciences, physical and
> geometrical, and many others, would be about things other than God,
> and therefore about contingent things (Rimini 1979, 6; Brown 1998a,
> 171).
> 



One can see here how Gregory's stress on the overarching
contingency of creation connects with his epistemology.



Gregory chooses as the object of scientific knowledge the alternative
offered by Adam Wodeham. Chatton's notion of "thing"
in scientific knowledge was the state of affairs signified by both the
negative and the affirmative proposition. For example, "Socrates
is sitting" and "Socrates is not sitting" signify
for Chatton the same thing, not Socrates, not sitting, and not the
propositions, but somehow the whole Socrates's-being-seated.
Although Chatton had his reasons for his theory, Wodeham modified it
in a useful way, differentiating between positive and negative states
of affairs. Thus for Wodeham, each proposition has its own total
significate that is only complexly signifiable (*complexe
significabile*), so that Socrates's-being-seated and
Socrates's-not-being-seated are two different things, the
objects of scientific knowledge.



Gregory adopted Wodeham's theory and tailored it where necessary
to his own thought. The *complexe significabile*, once thought
to be Gregory's invention, is neither the proposition itself,
nor individual things in the world, nor the arrangement of things in
the world. The exact status of Gregory's *complexe
significabile* has been much discussed. In a nutshell, there are
three main interpretations. The first one builds on Gregory's
claim that the *complexe significabile* is nothing
(*nihil*), and thus holds that Gregory does not defend logical
realism (Biard 1989, 183, Libera 2002, 217; Bermon 2007,
166-167). The second interpretation builds on Gregory's
claim that there are senses of "something"
(*aliquid*), "thing" (*res*) and
"being" (*ens*) that can apply to the *complexe
significabile*, and insists that the
*complexe significabile* must be something mind-independent
because of this, although it is not an entity (Elie 1936, 28, 174;
Nuchelmans 1973, 73). The third interpretation concludes from the fact
that the *complexe significabile* is said to be something but
not an entity to the fact that the *complexe significabile*
must be mind-dependent or in the mind (Trapp 1977, 58; Mandrella 2016,
208, as a legitimate hypothesis). Another point of debate concerns how
one should evaluate Gregory's take on Wodeham's ideas.
That debate opposes those who consider Gregory's developments as
a clearer elaboration of the concept (Bermon 2007, 169, 173), and
those who believe Gregory blurred the clear picture Wodeham had given,
thus making the doctrine of the *complexe significabile* an
easy target (Gal 1977, 70; Nuchelmans 1980, 185-186; Zupko
1994-1997, 218).



Gregory famously listed three ways in which some *complexe
significabile* could be said to be true: first, because a
proposition signifying it would be true; second, with reference to the
uncreated truth; third, because it is the case (i.e. it obtains).
These descriptions have sometimes been read as competing ones (Elie
1936, 175). If there is a general agreement that the first way must be
left aside as too weak, since it makes the truth of the *complexe
significabilia* depend on enunciations, it has been claimed that
the second and third ways are compatible with each other (Libera 2002,
253; Conti 2004, 482-483) and even complementary (Bermon 2007,
161-162).



It is also known that Gregory differed from Wodeham in the way he
thought about "assenting to" and "dissenting
from" such *complexe significabilia*, an issue which had
occupied Chatton at length. Wodeham thought of assent pretty much as
an act of the will (Bermon 2007, 319), that can contingently be added
over and above a formed proposition. Gregory distinguishes two kinds
of mental propositions: mental propositions that are not expressed in
a given language, and mental propositions that are expressed in a
given language and that derive from the first kind. For Gregory,
Wodeham's claim is true only of linguistic mental propositions
(Bermon 2007, 343-344). For non-linguistic mental propositions,
it is impossible to dissociate the formation and the acts of assent or
dissent. Formation and assent are associated in such a way that
Gregory can claim that assent is a mental utterance (Bermon 2007,
331).



Gregory applied the notion to a host of philosophical problems, such
as future contingents, and through him the *complexe
significabile* became the common intellectual property of
continental thinkers, and parallel notions are found in many important
later intellectuals. More particularly, recent studies have focused on
the reception of Gregory's doctrine in Pierre Ceffons (Nannini
2015; Corbini 2020).



Apart from *complexe significabilia*, another point of contact
between Wodeham and Gregory in connection with complex cognition is
the debate on the capacity that non-human animals have to make a
judgement (i.e. Reina 1986; Perler 2006, 89-94; Oelze 2018,
123-129). Gregory claims that we need to ascribe sensory
judgments to non-human animals in order to account for their
behaviour, especially for the different responses a same individual
can exhibit to a same stimulus (Oelze 2018, 126-127).



With regard to the mental proposition, although Gregory defends that
the intellect can indeed have simultaneous acts (Friedman 2009, 114;
Dubouclez 2014, 342-347), nevertheless he holds, as Durand of
Saint-Pourcain did, that the mental proposition must consist of
a single act (Friedman 2009, 115).


## 5. Natural Philosophy



Coming to natural philosophy, Gregory of Rimini's conception of
the continuum has been the object of several studies (i.e., Maier 1949,
172-173, 176-177; Cross 1998; Sylla 2005,
260-268). According to Gregory, following Adam Wodeham, the
continuum is not composed of point-like entities, but parts of the
continuum are themselves magnitudes (Cross 1998, 96). Gregory also
claims, this time against Wodeham, that the division of the continuum
can actually be completed, so that it is composed of an actual
infinity of potential extended parts (Cross 1998, 97-98). It is
understood that each of these parts itself includes an infinity of
parts (Cross 1998, 102). That said, a problem is to see how exactly
the division of the continuum can be completed if any part of the
continuum must be said to contain an infinity of parts. It has been
argued that it is in connection with this issue that several scholars
(following Maier 1949, 172-173) read Gregory as holding that
there are infinitesimal parts in the continuum (Cross 1998,
103-104). Yet, in fact, the process is completed, not because
one reaches something that cannot be divided, but because every part
has been actually set apart from the others, including the ones it
contains (Cross 1998, 103). It is in connection with its conception of
a continuum composed of an actual infinity of parts, each themselves
composed of an actual infinity of parts, that Gregory explains how an
infinite can be greater than another by including it (Cross 1998,
105-106; Thakkar 2009, 631-632), thus answering
Bradwardine's objection on infinite parts and wholes (Thakkar
2009, 628-629).



Gregory's views on *minima naturalia* also attracted
attention. Although Gregory acknowledges that there is a minimal
extensive quantity some subject needs to have in order to receive a
given form (Sylla 2011, 403), he rejects the idea that forms of a
given species would have intensive minima, relying on ideas developed
by Richard Kilvington (Knuuttila 1971, 313; Loewe 2014, 320-323).



In general, Gregory's answer to the problem of the intension and
remission of forms (i.e. how to account for increases or decreases of
a given quality) had a life of its own, since it circulated as a
separate treatise, the *Tractatus de intensione et remissione
formarum corporalium* (Loewe 2014, 274). Gregory argued that when
intension occurs, a form of the same species is added to the subject,
so that this new form and the preceding form now constitute a total
form that has per se unity (Loewe 2014, 286, 316).


## 6. Economic Thought



Although his commentary on books I and II of the *Sentences* is
by far Gregory's largest and most important work, historians of
medieval philosophy have recently devoted some attention to his sole
writing on economic thought, which was printed in Reggio Emilia in
1508 as the *Tractatus de imprestantiis Venetorum et de usura*
and reprinted in Rimini itself over a century later in 1622 (Rimini
1508; Lambertini 2003, 2009; Kirshner 2015). The only known manuscript
witness is in a codex containing various political and economic
tracts: Florence, Biblioteca Nazionale Centrale, Conv. Soppr. J. X.
51, ff. 201r-212r. The manuscript carries a different redaction of the
text, but it can be used to correct the printed editions and should
form the basis of a future critical edition. The title and explicit in
the manuscript further identify the work as a *quaestio
disputata* on the forced loans of the Venetian commune according
to the determination of Gregory of Rimini, Master of Theology and
prior general of the Augustinians. Terminology in the text itself
confirms that rather than a purely written work, the piece derives
from an oral disputation, although the internal structure and the
existence of two redactions indicate that it was much revised
afterwards. Since we know that theologians' administrative
responsibilities did not preclude their participation in such events
as quodlibetal disputations, it is possible that the debate took place
while Gregory was his order's prior general as the incipit says,
i.e., in the latter half of 1357 or in 1358, which would make it his
last word on intellectual matters.



Gregory was actually asked two questions, and he combined them in his
determination. The first was whether it was licit for a creditor to
receive interest on a forced loan. Various Italian communes resorted
to forced loans from their citizens to raise money, paying in return
an annual sum but never the principal. In the case of Venice, the
forced lender received 5%. The second question asked whether it was
licit for someone else to acquire the title to the loan from the
forced lender, for a sum smaller than the initial loan, and continue
to receive the annual sum from the commune. For example, the
government could demand $100 from a citizen, promising to pay $5 each
year. Another citizen could then pay $25 to the first citizen and
acquire the right to receive the annual payment of $5.



The issue was a concrete one in the fourteenth century, and several
scholars were asked similar or even identical questions, which allows
us to place Gregory's determination in a historical context. One
writer gave a liberal response to the first question, that the mere
fact that the loan was forced made the creditor's receiving of
5% interest licit, while the same author considered the second
transaction an acceptable contract of sale and not a purchase of a
loan. A more conservative author, on the other hand, viewed the 5% as
usury, unless it constituted a spontaneous gift from the commune to
the citizen and as long as the citizen did not intend to profit. In
this case, the gift could not be purchased licitly by another,
naturally, for the unforced buyer would surely be a usurer.



Gregory's treatment has been singled out as historically
significant. Gregory's procedure reflects his earlier
*Sentences* commentary in his careful structure. Following
opening arguments, Gregory divides the determination into four
articles, first defining his terms, second discussing the sinfulness
of usury, third answering the questions, and fourth responding to the
opening arguments. Although Gregory is a Master of Theology, he
answers the question as a philosopher, employing rational arguments.
For Gregory, usury is wrong pure and simple, since it breaks the rule
of equality in exchanges. One might view this as a conservative
approach, but Gregory's general position may entail a liberal
implementation of his theory, since the determining factor lies in
one's conscience, in one's intent: "Usury is profit
*intended* from a loan." Gregory's emphasis on the
role of intent and conscience here is unusual. In the case at hand,
Venice can legitimately pay the 5% only if the commune's motives
are honorable, either because it believes it is paying for damages or
returning a kindness, although Gregory excludes from the rubric
"damages" the opportunity costs from the resulting
non-acquisition of possible profits, thus further demonstrating his
awareness of business and banking practices. Since Venice pays all
forced creditors such a regular annual fee, however, it does not seem
to Gregory to be paid for either of those reasons. Still, he leaves it
up to the conscience.



This applies to the second question as well. The creditor who has
given the loan in good conscience and without hope of profit has not
committed usury, so he has "a right over the commune" that
he can sell licitly. Moreover, the buyer can purchase this licitly, as
long as he does not intend to profit thereby. But if this is not the
case, if profit is intended, the sin of usury is committed, more
seriously than in the first case, since no force is involved.



Gregory's determination would allow Venice and its creditors to
proceed with their practice of forced loans and creditors'
transfers of annual payments without outward restrictions from the
Church. Perhaps he was being practical given the complexities of the
situation. By stressing the role of intent and conscience, he freed
investors to pursue their projects. But without drawing clear lines
separating the legitimate from the illegitimate, he burdened them to
consider their motives in each and every transaction, warning that
whether they are usurers in truth will be determined before God at the
judgment of souls.


## 7. Conclusion



Now that Gregory's works are available in a reliable modern
edition, he has begun receiving more direct attention, for example in
the collection of papers in Oberman 1981 and in the conference held in
Rimini in 2000 that was devoted to Gregory's life and thought
(published as *Gregorio da Rimini. Filosofo* in Rimini in
2003). It is to be hoped that further studies of his Parisian and
Oxford predecessors on various single issues will enable us to see his
innovations more clearly. Recent studies have shown that he was not
always as original as was once thought, but that does not diminish in
any way his important position in the history of philosophy. Moreover,
Gregory sometimes did come up with new solutions to problems, and even
where he did not, his treatments, because of their clarity and
comprehensiveness, often became the primary source for later thinkers
of the ideas he adopted from his predecessors and developed.