How easily a university might grow up about the
personality of some eminent teacher is shown by the career of Abelard. The
eldest son of a noble family in Brittany, Abelard would naturally have entered
upon a military career, but he chose instead the life of a scholar and the
contests of debate. When still a young man he came to Paris and attended the
lectures given by a master of the cathedral school of Notre Dame. Before long
he had overcome his instructor in discussion, thus establishing his own
reputation. At the early age of twenty-two Abelard himself set up as a
lecturer. Few teachers have ever attracted so large and so devoted a following.
His lecture room under the shadow of the great cathedral was filled with a
crowd of youths and men drawn from all countries.
UNIVERSITY OF PARIS
The fame of Abelard led to an increase of masters and
students at Paris and so paved the way for the establishment of the university
there, later in the twelfth century. Paris soon became such a center of
learning, particularly in theology and philosophy, that a medieval writer
referred to it as "the mill where the world's corn is ground, and the
hearth where its bread is baked." The university of Paris, in the time of its
greatest prosperity, had over five thousand students. It furnished the model
for the English university of Oxford, as well as for the learned institutions
of Scotland, Denmark, Sweden, and Germany.
