ly as grotesque. The weakness of the method was
recognized by Roger Bacon so early as the thirteenth century. The
growing recognition of its futility finds repeated expression in the
sixteenth and seventeenth centuries, notably in the New Method (Novum
Organum) of Francis Bacon.

Like the scholastic method and the worship of Aristotle, the Disputation
fell into disrepute because of the extravagant lengths to which it was
carried. The following sarcastic criticism by the Spanish scholar, Juan
Luis Vives (1462-1540), is one illustration of the growing revolt of his
times against it:

Disputations, also, to no slight degree have blinded judgment.
They were instituted originally (but only among young men) to
stimulate mental vigor, often torpid, and to make young men
keener in their studies, so that they might either conquer or not
be conquered, and also that the instruction received from their
teachers might be more deeply impressed upon them.

Among men, or older persons, there was a kind of comparison of
opinions and reasons, not aimed at victory but at unravelling the
truth. The very name testifies that they are called disputations
because by their means the truth is, as it were, pruned or purged
[dis = apart; puto = to prune, or to cleanse]. But after praise
and reward came from listeners to the one who seemed to have the
best ideas, and out of the praise often came wealth and
resources, a base greed of distinction or money took possession
of the minds of the disputants, and, just as in a battle, victory
only was the consideration, and not the elucidation of truth. So
that they defended strenuously whatever they once had said, and
overthrew and trampled upon their adversary.

Low and sordid minds such as with drooping heads look solely at
such trivial and ephemeral results, regarded as of small
consequence the great benefit that results from study:--namely
probity or knowledge of truth; and these two things they did not
regard with sufficient acuteness nor did they comprehend their
great value, but they sought the immediate reward of money or
popular favor.

And so, in order to get a greater return for their labor, they
admitted the populace to their contests like the spectators of a
play brought out at the theatre. Then, as one might expect when
the standard is lowered,