{"id":1081,"date":"2021-04-28T04:38:10","date_gmt":"2021-04-28T04:38:10","guid":{"rendered":"https:\/\/tgenloe.com\/?p=1081"},"modified":"2025-07-21T15:40:51","modified_gmt":"2025-07-21T15:40:51","slug":"the-liberating-knowledge-of-letters-literature","status":"publish","type":"post","link":"https:\/\/tgenloe.com\/?p=1081","title":{"rendered":"The Liberating Knowledge of Letters (Literature)"},"content":{"rendered":"\n<p>Here\u2019s a snippet from a letter about the educated man, written ca. 1160 A.D.:<\/p>\n\n\n\n<blockquote class=\"wp-block-quote is-layout-flow wp-block-quote-is-layout-flow\"><p>&#8230;it is the knowlege of letters [literature] that leads one forth from the common ignorance of human beings and from the stolid torpor that characterizes the dull-witted, and renders to its pupil glorious liberty. And so the pagans rightly called the art of letters a liberal art, because this art liberates the one who studies it from the common lot of human beings enslaved to confusion; the one who obtains a mastery of letters is no longer oppressed and overwhelmed by the fetters of lethargy which bind the unlearned.\u00a0<\/p><cite><strong>&#8211; Philip of Harvengt, abbot of Bonne Esperance, to Henry, Count of Champagne (As translated by Robert Ziomkowski in\u00a0<em>Readings in Medieval Political Theory 1100-1400<\/em>\u00a0[Indianapolis and Cambridge: Hackett Publishing Company, Inc., 1993], pg. 65.)<\/strong><\/cite><\/blockquote>\n","protected":false},"excerpt":{"rendered":"<p>Here\u2019s a snippet from a letter about the educated man, written ca. 1160 A.D.: &#8230;it is the knowlege of letters [literature] that leads one forth from the common ignorance of human beings and from the stolid torpor that characterizes the dull-witted, and renders to its pupil glorious liberty. And so the pagans rightly called the [&hellip;]<\/p>\n","protected":false},"author":1,"featured_media":0,"comment_status":"closed","ping_status":"closed","sticky":false,"template":"","format":"standard","meta":{"footnotes":""},"categories":[3,11],"tags":[],"class_list":["post-1081","post","type-post","status-publish","format-standard","hentry","category-education-general","category-literature"],"_links":{"self":[{"href":"https:\/\/tgenloe.com\/index.php?rest_route=\/wp\/v2\/posts\/1081","targetHints":{"allow":["GET"]}}],"collection":[{"href":"https:\/\/tgenloe.com\/index.php?rest_route=\/wp\/v2\/posts"}],"about":[{"href":"https:\/\/tgenloe.com\/index.php?rest_route=\/wp\/v2\/types\/post"}],"author":[{"embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/tgenloe.com\/index.php?rest_route=\/wp\/v2\/users\/1"}],"replies":[{"embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/tgenloe.com\/index.php?rest_route=%2Fwp%2Fv2%2Fcomments&post=1081"}],"version-history":[{"count":1,"href":"https:\/\/tgenloe.com\/index.php?rest_route=\/wp\/v2\/posts\/1081\/revisions"}],"predecessor-version":[{"id":1082,"href":"https:\/\/tgenloe.com\/index.php?rest_route=\/wp\/v2\/posts\/1081\/revisions\/1082"}],"wp:attachment":[{"href":"https:\/\/tgenloe.com\/index.php?rest_route=%2Fwp%2Fv2%2Fmedia&parent=1081"}],"wp:term":[{"taxonomy":"category","embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/tgenloe.com\/index.php?rest_route=%2Fwp%2Fv2%2Fcategories&post=1081"},{"taxonomy":"post_tag","embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/tgenloe.com\/index.php?rest_route=%2Fwp%2Fv2%2Ftags&post=1081"}],"curies":[{"name":"wp","href":"https:\/\/api.w.org\/{rel}","templated":true}]}}