Previously Unpublished Works, Fascicle 5

Manuscripts of the Secret of Secrets The Secretum Secretorum was a widely influential medieval book of advice for kings, falsely attributed to Aristotle writing to Alexander the Great. have gone so far as to introduce the preface of John of Seville original: "Hispalensis" into the text at page 68.

There can hardly be any doubt that Philip was French speaking. The use of ache (parsley) and betes (beets, page 97) is sufficient proof. We also have several Latin words used in the sense of their French derivatives: probus for valiant original: "preux", indiscretus for indiscreet, extraneus for strange original: "étrange", bajulus for bailiff original: "bailli", and citra mare (this side of the sea) in opposition to outre-mer (across the sea), and so on. We are referred to a dissertation by Taube which I have been unable to see for other proofs by C. B. Hase.

The Official Revision of Philip’s Translation.

The difference in order between the Arabic and Latin texts points to the conclusion that an extensive work of revision was carried on before the form in which we now have the Latin text was established. The most important changes, as has already been said, were the elimination of the magical element in the tenth discourse and the removal of the physiognomy physiognomy: the practice of assessing a person's character or personality from their outer appearance, especially the face. from the end of the Arabic second discourse to take its place as the Latin tenth book. Even if we had only Philip’s preface before us, we might be led to suspect some tampering with the book, since we find in the body of the common Latin text nothing of the performing of incantations, sky-divination, and earth-divination original: "operandi incantaciones et celimanciam et geomanciam" of which he speaks (page 26²⁹) in his dedication.

As a matter of fact, Bacon tells us plainly that some such process of editing had taken place before he undertook to explain the work. "And many copies do not have that teaching, because fools did not want to write it, but they erased it from their books, just as the four copies that I now found at Oxford did not have them, nor similarly many others, but at Paris I had perfect copies" original: "Et multa exemplaria non habent illam doctrinam, quia stulti non voluerunt scribere, set abrarserunt a libris suis, sicut exemplaria quatuor que nunc inveni Oxonie non habuerunt illa, nec similiter multa alia, set Parisius habui exemplaria perfecta" (page 39³¹). "Also, since in the correction of this version I had four copies, I know that certain chapters were taken away from them through the foolishness of some. And therefore let them be sought in other copies. For I used to have the whole as much as was translated" original: "Item cum in correccione istius exemplaris habui quatuor exemplaria, scio quod ablata sunt ab eis quedam capitula per stulticiam aliquorum. Et ideo querantur in aliis exemplaribus. Solebam enim habere integrum quantum fuit translatum" (page 172¹⁰).

It would be tempting to connect this revision with that ordered by Pope Gregory IX in 1231 of the books on nature original: "libri naturales", which were not to be used "until they have been examined and purged from all suspicion of errors" original: "quousque examinati fuerint, et ab omni errorum suspicione purgati", but there is absolutely no reason for doing so.

We have no manuscripts which represent this earliest form of Philip’s version, and Bacon’s is the fullest text we have. However, there are traces of the earlier order in the indexes of many of the common manuscripts, in which (only in the index) the tract of Physiognomy comes before