A point of view about nature in Italian Humanism

Abstract

This article starts by offering a general overview of the main characteristics of 15th Century Florentine Humanism and its stages. Pico della Mirandola belongs to the stage of cientific and philosophical concerns. The article reviews the basic notions of natural philosophy in Pico’s works and claims that there is a gradual development on these ideas. First, on De hominis dignitate and the Thesis, the author points out the underlying natural philosophy in Pico’s conception of natural magic as a a theoretical and practical knowledge supported by Saint Augustine’s auctoritas. However, in his later works such as the Disputationes adversus astrologiam divinatricem, Pico appeals to Aristotelian authority to deny any supernatural connection between supra and sublunar worlds. In this process, Heptaplus is the pivotal text that reveals the locus hermenuticus from where Pico observes nature. Finally, the conclusion reviews Pico’s notion about natural world, which confirms him as a true representative of Florentine Humanism.

Key words: nature, magic, microcosmus, Humanism.