SOURCE: Nichols, Aidan. “Anselm of Canterbury and the Language of Perfection.” Downside Review 103, no. 352 (July 1985): 204-17.

In the following essay, Nichols investigates the biographical context of Anselm's Proslogion and defines the work's fundamental aim as the search for a “language of perfection” that would allow one to articulate the transcendent nature of God.

The aim of this article is to reconsider the Proslogion of St Anselm in its historical setting, and to suggest, in the light of recent Anselmian studies, that its basic argument is only acceptable if one shares the ‘fiduciary’ view of language represented, in different ways, by S. T. Coleridge and Martin Heidegger.

The Proslogion in Context

Anselm of Canterbury is the typical monastic philosopher, so much so that his principal contribution to the philosophical tradition is today most easily available in English dress as part of an anthology of his prayers and meditations.¹ This...