Three Books on the Soul and Life
Title
Three Books on the Soul and Life
Description
Juan Luis Vives was a Spanish humanist who wrote about reforming the church and deepening spiritual life. One of his most prominent works was “Three Books on the Soul and Life,” a collection of writings about the soul and its relationship to the body. The various pieces included therein reflect on functions of reproduction, senses, emotion, and memory, which have caused some to label him the father of modern empirical psychology (Casini, 497). Vives’ writing is also notable as somewhat of a challenge to the church, as he states the soul’s functions as more physical, rather than spiritual. Furthermore, he states that the soul is not revealed solely through introspection, but is something that is always concealed— informally challenging the church’s practice of confession (Casini, 502).
Vives wasn’t the only humanist to critique the church. His friend Erasmus also wrote numerous satire pieces about the problems of following church doctrine, and how many chose to only obey it in parts. This criticism, in turn, may have eventually led to the Protestant Reformation— a revolutionary change in the state of world religion (Wiesner-Hanks, 141). Finally, a lot of Vives’ ideas built off Plato and Aristotle’s writings on the soul, meaning Vives' writing provides an important example of humanism— where various scholars studied classic writings and discussed the ideas in further detail. For instance, his definition of the soul as "...the principal agent that inhabits a body equipped for life" comes from a combination of Platonic and Aristotelian ideas (Casini, 503).
Vives wasn’t the only humanist to critique the church. His friend Erasmus also wrote numerous satire pieces about the problems of following church doctrine, and how many chose to only obey it in parts. This criticism, in turn, may have eventually led to the Protestant Reformation— a revolutionary change in the state of world religion (Wiesner-Hanks, 141). Finally, a lot of Vives’ ideas built off Plato and Aristotle’s writings on the soul, meaning Vives' writing provides an important example of humanism— where various scholars studied classic writings and discussed the ideas in further detail. For instance, his definition of the soul as "...the principal agent that inhabits a body equipped for life" comes from a combination of Platonic and Aristotelian ideas (Casini, 503).
Creator
Juan Luis Vives, Veit Amerbach
Source
“Ioannis Lodovici Vivis Valentini de Anima & Vita : Libri Tres ; Eivsdem Argvmenti Viti Amerbachii de Anima Libri IIII, Ex Ultima Autorum Eorundem Recognitione | Juan Luis Vives - Europeana Collections.” Accessed November 13, 2018. https://www.europeana.eu/portal/en/record/2022701/lod_oai_minerva_usc_es_10347____13315_ent0.html?q=De+anima+et+vita+libri+tres+.
Merry E. Wiesner-Hanks, "Cultural and Intellectual Life, 1450-1600" in Early Modern Europe, 1450-1789, (Cambridge, UK: Cambridge University Press, 2013), 141
Lorenzo Casini. "'Quid Sit Anima': Juan Luis Vives on the Soul and Its Relation to the Body." Renaissance Studies 24, no. 4 (2010): 496-517. http://www.jstor.org/stable/24419585.
Date
1555
Contributor
Teddy Wolfe
Rights
Free Re-Use
Original Format
Book
Physical Dimensions
Not available.
Citation
Juan Luis Vives, Veit Amerbach, “Three Books on the Soul and Life,” HIST 139 - Early Modern Europe, accessed July 20, 2025, https://earlymoderneurope.hist.sites.carleton.edu/items/show/30.