Proslogion
A short meditation addressed to God, in twenty-six chapters, in which Anselm sets out a single argument that God exists and is what Christians believe him to be. Its first title was Faith Seeking Understanding.
Read the text at ccel.org ↗The same translation on one page (Fordham Medieval Sourcebook) ↗Gaunilo’s reply and Anselm’s answer, printed as an appendix ↗
Anselm wrote the Proslogion at Bec, after the longer Monologion. The preface tells how he looked for one argument that would need no other, nearly gave the search up, and found it while he was trying to put the question out of his mind. He first sent the work out without his name under the title Faith Seeking Understanding and renamed it later.
The work is a prayer as much as an argument: the reasoning of chapters 2 to 4 is spoken to God by someone who already believes. A monk named Gaunilo wrote a reply on behalf of the “fool” of the psalm, and Anselm answered it. The two pieces have travelled with the Proslogion since, and are cited here as its appendix.
Cited in
- about 1078 to 1098, estimated date