Editing Bernard of Chartres (section)

== Contemporary accounts ==

[[Gilbert de la Porrée]] and [[William of Conches]] were students of his, and their writings reference his work, as do the writings of [[John of Salisbury]].  According to the latter, Bernard composed a prose treatise named ''De expositione Porphyrii'', a metrical treatise on the same subject, a moral poem on education, and probably a fourth work seeking to reconcile Plato and Aristotle. Fragments of these treatises are found in John's ''Metalogicon'' (IV, 35) and ''Policraticus'' (VII, 3).<ref>[[Migne]], ''[[Patrologia Latina]]'', Vol. CXLIX, coll. 938 and 666.</ref> [[Hauréau]]<ref>''Catholic Encyclopedia'', I, 408</ref> confounds Bernard of Chartres with [[Bernardus Silvestris]], and assigns to the former works which are to be ascribed to the latter.

The earliest attribution of the phrase "[[standing on the shoulders of giants]]" is to Bernard (by [[John of Salisbury]]):
{{quote|Bernard of Chartres used to say that we [the Moderns] are like dwarves perched on the shoulders of giants [the Ancients], and thus we are able to see more and farther than the latter. And this is not at all because of the acuteness of our sight or the stature of our body, but because we are carried aloft and elevated by the magnitude of the giants.<ref>John of  Salisbury, ''Metalogicon'', Book III, Chapter 4. Cfr. Troyan, Scott D., Medieval Rhetoric: A Casebook, London, Routledge, 2004, p. 10.</ref>}}