Truls Ljungström’s Reviews > Syncretism in the West : Pico's 900 Theses (1486) : The Evolution of Traditional Religious and Philosophical Systems : With a Revised Text, English Translation, and Commentary > Status Update

Pico's theory of knowledge was closely tied to his views of the relative powers of the intellect and will—a topic discussed continuously, and with little significant development, from ancient times through the Renaissance. "When Plato says that only the unwilling sins, he only means what Thomas maintains, namely that there can be no sin in the will, unless there is a defect in reason?"

A large number of the nine hundred theses invoke the traditional Anstotelian distinction between substance and accident—roughly speaking, the difference between the essential "appleness" of an apple and its contingent sweetness or tartness.

It is no accident that Pico's "emanation of wisdom" ends abruptly with the
Arabs. On the whole, in fact, the "nation" of Latin scholastics comes off rather badly in all of Pico's major works, although for systematic reasons he did not repudiate Latin scholastics entirely.