Gram loquitur, Dia verba docet, Rhet verba colorat,
Mus canit, Ar numerat, Geo ponderat, Ast colit astra.

Few have encountered that Latin couplet today, but Lewis introduces it by saying:

Everyone knows that the Arts are Grammar, Dialectic, Rhetoric, Arithmetic, Music, Geometry, and Astronomy. And almost everyone has met the mnemonic couplet” (The Discarded Image, 186).

The Liberal Arts are our subject, which are discussed today almost exclusively by the classical education movement. But it was not so in Lewis’ day. He took for granted that everyone knew the seven Liberal Arts, and he assumed that nearly everyone had encountered the couplet above. Today, we think of the Liberal Arts as being classical, but only a little over a hundred years ago, they were simply a part of any education. And it was an education that extended back to the golden age of Greece. By forgetting the Liberal Arts, we have severed ourselves from two thousand years of our Western heritage.

But mere historicity is not enough reason to conclude our study on the theology of education with the Liberal Arts. Instead, they are very much the nature end point, which ought to leave us with a practice framework for carrying the principles of this series into our everyday education from here on.

We began with the telos of education, establishing that supreme goal of education ought to be to know, love, glorify, and enjoy God forever. Then we considered the tenets of education by considering how Scripture itself uses the Greek word paideia, giving us a biblical means of evaluating different educational methods. We now turn to the Liberal Arts as the tools and lens for pursuing education.

WHAT ARE THE LIBERAL ARTS?

For we let our young men and women go out unarmed, in a day when armour was never so necessary. By teaching them all to read, we have left them at the mercy of the printed word. By the invention of the film and the radio [what would Sayers think of TikTok!], we have made certain that no aversion to reading shall secure them from the incessant battery of words, words, words. They do not know what the words mean; they do not know how to ward them off or blunt their edge or fling them back; they are a prey to words in their emotions instead of being masters of them in their intellects. We who were scandalized in 1940 when men were sent to fight armoured tanks with rifles, are not scandalized when young men and women are sent into the world to fight massed propaganda with a smattering of “subjects”; and when whole classes and whole nations become hypotised by the arts of the spellbinder, we have the impudence to be astonished. We dole out lip-service and, just occasionally, a little grant money; we postpone the school leaving-age, and plan to build bigger and better schools; the teachers slave conscientiously in and out of school-hours, till responsibility becomes a burden and a nightmare; and yet, as I believe, all this devoted effort is largely frustrated, because we have lost the tools of learning, and in their absence can only make a botched and piecemeal job of it.

That quotation is from Dorothy Sayer’s essay called the Lost Tools of Learning, in which she argues for a return to the trivium. I fundamentally agree with Sayers’ assessment of where modern education has left us and of our need to recover the Trivium. I disagree, however, with her when she says explicitly that the quadrivium is for scholars. Here we are going to address the importance of recovering the full liberal arts, both the trivium and the quadrivium.

So, what are the liberal arts, and how they can help us address the problems with modern education that Sayers addressed? The liberal arts are the foundational skills necessary for every field of learning, equipping men and women with the freedom to pursue wisdom in every vocation. They are divided into two groups. Grammar, dialectic, and rhetoric form the trivium, while arithmetic, geometry, music, and astronomy make up the quadrivium.

Notice that I called them skills rather than knowledge. A skill is much closer to what is meant by an art. Today, we view art as simply a means of self-expression. That, however, is a modern understanding of art. For most of history, arts were skills and crafts that needed to be taught, practiced, and perfected. We will use this when we speak of the martial arts today.

This is a critical point because there are also subjects and stages. All seven liberal arts are also subjects to be studied, and Sayers made tremendously valuable insight in mapping grammar, dialectic, and rhetoric onto stages of childhood development. But we are not going to speak about the subject nor the stage of grammar but about the art or skill of grammar.

As a skill, we should think of the liberal arts with two metaphors: tools and lenses. They are tools in our hands like a hammer, and they are lenses for our eyes like glasses.

And they are called the liberal arts because they are the skills that enable us to pursue freedom. They are certainly liberal in the sense that they are free to every human being. Indeed, I would argue that every human being does use them to some extent. The only question is whether we use them well or poorly.

But they also equip us to pursue freedom, which is not the ability to do whatever we want. As we noted already, freedom is the ability to achieve one’s telos. A fish is most free when it is able to swim. A bird is most free whenever it is able to fly. You and I are most free whenever we are equipped to know, love, glorify, and enjoy God forever. The liberal arts are the tools and lenses for that pursuing that freedom, that telos. Therefore, they are not for merely for scholars or school children. They are for everyone, young and old, regardless of profession and vocation.

THE LANGUAGE ARTS

Let us now briefly consider the liberal arts. We begin with the trivium, which are grammar, dialectic, and rhetoric. The purpose of the trivium is to provide us with the three essential language arts for the everlasting pursuit of knowing, loving, glorifying, and enjoying God, especially through His Word. We call the trivium the language arts, and they are the foundational skills by which we learn almost everything. Indeed, Sayers says in her essay that language is the means by which we learn nearly everything.

The subject of grammar refers to learning how a language works. You learn words, letters, and rules. The art of grammar is the skill of acquiring foundational knowledge or basic building blocks of any given subject. This applies to all learning, whether you are learning calculus or welding. You always begin with the foundational knowledge of any subject or skill.

Dialectic is the art of rightly ordering and testing knowledge through reason and dialogue. In the book of Proverbs, knowledge is a good parallel for grammar, while understanding is a parallel for dialectic. Grammar asks what, while dialectic asks why. Dialectic is the skill of thinking logically and reasonably, but it is also to be done in community. Dialectic should be strengthened in dialogue with others both personally and literarily. It is the argument, questioning, defending, and ultimate pursuit of truth that leads to a conversation becoming like iron sharpening iron.

Here particularly is where we begin to see the kind of armor that Sayers said so many lack. Dialectic is the questioning without becoming quarrelsome. Even the great books are not infallible authorities (that is Scripture alone, as we discussed last time). In fact, Mortimer Adler calls them the Great Conversation precisely because they are a conversation throughout the history about the ideas that humanity continues to wrestle with. Through dialectic, we should become charitably skeptical.

Rhetoric is the art of communicating knowledge and reason wisely and persuasively for the good of others and to the glory of God. Of course, my definition is an explicitly Christian of rhetoric. For the ancients and Medievals, rhetoric was the most beautiful and most practical of the trivium, and we can certainly agree. If grammar corresponds to knowledge and dialectic to understanding, then rhetoric corresponds to wisdom. Rhetoric is the skill of being able to properly communicate to others, which is essential because no man is an island. Also, consider the Feynman technique.

Regardless of one’s vocation, these are skills that we need constantly: to know, to understand, and to communicate. That is the trivium. But most significantly, we need the trivium in order to know, understand, and communicate God’s Word. God has spoken to us through a book. The highest usage of the arts of grammar, dialectic, and rhetoric is the pursuit of God through the Scriptures. Why do you need to be skilled in grammar? To read Scripture. Why do you need to be equipped in dialectic? To read Scripture rightly. Why do you need to be trained in the art of rhetoric? To communicate Scripture effectively to others.

THE MATHEMATICAL ARTS

Now we come to the forgotten or perhaps neglected liberal arts: the quadrivium. These are the arts of arithmetic, geometry, music, and astronomy. The purpose of the quadrivium is to have the mathematical arts for reading and understanding God’s world, equipping us for the everlasting pursuit of knowing, loving, glorifying, and enjoying Him.

Again, we must differentiate between the subjects and the arts. Arithmetic as a subject is simple enough. Addition, multiplication, subtraction, and division are the core components to master. However, the art of arithmetic is essentially the art of numbers themselves. The art of geometry, likewise, is deeper than learning shapes and proofs; it is the skill of understanding numbers in space. Music, as an art, is numbers in time, while astronomy is numbers in both space and time. Because each is rooted in number rather than word, these are the mathematical arts.

Math, as many have argued, is the language of the universe. Scripture tells us that God created the world in an orderly way, and mathematics are one of the chief ways that we are able to perceive that order.

Indeed, in theology, we speak of two forms of revelation by which God makes Himself known to us: special and general revelation. God’s special revelation is His Word. His general revelation is His world. David tells us this in Psalm 19, as does Paul in Romans 1. Therefore, if the supreme use of the trivium is God’s Word, then the supreme use of the quadrivium is God’s world.

Let us, then, briefly consider these four arts.

What is arithmetic? Arithmetic is the art of understanding number and numerical relationships, revealing the order and quantity with which God has structured His creation. Recognizing order almost always begins with quantity. After all, most infants learn to recognize that five is more than one before they recognize the difference between a circle and a square.

Geometry comes next. It is the art of understanding number in space, revealing the forms and proportions of God’s created world.

Next comes music, which is the art of understanding number in time through rhythm, melody, and harmony, reflecting the beauty of God’s creation.

Finally, astronomy is the art of number in space and time through the study of the heavens, revealing the grandeur of God’s creation and orienting our place within it. Astronomy as an art is more about understanding the enormity and beauty of the cosmos as a whole through considering the heavens.

Thus, putting the four together, arithmetic is the skill of understanding quantity, geometry is the skill of understanding form and structure, music is the skill of recognizing harmony and rhythm, and astronomy is the skill of orienting that knowledge within the rest of the cosmos.

A consider a tree. Through arithmetic, we focus on one tree, while understanding that there are many. Through geometry, we consider the form and structure of the tree, perhaps how it reaches up to the heavens while being firmly rooted in the ground. Through music, we perhaps consider how the trees sways with the wind or how it fits with the trees around it to create a forest. Wtih astronomy, we consider the trees role in creation. Astronomy is a wonderful place for pondering over Aristotle’s four causes.

Of course, take a subject like Latin. It should be clear how the trivium applies to learning Latin, but what about the quadrivium? Through arithmetic, we might recognize that there are only five declensions to learn, which sounds intimidating but is ultimately finite and, therefore, doable. Geometry might be seen in recognizing patterns like most singular accusative forms end with M. Music seems to be the most easily applied to language because every language has a rhythm and harmony to it. In Latin, it would be recognizing that ‘vacca magnus’ is dissonant but ‘vacca magna’ is harmonious. To feel that in English, consider these two phrases: the plastic red old round rough big spoon OR the big rough round old red plastic spoon. The second has a harmony that the first lacks because we tend to put our adjectives in a certain order. Finally, astronomy would be about seeing and remembering the purpose for which you are learning Latin.

And we could apply these to learning quite literally anything.

USING THE LIBERAL ARTS

The beauty of the liberal arts is that they are free to all of us and they are freeing to us. But how do we actually start using them for ourselves and teaching them to our children?

First, we can shape them into evaluative questions so that we can better recognize the liberal arts whenever we are using them. For the trivium, grammar asks: What is it? Dialectic asks: Why is it? Rhetoric asks: How should I communicate it? For the quadrivium, arithmetic asks: How much? Geometry asks: How is it formed? Music asks: How is it harmonized (or even beautiful)? Astronomy asks: How does it fit with the whole?

Of course, we can then expand them further.

• Grammar: What new words or terms do I need to learn or teach? What are the basic facts that I need to know about this?
• Dialectic: How do these ideas fit together? Why is this true? What evidence supports it? How does it relate to what I already know?
• Rhetoric: Can I explain this clearly to someone else? How might I try to persuade someone that this is true? Why does this matter? How can this benefit others? How does this glorify God?
• Arithmetic: What quantities or relationships am I noticing? How is God bringing order here through number?
• Geometry: What patterns, structures, or proportions do I see here? How has God arranged this?
• Music: What rhythms, harmonies, or recurring patterns are present? How do the parts work together as a whole? What makes this beautiful? What is the dissonance happening here?
• Astronomy: Where does this fit within the larger whole? How does this help me to understand God’s world? What does this teach me about my place in God’s creation?

These are not a checklist to follow but only some samples that I could think of. We could certainly keep thinking of more.

Second, since the liberal arts are tools and lenses, there is a four-fold movement to how they are used: first, they are explicitly taught; second, they are modeled; third, they become habitual; and fourth, they become a part of us.

That, after all, is the same pattern that a carpenter learns to use a hammer. First, he is taught how to properly use it. Then it is modeled for him. Next, he starts to actually use it. Eventually, the hammer becomes an extension of his hand. He forgets that it is even there while he uses it.

The same is true of glasses. When we first put them on, everything looks different, and we might even get dizzy. But soon, they clear our vision, and we entirely forget about them because we are simply seeing through them.

For much of history, the liberal arts were simply modeled and then used.

How does that work with the liberal arts?

Students need to be taught that they exist. They need to be aware that they exist. One of the best ways to do this is through a catechism, like the one I have, where you can teach children to memorize these things. At really young ages, they don’t need to be taught exactly why they are, but memorization gives a peg to explain later.

They must also be modeled for students. One of the best ways to do this is that when approaching whatever subject you are teaching, you can show how we learn through the trivium and the quadrivium by turning them into evaluative questions, such as the examples above.

Then third, they start becoming habits. If you as the teacher start asking these kinds of questions, start framing how the students are learning and how they’re evaluating their learning through the liberal arts, through these lenses, and you’re showing them how they’re using these tools, then the point where you start to notice that they’re becoming a habit is when the students start asking these questions for themselves. Eventually, the teachers don’t need to ask these questions as explicitly anymore because these become second nature to the students.

Eventually, that leads to the fourth point: they become transparent. They become a part of the student, and that’s the beautiful place. We have to focus explicitly on the liberal arts like we’ve done this evening because most of us have never been taught them. We do need to teach them explicitly, but the goal of them as tools and as lenses is for them to blend into the background, to simply become a part of us. The goal is to let them fade into the background and simply let them be used. They become an everyday part of us.

As they become transparent, it’s not that they become less important, but they become so important that we no longer notice they’re even there. They just become a fabric of who we are, a part of who we are.

The reason why that is so important is because these are the tools and lenses through which we learn who God is, and we can cultivate the wisdom for living wisely in His world and for living wisely according to His Word.

So that’s the goal with using the liberal arts: that through them, we would know God more, so that we would love Him more, so that we can glorify Him by doing what He commands us, and we can ultimately one day see Him face to face, and enjoy Him forever.