This aim he formulated in the celebrated “ Law of Parcimony”, commonly called “Ockham’s Razor”: “Entia non sunt multiplicanda sine necessitate”. The aim of this reformation movement in general was simplification. In philosophy William advocated a reform of Scholasticism both in method and in content. He even went so far as to advocate the validity of the adulterous marriage of Louis’s son, on the grounds of political expediency, and the absolute power of the State in such matters. He denies the right of the popes to exercise temporal power, or to interfere in any way whatever in the affairs of the Empire. In his controversial writings William of Ockham appears as the advocate of secular absolutism. It was to Louis that he made the boastful offer, “Tu me defendas gladio ego te defendam calamo”. He was cited before the pontifical Court at Avignon in 1328, but managed to escape and join John of Jandun and Marsilius of Padua, who had taken refuge at the Court of Louis of Bavaria. In the controversies which were waged at that time between the advocates of the papacy and those who supported the claims of the civil power, he threw his lot with the imperial party, and contributed to the polemical literature of the day a number of pamphlets and treatises, of which the most important are “Opus nonaginta dierum”, “Compendium errorum Joannis Papae XXII”, “Quaestiones octo de auctoritate summi pontificis”. In 1323 he resigned his chair at the university in order to devote himself to ecclesiastical politics. During this portion of his career he composed his works on Aristotelean physics and on logic.

About 1320 he became a teacher (magister) at the University of Paris. Towards 1310 he went to Paris, where he may have had Scotus once more for a teacher.

At an early age he entered the Order of St. He is said to have studied at Merton College, Oxford, and to have had John Duns Scotus for teacher. at or near the village of Ockham in Surrey, England, about 1280 d. William of Ockham, fourteenth-century Scholastic philosopher and controversial writer, b.

William of ockham opus nonaginta dierum