ON SAINT LANTBERT, FORMER ABBOT OF FONTENELLE, ARCHBISHOP OF LYON.
ABOUT THE YEAR 688.
PrefaceLantbert, from Abbot of Fontenelle, Archbishop of Lyon in Gaul (St.)
BY G. H.
[1] Fontenelle, on the river Seine in present-day Normandy, between Rouen and the Ocean, an illustrious Abbey, was built in the seventh century of Christ by St. Wandregisilus, from whom also it is commonly called St. Wandrille. Chronicle of Fontenelle, To this founder and first Abbot, St. Lantbert, of whom we now treat, was subrogated. There exists a Chronicle of Fontenelle, sometimes cited by us from our copy, afterwards published by Luc d'Achery in volume 3 of the Spicilegium, drawn up in the time of the Emperor Louis the Pious: and because at that time the method of reckoning time from the birth of Christ and inserting Indictions with years or at least the names of the Roman Pontiffs was in its first vigor, the same was done by the author of the said Chronicle and by the writers of the said monastery;
even in earlier centuries, in which such calculation had not yet been adopted in Gaul. Hence not without various errors such notes are found inserted in the Acts of SS. Wandregisilus, and various Lives of Saints have years of Christ inserted wrongly. Lantbert and their successor Abbots, indeed also in the Life of St. Audoenus Archbishop of Rouen, by whom St. Wandregisilus was initiated into sacred Orders, in whose diocese he built his monastery: There exists a double Life of St. Wandregisilus, both by a contemporary author; in one of which, by an author who was a monk of Fontenelle, from the Chronicle of Fontenelle; so that it might be known when the said monastery was built, this note of time is inserted: "This work began from the year of the Lord's Incarnation 645, on the day of the Kalends of March, Indiction III, which was the 11th year of King Clovis, with the most blessed Pope Martin presiding in the Seat of the Roman Church in his 7th year." Thus there. But with the said year 645 only Indiction III agrees. But St. Martin the Pope was only created in the month of July of the year 649, and so much the more distant is his 7th year, which he had in the month of March far from his Roman See in exile, with St. Eugene II already substituted in his place as Vicar. Finally the 11th year of Clovis found by them, because they wished him to have been substituted for his father Dagobert I in the year 633 and indeed from the 19th day of January, so that in the 3rd year of Clovis, of Christ 635, they might assert that SS. Eloi and Audoenus were consecrated Bishops on May 14, the Sunday before Rogations or the Ascension of Christ, which in the said year with cycle of the Moon 9, of the Sun 28, Dominical letter A, and Easter concurring on the 9th day of April, these things would have agreed in this manner. But how the aforesaid things about the consecration of Bishops Eloi and Audoenus are to be taken, we give in the Dissertation on the three Dagoberts Kings of the Franks, renewed and established, and illustrated with new characters of the times, before the third volume of this month of April: whence we conclude that, in the said Chronicle of Fontenelle, the death of Dagobert I is anticipated by five years.
[2] We say moreover that, Dagobert having died in the year 638, on the 19th day of January, In the year 648 Fontenelle was built: Clovis II succeeded, and his 11th year of reign corresponds to the year 648, in which year the cenobium of Fontenelle began to be built on the day of the Kalends of March. From which day St. Wandregisilus lived until July 22, of the year 667, in which he died, in the 19th year of his rule, 4th month, 21st day, which is called the eleventh year of Chlothar III in the said Life of St. Wandregisilus, in the year 667 St. Lantbert succeeds St. Wandregisilus, who succeeded his father Clovis in the year 656. Therefore in the 11th year of this Chlothar, of Christ 667 still in the month of July, St. Lantbert was created Abbot of Fontenelle: and because he governed the same monastery for 13 years and 8 months, he left it at least at the end of March of the year 681, in which he was ordained Archbishop of Lyon: Meanwhile while he was Abbot, King Chlothar III having died, in the year 670 declining toward the end, his younger Brother Theodoric succeeded, and when he was expelled in the year 671 Childeric was summoned from Austrasia, who when he had not fully ruled four years, ordained in the year 681 Archbishop of Lyon. killed in the year 675, had Theodoric his brother as successor: in whose 6th year St. Ansbert succeeded St. Lantbert in the government of the Fontenelle cenobium: and his second year corresponds to the 7th year of the reign of Theodoric, as Aigrad relates in the Life of St. Condedus on October 21, and confirms our calculation. Indeed in the same Life of St. Condedus the 3rd year of King Theodoric, and the 11th year of St. Lantbert (for so the characters inverted from IX must be corrected, as the passage indicated before demands) on October 10 agree in the year of Christ 678. But the said Ansbert, by St. Lantbert and other Bishops was consecrated as Archbishop of Rouen, when on the 24th of August, St. Audoenus, Bishop of the same city, had died in the year 683, he consecrates in the year 683 St. Ansbert Archbishop of Rouen. that is after 43 years, 4 months and 10 days of rule. Where again the Fontenelle interpolators placed the year 677, in the published and MS. Life. But from their established principles it should have been the following year 678, perhaps erroneously noted by an easy error of copyists. However long St. Lantbert governed the said Church of Lyon, is not clear. Mabillon refers the year of his death to the year 688; but on what argument he relied, he does not indicate.
[3] Aigrad, a contemporary author, wrote the Acts of St. Lantbert, as also of SS. Ansbert and Condedus. But hitherto only some fragment of them, A fragment of the Life is given with analecta found by Luc d'Achery and published in the Appendix of the Acts, which d'Achery and Mabillon published concerning the Saints of the Benedictine Order: from whose part 2 of volume 3 we here give the same fragment, and illustrate it with our notes: and we attach to it what is held concerning the same in the Acts of SS. Ansbert, Hermeland, Erembert and Condedus; all of whom under the same St. Lantbert led a monastic life among the Fontenelle. There is also an illustrious mention of the same St. Lantbert in the cited Life of St. Wandregisilus: which is nearly the same, as some things from the Life of St. Ansbert, are repeated below in the Fragment of this Life, and therefore we omit them.
[4] The sacred cultus of St. Lantbert among the Fontenelle is ancient, and can thence be gathered, sacred cultus, because among them there existed some old copy of the Hieronymian Martyrology, in which as on July 22 in the first place is referred with illustrious encomium the memorial of St. Wandregisilus, and on March 9 toward the end the memorial of St. Ansbert, and on April 30 the translation of St. Erembert; so on this day April 14 these words were inscribed: "And in the city of Lyon the passing of Dom Landibert the Bishop." Which words afterwards in the Lucca codex were intruded by the copyist among the Martyrs of Interamna, of whom we have treated; perhaps because they had been inscribed in the margin before. In the MS. codex Blumianum of the same Hieronymian Martyrology, with a few things changed, it is called the Deposition of Landibert. In the MS. Martyrology of Brussels of the Church of St. Gudula, which is the principal of the said city, these things are read: "The passing of St. Lantbert Bishop of Lyon, disciple of St. Wandregisilus, and second Rector of the cenobium of Fontenelle after him." Nearly the same things are held in the MS. Florarium Sanctorum. In the ancient Breviary of Fontenelle his festivity is expressed in red letters. Grevenus and Molanus in the Additions to Usuard make mention of St. Lantbert on the same day, and again Molanus with a longer encomium in the Natales Sanctorum Belgii, Miraeus in the Belgian and Burgundian Fasti, Saussay in the Gallican Martyrology, Canisius in the German, and with these the Tables of the Roman Martyrology in these words: "At Lyon, of St. Lambert Bishop and Confessor." We were at Lyon and Fontenelle in the year 1662, and learned that in this cenobium he is celebrated with solemn cultus: but at Lyon we received the Calendar and Lives of the Saints of the Breviary of Lyon, by the author Stephen Vernay the Priest, whence we have an illustrious encomium taken from his Acts: such as Theophile Raynaud published, but much more copiously, in his Indiculus of the Saints of Lyon.
[5] A controversy has recently arisen concerning the Rule which St. Wandregisilus prescribed to his followers, and which SS. Lantbert and Ansbert observed. also among the Benedictines. We, outside the line of the dispute, to the Life of St. Ansbert we brought forward the long elogium of Wion, and then we cited Dorganius and Menardus. In the same manner we do in this place. Trithemius in book 4 of the Lives of the Illustrious of the Order of St. Benedict, chapter 4, celebrates St. Lantbert, but erroneously makes him Archbishop of Bourges: when this error had been corrected, Wion, Dorganius, Menardus, Bucelinus inscribed him in the Benedictine Martyrologies. Charles Lecointe opposes himself to the Benedictines in the Ecclesiastical Annals of the Franks under the year 667, number 1 and following, and under the year 734 number 69. Against him Jean Mabillon in the Preface to part 2 of volume 3 of the Acts of the Benedictine Saints, number 35 and following, defends the Benedictines and rejects the arguments of the other: all of which can be seen there in the said authors. Whatever may be about the opposition of Lecointe, the ancient cultus of St. Lantbert suffices, which the Benedictines can and must retain among the Saints of their Order.
[6] The Life now to be given had this title prefixed to it: "Begin the Acts of Blessed Lantbert the Abbot, who was the second after Blessed Genesius made Prelate of the Church of Lyon, Title of the Life. and after the life-giving Wandregisilus Rector of the cenobium of Fontenelle for thirteen years and eight months, who also built the cenobium of Donzère in the region called Provincia, above the river Rhone, in whose time very many things accrued to our Church." Thus there. From which we gather that the Author of the Life was a monk of Fontenelle, and as we said Aigrad the contemporary author. Now St. Lantbert was the second Bishop of Lyon from St. Genesius, that is, his nearest successor.
FRAGMENT OF THE LIFE.
Drawn from MSS. by Luc d'Achery.
Lantbert, from Abbot of Fontenelle, Archbishop of Lyon in Gaul (St.)
BHL Number: 4675
[1] Lantbert, a man exceedingly distinguished, and sprung from the lineage of the most noble family, born of a father, by name a Erlebert in the territory of Thérouanne, succeeds first in the government of the cenobium to the great Priest of the Lord and in Christ the admirable Father b Wandregisilus. St. Lantbert of Thérouanne, He in the court of the young King Chlothar, son of c Clovis, first served in a secular habit, although his mind panted more for another warfare, having left the King's court as the outcome of the matter is an indication. Finally in the d eighth year of the young King, having deserted the warfare of the corruptible King, and having laid aside the swords formed from e iron, he most devotedly flew to the shining camps of Christ; and clothed with the helmet of salvation, the breastplate of faith, and the sword of the Holy Spirit, he happily fought against the invisible enemy. He received also the tonsure of his head in this cenobium, under the aforesaid venerable Father Wandregisilus of holy memory, that is in the fourth year before the servant of Christ himself entered the way of the Fathers. For there were uncles of his, most distinguished men and most noble in the world, whose names are e Rotbert and Altbert (of whom the former Rotbert at that time had been chief Referendary of the palace, Led by his uncles to Fontenelle, he becomes a monk: the second Altbert at a later time received from the holy man Lantbert himself the habit of the f Clerical state), who led the same distinguished man honorably to this cenobium of Fontenelle, though they wished to turn him from this intention, so that he might rather remain in the secular habit. Who on the day of the cutting of his hair, among other little gifts of various kinds, bestowed seventy gold solidi on the aforesaid great Father, which in his ornaments had been inserted by smith's work, namely in the baldric, belts and bracelets. For he was of most wealthy and honorable parents, and in the royal house was to be honored not moderately, but shining in the greatest honor: for just as he showed himself noble in worldly affairs, so he rendered himself more noble by the innocence of his life. Now the aforesaid
admirable Father of the cenobium loved him, on account of the distinguished operation of his chaste conversation in him. By what order indeed he took up the order of government after him, is now to be said in the present work.
[2] When therefore the blessed aforesaid g Wando of Christ had held this cenobium in his government for 19 years and h five months from the first day of its building, he succeeds St. Wandregisilus: and was already placed in decrepit and old age, the same, ninety-six years old, is seized with a slight illness before the day of his death. And already being placed in his last moments, and intent on the agony of his dissolution, the whole company of the Brothers asks of him whom he would appoint as Rector over them after his departure. To whom he is said to have given this response: "God, my dearest Sons, I believe, will after my death provide you the best Rector: I however, a suppliant servant, implore his clemency, that he may grant to his family a worthy steward, who may grant it a double provision. But you, dearest ones, consult his will, and place in his judgment always what is to be done, and no longer weary my course, but rather protect me with your prayers, and always remember my admonitions. I commend today your care to Christ the highest Shepherd of all: may he grant you so to retain in mind my tiny admonitions, and constantly keep his most sweet precepts, that you may deserve happily to arrive at his eternal brightness. There are however two in your presence, my most delightful sons, to whom, after my little dissolution, the place of government will fall." Now this Lantbert was one of the two, and the other the most distinguished Ansbert, both sufficiently marked with virtues of most excellent religion and comrades in the work of God. When the servant of God had completed this sacred address, he gave back his soul to heaven, to be joined to the angelic choirs, to possess the happiness of Paradise, on the 11th Kalends day, on the i 7th day of the week, Indiction VII. After his most glorious passing, the whole band of monks implored the clemency of Christ, celebrating a three-day fast with all devotion. When this was most devoutly celebrated, it elects the aforesaid Lantbert to be substituted in the place of government, and he presided for 43 years and 8 months, in the year of the Lord's Incarnation 665, in the Indiction written above, which was the eleventh year of the aforesaid young King Lothar; and moreover the k seventh year of Pope Vitalian had already passed. He remained in the same cenobium for thirteen years and eight months under three brother Kings, holding the scepters of the kingdom of the Franks in turn by order, that is Chlothar, Childeric, and Theodoric.
[3] Now the same venerable Father Lantbert was chaste in work, venerable to Kings on account of his virtues, diffuse in charity, most firm in faith, prudent in counsels, conspicuous in goodness, affable in conversations, and prompt in every best thing; of tall stature also, and comely in appearance: from the lowest sole of the foot to the very top of the head he was most elegant. Indeed all the aforesaid Kings wished to call him no otherwise, both in their mutual conversations and also in the descriptions of privileges or letters which they extended to him, "Lord and in Christ our Father the venerable Abbot Lantbert." For after the aforesaid young King Chlothar had ended his life, l and had left his brothers Childeric and Theodoric surviving, and a violent contention had arisen between them for the summit of the Kingdom; with some favoring the part of Childeric, others inclining toward Theodoric; so this venerable man rendered himself cautious, so that he inclined to neither part, until a part of the people might overcome the rival part. For when Childeric had been raised to the throne of the Kingdom, he was held in such great honor by him, that whatever he asked from him, he obtained without any obstacle of difficulty. Which also from the grants of certain possessions, and remaining in the middle between them contending for the throne, which he bestowed on the same venerable Father and this cenobium, it is clear to be manifest. Finally at the petition of his Queen Bilhild and the venerable Bishops, that is of m Leodegar of good memory, Bishop, who was afterwards made a most glorious Martyr, n also of Nivo the Bishop, he is given estates by Childeric. and of Ermonius; and of the illustrious men, whose names are these, o Fucoald, Amalric, Wulfoald Major-domo of the royal house, [p] Bavo, Waning, Adalbert, Gerinus the brother of the famous aforesaid Leodegar the Bishop, he bestowed on the aforesaid venerable Father two fiscs, whose names are [q] Ulmius and Warinna, which are situated in the district of Tellau near the rivers called Tella and Warinna, with all their adjacent properties, that is Crisciacus, Seda, Magnerotus, and again Magnerotus, Neon and Toscariae, together with land on the shore of the sea, and areas of salt pits and fisheries, which had been established there; also vines in Warnacus, on the river Seine, situated in the district of Vexin, with all their integrity. All these things, establishing with his own authority two privileges, he handed over to the same venerable Father and this Cenobium of Fontenelle to be possessed with most firm right forever. Now this royal grant was issued at the delightful palace of Arlaunus, in the [r] 12th year of the aforesaid King in Austrasia, who had been the first in Neustria; and moreover in the most bright [s] fifth year of the same Rector of the Cenobium, from the time when he obtained the place of government after the most happy death of the great Father and of the most distinguished Priest of Christ, Wandregisilus. For very many grants of various possessions of the same King issued to the same most reverend Father exist up to now, which it is most laborious even to enumerate. For he among various other gifts, also bestowed a portion of the forest of Jumièges on the same venerable Father: whence some privileges remain with us, which are kept as a sacred gift in this Cenobium. For in them, if anyone shall have considered them worthy of reading, he will find the places designated, by which the boundary of this donation is determined.
[4] He has a dispute with St. Philibert the Abbot. There arose at that time no small dispute between the same venerable Father Lantbert and the most reverend [t] Rector of the cenobium of Jumièges, Philibert, over the boundary of the same forest: whom Audoenus, great Pontiff of the Church of Rouen, of glorious memory, together with his own authority, and together with the letter of the aforesaid King directed to him concerning the same matter, recalled to concord of true peace, and with equal lot divided the same forest between the same life-giving Fathers. And because Father Lantbert's portion seemed to be greater, the aforesaid Prelate, together with his consent, from the same division to the basilica of the distinguished Martyr of Christ Dionysius, which is situated on the bank of the bed of the Seine, in the place which is called [u] Duro-Clarus, where Lidoald held the place of government, bestowed some little portion. For he was conspicuous in sanctity, whose marks of perfection always were such, that he opened the way of salvation to his fellow citizens by sacred preachings, and instructed untaught peoples with bright examples, and kindled by the vigor of the supernal Spirit, by the greatest industry recalled even the discordant to the brightness of concord.
[5] The aforesaid [x] King Childeric, by the plots of his henchmen, [y] namely Amalbert and Ingolbert, Childeric is killed with his son Dagobert. and together with Bodilo, and also with Lupus and others, together with his wife, by name Bilhild, and his son by name [z] Dagobert, was deprived of life and kingdom: whose bodies the aforementioned greatest … The rest is lacking.
NOTES.
ANALECTA.
From the Acts of SS. Ansbert, Hermeland, Erembert and Condedus.
Lantbert, from Abbot of Fontenelle, Archbishop of Lyon in Gaul (St.)
BHL Number: 3851
BY G. H. FROM VARIOUS SOURCES
[1] He uses the counsel of St. Ansbert: Aigrad in the Life of St. Ansbert writes these things about St. Lantbert: "With the grace of Divine charity inspiring, the same venerable Father venerated the blessed servant of Christ Ansbert as a father, loved him as a son: and there was to them in the Lord one heart and one soul. He, however, who had taken up the care of government, at the counsel of the holy Father Ansbert, in managing the flock of Christ a according to the norm of the holy Fathers, energetically and irreproachably conducted all things: by whose examples of pious action, and by diligent exhortations of words, very many being stirred up, seized the journeys of holy conversation."
[2] To this venerable Father Lantbert, King Theodoric, He receives Donzère in Provence from the King: son of King Clovis and Queen Bathild, granted some patrimony, which was situated beyond the river Rhone, in the region which is properly called Provincia, in this manner, namely, that this estate might furnish the monks, dwelling in the cenobium of Fontenelle, lights for the church, in oil and other things necessary for this. In which place the aforesaid Father founded an excellent cenobium of monks, monks having been sent from the cenobium of Fontenelle, and there he builds a monastery: who diligently carried out that praiseworthy work. And from a small estate a great monastery of monks still exists, even excellent in that region above others, b devastated in the time of the invasion of the wicked race of Hagarenes.
[3] Under whose rule also blessed Hermeland, from the aforesaid monastery of Fontenelle, at the request of the venerable Pontiff Pascharius of the city of Nantes, was sent by the Father Lantbert himself into the same region of Nantes, on a certain island of the channel of the Loire, another on the Loire through St. Hermeland, which was called Antrum, according to the property of the same name, built a venerable cenobium of monks. In the grant of which, the aforesaid Prelate Pascharius established that after the passing of the same venerable Father Hermeland, from the monastery of Fontenelle, through all succeeding ages, all the inhabitants of the said place should appoint for themselves Rectors; just as the grants of the same place, which are still kept in the aforesaid monastery of Fontenelle, most openly declare.
[4] With the aforesaid Father Lantbert also holding the government of the place, he receives SS. Erembert and Condedus blessed Erembert, Pontiff of Christ of the city of Toulouse, and the holy Priest Condedus and anchorite, born on the island of Britain, took up in the aforesaid monastery of Fontenelle both the name and the habit of a monk worthy of God. Very many things also about so great a Father, did we not hasten to others, worthy of God and useful to the place, done by him and under his government, could be told, which we once gave to memory more fully in his deeds, to be imparted to posterity.
[5] By what order indeed in Lyon, most celebrated city of Gaul, he was made Pontiff, With St. Genesius dead he becomes Bishop of Lyon: we shall narrate in a brief discourse. When therefore St. Genesius, Prelate of the same city, had died, whose God-worthy life his praiseworthy deeds commend; straightway the pious King Theodoric and the distinguished Prince Pippin, son of Ansegisus, namely cousin of blessed Father Wandregisilus, holding salutary counsel with the Nobles of the palace, with divine providence so commanding, with the unanimous vote of the people of the same region, established him as Prelate of the same city in the aforesaid city. But when, for a long time opposing with too much humility, he was unwilling to undertake it, compelled by royal command and priestly election, he is ordained c Pontiff of the aforesaid metropolis city. And so, having been directed to the same province with the honor befitting his Priesthood, with examples of humility and holy preaching and pious action, he dies holily, he ruled the flock of Christ with diligent moderation irreproachably. And there, called by God, stripped of the chains of earthly corruption, he happily migrated to the joys of the supernal city.
[6] From the aforesaid Saints, who lived under St. Lantbert, the first is Hermeland, or Ermenland, He clothes St. Hermeland with the sacred habit whose Life, written by a contemporary, we illustrated on March 25, from which we pluck these few things about Lantbert. "The most blessed Ermenland, having gone forth from the palace with the blessing of the King and his nobles, came in haste to the monastery of Fontenelle, where the venerable Landbert presided as regular Father of the monks. For he sought conversion in the aforesaid cenobium, and from the Abbot himself and from all the Brothers obtained the effect of his prayers. And according to the custom of monastic life d tested in the cell of the novices, he confirmed his vow of perfection with a sacred promise; adorned with all virtues, he admits to profession: so that among his fellow-soldiers, as the morning star brighter than the other stars, he shone conspicuous with the ray of virtues. Which the venerable Abba Landbert, perceiving with a sagacious eye, whom he had received to be instructed by the grace of discipleship; venerating him as a master on account of the beauty of his virtues, he loved. Also approving him as worthy of the sacred altars, he caused him to be ordained a Priest for himself by the Bishop …"
[7] "Therefore at that time in which the aforesaid man of the Lord Ermeland was strong in such virtues in the cenobium, Pasquarius, Bishop of pious memory, ruled the Church of Nantes with devout pastoral care … Now considering his own and the people's heart, He takes up the embassy sent by St. Pasquarius Bishop of Nantes, with the Lord inspiring the vow of this matter, with the effect of one will … he directed vigorous messengers to the venerable Abbot Landbert, who then was governing the cenobium of Fontenelle under the sacred habit of monastic life, beseeching through them his holiness, that by his liberality he might obtain the effect of his and the people's vows. Who, fortified with the blessing of their Pontiff, and going forth from him, taking up the journey, with the Lord as guide, swiftly arrived at the sacred monastery of Fontenelle. And when they had been well received by the Brothers and presented to the venerable Landbert; from the command of their Father, they addressed him in such words: 'Pasquarius the Pontiff, a great lover of your holiness, burning with sacred devotion, and urged by the prayers of all the people committed to him, asking for monks for the building of a monastery: desires with ardent vow, that in his parish monks, he preparing a place for them, may hold the regular life by way of example, for the profit of holy Church and the perpetual praise of God. Learning however, with the fame of your holiness flying far and wide, that your congregation shines more than the others in the beauty of this religion, he prays that your holy liberality may send him most religious monks, who know how best to keep this life, and to hand it over to others: so that he may be able to fulfill through them what he desires.'"
[8] "Who, when he recognized that the Priest of God with the people committed to him was on fire with such devotion, first gave the highest thanks to the most omnipotent and undivided Trinity, then having called Blessed Ermenland the monk, ordered the petition of the venerable Pasquarius to be expounded again before him, he says he will send St. Hermeland and other monks and finally gave a response in this manner: 'The vows indeed, dearest sons, of Pasquarius the Bishop and his holy flock, it is clear, just as they are divinely inspired, to savor of most holy devotion: and therefore, that I may deserve to be a sharer in such a vow, although I am deprived of great solace, the petition asked from our littleness, through this dearest brother Ermeland, with other Brothers sent with him, I would strive to fulfill; if most certainly I knew that the cenobium would be so established by him, that in future times the Brothers established in it, as far as it can be avoided by him, would not be disturbed by the molestation of anyone. For the life of our Order requires the greatest quiet, and nevertheless suffers great loss, when it intently contemplates heavenly things, if by the complaints of the wicked it is called away from the inspection of the supernal things. if the cenobium is well established, If therefore on the estate of his Church he should build a cenobium, in which these whom we send, and others divinely inspired, and converted from the world by their example, may dwell, they will perhaps be able to use the desired peace in his times; but after his passing, if he should leave the same cenobium under the dominion of his successor, with great (as we have found to be done in many cenobiums) instinct of cupidity, they will be disturbed by the unquiets of the wicked; so that necessity compels them to go out thence, and forces them, wandering, to roam around. But to me, if it should so happen, who direct the entrusted monks thither, much danger will come, and to him no increase of reward: and be confirmed by royal diplomas: but if with a view to perpetual recompense he desires to build a monastery, I urge that he commit it to royal hands to be protected, and that the Kingly clemency deign to make such a prescription, that no other power, instigated by a malignant spirit, with every occasion of dominion removed, may dare to bring molestation on those dwelling in it: so that, defended by royal protection, for his and the whole of his kingdom's perpetual peace, freely, the impulse of the wicked having been removed, they may supplicate the clemency of Christ.' 'Do not,' they say, 'do not delay with such suspicions, Father; for most certainly you can trust in the goodness of our Father Pasquarius, because according to the command of your mouth he will, with the Lord helping, complete the whole cause of this work.'"
[9] "Then, confirmed by the promises of the messengers, he said to Blessed Ermeland: 'Trusting too much, dearest Brother, in your religion, although I do not doubt that the greatest loss will come to me by your bodily absence, He selects St. Hermeland and 12 companions: I wish to send you with twelve Brothers, of whom in my stead I will appoint you Father, to the venerable Pasquarius: so that with your teaching dictating, he may build a monastery as he desires. Nothing however from this will I attempt to do without your determination, but I commit the whole cause of this business to your prudent judgment.' 'Do not, I pray,' said the holy man, 'my Father, deign to elicit our will over this, which for Christ I have handed over to your discretion: but wherever you send me, most willingly, as if divinely commanded, I will strive to go: only let the will of the Lord and yours be done.' Then the same Father
filled with joy, congratulating his most distinguished obedience, said: 'Come, my son, seize, as a soldier of Christ, a prosperous journey, take up the praiseworthy work, through which you and many others may deserve to enter the kingdoms of heaven.' When he had exhorted him and the others whom he was sending with him with such words, and especially that they should keep the holy rule with manly guard, rushing forward, he and all the Brothers, with tears in mutual embraces, giving to one another the kiss of peace, dismissed them, and after mutual embraces dismisses him, wishing for them all things prosperous, saying: 'May the grace of the supreme Trinity accompany you, and direct all the works of your hands prosperously, and may it deign by perennial guardianship to protect and preserve the place of your habitation for the salvation of many souls.' They, having asked for the blessing and having abundantly received it, taking up the journey with the legates of the already mentioned Bishop, hastened to present themselves to his face: praying that Christ might grant them solace for completing the enjoined work: and thus with the Lord as leader they arrived at the city of Nantes."
[10] "Then Blessed Ermeland with his companions entered the basilica of the blessed Apostles Peter and Paul for the sake of prayer. The venerable Bishop, hearing that they had arrived, exulting with ineffable joy, said: 'The Lord has remembered me, so that he has deigned to fulfill the vow of my desire.' Blessed Ermeland recited before him what his Father had objected to his messengers, with happy outcome. and their response, and finally added: 'And now if your holiness is willing to obey the counsel of my Father, as the Lord will grant to our smallness, whatever you command we will strive to perform. But if something else pleases your Paternity, with inviolable charity, according to his command, we will return to our Father.' 'No one, dearest Brother,' he said, 'more than I desires to establish the perfection of this work with perpetual firmness, I who seem to be its author and founder. And therefore according to your and your Father's suggestion and the promise of our messengers, not only will I commit you, with the cell which we propose to build, with all things which I shall confirm there for the support of the Brothers dwelling there, according to canonical authority to the royal dominion, and I will obtain its command to have for you; but also whatever I can deliberate upon with you as fitting and useful for the perpetual quiet of that place, I will most willingly strive to fulfill.'"
[11] The other above-named disciple is St. Erembert, who, having left his bishopric of Toulouse, withdrew to the monastery of Fontenelle, where at that time the venerable Rector Landbert presided, and living there for some time in holy conversation, finally worn out by old age … happily migrated to Christ, as is asserted on May 14 in his Acts.
[12] Benefits bestowed on SS. Erembert, and St. Condedus. The third is St. Condedus, who learning, fame flying about, that the congregation of the cenobium of Fontenelle of the holy Father Landbert shone no less than others by the beauty of religion; disposed himself to be fortified by their fellowship … The holy man came to the monastery of Fontenelle, and after prayers to God and fraternal greetings and spiritual conversations, when all humanity, as the monastic norm dictates, had been shown to the same holy man with all his, whom St. Lantbert the Abbot had received as if they were Angels, and for several days he was staying in the aforesaid cenobium, and enjoying the sweet conversations of such great Fathers; finally opening the vow of his heart he said, that it did not seem enough to him to sweat in the holiness of religion, if he did not also profit others by preaching and by radiating with the light of examples. Then at the counsel of the aforesaid Father Lantbert he sought a suitable place. Then with the blessing and permission of the aforesaid Father he sailed to the island e Belsinnaca, etc. Thus Aigrad in his Life on October 21.
NOTES.
ON BLESSED BERNARD, FOUNDER OF THE CONGREGATION OF TIRON IN GAUL.
YEAR 1114.
PREVIOUS COMMENTARY.
Bernard, founder and first Abbot of the Holy Trinity of Tiron in Gaul, of the Order of St. Benedict (B.)
BY G. H.
§ I. Tiron, head of the ninth Congregation in the Benedictine Order. Life of B. Bernard written.
The Monastic State, which above others has always flourished in the Church of God with exceptional religion and sanctity, recognizes its founder and chief restorer in our West as the most holy Patriarch Benedict, From the Benedictine Order most widely propagated whose Acts we illustrated on March 21, on which day he departed from this life in the year 542. For he, when he had written the Rule of Monks, praised by St. Gregory the Great as outstanding in discretion and splendid in speech, not only was it propagated through all provinces of Europe, innumerable monasteries having been founded through his Disciples and successors in the course of a few centuries: but also it was gradually taken up in all cenobiums of institutions different from the Benedictine. Then, as if from a most fertile root, various Congregations of this institute arose, professing the observance of the common Rule under their own regulations, New Congregations arose conceived for the renewal or establishment of the vigor of discipline. The most ancient of these and most happy in the production of holy men was the Cluniac, begun about the year 910 in Gaul by Blessed Berno, as we have brought forth in his Life on January 13. A similar Congregation can be reckoned Cava in Italy, Cluniac, which St. Alferius, whose Life we illustrated on April 12, founded toward the end of the 10th century, having died in the year 1050. The monasteries subject to it number three hundred and thirty in Italy and Sicily. Cava, At the same time St. Gerald, in Aquitaine near Bordeaux, founded the monastery of La Sauve-Majeure, with such success that the little church which he found broken by age, became fertile in offspring: so that in Spain and in many parts of Gaul, the filial devotion raised up from it reveres her as its mother, La Sauve, as Christian the monk of La Sauve-Majeure writes, in that Life which we gave on April 5 in the second place; written toward the end of the 12th century, number 15. A catalogue of all daughters of this kind, as well as of aggregated cenobiums, is still found in the archive of the same monastery, and was promised to us to be kindly submitted, but the new Prior restrained the ready hands of his religious, ignorant that such things were desired only for the greater praise of his monastery: whence this alone we can say, that even today more than thirty Priories retain their ancient subjection. Not unlike was the new Congregation, begun by Blessed Bernard of Tiron in the diocese of Chartres at the beginning of the eleventh century, to which in the Life below, number 52, one hundred cells are said to have been subject, whether they were Abbeys or Priories, and that when his Acts were drawn up a few years after his death. Tiron under Blessed Bernard: John of Ypres in the Chronicle of Saint-Bertin, chapter 40, part 3, treats of the Foundation of several religions under a new rite and habit, and among them reckons Tiron under the rule of St. Benedict; to which is handed down in the Monasticon Anglicanum p. 704 that the habit was of grey color, where treatment is of the Furness monastery. Concerning the site of the monastery of Tiron in the County of Perche we treat in the Life of Blessed Bernard himself, chiefly chapter 12.
[2] This Life was written by Gaufred, his disciple, Gaufred Grossus, who had lived as a monk under him at Tiron, wrote it, and in the Prologue asserts, that he, with a truthful style, has committed to letters and transmitted to successors what he saw or learned from the account of faithful men. Thus in number 88, when B. Bernard was at Chartres, and had learned that the monk Gervase, agitated by a malignant spirit, was being held bound in the cell of the infirm, he adds, who saw very many things himself: therefore he returned so quickly, he intimated to us who had gathered there. In the same way in number 94 he testifies, that he saw what he narrates: but especially of those things, which in chapters 12 and 13 he writes about his illness, exhortations to his own, reception of the last Sacraments, pious death, and funeral, he professes himself an eyewitness. Moreover from B. Bernard himself, or he had it from B. Bernard he seems to have learned very many things which he had formerly done here. Thus in number 27, when he was describing his solitary life on the island of Chausey, he adds: or from others: But with what foods he sustained his life, when we asked him about it, he refused to indicate, an artful dissembler of his own virtues. He could meanwhile have learned much from the monk Christian, who brought him back from the said island with Peter of Stars: whom in number 36 he says, when he was writing this Life, was still surviving, a man of wondrous simplicity and innocence. Finally the author indicates his sincerity in number 110 thus: I testify to Jesus whom he served, he indicates his sincerity. whom I too desire to serve, that I in neither direction feign anything, but as a Christian from a Christian, bring forth what is true. And toward the end of the following number: I testify, he says, by Truth itself and his holy Angels, and by that Angel also, who was the guardian and companion of this admirable man, that I say nothing out of favor to him in the manner of praisers; but whatever I am going to say, I say by way of testimony, and that it is less than his merits, whom the whole world proclaims.
[3] A double MS. copy of this Life we obtained, one was submitted to us from Rouen by Guillaume Thiersault, the other from Dijon by Pierre François Chiflet, we give the Life from a double MS, both Priests of our Society, and well-deserving on this work because of various Acts of Saints submitted. Chiflet had noted that his copy had been transcribed from an old parchment MS. codex of the Most Holy Trinity of Tiron. The same Life was published by Parisian presses and illustrated with his own observations by Jean-Baptiste Souchet, Doctor of Sacred Theology and Canon of Chartres, collated with that published by Souchet delighted by the author's flourishing style, and, considering the iniquity of the age, or rather its barbarity, sufficiently polished and neat, as he writes in the dedication to Henry of Bourbon, Bishop of Metz, Abbot of St. Germain-des-Prés and of the Holy Trinity of Tiron. He adds more in the Preface to the Reader. "As concerns the author of the Life," he says, "he needs no commendation, he himself suffices for himself. I read the Life, I read it through, not only willingly, but indeed eagerly, admiring the elegance of the author, with such great delight, that immediately the elegance of the writing captured me, and lest I should be without it, I committed it to be transcribed. It truly stung the mind, that its author, considering the ignorance of the age, polished in erudition and not to be despised (as one who with such great abundance of genius had woven his work in prose and verse, had sprinkled it with documents of witty maxims, and also had illustrated it with historical descriptions), should lie hidden in obscurity and perish in neglect." The copy of this Life Jacques Dinet, a distinguished Preacher of the Society of Jesus, had communicated to Souchet, and 4 MSS. used, when he was holding sacred sermons of the spring fast in the primary basilica of Chartres,
who also was Rector of the College of Clermont at Paris and Provincial of France, and who strove to deserve well of our studies by transmitting various Acts of Saints; in which also Andreas Duchesne was similar to him, who granted to Souchet another copy of this Life, transcribed from the codex of Papirius Masso. He found a third codex at Tiron, a parchment MS., on account of antiquity dissolved in its sinews and scarcely holding together: from which namely we obtained a copy transmitted by Chiflet, in which some things are lacking here and there. A fourth, finally, he received granted by William Laisne, Prior of Mondaville.
[4] This last Souchet does not doubt to be genuine Gaufred's offspring before all the other copies: The MS. of Tiron had been transcribed by the care of John of Chartres, chiefly because he thinks that from the original copy, transcribed by the diligence and sedulity of John of Chartres, Abbot of Tiron, the rest are taken, and he thinks this appears from the end of the book. Also toward the end of our copy, transmitted by Thiersault, these things are held: "These things were written by me, Philippe Bernyer, Priest of the church of St. Albinus in Campo-rotundo, in Percheto, in the year of the Jubilee 1600, in which year also I offered my first-fruits: The copy of this volume was given to me by the Prior of Huis and Superior of the house of the Most Holy Trinity of Tiron, written on old parchment: at whose end these things were written in red letters.
J. of Chartres, Father of the Church of Tiron, Caused me to be written, glory and praise to him. John Pignore of Valleca wrote me." Now the said John of Chartres was the 15th Abbot, elected in the year 1290, Abbot created in the year 1290. died in the year 1297, as Souchet hands down in the Catalogue of Tironensian Abbots, published with the Life of B. Bernard. After the said Catalogue Souchet adds the Benefices both regular and secular, depending from the monastery of the Holy Trinity of Tiron, and they are 11 or 12 Abbeys, 47 or 48 Priories, 32 parish churches: and after the number or heading 42 he numbers 58 Abbeys or Priories, Monasteries depending on Tiron depending from the Abbey of Savigny, and subjected to the Abbey of Tiron by Blessed Vitalis. Souchet describes the names and situation of each: who in the said preface writes that he has added numbers and headings to aid the reader's memory, without any prejudice to the reader or to the book. We have distinguished the headings otherwise and in our own manner: and under each we have given our own Notes, the longer observations of Souchet being omitted, to which, as very learned and suitable, we refer the reader. We have also added for the sake of clarity the marginal synopsis customary to us, which is neglected by him.
§ II. Time of life and death of B. Bernard. Name inscribed in the Calendars: title of Saint and Blessed attributed.
[5] B. Bernard is said when he was dying to have been in a broken, aged, and weakened little body, Born about the year 1056 and to have had members broken by the years: and therefore we judge that he had completed seventy years of age. Therefore he would have been born about the year 1046, who when he had embraced studies until about his 20th year of age; he began to aspire to a more holy life; and having set out to Aquitaine, monk of St. Cyprian 1066, in the cenobium of St. Cyprian he was made a monk, about the year 1066. When however for ten, or more, years he had lived in the cloister of St. Cyprian, he was made Prior in the monastery of St. Sabinus, until the year 1096, when with the Abbot dead in the Holy Land, then Prior of St. Sabinus until 1096 lest he should be elected Abbot, he fled into the desert: thence after three years to the island of Chausey, from which, brought back first to the desert, then to the monastery of St. Cyprian, he was made Abbot in the year 1100, and afterwards in the year 1110 was present at the Council of Poitiers, Abbot of St. Cyprian then he went twice to Rome: then having left the Abbey he withdrew, and after various wanderings built the monastery of Tiron, he builds the monastery of Tiron in the year 1113. having obtained a bull of donation on the 3rd day before the Nones of February in the year 1113; but because then among the Franks years began from Easter, according to this only the year 1112 should be counted.
[6] There flourished then Ivo Bishop of Chartres, concerning the year of whose death we shall treat below: in whose place when Gaufred had been enthroned, and sedition was stirring between the Clergy and the Count, Abbot Bernard agreed, He lived after the death of Ivo Bishop of Chartres with B. Robert of Abrissello "a man worthy to be remembered for all good things, whose praise is even today through all the Churches of Gaul." As is read on February 25 in the second Life of B. Robert of Abrissello, number 15. Concerning the death of Robert and Bernard in the Chronicle of St. Maxentius, commonly called Malleacense, in Philippe Labbe these things are read: "In the year one thousand one hundred and sixteen. Robert of Abrissello died, founder of Fontevraud, died not in the year 1116 on February 24 on the sixth day before the Kalends of March. In the same year Bernard, founder of the cenobium of Tiron, which is in Perche, died on the seventh day before the Kalends of May." But we demonstrate below in chapter 3 letter A that the author of the said Chronicle was not accurate enough in subtracting the years, and we note that he erred not only by five years, but perhaps by eight or nine: so that it would be no wonder if in this place an error of one year or another had crept in. but on February 25 of the year 1117. And first, we showed in his Life on the said February 25 that Robert of Arbrissel did not die on the sixth day before the Kalends of March, but on the fifth, and this in the year 1117; which year, on account of the beginning of the year from Easter as I said customarily begun among the Franks, could have been called 1116. Why therefore should not the death of B. Bernard be referred to the same year 1117, and after him B. Bernard, when the very manner of speaking which the author of the Chronicle used seems to insinuate, that he departed from life within the same year after B. Robert.
[7] We have been much concerned here, that from the death of Ivo Bishop of Chartres we might receive some light: but we found new darkness, to be illustrated from elsewhere. With Ivo Bishop of Chartres dead, not in the year 1114, For first the Supplement to the Chronicle of Sigebert, which was published by Laurent de la Barre in the Christiana Historia of the Ancient Fathers under the name of Robert of Monte, refers the death of Ivo and the succession of Gaufred in the See of Chartres to the year 1114. On the contrary in the genuine Supplement of the said Robert of Monte, which Luc d'Achery published with the works of Guibert Abbot of Blessed Mary of Nogent, a distinguished epitome of the Life of Ivo is held, and he is said to have died in the year 1117: to which year also, or 1117, Matthew Paris in Henry I King of England hands down that Ivo closed his last day. Other writers seize one of the intervening years, namely 1115 or 1116, but 1115 or 1116, and the former is held in the Martyrology and Calendar of the Churches of Chartres, the latter is brought forth from the old Calendar of St. Quintin of Beauvais, in which Ivo himself had been Abbot before his episcopacy, and dying bequeathed various gifts: He died however on December 23, he falls into illness on April 5. so that afterwards both Robert and Bernard could have been present to his successor Gaufred, and yet both died in the year 1117.
[8] Easter was celebrated in that year on March 25, with cycle of the Moon 16, of the Sun 6, Dominical letter H. And since below in the Life number 105 B. Bernard is said to have fallen into his last illness on the eleventh day of Christ's Resurrection, that would have happened on April 5. he falls into illness on April 5, In number 112 it is indicated that on the fifth day of his indisposition he was fortified with the last Sacraments, namely on the 10th day of the same month of April. Then, as is referred in number 117, fortified with the Sacraments on April 10 two days before he went to the celestial seats, he called to himself from the tower of the castle of Nogent a certain matron with her daughter, appearing to her among the white-clad monks; who on the following day, both, came. The following night, as is said in number 119, he ordered the Brothers, who were serving him, to refresh their weary limbs by sleeping; when he himself was visited by the monks there, the holy dead. On the following and last day, when he had instructed all, called to him, with pious admonitions, and had kissed them, he closed his eyes amid pains, and gave back his spirit to God, as is read in number 60 and following. dead on April 14 or 25, This could have been the day April 14, namely the 18th day before the Kalends of May, for which by easy error the day 7th before the Kalends of May, in the above indicated and often faulty Chronicle of St. Maxentius, is printed: with which however the MS. Calendar of the Church of Tiron agrees: in which in red letters on April 25 this is noted: "Passing of our venerable Father Bernard, first Abbot of Tiron." But on April 14 he is mentioned in the Benedictine Martyrology by Hugh Menard in these words: and on the 14th day inscribed in the Calendars with the title of Blessed. "In the monastery of Tiron, of Blessed Bernard, first Abbot of the same place, a man of great sanctity," and then in book 2 of the Observations, a summary of the Life taken from Gaufred his disciple is handed down; in which again he is honored with the title of Blessed.
[9] On the same day André Saussay in the Gallican Martyrology has this elogium about him: "In the monastery of Tiron, the passing of B. Bernard, first Abbot of that place, glorious with excellent virtues and spirit of prophecy and the gift of miracles." Also with a long encomium, but taken chiefly from the observations of Menard, Bucelinus celebrates him in the Benedictine Menologium. The Sammarthan brothers, volume 4 of Gallia Christiana, page 865, with the Malleacense Chronicle cited, assert that he died on the 18th day before the Kalends of May, and bring forth these things from an old Necrology of Chartres: "Bernard died, Abbot of Tiron, who built the church of the same place from the foundations, and gathered many monks there under the norm of sanctity and religion." He is called Saint in the Life, Other elogiums are held below in our Notes to the Life. Gaufred Grossus in the Life everywhere uses the title of Saint Bernard, as can be seen in all the MSS. and in the Life published by Souchet in numbers 78, 79, and 94, so also everywhere he calls him Confessor and Confessor of Christ, and in the Prologue indicates that his birthday is celebrated, written after the year 1131. and that the Life was written by him so that then it might be read aloud: which was done after the year 1131, in which Louis the Younger was crowned King of the Franks: of which matter he makes mention in number 97.
LIFE
By Gaufred Grossus, monk of Tiron and disciple of B. Bernard From several MSS. and the edition of Souchet.
Bernard, founder and first Abbot of the Holy Trinity of Tiron in Gaul, of the Order of St. Benedict (B.)
BHL Number: 1251
BY GAUFRED THE DISCIPLE FROM MSS.
PROLOGUE
To the most reverend Father, Lord Gaufred, by the grace of God Bishop of the Church of Chartres, and Legate of the Apostolic See, Gaufred, lowest of all monks, greeting.
[1] Your sublimity, most blessed Father, That the acts of saints are usefully written, they teach knows with much better and clearer wisdom, that the Deeds
of Holy men are to be described, and to be transmitted, gathered together by the tips of letters for the sake of the utility of the knowledge of those who come after, through the Archangel Raphael, the bearer of medicine, we are sufficiently clearly admonished, saying to Tobias: "It is good to hide the sacrament of a king; but it is honorable to reveal and confess the works of God." Raphael the Archangel, Tob. 12:7 But also Jerome, the lamp of the world, by his own example stirs us to this same thing, who after he had faithfully translated the Old and New Testament with a polished discourse, St. Jerome, and after he had diligently expounded the Prophecies and the Gospel, painted the Lives of the Anchorites, namely of Malchus, Paul, Hilarion, with a most flourishing style; a and also the fountains of eloquence, flowing forth from the high mountains of the incomprehensible wisdom of God, watering every surface of earthly hearts dried up with the heavenly dew of Philosophy, and other Fathers teach: b namely Athanasius, Ambrose, Augustine, Gregory, and many other most distinguished Doctors of the Church of Christ (whose names we avoid inserting into our pages because it is long), invite us to a like zeal of labor: who after innumerable volumes of books, which have been most fully arranged by them concerning the most hidden reasons and expositions of sacred Scripture with the most splendid eloquence, capturing every understanding of the Christian faith raising itself up against Catholic doctrine with the reasonings of unassailable arguments, not only published with flowery narrations the victorious contests of Martyrs, blooming with flowers of rosy color; but also the flower-bearing acts and customs of Confessors and Virgins, containing the lilies of chastity, breathing the sweetest odors.
[2] The same is indicated by God through the sacred Scripture. But also the arrangement of canonical Scripture, and the series of the Old Instrument, studied to designate the life, conduct, acts, conversations, labors, sweats of contests, constancies of agonies, triumphs of victories, triumphal palms of rewards of all the Saints of the New Testament not yet universally gathered and published, by signs, figures, narrations of shadowy things, obscurities of enigmas, stupendous and intricate descriptions of material works. For God commanded Moses that according to the pattern which he had seen in the mountain, designating for Moses the fabric of the works of the tabernacle, he should so diligently complete all the works of the testimony, prefiguring in them the form of the conversation of the Saints, that he should make both vials, and cups, and the rim of the table, and the reeds of the lampstand, the cups, and the little spheres, and the lily-works, the snuffers of the lamps, and all the other things which Scripture altogether enumerates singly. Also everything of the temple of Solomon with its measures so studiously, and for Solomon not only the buildings, but all the carvings of the buildings, he arranges, that he may not pass over the architraves of the columns, or capitals, and the meshes of the capitals, or the axles of the wheels, the spokes, rims and hubs. And also by Ezechiel the building of the city turning toward the south, and for Ezechiel the building of the temple. seen in the Spirit, is so subtly described; that he does not pass over the carvings of palms, nor even pass over the threshold of the gate unmeasured: all of which things, with the Apostle as witness, were shadows of future things. Heb. 10:1
[3] Therefore if the providence of divine wisdom, distinguishing the times of shadows and of things, wished and commanded through the men of that age, whom by his inspirations he had made fit for this, figures and signs to be described with such great zeal; what wise man does not understand, that the deeds of saints figured and signified by them, with what great diligence they should both be preserved by descriptions of letters, and made known to the knowledge of the faithful to come, both will wish and intimate. And since the knowledge of the divine will is a full and evident imposition of admonition; if we, lazing in the torpor of sloth, and snoring in the sleep of inertia, neglect to designate with the pen the acts of the Saints of our time known to us, and to destine them to the uses of future posterity; do we not incur the guilt of offense, and fall into the detriment of our own salvation? Therefore let us just to the increases of our salvation, let us note by writing the works of the piety of the saints; and noting those things, because by writing them God is honored, let us proclaim the magnificence of Christ, who is wonderful in his Saints. For while we relate the praises of the soldiers of Christ, we sublimely magnify the magnificent triumphs of their King: because whatever of virtue is found to be in their minds, is without doubt owed to the divine power and strength. But also the propagators of such Writings, while by the set example of the just they draw the minds of the hearers back from the perpetration of iniquity; they convert the sinner from the error of his way, saving his soul, sinners are emended, and cover the multitude of their sins.
[4] Moreover, when we see the titles of mortal things set up in c wax images; and the fillets of various boastful praises, written in letters shining with gold, set forth to successors for imitation; who of us, considering these things, will not blush to cover with silence the victories of the athletes of Christ? And not for the praise of their Emperor, in what way they fought against the aerial powers and the rulers of the darkness of this world, and conquered, to hand them over at least on cheap little sheets; and for the encouragement of the minds of the warring, to unfold more diligently? Who also does not see more clearly than the light, that while we recite such writings on the birthdays of the Saints, the good are stirred to imitation, we pay to God the cult of the praise owed, we cultivate the memory of the Saints, we imbue the minds of the faithful with the profits of edification, we show to the Saints the due honor of veneration. Hence the minds of the unbelievers are struck down with sorrow, the unbelievers waste away with envy, the undisciplined are oppressed with anxieties; with all the Saints dancing in joy, only the devil groans, who sees the fruit of all his temptations and wars reduced to this end, that he, cast down under the feet of the Saints, the devil wastes away with the wicked. and bound with the chains of their virtue, beholds himself wasting away with the gall of sorrow; and, compelled by the torment of his vexation, willingly or unwillingly, recognizes their magnificence. For when, from the bodies possessed, as if from the kingdom of his tyranny expelled, through lunatics and those possessed, giving a roar, he confesses and grieves the torment of his burning; he most clearly demonstrates that they through whom he suffers this are alive happily with God, and are mightily strong. For truly when life to the dead, healing to the languishing is restored through them; how firmly they cling to true life and power, is most certainly noted to Christian peoples.
[5] Thus far, most happy Father, discussing somewhat more broadly the causes and reasons why the deeds of the Saints should be written, I have in some way opened up; because I have described the life of our Father Bernard, The author in this life chose not so much diction as truth: obeying your exhortations (to which I think it absurd not to obey); and I have confined it under the distribution of d three volumes, with a cheap scheme indeed of words, but brief; so that he who shudders at the rough face of the speech may at least breathe with the brevity of the reading. For knowing that nothing is more excellent than truth, with a truthful style rather than a polished one, holding the plains of humility, what I have seen or learned from the account of faithful men, I have committed to letters and transmitted to successors; and diminishing rather than unfolding the dignity of the work, I have only provided matter for good orators: writing things seen by himself or learned from certain report. which I did not wish to overlay with deceits of speech even the truth of the matter, lest while the reader more studiously attends to the pomps and trappings of the words, he should more negligently perceive the virtues of the holy man. But if anyone, after the manner of Jewish unbelief, seeking signs, should measure any Saint by the quantity of miracles; what will he judge about Blessed Mary the Mother of God, whom the Gospel series of reading, referring many other things about her, does not say to have done prodigies? But also what will he judge about John the forerunner of Christ, whom the Evangelist most clearly confirms to have done no miracle, saying, "John did no sign"? and loving virtues above miracles. More soundly therefore is it decreed, that when many who have done signs are reproved on the day of judgment, only those who have pursued works of justice will be gathered to salvation. John 10:41 Not therefore by the performance of miracles (although these will by no means be absent) do we commend our Father Bernard: but because, meek and humble of heart, he imitated Christ, we demonstrate. But lest the times be consumed in preludes, let us now more fully approach speaking of him, about whom we have been speaking for a long time. e
NOTES.
METRICAL SYNOPSIS OF THE CHAPTERS.
CHAPTER I.
B. Bernard's education, and monastic life in the cenobium of St. Cyprian.
[6] Bernard therefore, by race a Ponthieu man, in the territory of Abbeville, was born of honest and religious parents, Born in the territory of Abbeville, pursuing the studies of hospitality and humanity, and, as their means sufficed, diligently administering to Christ in his needy members. When he was assigned by them to the studies of letters, the grace of supernal condescension received him into the bosom of its love, so that to all things with which he was taught he might easily attain: he is instructed in various sciences, whence it came about that in Grammatical and Dialectical reasonings, and in other faculties of the literary art, he thrived somewhat. Living indeed among scholastic youths, he did not enter upon the broad ways of this world, but avoided wantonness with such zeal as one would flee the poison of a serpent, and a deadly plague. And while the young men of his age, as the age of men is accustomed, devoted to piety. would follow the spectacles of vain things; he withdrew into the inner chambers of his lodging,
writing or reading or meditating on something useful. For he wished to turn away his eyes, lest they see vanity: because in the way of God he was ardently thirsting to be given life.
[7] Having assumed a long garment, Indeed already at that time his mind was so inflamed with the affection of religion, that he clothed himself in a regular garment in the manner of a Canon; and according to the custom and manner of the habit, he kept such great sobriety of life and such great modesty in his conduct, that very many of his schoolmates mockingly called him a monk. He does not care about the mockery of others The young man of good disposition preferred, however, to endure their ridiculous hostilities, rather than to desert the purity and purpose of a good life, and to mix himself with the death-bearing acts of corrupt men. For the inspiration of divine love was already drawing him, which strengthened his mind to bear the trouble of mockery, and separating him from the mass of the lost, adorned him with the gifts of sanctity: in the 20th year of his age he is instructed in sacred Scripture, and so up to about the twentieth year of his age, having embraced the disciplines of scholastic studies, he attained a not moderately lively and keen understanding in the sciences of the Scriptures.
[8] But in truth he was burning more and more each day with the desire of holy conversation: because that fire, which the Son of God came to send upon earth, wishing that it should burn, had kindled his mind from his early age, which daily increasing, revealing itself by sparkling through signs of sanctity, could not be hidden. For who shall hide fire? But now it had received the strength of such increase, that already it wished to burst forth through the burning of a greater flame; and bursting forth, inflaming his soul more vehemently, he aspires to a more holy life: to lead him to this, that he should put off entirely the ambition of temporal things, and join himself to the followers of the monastic profession. For divine goodness was doing this, that the good shoot of the plant, which it had already cut off from the love of transitory things, should be grafted into a tree of good seed; unwilling that he should longer remain in the company of scholarly men, lest the example of their malice and depravity should turn his mind back from good purpose.
[9] The young man therefore, acquiescing in holy inspirations, did not delay to do what he was drawn to: he goes into Aquitaine, leaving behind his native Ponthieu, he entered the parts of the region of Aquitaine, accompanied by three companions of the same age, burning with the same vow as he. When these without hesitation, taking the way, were heading toward the purpose, they met the b King of the Franks. By which presage Bernard, admonished, is said forthwith to have said these things to his comrades: "Come, companions, let us proceed briskly in mind, trusting having met the King of the Franks, that we shall find the King of heaven whom we seek; who have found in our journey the king of earth, whom we were not at all seeking." When, He comes to Poitiers, with the Lord leading, they arrived at Poitiers, they stayed there for some time: and endeavored by diligent inquiry to discover which monks in Aquitaine kept more strictly the discipline of regular life. For this they inquired, that they might associate with the better, and commit their life to be ruled by the holier. Not far from this city is situated the c monastery of St. Cyprian, to the monastery of St. Cyprian: which at that time was governed by a certain Abbot, whose name was d Rainald: a man preeminently learned in letters, and the Abbot Rainald, endowed with such great wisdom, that in public councils he was the most eloquent pleader of causes: on account of which he was also well known and accepted in the Roman curia, and was held in high repute in Aquitaine. He had also been a disciple of e St. Robert, founder of that monastery which is called Casa-Dei, which fame had reported to Bernard, and by reporting had made him very thirsty to hear his teaching.
[10] Now the aforesaid monastery at that time had several monks, noble by birth, but much more noble by the holiness of their life and the honorableness of their character: where there lived Hildebert, afterward Abbot of Dols, of whom one was Hildebert, who afterwards became the f Abbot of the monastery of Dols, then the g Archbishop of Bourges, to whom the blessed Mother of God, the Virgin Mary, is said to have appeared in a certain tribulation of his, and to have brought him consolations. But also Gervase, who afterwards was Abbot of the h monastery of St. Sabinus, Gervase, Abbot of St. Sabinus: a man of the greatest abstinence and distinguished with the ornament of all virtues. Also Garnier, who had been lord of that castle which is called i Mons-Maurilionis. He, a lover of poverty and solitude, deserting the fellowship of cenobitic monks, pursued the zeal of the anchoretic life; Garnier, famous for a miracle: who when on a certain day he was proceeding through the vastness of the desert, he saw a certain man seized by a demon, compassionating whose misery, calling by his prayers upon the power of Jesus Christ, he expelled the demon by which he was held, and sent the man away unharmed. and other illustrious men: With these and many other similar men, by whose frequency the monastery of St. Cyprian was then ennobled, the disposition of divine providence, wishing to add his servant Bernard, so that with the strongest soldier joined to the stronger ones, the whole army might be rendered more daring and more robust against the enemies, he takes the monastic habit: led him with favorable journey to the presence of the aforesaid Father Rainald. To him, diligently comforted first with sufficient teaching and exhortation, the Abbot gave the habit of Holy conversation, and joining him to the body of the congregation, distinguished him with tonsure as a monk.
[11] Who, having been received into the monastery, and instructed by the holy Brothers, whom we have mentioned above, in the institutes and customs of monastic conversation; forthwith ascended to such a height of perfection, that he was held admirable by all. For who can express in speech, in how great humility he contained his life, and with how great subjection he submitted himself. He excels in obedience, He ministered to all, served all, being subject to all: he attended to all as superiors, venerated them as elders, showed reverence as to his masters and teachers: obedient to all, contradicting none; loving all without pretense, embracing all with the affection of piety and the bowels of mercy; he had compassion on all, and in other virtues; caring for their advantages, putting off his own: envying none, slandering no one; never murmuring, never whispering, judging the life of no one, condemning no one; his words always echoed Christ, peace, mercy. Who ever knew him angry, who turbulent? Always serene in mind, gentle in address, polished in speech, joyful in affability, outstanding in discretion, assailer of injustice, champion of justice: confident in faith, strong in hope, diffused in charity, and to conclude briefly, distinguished with every honesty of manners. Who ever more sharply subdued his body with the torments of abstinence, cold, and vigils?
[12] He gave special attention to reading and meditation on the Scriptures, reading Scripture by night, to such a degree indeed that for the greater part of the nights he persisted watchful in reading the sacred volumes, and passed the night for a long time in the consideration of the divine reasonings. Therefore when one night he gave effort to this study, he was overcome by sleep; and the candle which he had prepared large enough for this work, slipped from his sleeping hand onto the book. He saves the book from the candle which fell on it unharmed. He sleeps, it burns lying upon the page, until it is all consumed, and yet the codex is not burned. Here therefore, for ten years or more, he dwelt in the cloister of St. Cyprian with so great a rigor of abstinence, he shone with the radiance of so great virtues, that he illumined the whole congregation with the rays of his sanctity, and provoked it to better things not so much by words as by deeds: and he taught his teachers, who had first instructed him, by words, now not by the argument of speech or the splendor of discourse, but by the power of his work. And so it came about that he already began to preside over the whole congregation, not by place of prelacy, but by excellence of sanctity, and by the authority of good operation.
NOTES.
CHAPTER II.
The Priorate of the monastery of St. Sabinus administered, discipline restored, and other distinguished deeds.
[13] At that time a certain monk of the monastery of Cyprian, namely Gervase, Under Gervase as Abbot of St. Sabinus he is made Prior, of whom we have made mention above, was being asked by many prayers of the whole congregation to take up the governance of the church of St. Sabinus. But to this he could by no means be impelled, neither through the Bishop commanding, nor through his own Abbot extending obedience to him, unless they gave him St. Bernard as helper. Which at length having been granted to him, Gervase is set as Abbot, and Bernard is appointed Prior in the congregation. This however was done by the pious counsel of divinity, that to drive off the darkness of that church these two great luminaries might be sent; because, by the negligence of the preceding Abbot, the congregation of that place had deserted the path of regular life, and had changed the rigor of discipline into the lukewarmness of life and dissolution. Which being first well known to Gervase, by good and sound counsel divinely inspired to him, he was unwilling to take up the care of them alone: lest, while he labored outwardly in the administration of temporal things, there might not be within, who would sustain spiritual things. But with two associated and helping him, one procuring outwardly, the other providing inwardly; by the grace of the Lord the monastery, within a short time, was restored to such great integrity of holy conversation, that, what was marked with infamy on account of dissolution, afterwards was held famous on account of religion.
[14] At the same time, on the occasion of a certain church, between the often-mentioned Gervase and the venerable Bernard, with the monks of the same monastery dissenting, he resists him on account of simony; no small altercation arose. For Gervase, for the sake of enlarging and enriching the cenobium, was eagerly insisting on acquiring the said church; but Bernard by no means acquiesced, perceiving that the Simoniacal pest was entering from the side. Whence it came about that the same Gervase, after he saw himself had not prevailed, and the already said church, for which he was breathlessly sighing, the then Abbot of St. Cyprian obtained; moved with vehement indignation against the man of God Bernard, despising the care committed to him, put it off, and from the expenses of St. Sabinus constructed a habitation for himself at St. Cyprian, in which thenceforth he dwelt for a very long time. These things
we have not brought forth to this end, that we might propose any argument of dissension to simpler people; but so that, and with him departed as will be declared in what follows, by handing them down to the posterity of those to come, we might make manifest the fearful judgments of God and at the same time his great works to be proclaimed. For very many read much more ardently, that among those also contention was made, who by the Gospel's testimony visibly adhered to the heavenly teaching; than what is intimated in their Acts: "The multitude of believers had one heart and one soul." Luke 22:24, Acts 4:32 But since we by no means now desire to satisfy those who judge the divine Scriptures with a crooked glance, and contrive to pervert them with inexplicable evasion; let us return to our intermitted proposition, from which we have somewhat digressed.
[15] Bernard meanwhile, deprived of the patronage of the often-mentioned Gervase, watches over the utility and regular discipline: but not destitute of divine support, after the manner of a provident steward; with watchful care insisting now on the outer, now on the inner advantages of the whole monastery of St. Sabinus, he gave so much the more effort, as a greater burden of care lay upon him: and therefore, lest anything less honest should happen through his laziness, he recalled with frequent reconsideration. But because he cannot be Abel whom the malice of Cain does not exercise, nor is a rose seen to bloom except among thorns; he is reported to have been affected by very many exacerbations, by certain opponents of canonical institutions dwelling in the same cenobium only in body, and provoked by most frequent molestations. Of whom one, who was recognized more obstinate than the rest and more daring in inflicting any molestations, He patiently bears contumelies brought upon him: when with frequent invective of words on a certain day he rushed headlong against him, Bernard indeed, for the sake of example, committing vengeance to him who admonishes it to be committed to him, saying, "Vengeance is mine, and I will repay"; bore the reproaches heaped upon him with equanimity: but divine vengeance at once by an evident and most celebrated judgment terribly restrained his opposer. Rom. 12:19 For the same most unfortunate man, sitting in the cloister sound and brisk with the others, with a certain obstinate one punished with sudden death died by sudden and unexpected death, given as an example to others for the heap of his damnation. And because, by the oracle of the Wise Man, "a pestilent man having been scourged, the prudent man is made more prudent"; the rest, terrified by such strict animadversion, forthwith manfully gird themselves to higher exercises of monastic rigor. Prov. 19:25 He has the rest morigerous: Finally in the administration of outward things, with suitable procurators appointed, the servant of God Bernard, given to prayer and silence with irrefragable length of time, had arrived at such great purity of mind, that he knew very many things by prophetic inspiration, which the knowledge of men had not yet.
[16] Therefore in the year of the Lord's incarnation one thousand and ninety-b sixth, the Roman Pontiff c Urban was admonishing the people of Christians, In the year 1096 that they should go to Jerusalem, and free the city from the hands of the Gentiles, and cleanse the temple of the Lord and the sepulchre from their filth. Which admonition of the Pope the Christian people received with such great affection and desire of mind, that d not a few Abbots and monks and also hermits deserted their monasteries, to the journey into the Holy Land having set out Gervase and set out for Jerusalem: with whom the aforesaid Gervase, without satisfaction for the injury which he had inflicted on the man of God Bernard, took up the journey. About to go to Jerusalem; but (because man's way is not his own) neither about to arrive there, nor to return again. For he, taking the begun journey, with prosperous successes coming to himself and his company, had reached the desired shore: and already, as it seemed, master of all his vows, he had come to the Jerusalemite plains: when truly by the permission of Him, whose judgments, though sometimes hidden, are never however unjust, a most fierce lion leaping forth from his lair, torn apart by a lion, tore him limb from limb, together with the ass on which he sat, and killed him: and having performed so horrendous a spectacle, to mountain caves and lairs known to him, with the rest untouched, but terrified by such prodigious misfortune, with swift steps went back. When these things were happening in the territory of Jerusalem, Bernard in Aquitaine, placed not far from his monastery, on the same day knew it through the spirit: on the same day he knows it, and moved with the affection of pious remembrance, calling to himself a certain monk of the same church, of which at that time, as we have often already said, he had charge, he made it known: "Go," he said, "and tell William Samuel, that Gervase the Abbot, his paternal uncle, and his ass in the province of Judea have been killed by a lion, and let him strive to announce his death to the Brothers, and have the bells rung, so that the funerals may be performed with due veneration. and arranges for his funeral rites to be celebrated. The monks however performed the Office according to custom; but how he himself knew this they did not know. But in the same year from those who had returned from Jerusalem, they learned, that on the same day Gervase with his little ass had died, on which Bernard had announced his death: whence without doubt the matter was clear, that he knew it through the spirit of prophecy.
[17] To Bernard wisely and regularly governing the said monastery committed to him, through whom chiefly had been made the restoration of its religion, such a revelation is divinely opened. He had the custom, that after Compline he would remain in the oratory, and for a long time would spend the night watchful in prayers. Therefore on a certain night, when after prayers he was going from the oratory to the dormitory, he sees a multitude of monks, whitened like snow, sitting in Chapter. Moved by the novelty of this vision, he is said to have entered the Chapter, seen by white monks in Chapter and having humbly asked and received their blessing, to have sat with them a while, for the sake of knowing the matter more diligently. Then one of those sitting, who seemed worthier than the rest both in age and order, revealed to Bernard alone, as had been enjoined on him, the office and name of his priorate to the others; and said such things to him: "Dearest one, he is praised for restored discipline: we were monks of this monastery, and we have permission to visit these holy places, in which by working out our salvation we once dwelt: but to you we render worthy thanks, because by divine grace going before, to the state of religion and holiness of this cenobium the congregation has returned by your working, and he understands that 10 monks will die shortly: which once greatly strayed from the norm of justice. This also we enjoin, that on the morrow you announce to the Brothers, that of them ten and nine are about to depart from this life within a short space." This vision having been completed, he himself, asserting that a certain monk had seen this, he indicates to each the day of illness and death. warned the Brothers, that they should purge their consciences through confession, and prepare themselves to receive the end of life. But one of those who were about to die asserted that he was delirious and uttering the words of a dream: but soon he heard from Bernard such a response: "That you may know by experience, that I do not tell uncertain things of dreams, first of all the Brothers you will die, nor will you be able to pass the fixed term." By the Mother of God And so, beginning from him, he showed to each one by name the time of his sickness; also expressing the day of his dissolution. But the death of the Brothers follows in the same order as had been foretold by him, and so he is proven to have seen certain things.
[18] In the oratory of this monastery, one night, according to custom after Compline, with Bernard weeping zealously and praying,
Shining in appearance, and bright in snowy raiment, The Mother of God was seen, she said this, the renewer of the world: Having first suffered many anguishes and labors, Joyful you shall come to the ethereal throne.
"But about the trouble of labors and anguishes announced to you beforehand, dearest Bernard, do not be angry at the divine disposition: he understands his predestination, nay rather joyfully acquiesce in the reasonings of his judgments, and gratefully rejoice: and again I say rejoice, because he who proposed that you should be afflicted temporally on earth, holds you eternally pre-inscribed in the number of his Saints in the indissoluble writings of his predestination." Having said these things, she disappeared: And he, cheered with inestimable joy over the happiness of his lot made known to him, afterwards revealed to a certain elder what he had heard, through whom the knowledge of this matter came to us.
NOTES.
CHAPTER III.
Eremitic life in the Maine solitude.
[19] But that in the very matter, what the Mother of God had foretold to the holy man, About to be elected Abbot, he flees: might be proven to be true, immediately the cause of labor arose for him. For having learned the will of the monks, who were disposing themselves to make him Abbot, he secretly departed from them; intending to seek that which he had for many years desired, namely the pursuit of the anchoretic life, and so that he might acquire his sustenance by the labor of his hands. Now there lived, not far from the monastery of Sabinus, a certain venerable man, by Peter of Stars the hermit he is received, and religious hermit, Peter by name, of Stars, who afterwards was the founder of that monastery which is called a Fons-Gumbaudi: to whom Bernard turning aside, because he was already known to him and familiar, opened the cause for which he had come. Whom Peter received with great joy of mind: but because there were in the neighborhood monks, who were striving to make him Abbot against his will; he could not keep him with himself for long, although he exceedingly desired it. Bernard furthermore, burning both with the desire of now-wished-for poverty and solitude, and vehemently fearing, that, unless he withdrew more quickly, compelled by his Abbot or by the Bishop, he would be made Abbot, to be implicated in the cares of pastoral solicitude; more earnestly asked Peter, that he would more quickly and secretly withdraw him thence, and lead him to unknown solitudes of a very remote region. Peter therefore, acquiescing in the prayers of the one asking, made leader of the journey, completed what he requested.
[20] and led into a vast solitude, Now on the border of the Maine and Breton region there were vast solitudes, which at that time flourished like another Egypt with a multitude of hermits, inhabiting diverse little cells, holy men and famous on account of the excellence of their religion: among whom were chiefs and masters, b Robert of Abrissel, and c Vitalis of Mauritonio, d Ralph also of Fustine, who afterwards became founders of many and great congregations: to whom the divine disposition took care to join this fourth one through Peter, who had known them before; so that with the fourth joined to those three, a firm square might be made, which afterwards was to carry great and broad buildings. Peter truly of Stars, having completed the journey of many days,
arrived at the divine Vitalis, one of the aforesaid, whom we have already said were Princes and Masters of the hermits. He, first making Bernard commendable and praiseworthy with sufficient support of eloquent speech, asked that he be permitted to live with him, he is commended to Vitalis of Mauritonio: entirely keeping silent about his name and his past office of Priorate, not naming him Bernard, but William; as had been instructed by Bernard himself beforehand, that he should henceforth be held worthless and unknown everywhere.
[21] Peter therefore, having commended him, returned to Aquitaine. by whom, led around through the cells of the hermits, Lord Vitalis, however, according to the manner of a council, calls the anchorites together into one, and brings William's desire into the midst. The hermits, however, having learned the man's vow, from affection of charity assent, applaud the fellowship, and offer their little cells in rivalry. But in truth, the ardor of charity stirs Vitalis, and settling the dispute pleasing to him, he decrees by the authority of the synod, that William, traversing the forests, should view the dwellings of all the Brothers, and take up for dwelling whatever should please him. He therefore, with the flock of the Anchorites going before him, as had been sanctioned in the council, inspects the cells of all: and proceeding into the further wilderness, he chooses the cell of Peter the hermit; he comes to the last stone: and there he finds the dwelling of a certain Brother, whose name was Peter.
He, however, neither knew how to cultivate fields, nor to dig gardens: but only by the fruits of trees, and with the help of the art of turning, daily provided himself with dishes for the table. He had also made for himself a not very large house from the bark of trees in the ruined walls of a certain church of e St. Medard: whose better part the violence of the winds had torn off. But lest the rage of the raging winds should again prevail, he had bound the remainder of the house which had remained, with the stronger framework of some fortification, with withy cords to the oaken branches lying above. Seeing therefore from everywhere the furniture of so chastened a possession; the form of so profound and thoroughly perfected poverty, which William had desired; finding so lofty and consummate contempt of the world, which he was seeking; he presently declared to the Brothers with whom he had come, that he would remain there, and asserted that he would by no means depart thence.
[22] Peter, seeing the riches of his own fortune preferred to the others, and received by him with great joy, bearing off as from a victory the triumph of the lot of election, is poured forth in immense gladness, glories, leaps for joy, insults his comrades; he favors William's judgment, praises the mind, approves the will, which loves poverty, and despises the supports of greater substance; and promises that he will instruct him in the art of turning, appointing him heir of the iron tools of this art, if it should happen that he should survive after his death: for he was treasuring up such treasures for his successors. These things having been done, Peter, cheered with much joy, invites them to dinner: but having searched his cellars, he found provisions so thin, that they would not suffice for one, if all were set out: which thing was not new nor unusual to him; because the state of his own household affairs assiduously pressed him with such businesses. But considering with himself that a table which could not feed one, would not satisfy many, not being ignorant whence he might feed those whom he had invited, he hastily seizes his baskets; and entering the forest surrounding his dwelling on every side, he not sluggishly pulls up the thorn-bushes and brambles, strips the hazels and other wild trees of their fruits; and while he heaps up fruits of various kinds in his little baskets, in the hollow of a certain trunk he finds a swarm of bees with such fullness of wax and honey, he is refreshed by the fruits of trees and a honeycomb found. that from this very horn of plenty you would believe such abundance had flowed. Marveling therefore at such great successes of fortune, he attributes to the merits of the pilgrim monk, whom he had just received into fellowship, that God had bestowed so much material of light and food. Returning home, he loads the table with dishes: for he sets out huge dripping combs of honey, and the wild fruits of various trees, and brings a pottage made from the leaves of trees; and it would be a lavish feast, if bread were not lacking, the worthier part of the fare. But the celebration of fraternal joy being finished, each returns to his own cell.
[23] Peter however teaches William, who remains with him, the discipline of turning, as he had promised: and he, having a docile mind, in a short time surpasses his teacher. The ease of William's capacious genius pleases Peter. He learns the art of turning: For zeal and envy had long receded from the secret of his heart. He, as an ancient cultivator of the desert and accustomed to such things, from the fruitful benefit of the forest trees and the practice of the aforesaid art, obtains his provisions: William however, always remaining at home, as a subject disciple, fulfilling the duties of the non-lavish kitchen, prepares wild herbs into pottage; to which, that they may be rendered softer and sweeter, on festive days he adds the seasoning of salt. After Vespers when they dine once in the day, Peter reclines, William serves: for he had learned from the good Teacher, "I came not to be ministered unto, but to minister." Matt. 20:28 Having embraced then the purpose of the anchoretic life, soon surpassing all others in the rigor of abstinence, he stands out in abstinence, he sustains his life with the leaves of trees and herbs; taming his body, with hunger, thirst, vigils, cold, and the hard exercises of labors.
[24] Also in the assiduity of prayer and of contemplation he perseveres so indefatigably, that although living in the body, he seems to live beyond the affections of the body. Nor is absent from the secret of his conscience, the sacrifice of a contrite heart; nor is absent the groaning, nor the compunction, nor from the gaze of the mind the contemplation of divine things, nor from his eyes the overflowing and restless pouring forth of tears.
Putting earthly things behind, by prayer and contemplation, in mind he surveys heavenly things; Dwelling in the caverns of the desert in body, in mind the pole, An inhabitant of the woods, through the pathless lairs of beasts, Small, unknown, he lies hidden, alone without a name; But joined to the citizens of heaven, in the light of his heart Known, exalted, great, famous, venerable He enters the spacious palaces of the starry kingdom, having his conversation in heaven And the whole court of the Thunderer now favors him as he enters. With internal sight, placed above the stars on high, He also traverses the flowering fields of the upper world, Plucking flowers, tasting healthful fruits, Whose taste drives away the languors and pains, And the odor takes away the anguishes and also the labors: And he foretastes already the sweet joys of the highest good. He is astonished and seeing the miracles of the bright heaven, Marveling at the mystical volumes of great things.
[25] Sought for three years he is found, For three years therefore, during which William lay hidden with Peter at St. Medard, scouts were sent from the monks of St. Sabinus, running through the hidden places of the woods of all Gaul, through the digged places of the lands, through the precipices of the mountains, to seek out wherever they might find Bernard. At length having learned where he was, they return, and announce where and with whom he was hiding. Hearing the certification of this matter, the monks are rejoiced, and straightway diligently seek from the Bishop and the Abbot himself mandates secured with seals, that it may be permitted to lead Bernard out of the desert, and to appoint him as their Pastor, as the common assent of them had asked. These having been obtained, while they prepare the necessaries of the journey; and understanding that he is to be compelled to the Abbey a certain monk of theirs, whose name was Hugo, secretly went out from the monastery, who coming to Bernard, burst forth into these words: "You are struck with anathema, if you remain here longer; unless you take up the government of our monastery, as the Bishop and your Abbot obtain." Having said this, he recounted the whole series of the matter in order; that they had sought him for a full three years, that from the Bishop and the Abbot they had received mandates for bringing him back and making him Abbot. Which when Bernard heard, he groaned, and disposed to flee to the marine islands; he desires to flee toward the sea, so that at least the sea might conceal him whom the land could not hide. Setting out therefore thence, having said farewell to the Brothers, all weeping from sorrow, he departed.
NOTES.
CHAPTER IV.
Solitary life on the island of Chausey. Pirates emended.
[25] One of the hermits, sympathizing with his poverty, gave to one of his companions eighteen coins, piously providing that they might have so little money, from which on the journey they might purchase supplies, at least for some days. Which when the man of the Lord had learned, The 18 coins given to his companion, not moderately indignant, that he was carrying silver with him, he thus said: "Either you will not be my companion, or you will cease to carry these coins. Do you think Christ to be poor in those parts to which we are hastening, whom we know to be rich everywhere? Fear not poverty, Christ being rich: for Christ will minister to you sufficiently the necessaries, if you shall first faithfully seek the kingdom of God." And these things having been said, a certain poor peasant met them, to whom he commanded the coins to be forthwith given. The poor man indeed, receiving the silver, is made glad, because with ease he had the coins: Bernard however is made more glad, because he is entirely without coins. Each therefore in a different way being made glad, that one hastens home with his money, he orders to be given to a poor man. this one without money, not having for his first lodging where to lay his head, knew not whither to go; but trusting in the largesse of God's goodness, hastening to complete the begun journey, according to which he had intended, he had come to the British sea: and there, having learned that within ten miles of the sea a certain island, he sails to the island of Chausey: would afford a solitude suitable for anchorites, which the ancients called a Causeum, he boarded a ship: to which having come, he lived in it for very many years.
[27] Placed therefore in such hidden remoteness, and separated from the noise and disturbance of men, and alienated from all hearing of human conversation, he lives solitary he was wholly in heavenly contemplations. Day and night persisting in prayer, in contrition of heart, and in the pouring out of tears, he was thinking of the days of old, and the eternal years he had in mind, and the contemplation of the highest good was feeding him: nor any longer was he burning with much desire of earthly food, whom the sweetness of divine contemplation was assiduously satisfying. He remained therefore for many days without bread in this place, without fire, without companion. But with what foods he sustained his life, when these things were absent, when we asked him, he refused to indicate, an artful dissembler of his own virtues, as any perverse man is wont to be a crafty concealer of his own shameful deeds.
Living on raw herbs: But in truth, as was afterwards learned by certain of his companions, he used raw roots of herbs. Nor to him, dwelling there, was lacking the temptation of the demon, wishing to frighten him away and expel him from those seats: for with his phantastic arts he brought in terrible forms, which the soldier of Christ, armed with the little sign of the Cross, manfully and confidently overcame.
[28] In these days from Armoric Brittany piratical raiders, with three armed rafts, went forth: who in the deep of the English sea find two ships, loaded with various merchandise, Seeing pirate ships driven thither, whose owners, preparing themselves boldly to defend, are attacked in a naval battle. The fight is fought bravely on both sides: by the pirates fiercely, that they may plunder the goods of others; by the merchants manfully, that they may defend their own. At length the raging pirate multitude prevailed: the wretched merchants are overcome, wounded, and half-dead bound on the benches. Soon the rapacity of the raging ones, having obtained its desire, turns toward Brittany: but the contrariness of the winds, with the heavenly clemency doing this, drives the fleet to the island of Causeum. Bernard however, a lover of piety and executor of mercy, of which his whole bowels overflowed, when he sees the captive men, with their hands bound behind their backs, he rebukes the raiders, comforts the captives. lying half-dead in the bilge, despoiled of their money, wailing with tearful complaints, soaked in their own blood; but the robbers exulting and dancing with joy; compassionating the miseries of both, draws sighs from the bottom of his heart, and forthwith suffusing his eyes with tears, weeps for these, who by cruel rapacity destroy their souls; exhorts those to patience, whom such hard misfortunes heavily afflict. He reproves, terrifies, rebukes, and beseeches the raiders, that they cease to be like the demons, whom through cruelty they imitate: and that they restore to their brothers the damages which they had inflicted, and make satisfaction for the injuries inflicted with humble supplication and asking for pardon. He admonishes the wounded merchants, that imitating Christ, they should ask of God pardon for their persecutors; and keeping in mind the virtue of wisdom, they should love those from whom such great evils are brought upon them. But the wretched merchants, in whom was a deeper sense, weep for the evils which they feel; but the most cruel robbers, who were rejoicing in the worst things, laugh at the words which they hear.
[29] Furthermore around the twilight of day and night, with the winds blowing according to the vow of the piratical band, heeding nothing of the holy man's admonitions, they depart; and with the prey which they had taken, strive to reach the native ports. They having departed, he prays the whole night Bernard, however, whose mind was moved by the affection of fraternal compassion, betook himself to prayer; and passing that whole night sleepless, invokes with pious voices the Mother of God accustomed to help him, and invokes the other Saints of God in aid at the price of his tears and groans, that the divine goodness might convert the minds of the pirates to good, and restore those whom they had captured, free and released, with their recovered money, to their families. But in truth the devil, the author and kindler of all cruelty, by no means sleeping, inflames his satellites under the pretense of gain to works of cruelty, that he may afterwards drag them to hell. For among them he stirs up a dispute about the division of the booty: for some of them contended to have the greater part for themselves: and turning the pirates to mutual slaughter but certain contended that in this partition the rules of justice and equity should be kept, which however in its acquisition they by no means had kept. And because among the wicked there are always quarrels, being wholly divided in this matter, with the devil instigating and persuading, with swords drawn they begin to strike one another alternately: and there would be the greatest slaughter of the wretches, if the merit of the holy man praying for them had not opposed. Thus the whole night Bernard and the devil, by his prayers he hinders: like two great wrestlers, standing in the field of contest, with mutual and restless encounters fiercely attacked each other: for the devil was striving to destroy, Bernard to deliver: each fought for his own side, and labored to obtain the victory.
[30] But at length our athlete rising more strongly, redoubles the blows of prayer, slays the enemy, and grants no respite; compels him to retreat, pursues him as he yields, and finally drives him off the field of contest, troubling the elements with prayer, that he might bring back to himself the wretched merchants, and the ships and the wild robbers. Now the aforesaid pirates had by now reached the desired port: they were already beginning to seize the rocks of the shore with the iron teeth of their anchors; they were already hurrying to bring the planks out from the ships, fix the stakes, b or secure the rafts with the cables of hawsers. When behold a vehement wind and contrary to them, and a storm arising, moved by Bernard's prayers, rising, heaps the air into clouds, accumulates shadowy clouds, from whose collision created thunderclaps are soon heard, deterring them with horrible sound; terrifying lightnings rush down, and the flashing of flickering flames, beating back their eyes, precedes: the upper surface of the sea on every side appears to them burning and flame-belching, and with the wind commanding, the fleet is led back to the depths of the sea against their will; the density of the clouds, with the air no longer able to bear them, is dissolved into showers, and there comes such great inundation of rain, that you would believe the floodgates of heaven to be again unloosed for making a flood, and that the old times of Noah had returned: and so great disturbance of the elements arises, that anyone standing there would think the whole fabric of the convulsed world was being immediately reduced to the old chaos: and by the furious blasts of attacking winds, immense rollings of waves are raised up like mountains, on whose summits the keels are lifted to the stars, and soon with the waves parting swifter than flying arrows, they descend to the very depths of the abyss.
[31] The rowers, however, affected by the stench of the lightnings falling near, them perishing are prostrated like the dead upon the benches c with their straps bursting, the oars striking the waves, are drawn out from the oar-holes. The masts also, with their binding loosed, fall down with their yards. The substance of the sails also, torn in pieces by the rapacity of the winds, is drawn hither and thither through the emptiness of the air. The halyards and other service ropes, with the mastheads of the pulleys shattered, fall down. Immediately the masts, necessarily deprived of the support of the cords, are driven hither and thither by the quivering of the winds; and by their own staggering the keels of the ships are almost overturned; and finally not bearing the rage of the winds, torn from the very hollows of the modii, with the supports on every side broken, almost sinking the ships with their own weight, they are rolled into the waves. Finally, with the joints of the planks open, water is found to have entered up to the gangways, so that not so much the ships were seen to be among the waves, as the waves now within the ships. Finally by the severity of the tempest the rudders are taken away from the fastenings of the nails. Therefore with the rafts lacking control, the sterns are turned toward the prows, and are tossed about in the manner of a whirlwind. and rendered gentler, Then the helmsman himself grows pale, then the wretches despairing of their life loose the bound merchants from their chains, and with humble supplication ask pardon for the injuries inflicted: and restore their moneys, as was thought, profitless henceforth either to themselves or to them; and if they know any counsel, as in a common peril, they ask them not to hide it;
But what counsel, what of mind could now be theirs, When on every side the whole world now crushes the wretches?
[32] Nevertheless they socially expend all the exertions of their machinations, by which the industry of nautical honesty is wont to defend its life from the furious whirlpool of the raging waves. But after they see that their efforts avail nothing against the fury of the sea; then with the hope of living wholly removed, the transgressors return to the heart; and with vexation giving understanding to the hearing, then confessing that they have sinned, that they are guilty, they tear their garments, beat their breasts, and bind themselves by the resolve of various pilgrimages: some assert that they will be Jerusalem-goers, and after various vows others that they will travel to the Roman city, that they may deserve to have suffrages. Very many of them assert with guaranteed promises, that they will seek the famous memorial of James the Apostle in the furthest bounds of Galicia. But after these vows, with the severity of the tempest nevertheless persevering, agitated by the vehemence of fear, they begin to make manifest by confessing in the hearing of all, the sins which they had shamefully committed, more shamefully; usurping to themselves the Priestly office, d while they both give and receive penances alternately. Then they confer on one another the kiss of peace, so that death might find them as confederates in peace, whom the devil, inventor of dissension, that they might wage war on the faithful of Christ, had long since confederated: and with clasped hands they hold themselves bound, because it seemed to them to pertain to piety, if they perished together beneath the waves, whom the cruelty of slaughter and rapacity breathing had previously associated.
[33] So with the pirates preparing themselves to receive death, one of them, who was arguing with himself not how he might receive it, but how he might find its escape, thus brought forth: "O Comrades, why do we perish? Do what I shall say, imploring his intercession, without doubt we shall live. Do you not remember that on the island of Causeum yesterday you saw a holy hermit, whose admonitions we despised, whose words we laughed at? Let us vow, lifting our hands upward, and firmly determine with ourselves, if the Lord brings us back to him, that whatever he shall order we will do; and from the jaws of this death, now swallowing us up, we shall be drawn back by his merits." This voice all unanimously, as an oracle sent from heaven, they receive; and in testimony of this profession, as the instructor had directed, they raise their hands. Soon with a certain security received, they burst forth into these words: "O virtue of the Most High," they say, "which we have now known by most certain experiences to be most powerful; permit us to live: grant times of correction: give place for indulgence: which, as it seems to us, you cannot justly deny; because we are now no longer piratical raiders, but professed followers of the hermit man. We no longer hold the merchants captive: but we help them, as our brothers, whose burdens we ought to bear, fulfilling the law of Christ, struggling against the rage of the sea, lest they be swallowed by its whirlpool, as we are able. Their money, we desired as greedy robbers: but laboring for its protection, as ministers of the holy hermit, we keep it to be returned."
[34] But omnipotent God: who wondrously terrified their minds, also wondrously preserved their life through the merit of his servant Bernard, to whom they called out with special devotion. he finally receives the shipwrecked: For while these and similar things were being cried out by those wretches, the terror of death agitating them; by the terrific blast of thundering air the ships are driven to the shores of the island of Causeum, and by the force of the most rapid impetus are driven up onto the dry of the shore: of which four having suffered shipwreck, the fifth with its rigging is preserved unharmed. The pirates therefore and merchants, when they find themselves and their money on the ground of the earth with the fragments of the ships; seeing that they had escaped the abyss of death, are said to have wept for joy. Then the holy man, by whose sanctity they had no doubt this had been granted to them, is sought; then his merits, as the miracles of divine power, are proclaimed by them with a loud voice. When found, however, as if a heavenly divinity, he is adored by them, although he himself forbids it. Then he is asked by the robbers with tears, that he take up the merchants as free men with their merchandise; whom on the previous day, asking with manifold supplication, he had not been able to free. Then the pirates, prostrate at his feet, ask that the measure of penance be determined for them for their former faults, and set forth the vows of pilgrimage which they had made; and that they might fulfill them, some of them receive a command; but some, that they might imitate the innocence of his life, remained with him.
The merchants also suggest to the holy man that he make a house for himself from the planks of the shipwreck, He builds a house from the planks of the shipwreck. and offer money for the hiring of craftsmen for the work. For Bernard, although he had lived on the island for several years, had not yet had a house; but in caverns of rocks, or like a guardian of a vineyard or of a cucumber-field, had lain hidden in cheap little huts.
[35] This, O Christ, is the provident dispensation of your condescension, this is your power, this is the benign change of your strong right hand. For to this you willed that the elements should be disturbed for the merits of your servant, that you might convert the minds of rapacious men, that you might rescue the captives from the bonds of prison, that you might construct a house for your anchorite lying hidden in cold rocks, and reveal his life to the world. Finally, after they had remained for some days on the island with the holy man, and with provisions wholly failing, they were not able to use raw roots of herbs, imitating him, in order to sustain themselves; compelled by hunger they greatly desire to depart: and being asked by those wasting from hunger but deterred by the fury of the previous sea disturbance, they know not what to choose for themselves. For raging hunger, feeding on their limbs, commands them to depart: but the fear of the rage of the sea, shaking their hearts with trembling, compels them to remain. They are compressed therefore by anxieties: yet it is necessary for them to choose one of the two, either to perish from the scarcity of provisions, or to attempt again that most perilous navigation which they had experienced. But not able to bear any longer the tyranny of the torturing hunger, which they feel in the present, he obtains tranquility: they strive to find a reason for themselves to navigate securely: for they approach Bernard, whom, taught by the preceding experiences, they do not doubt to be able to command both the winds and the sea, that he might take up in his faith the motions of the elements, that he might establish himself with God as guarantor, that the marine waves might keep tranquility, until with prosperous course they reach the desired ports. The holy man, however, to whom divine grace had granted great faith, seeing men laboring under the danger of death, brings to memory that word of Christ: "If you shall have faith as a grain of mustard seed, you shall say to this mountain, 'Remove hence,' and it shall be removed." Matt. 17:19 What they had asked, he accomplished, and sent them with peaceful navigation to their own.
NOTES.
CHAPTER V.
The return of B. Bernard to the former hermits, and then to the first monastery of St. Cyprian.
[36] Meanwhile the monks of St. Sabinus, seeking Bernard, to whom they proposed with all effort to hand over the governance of their Church, when they find him nowhere, appoint another Pastor for themselves. Peter of Stars Which Peter of Stars, because he lived in their neighborhood, immediately learning, soon hastened to the aforesaid deserts of the hermits, and coming to Lord Vitalis, asked where he was, whom he had commended. He answered that he was hiding on a most remote sea island. Peter indeed, now judging that it was not useful to conceal what he had previously kept silent about Bernard, learning that he lies hidden on an island, recounted to the Brothers in common hearing his name, his skill in letters, the sanctity of his conduct and life, his refusal of prelacy; and was then preaching in Neustria such a fame of him, as many years before he had known in Aquitaine: he encourages the hermits to recall him: and counsels them, that they should draw him back from the sea islands even unwilling, if they loved the doctrine of Catholic preaching, the counsel of life, the example of holy conversation. Whose judgment the multitude of the Brothers receiving in mind, already from the past conversation of the man with them, recognizing that what he reported was true, by common decree forthwith they resolve, that they should send such legates to him, by whose solicitude and industry they should not doubt that he could be recalled to them. Wherefore they direct to him Peter of Stars himself, by whose authority and love he could be brought back, to which he himself is sent adding to him as a guide of the journey, one who is still surviving, by name Christian, a man of wondrous simplicity and innocence: who, having completed the labor of the journey and the peril of the navigation, at length arrived at him.
[37] The man of the Lord Bernard, seeing Peter, for a long time already most familiar to him, and most faithful in receiving his flight, marvels that he had undertaken the labor of so long a pilgrimage: and pouring tears for joy, and with embraces given, kisses him many times, venerates him as father, receives him as guest, kindly received, paying all offices of humility or humanity and charity as he was able: and after sweet conversations of eternal life, with which they refreshed one another, Bernard says: "Dearest Father, tell me about the state of the region of Aquitaine, whether in those parts the Churches of Christ now have peace, and whether the monasteries preserve the rigor of discipline and religion." To these things he answered that all Christ-worshippers were, by the grace of God, joyful and quiet in festal peace: and at length added that the monks of St. Sabinus had now set over themselves an Abbot. Which when Bernard heard, he is made glad, and the fear which had afflicted his mind before, namely that he might be compelled to become their Abbot, is laid aside. Peter thereupon, desiring to fulfill the business of his legation: "I have visited," he said, "our brother hermits, and have borne their commands to you, that you return to them, that you may not wholly leave their fellowship. With how great affection of mind and desire of soul they await this, I cannot express in words." Bernard indeed, persuades him to return: as he was wholly overflowing with the bowels of fraternal charity, forthwith is said to have given such a response: "I will do what they ask, lest I seem to despise the authority of the legate and of those asking, although I would not wish to desert the solitude of this remote island." This legation therefore having been completed, Peter returned to Aquitaine.
[38] At this time the spirit of prophecy touched the mind of the man of God, which he enlightened for seeing certain absent things, as if they were present to him. For there were two of the number of hermits who had received him, and for a long time had dwelt together in the woods in concord: Adelin the hermit, of whom one, Albert by name, already advanced in years, was indefatigably pressing on in the study of abstinence and prayer; but the other, younger, called Adelin, excellently excelled in the virtue of meekness and obedience, and was so gentle by the mildness of affability, that he was held lovable by all who had enjoyed his company. Now Albert, by the privilege of his long age, presided as Master; the other, as a subject, having left the fellowship of old Albert obeyed his commands. This one, vehemently desiring to be formed by the example of the man of the Lord Bernard, and to be instructed by his teaching, leaving the aforesaid Master, took up the journey to his island. The Elder, therefore, being widowed of the consolation of his beloved disciple, fell into such a pit of temptation, that, affected by too great and irrational sadness, he would have hanged himself, unless he had been kept from such danger of death by the careful guardianship of certain Brothers, who had foreseen this. Meanwhile the man of the Lord knew through the spirit that the disciple was coming to him, Bernard receives him coming to him, and that the Master was disposing himself to a dire death hanging. The Younger, however, landed at the shores of the island, as he had desired: whom the holy man eagerly receiving, said such things to him: "You have come to us, dearest one, and not about to remain with us for a few days, rather about to return whence you have fled, and not hereafter about to come here." The young man, because he had firmly determined that he would by no means leave him wherever he went, did not give faith to his words, nor understood that he spoke by a prophetic Spirit. Therefore on the high rocks of the island for some days he remained with him: but burdened by the severity of the cold, he returned to the woods, to take up the garments which he had left there, and to return again. Who coming to the aforesaid Albert, and predicts that his return will not happen henceforth. after he sees him wasting with grief and now almost fainting, and besieged by guards lest he should snatch life from himself with a noose, compassionating his anxiety, and striving to mitigate his pain, prostrate at his feet sought pardon, and promised that he would no longer abandon him. From the chiefs of the desert also, whom we mentioned above, he received the sentence of excommunication if he should depart from him again: and held by this necessity, as the man of God had foretold to him, he could not return: and thus it was clear that he had had the spirit of prophecy.
[39] Bernard then not long after, with his companions accompanying him, having taken up his not very ambitious furniture, as he had promised, returned to the woods of the hermits. Who having been received with joy, with them helping, in the place which is called a Fons Syhardi, built for himself a cell: in which for some time he lived with certain of his disciples. While he tarried there long, Having returned to the woods of the hermits, because the lamp could not lie hidden under the bushel, he ministered the word of life to all who came, and strengthened them by the example of his conversation. For there flowed to him not only a copious multitude of the surrounding hermits, but also of the people. he instructs all, He lay hidden therefore and did not lie hidden: and the more he cast himself down, the more he was raised up by Christ: by fleeing glory, he deserved glory, which sometimes deserting those who seek it, seeks those who despise it. The men of the world admire those who are strong in these privileges: we praise those who for the Savior have despised these things; and in a wondrous way, we proclaim those who, having them, we would value little, if they had refused to have them. Therefore while he preached to all, while he instructed all according to the manner of life and state of order, with great celebrity of name and taught each according to the capacity of their souls; so widely celebrated he was held everywhere, that his fame struck the ears of the often-mentioned Reginald, Abbot of St. Cyprian: and both Bernard's holiness of religion and the grace of his preaching spread far and wide.
[40] Now the aforesaid Abbot, when he had learned the place of his habitation through scouts sent ahead, was not moderately rejoiced. For he had already for many years earnestly desired to bring him back to his monastery: so that after his own departure, he is visited by Reginald Abbot of St. Cyprian: there might be one who would sustain the discipline of the regular path. For he had known him as a man of wonderful simplicity, and endowed with much wisdom: and he saw himself now b an old man on the verge of death, worn by disease and old age, wherefore he felt without doubt that the end of his life was impending. Taking precaution therefore lest on account of the distinction of his merits he should be carried off thence to the governance of some Church, unless he should more quickly recall him; he himself, diligent, suddenly came upon him where he was living; and by a fairly praiseworthy trick, in the order described below, led him back to his monastery. For after the offices of hospitality had been rendered and received, according to place and time, Reginald thus addressed Bernard: "A certain very necessary usefulness of our Church has driven me, dearest one, to these shores:
but having heard the fame of your benignity, at which with due paternity I congratulate, I did not wish thus to pass by, I did not wish to omit that I should see you, that I should greet you, and commend myself to your prayers most desired by me: and since no small amount of irrecoverable money, and he is cunningly invited, that he might lead him outside the forests: which by the favor of supernal clemency I have acquired in this province, is with me; I fear lest in these vastnesses of the forests by some unknown robbers, by whatever fraudulent violence it may be taken from me. Wherefore let it please your fraternity, by your own presence, which is known to be exceedingly celebrated and amiable in these regions, until, if any hidden ambushes do not prevail against us, not to delay to be wearied."
[41] And when by such cloaked circumlocutions, as one most benign and aware of no deceit, he had acquiesced; and, as a fellow traveler and also guide of the journey, he had led the already mentioned Father, the solitudes having been traversed, to a safe place; and when he had wished to return with a certain companion whom he had taken for this purpose; the same Reginald detained him, then he is asked to accompany him to the monastery: and said to him: "To approach our weakness in parts so remote, no necessity, except your charity, my son, has compelled, nor has any worldly ambition imposed on our old age a labor of this kind. You, dearest one, alone I have striven to acquire: no robbers, except the hermits and your disciples, have I feared: but by the grace of God we have now escaped their hands, that they should violently snatch you from us we now by no means fear: now secure I possess you as such wealth, with the treasure of whose holiness and wisdom I desire to enrich our monastery magnificently, which, once lost, and now divinely recovered, I would exchange for no price. But nevertheless, most sweet son, I now ask to be entreated, do not take it ill, do not be angry with me, your father, because I recall you as if fraudulently to our fellowship: for this I do out of too much love, knowing for certain that, unless I should deceive you in some way, I would by no means draw you out of the solitude too much loved by you."
[42] The servant of the Lord therefore, seeing that he could neither withdraw himself from him, nor return further to his disciples; and at the same time recalling that such things could not befall him except by the ever just judgment of Him, who, that he might profit many, went forth from the very bosom of the Father to our public; both for the piety of the old man entreating, and for the authority of the one commanding, answered sufficiently providently: "I know, Father, I know, he commends his disciples to his care, that for me not to wish to acquiesce in you is as the crime of idolatry; but it is perilous and hard for me, to leave those whom I have gathered as disciples, thus desolate and as it were orphans utterly. Wherefore let the censure of your providence now provide what should be done about them." To these things he said: "Your companion, who is present here, fulfilling my legation, let him return to them; and let him set forth what is going on concerning you; and let him truly tell them, that whoever of them shall wish to follow you to the monastery, most willingly for your sake, I will sufficiently provide for them the support of both lives." These things therefore having been accomplished, the long journey completed, they arrived at the monastery of St. Cyprian. and he comes to the monastery of St. Cyprian The monks indeed received Bernard, whom for many years they had not seen, joyful and congratulating; marveling at the man, shaggy, bearded, roughly dressed in cheap and hairy rags according to the manner of eremitic custom; shuddering at such a habit, they hastily removed them, shaved his beard, and clothed him in their own garments, and after a few days, although reluctant, made him Prior. And indeed, stripping him externally, He is created Prior, they took away from him the habit of poverty; but they could not draw his mind from the love of the desert.
[43] But as great joy in the same Church was born over his return, so great sadness suddenly arose in the aforesaid solitude at his departure. Those rejoiced, who had found him as if lost: those grieved, who had lost him when he was taken. They tenaciously embraced the old comrade, those begged with supplication that their new teacher be restored to them: these confessed that they were adorned by his presence, those that they were fainting from his absence. While these things were happening, the venerable c Peter the Bishop governed the bishopric of the city of Poitiers, who afterwards d suffered exile for justice unto e death, whose sanctity of life was wonderful, as after his death f was clear by the attestation of miracles: whose presence the often-mentioned Reginald strove to approach, and he is designated as future Abbot, and diligently set forth how he had brought the praiseworthy fugitive back from the desert: and studiously intimated how useful he would be after his own departure, which was now as if at the doors, for the government of the monastery: adding this also by forewarning and providing against, that Bernard should not so learn of it; lest perhaps by clandestine flight he should withdraw himself from them, as formerly he had secretly withdrawn from the monastery of St. Sabinus for the same cause. To all of which things the Bishop willingly gave assent, as the outcome of the matter itself afterwards approved.
Notes.
CHAPTER VI.
He is appointed Abbot of St. Cyprian: on account of persecution he turns to preaching. Morals of the Clergy reformed.
[44] But it happened that Reginald, four months having passed, seized by a grave infirmity, Commended by his predecessor in his last illness, fell onto his bed. And when the day of his death drew near, the Brothers came to him, and asked him with the highest prayers that he should deign to show, the holy Spirit revealing it to him, who ought to be his successor: for he was a man preeminently learned, adorned with the privileges of the highest sanctity and innocence and wisdom. To whom he, saying: "Although it does not pertain to me to determine about so great and such a matter; nevertheless because I fear your desolation, if you will believe me, establish Bernard, a religious man, recently restored by God to you for this, as a worthy steward for the House: for, that I may speak according to conscience, I know no one, God being witness, more holy than him." Who unanimously acquiescing in the counsel of so great a Father, after he had paid the debt of human condition, they hastened to place him whom he had foretold in the place of Abbot, He is consecrated Abbot unwilling: and, as is the custom, to drag him to consecration unwilling and resisting.
[45] Having therefore undertaken the office of pastoral care, he took care to administer it so much the more worthily, as he recalled in mind that this had been enjoined upon him not by the impulse of his own will, but by the sole judgment of the divine will: nor did he only desire to seem a Doctor, but as he preeminently was above the rest by order, he goes before the rest by the example of a blameless life, so he strove to transcend them by pious manners: and he strove to hold himself in all things so, that not even about him would the fame of slanderers dare to invent anything. For by a simple life he took away occasions from those who would detract, by sound doctrine he resisted the contradictors. For he was not of the number or kind of those who impose the heavy burdens of a stricter life on their disciples, which they themselves are unwilling to touch even with the least finger: but whatever he preached in words, he adorned by manners and proved by examples. Indeed he had not come untrained to bear such a burden: but what from early age, not so much by sudden or headlong trepidation, as by assiduous exercise, he had learned, these things he proposed to others to fulfill. He avoids praise and honor: He did not exult in the abundance of flowing things, he did not rejoice in his own praise; he did not lift his heart to honor, nor was he fed in the hidden meditation of thought by the subjection of the rest: he grieved at his honor, and hastened to turn aside and flee the mouths of those praising him. Very many are accustomed to confer certain gifts on their trumpeters, and being lavish in the largesse of a few, to withdraw their hand from the rest: of which vice he was wholly lacking: for he so divided to each, as he knew it necessary to each.
[46] Now let the virtue be more broadly described which is his own, and in whose exposition, God being witness and judge, I profess to add nothing, he desires to be least among his own. to extol nothing greater in the manner of those who praise. For as among many gems a most precious gem gleams, and the ray of the sun overwhelms and obscures the small fires of the stars; so by his humility (which is the first virtue of Christians) he surpassed the virtues and power of all, and was the least of all, that he might be the greatest of all. For by this he so cast himself down, that whoever had seen him, and had wished to see him because of the celebrity of his name, would not believe him to be the same, but the last of his disciples. And when he was surrounded by frequent choirs of monks; both in garment, and voice, and habit, and gait he was the least of all. He was slow to speak, swift to hear, mindful of that precept: "Hear, O Israel, and be silent." Deut. 6:14 For he so gave himself to the works of hospitality and mercy, that he daily received sixty or a hundred Clerics or more at the table, hospitable to whom with a generous hand he ministered, toward the Clergy, besides what to pilgrims and other poor people coming he munificently gave. What shall I say of his most clement mind toward all and his goodness, wandering even to those whom he had never seen? And because he thought most of all not of his own but of others' gains, and others, even unknown ones remembering that he was not set over men but over vices,
A paternal rod to the pious, a saving staff to the sick,
he existed without complaint of anyone.
[47] Therefore by this virtue he so excelled, that he preached to all in public that in this alone divine precepts consist. outstanding in the exercise of virtues: For he was pure in thought, excellent in action, discreet in silence, useful in speech, near to each in compassion, above all suspended in contemplation, strong in the strength of abstinence, refreshed by the feasts of doctrine, most humble in the longanimity of patience, raised up by the authority of fortitude, benign by the grace of piety, strict in justice; and what among the men of the world was thought either light or nothing, this he said to be in monasteries the most grievous fault: and recalling most of all that divine oracle, "Let him that hears, say Come"; as he was diffuse in charity, he began to lead all inside, and to draw the poor and ignoble to God. Apoc. 22:17 But the lukewarm and cold monks, more solicitous about the present than about the future life, from envy began to resist on many occasions, saying that there was lacking to the monastery possession which could receive so many.
[48] About the same time two Cardinals, John and
Benedict, fulfilling the legation of the Apostolic See, convoked a b Council at the city of Poitiers: in which one hundred and forty Fathers called together were present, who struck King Philip of the Franks, in the Council of Poitiers he excommunicates the adulterous King: on account of the wife of Count Fulk of Anjou, whom he was keeping in adultery, with the punishment of anathema. Having learned of this excommunication, William Duke of the Aquitaines, who was present, enemy of all modesty and holiness, fearing that he would suffer similar punishment for similar faults, inflamed by too great a fury, ordered all those to be plundered, flogged, killed. When his ministers were beginning to do this, the Pontiffs and Abbots fled hither and thither; and to preserve their temporal life, strove to seek safe hiding places. But Bernard and Robert of Abrissel, and with Robert of Abrissel he stands constant. who were present at the council, strongest champions of justice, and conquerors of all iniquity and injustice, with others shamefully fleeing, remained so unmoved and constant, that they did not desist from the begun excommunication; but counted it most glorious to suffer death or contumely for Christ. And although the persecutors did not inflict death on them; they, as far as was in them, bore martyrdom.
[49] Now Bernard had established procurators in the administration of external things: but he himself kept watch in contemplation, prayer, silence, and the observance of religion; and in great purity of life, wisely and regularly governed the monastery committed to him. Yet the disposition of divine piety did not wish him to linger there longer: because it was disposing to do something else about him and through him. Wherefore it permitted such a persecution to arise against him, by the compulsion of which he left that monastery. A persecution having arisen, The monks of Cluny, asserting that the church of St. Cyprian ought to be subject to their jurisdiction, approached Lord Pope c Paschal, who at that time was governing the Roman summit; and compelled him to interdict from Bernard the office of Abbot, unless he should subject himself and his church to their laws. Which interdict placed under disjunction, Bernard hearing, lest he subject his free church to the monks of Cluny, accepted one member of the disjunction, that is to abandon the office and honor of Abbot, quite willingly; but refused to accept the other, fearing lest he should subject the church, which he had received as free, to servitude; and on the other side vehemently fearing to impede the rights of the Cluniacs, who said they had a just cause. What he believed would be safer for him, he did not delay to do: for burning with the love of poverty and solitude, he seeks the desert again: he returned to the secret of the desert, from which he had been drawn by fraudulent violence, and found his mind, which had remained there. He joined himself to Dom Robert of Abrissel and Vitalis of Mauritonio, of whom we have already made mention above.
[50] These traversed the Gallican regions with bare feet; in villages, castles, and cities they preached the word of God; drawing men from the errors of their life, and with Blesseds Robert and Vitalis as strong and most robust rams, aided by the powers of divine power, crashing through they broke down the walls of unbelief and vices; they tore the hearts of men from the love of transitory things; they destroyed their evil conversations, corrupting good morals; they scattered the wickedness of evil works; they dispersed the accumulated mass of all iniquity; missionary leading the Apostolic life: they planted, God being author, virtues grafting them into their hearts; and strengthening them by example, they built up what was planted. And although they were not raisers of dead bodies, they did what is greater, that is, they gave life to souls dead in sins, and joined those given life to God of true life. Performing therefore such signs, sometimes together, sometimes indeed singly they went around various provinces to which, with the devil plotting, tribulations were not lacking. When therefore Bernard was sowing the word of God, preaching through the maritime parts of Normandy, he spared no one, nor for love or fear of anyone did he keep silent the truth.
[51] Now it was the custom at that time through all Normandy, The priests of Normandy living in marriage, that d Priests publicly took wives, celebrated weddings, begat sons and daughters, to whom after their death by hereditary right they would leave churches; giving their daughters in marriage, many times, if other possession was lacking, they gave the church as dowry. But when they received wives, before they joined them to themselves, in the presence of the parents they swore, that they would never desert them. Therefore doing this, they bound themselves by an oath, that they would never cease to be fornicators, and would never approach the Body and Blood of Christ except as guilty and unworthy, and approaching unworthily they would eat and drink judgment to themselves. Against this deadly custom the servant of God Bernard zealously disputed in the little gatherings of the Priests, he seriously tackles: and greatly strove that they should abandon it. Certain therefore he drew away: he corrects some, with others resisting; but he was unable to draw the greatest part of them from the abyss of this death; whence it came about, that the wives of the Priests, fearing to be separated from them, with their helpers sought to kill him; and the Priests themselves prepared ambushes, by terrifying him to call him back from preaching.
[52] He refutes the Archdeacon of Coutances, For on a certain day when in Coutances, a maritime city of Normandy, he was publicly preaching to the people; a certain Archdeacon, having a wife and sons, came with a great company of Priests and Clerics; and asked why he, who was a monk and dead to the world, preached to the living. But Bernard, surrounded by them, in the presence of the whole people thus responded: "Have you not, dearest brother, read in the Scripture of God, that the most strong Samson with the jawbone of a dead ass killed his enemies? Judg. 15:15 with the example of Samson destroying his enemies with the jawbone of an ass:" And having seized this occasion, with the people listening, he expounded for his defense a chapter of this Scripture: "Samson," he said, "who is interpreted 'sun,' signifies Christ the sun of justice: his enemies the demons, and sinful men, clinging to him through malice, attacking Christ and his law: the dead ass, the simple obedient people, bearing the sweet yoke of Christ and his light burden, following the ways of humility, dead to the world, that is, mortified to sins and vices, as Scripture says: 'For you are dead, and your life is hid with Christ in God.'" Col. 3:3
[53] "The jawbone, having the strength of bones, harder than the softness of flesh, the jawbone indicates Preachers, the instrument of biting and chewing in the head of the ass, designates the preacher of the Church: who ought to have the strength of bones, because he ought to resist sins and vices manfully, and to bear adversities strongly for the defense of justice and holiness. The preacher ought to be harder than the softness of the flesh, because carnal delight of pleasure, he ought to cut off from his life and conversation by the harder labor of abstinence; not to lie enervated under vices, softening the mind. The preacher is the instrument of chewing, if the word of God (which is the food of our soul, as the Lord says in the Gospel: 'Not in bread alone doth man live, but in every word that proceedeth from the mouth of God' Matt. 4:4) he subtly understands; if understanding, he fulfills in deeds what he says: because if he teaches well and lives ill, he does not instruct the people but corrupts: for when he lives badly, expounding the word of God well chewed to the people, his preaching is despised and not received, and by his example the people is not edified but destroyed. Therefore it is necessary that he should live well; and the Scripture, the food of souls, by chewing and grinding, subtly discuss; namely that he may discern the historical understanding from the allegorical, divide the allegorical from the tropological, separate the tropological from the anagogical, and thus the chewed and minutely ground food of the word of God, first to himself by right operation, by tasting the virtue of its flavor, he should swallow; then transfer to the body of the dead ass, that is to the capacity of understanding of the simple people and the one mortifying himself, let him bring it: namely that he may strive through all the above-mentioned modes of understandings to inform him for seizing eternal life; so that through the doctrine of assiduous preaching, discreetly and wisely disposed, he may promote his acts and conversation to better things. Let him not also consign to oblivion that he himself is an instrument of biting: that he may cut off sinners from the body of the devil, through the bite of correction and rebuke; and restore them to the body of Christ, which is the Church, justified by the laments of penance. And as in the more eminent part of the ass, namely in the head, by the dignity of prelacy he exists; so let him transcend the people which is understood by the ass, by the virtue of the work and the sanctity of conversation."
[54] "You see therefore, dearest brother, according to the authority of sacred Scripture, that if the Christian people, which is understood by the dead ass, ought to be dead to the world, much more the preacher of it, who is designated by the jawbone, must be fixed with Christ to the cross, and with St. Paul fixed to the Cross of Christ, and dead to the world; as that true preacher to the world was saying of himself, 'fixed with Christ to the cross'; so that by the authority of his mortification, he might chastise those still living in sins and vices, and make those chastised conformable to himself dead, that what the Apostle says may be fulfilled: 'Be imitators of me, as I also am of Christ.' Gal. 2:19; 1 Cor. 11:1 Therefore, since the preacher of the Church ought to be dead to the world, and his preaching is despised by the people, whose life is not yet believed to be mortified to vices and sins; by what reason, because I am a monk and dead to the world, can you forbid me from preaching, who by the example of my mortified life can profit the peoples, and he shows that such are himself and other monks. and by the word of doctrine promote them to better things? And since it is established that Blessed Gregory and Martin, and many other holy monks, by the merit of their mortification, received pastoral government in the churches; and with the honor of prelacy, the office of preaching; from this it consequently follows, that through the virtue of mortification one arrives at the license of preaching. Therefore, because I am a monk and dead to the world, the right of preaching is not taken from me; but much better is conferred. These things, and other such, the man of God continuing, and the people acclaiming with him, by the nod of God the aforesaid Archdeacon laid aside for some time the fierceness and arrogance of his mind, and restrained the Priests and their wives from injuring him, of whom such a multitude of each had flowed together on the solemnity of Pentecost, so that, namely, according to the custom of the country they rendered due processions to the principal Church, so that that place could scarcely suffice to hold them. But the soldier of Christ Bernard, as has been said, preached to the peoples: wherefore outwardly fights, inwardly fears, he patiently sustained."
NOTES.
CHAPTER VII.
For the defense of the Abbey a Roman journey undertaken twice. It having been left, disciples gathered elsewhere.
[55] Meanwhile the monks of St. Cyprian, for nearly four years, striving with many labors and expenses, so that they might free their church from the calumny of the Cluniacs, Recalled to the monastery, were unable to do it. Compelled by the difficulty of necessity, with letters of the Bishop of Poitiers they approach the desert, find their Abbot, and ask that he would come to the aid of their laboring church. He, touched by piety, and compelled by the command of his Bishop, returned to St. Cyprian, and there dwelt for some days. And then, with the Bishop and the monks driving him, with a few Brothers from the desert taken with him, He went to Rome himself sitting on an ass, clothed in the garments of his poverty, that is eremitic, with such humble company he sought Rome. To which coming after many labors, he approached Lord Pope Paschal, and inquired why he had deprived him of the office of Abbot. The Apostolic one indeed, because he had heard many things about his sanctity, through his Cardinals John and Benedict, who had formerly known him in Aquitaine, and had seen his constancy in the council for excommunicating the King, received him kindly; and holding his hand, led him into a secret oratory; and alone with him alone, had conversation for a great part of the day. Then indeed he brought him back to the palace, and the office which he had interdicted, and is sent back kindly by the Pope. in public hearing he benignly restored to him. Thence Bernard, having received the blessing from him, returned to Poitiers, and held his monastery for some years in peace.
[56] But the monks, compelled by his teaching to change the lukewarmness of life into the rigor of discipline, and the dissolution of conversation into a stricter observance of the regular path; Suffering many things from disobedient subjects when they perceive for themselves that illicit things are not licit and they refuse to leave the accustomed, they tried in some way to drive him from the monastery. For by theft from his dwellings they took away and hid the greatest part of the wheat and wine; so that, when he would not have whence to feed his subjects and the poor, in whose refreshment he most delighted; afflicted by the weariness of acquiring provisions, he might return to the secrets of the desert. But there is no wisdom, there is no knowledge, there is no counsel against the Lord. For while they strive to constrain him by the straits of domestic affairs, they make him rich with more abundant riches. For a certain Canon, who knew him as a most pious procurator of the poor, at the same time bestowed on him so much grain and wine, as he believed could suffice him for spending the year. Divine disposition also in the same year returned to him the wheat and wine, which the monks had hidden; but first afflicted them miserably with the penalties of avenging death. But their accomplices, who had died by punishment, not even terrified by their death, when they could not in this way drive out the holy man, sought another. For they suggest to the Cluniac monks, promising themselves to be in aid, that they should subject the monastery of St. Cyprian to their laws: because if this were done, they did not doubt that Bernard would depart thence. lest he be suspended from office, he again goes to Rome: Encouraged by the exhortation of which suggestion, the Cluniacs again approached Lord Pope, and once more compelled him, that he would suspend Bernard from the office of Abbot, unless he subjected the monastery to them.
[57] Bernard therefore, taking up the labor anew, lest he should succumb to the blows of a heavier fortune, fearing to sin, if on account of his laziness and negligence the monastery of St. Cyprian should lose its liberty; again coming to Rome, asked the aforesaid Pope, that he would attentively examine the causes of each side, and make a just judgment. and rejected by the Pontiff, Which he, subterfuging to do, commanded, that either he should subject the church to the Cluniacs, or he should never exercise office in that Abbey. Now the man of God, after he knew for certain, that in the Roman Curia he would profit nothing, nor would the Apostolic one bend from the decree of his will, was compelled to appeal to the hearing of a higher court: which although it cannot be found in the courts of mortals, he appeals to Christ the Judge: it was not hidden whence Bernard must seek it. Kindled therefore with the zeal of justice, following that saying of Solomon, "The just, trusting as a lion, shall be without terror," he constantly invited the Lord Pope, and all his accomplices in this matter, not with presumptuous audacity, but with free magnanimity, to the examination of the last judgment before the Judge who could not be deceived by any darkness of ignorance, and did not know how to be corrupted by any gifts. Prov. 28:1 The Pope however, having heard so great liberty of voice, from indignation commanded the man of God to depart from him: then he asked his counselors what should be done by him about this matter. They however unanimously answered, that with so great sanctity of the man to dispute about the controversy of this cause before the Judge of all was not safe, the counsel of the Cardinals having been heard he is recalled, nor did they grant that they would in any way be participants of any disputation against him: indeed by the consideration of a common decree they argued it was just, that his dignity should be restored to him, and that pardon should be asked from him for the labor and injury brought upon him. John and Benedict, two Cardinals who were present, were publishing the magnificent heralds of his virtues, which they had known in Aquitaine, with the Apostolic one listening; and were now preaching him to the Romans such as in the Council of Poitiers, where for justice he had been ready to suffer martyrdom, they themselves had seen him.
[58] The Apostolic one, however, having known the man's such great perfection, restrained his mind from indignation; and commanded that he should return to the council. He argues the case before the Pontiff. When he had entered, he granted that he should speak for himself, and that he might be heard by all more freely, he commanded silence. The man of the Lord then began thus: "The excellence of your sublimity, most reverend Pope, I beseech, that you would for a little while bear with me about to say a few things, and not discrepant from the truth. Already from preceding years your paternity, and very many who are present at this sacred assembly, most honorable men by the merit of their life and wisdom, are not ignorant of this, that the Church of St. Cyprian, which is committed to the government of our smallness, enjoying its liberty through the courses of many years, reflourished in great religion, before the monastery of Cluny began to exist. But now the Abbot of Cluny, asserting that his monastery is older than Cluny according to the prophecy of Isaiah, does not cease to neigh after my wife, and seeks with a proud tyranny to lord it over me, an Abbot of whatever kind, as if an Archabbot; and that our church should serve him as a handmaid; his own should reign and command, he strives to accomplish; which kind of ambition is new and unheard of: for from that vice the beginning is taken, which unless it be cut off at its root, will emit a great propagation of virulent progeny; and the seed-bed of immense corruption, if it is permitted to rise, will bud forth. This so detestable evil, which on account of the greatness of your judgment will by its censure merit to cut off I do not doubt, I would have said is new and unusual. For in letters divinely conferred we read of Archbishops, Archpriests, Archdeacons: and in this he does not acknowledge any second rule of an Archabbot. but the names of Archabbot, we have not yet found in them. The rule of St. Benedict (of which I am a professor, who am attacked; and he is one who attacks me) establishes that the Abbot alone should have the right of disposing all things in his monastery: but of the Archabbot it was entirely silent, because it believed that no one would be or had been in the world who would desire this proud vanity. To show the falsity of which calumny, if the place of defense be given to me, and to argue the liberty of our monastery; most excellent of Fathers, I have come; and approached the presence of the Roman curia so much more securely, as I knew more certainly, that under the examination of our consideration, prejudice and injustice could in no way prevail in it. The assembly of our place therefore, whose legation I fulfill, and the humility of my smallness asks, that the preeminent sublimity of your majesty, which is placed in the more eminent part of the body of Christ, which is the Church, after the manner of the head may bestow government on the other inferior members; and the framework of the whole body, according to the rules of justice rendering to each what is his own, may hold in peace; may condole with the suffering member, attentively discussing the cause of each side; and make a just judgment, considering not the benefit of any transitory commodity; but the interminable fruit of eternal retribution."
[59] These things having been splendidly completed, the holy man was silent: But the Apostolic one commanded the defenders of the cause of the Cluniac monks, to speak. But these, because they could not find arguments of truth not having corners, To which with the Cluniacs silent by which they might prove the church of St. Cyprian ought to be subject to their laws; begin to feign certain inventions through ambiguities cloaked with ambitions, and full of circumlocutions. Which when the assembly which was present understood to wholly disagree with the rules of justice, he obtains the case: the monastery of St. Cyprian is asserted to be free from them: and the Apostolic one, confirming this judgment, restored to the holy man the office of Abbot which he had interdicted, and wished to obtain this from him with many prayers, and refusing the Cardinalate that he should take up the dignity of a Cardinal-Priest, and should remain at Rome with him, to treat the business of Ecclesiastical causes. But Bernard, desiring to be satisfied with assiduous contemplation in the secret of the desert, feared to take up the entanglement of external solicitude, and by no means acquiesced in the one asking; he asks to return to the desert: rather he asked that it might be permitted him to leave the monastery which he governed, and to return to solitude, which with many supplications he at length scarcely obtained. But the Pope, because he could not retain with him a man of so great constancy and so great sanctity, who desired nothing in the world, sought nothing except God alone, he is appointed Apostolic preacher. enjoined on him an office of this kind: namely that he should preach to the peoples, receive confessions, impose penances, baptize, go around regions, and carefully fulfill all things which are to be done by a public preacher. But after he handed over to him the place of an Apostle, not wishing that the food should be lacking to the vicar of the Apostles, whom he was sending without money to preach; he admonished that he should receive bodily food from those whom he would refresh with the word of salvation; and wishing to begin from himself, he invited him to dinner: and because he stayed at Rome a long time, he made him a participant of his table daily.
[60] Bernard went out with the blessing received from him: returned to Poitiers, and after a few days leaving the monastery, Having returned he departs to the island of Causeum, and with great ardor of mind desiring to pursue the anchoretic life, with a few disciples he entered the island of Causeum (because it was remote from all): and desiring to linger there longer, he could not. For a piratical multitude of robbers landed on the shores of the aforesaid island, who carried off for themselves the vessels and vestments of the altar of that little church; and in his own presence handled them shamefully. He however, seeing the sacred things basely dishonored, grieved with such commotion of mind and indignation that this dishonoring was being done, that not long after, but he returns to the woods, despoiled by pirates: on account of this matter, he deserted the island, not about to return to it thenceforth; and returning to the woods, he dwelt in them. For the Lord wished this plundering to be made by the pirates, that he might draw Bernard out from the enclosure of that island, and lead him back to inland places: c in which
not only to himself, but also to very many others he would profit. The monks of St. Cyprian, however, seeing that they would no longer have him, with his own counsel and benevolence established another Abbot for themselves. Then, a few days having passed, the aquatic raiders, of whom we made mention a little above, who had dishonored the man of God and the things of his altar, at the command of their Prince, Heobold by name, of almost all the pirates the most cruel, while they pursued the ships which they desired to plunder, were swallowed by the marine waves, unhappy. Nor is it to be wondered at, if they perish by the death of submersion, who had compelled innumerable faithful to perish by the same kind of death. At their deaths, however, innumerable armies of demons, in the form of crows, gathering, filled the spaces of the air with a foul mist; and blowing trumpets with a horrible sound, under a carnal likeness, with demons performing their funeral rites. gravely terrified the minds of those sailing near. These, because Priests were lacking to celebrate their funeral rites, gathered: these received their most wretched souls, not that they might carry them to the joys of paradise, but that they might drag them to the lowest depths of the abyss with fiery whips: such commenders of souls did the end of their life have, who did not deserve to have the ministers of the Church of Christ.
[61] In those days Bernard had not yet gathered any congregation, not yet was he beginning to make any monastery; but ardently thirsting to pursue the anchoretic life, in a place which is called Quercus-docta ("Learned Oak"), he lay hidden with a few disciples. But having learned, To him dwelling at Quercus docta from the report of fame, that he would not return again to St. Cyprian, nor would he return to the dwelling on the island, unlovable to all on account of the difficult entrance and exit; many began to flow together to him, desiring to be formed by his teachings, disciples are joined to him: and to be strengthened by the examples of his life. But with them not having whence to live, unless they should acquire it by the labor of their hands; necessity itself commanded them to press on with labors, and the manifold length of the familiar Psalms, which at that time they recited, detained them for a great part of the day from the pursuit of the work. Wherefore the Brothers approach the holy man, and ask what he should decide about this matter. To whom he answered: to whom, because of the length of the psalmody, obtaining food with difficulty. "The Psalms indeed, which through nearly all monasteries are customarily sung, unless the Lord should reveal something, I fear to omit: yet necessity itself commands you to labor more diligently. But this seems fit, that meanwhile we should strive to pray to God more attentively, that he may intimate to us in some way, what we should do about this matter."
[62] After eight days therefore, the prayer having been completed, on the following night so great a sleep oppressed all, even the man of God Bernard, who before the rest in the deep night always was accustomed to rise, that no one of them could emerge from sleep, until the clear light of day poured over their eyes: who rising, nevertheless in the regular manner, begin the Office, which with nearly half the day passed they scarcely completed. Which oppression of sleep was truly a revelation divinely sent of leaving off the aforesaid Psalms, especially because that night was a winter one, until the very middle of which scarcely any of them was accustomed to sleep. But Dom Bernard from that time omitted to say these Psalms; and commanded his disciples, that henceforth they should rest from them: he indulges that they might omit it: and he said that he knew for certain, that God preferred that they should acquire their sustenance by laboring, than that they should press on with so manifold psalmodies. Now a certain nobleman, namely Radulph of Fougères, whose this wood was which they were inhabiting, fearing lest it be extirpated by their agriculture, could not bear it; because it was adjacent to Fougères his castle, and loving it most of all, in order to keep the wild beasts for his hunts, he had surrounded it with a rampart. Wherefore he gave them another wood, namely that of Savigny, he migrates with his own to the wood of Savigny. much better, fertile in the soil of the earth, pleasant with rivers: but remote from his castle by six miles farther than the other: in which they made for themselves a suitable habitation and built, and there acquiring sustenance by the labor of their hands, with a few Brothers left in the former place, for some years they dwelt. But Dom Vitalis, of whom we have made mention, had built himself a cell in the same wood, distant from these by about two stades, in which afterwards he built a cenobium. But because divine disposition did not wish two so great luminaries to dwell together, he made one of them remain there, and destined the other to traverse other regions.
NOTES.
CHAPTER VIII.
A monastery built in the County of Perche: benefits received and conferred on others.
[63] The nod of divine providence therefore moved the mind of his servant Bernard, and of all his disciples, that they might migrate to other regions, and go to distant solitudes. Wherefore he sent the lesser of his disciples to seek out the vastness of some desert, Seeking another habitation in which they might build for themselves such a spacious habitation, which could contain all at once, that none of them should be compelled to dwell apart from him, because this was most grievous for them to bear. For they had such great consolation from his words and presence, that they preferred to bear with him the burden of the heaviest poverty, than without him to abound in riches. Who when they had not found any such, and were returning to him with no fruit of labor; it is intimated to them
From heaven, that they may return quickly, and seek places, Fitting for Bernard, one day to be placed in heaven.
For such a vision appeared in dreams to a certain one of them, with angelic ministry revealing: by an Angel they are warned to seek from the Count of Perche; for it seemed to him, that a certain young man, splendid in appearance, and becoming with a snowy covering, placed his hand on his head, and brought forth such words: "Rise hastily from sleep: and to a Rotrou, b Count of Perche, who will give you what you seek, direct your journey." Who straightway awakening, narrated to his companions what he had seen. They however, making little of the vision, return to the Master; and report that they had found no dwelling so suitable for themselves. Afterwards however two of his disciples, after much inquiry of not finding a habitation, mindful of the vision related by their companion, at length came to the aforesaid Count, and set forth what they were seeking. He, most benignly acquiescing to the petition, promised that he would give what was asked.
[64] The same venerable Prince possessed a certain territory, which is called Arcissiae, distant by one mile from c Nogent his castle, fertile in the soil of the earth, contiguous with woods on every side, watered by springs and waters, conspicuous with the pleasantness of meadows, suitable for the cultivation of vineyards and the building of houses, who gives him the place of Arcissiae, and opportune for the uses of all things: in it his ancestors had built an oratory, and made a pond and planted shrubs. To which he led those two monks without any delay to show it, and granted it to the holy man of God Bernard and his monks to be possessed in perpetuity. Which the disciples receiving with joy, gave due thanks to the Giver of all good things and to the Prince himself, and did not doubt that the vision, which they had perceived from their companion, was true, being certified by such a prosperous and so swift event. Who being ordered by the Count to return, went, and as he had commanded, brought the Master. Whom indeed the Count strove to venerate with due diligence. But deceived by the counsel of certain ones, and obeying maternal commands, he withdrew the gift which he had made to him. Nevertheless he diligently invited the aforesaid servant of God to receive another territory. d For Beatrice his mother in those days greatly strove to remove the holy man from the neighborhood of Nogent, because from his association, she feared some inconveniences arising for the Cluniac monks, but afterwards he retracts the donation, very many of whom she had gathered in the aforesaid town. Furthermore Bernard, who stood unmoved against any blows of fortune, who could not be disturbed by any inconvenience of happening things, not similarly moved in this matter, but as always serene in mind and cheerful in countenance, did not reject what the often-mentioned Count offered, but the next day sent two disciples to explore it. Who with a guide going before come to the place, which is called e Tyronus: which inspecting diligently, and offers Tiron. on the same day they return to the Master, and report what they thought of the place shown to them: "For we have seen," they say, "to which nearly all things necessary for human uses are lacking": and while they see that they had labored in vain, consternated in mind, they dispose to return on the morrow whence they had come.
[65] Therefore on the following night, over the territory which he was going to receive from the Count,
A hanging Lamp, inflaming the neighboring lands with light, which Bernard, roused by celestial light, Shown to Bernard in the serene sky, Flashed with such a blaze of rays, that by the light of it fire-haired in a circuit the whole province shone.
Which revelation to you certainly, Admonishes; rather orders; that you should not refuse the gifts of the Count.
And when with morning come the disciples were preparing to return to their own, he brought forward that he would first see the place before they departed. surveys and accepts it. Who coming to the wood, which is called Tiron, he studiously took care to traverse it: and both the situation and the appearance of the place so pleased him, that his mind could not afterwards be torn from it. Yet neither the pleasantness of the region, nor the amplitude of the possession, nor the pleasant beauty of the meadows or rivers, nor the abundance of vineyards, nor the fertile fruitfulness of the fruit-bearing soil, so glued his mind to itself; but the necessity imposed by divine disposition through the previously shown revelation. Therefore having received this little possession from the Count, the man of the Lord Bernard returned to his disciples; who had remained in the borders of Normandy and Brittany, that he might gather them to himself, and gathered, more hastily lead them with him to the place which he had received.
[66] Here, while he was going from Nogent to f Mortagne, a certain soldier, g Pagan of Tilleio by name, taking the same way, overtakes him sitting on an ass, and two of his disciples, who were walking on foot with him: whom seeing roughly dressed in eremitic rags, from the very habit of humility and poverty, he judged them men of good conscience and despisers of the world, and sympathizing with their labor, asked where they were going. To whom the man of God Bernard answered, that on that day they were going, if they could, as far as Mortagne. Which he hearing, he asserted that he was an inhabitant of the same town, and asked with suppliant devotion To the soldier receiving Bernard hospitably that they would deign to lodge with him. The man of the Lord however by no means refused the lodging which charity offered him: but accepted it with due thanksgiving. Then he took care to refresh his host on the space of the road with the bread of the word of God, and instructed him with the admonitions of saving doctrine. Pagan therefore arriving at Mortagne, leads the man of God to his house, and desired to render all offices of humanity to him with the greatest alacrity of mind and solicitude, that in turn he might feed him, from whom he had received the refreshment of heavenly wisdom on the journey.
[67] But the enemy of the human race and the rival of all good things, envying the charity of one and the refreshment of the other; wishing to disturb the joy of the receiving and received guest, so infected the squire of this Pagan with the poison of his malice, the horse secretly led away that in the twilight of the night by theft he led away the destrier of his lord. Which Pagan knowing, is made sad, he who loved the horse most of all, as he knew him most necessary for the protection of his body: for there was then no moderate war between the Belismenses i, and the Mortagnese. But lest he should obscure the joy of festive hospitality with the darkness of his sadness, he outwardly showed a cheerful face, and dissembling his sadness, briskly admonished his guests to dine. But the loss and sadness of his host could not lie hidden from the man of God, and he strove to gladden his mind with consolatory words, and showed reasonably that he ought not grieve much for a transitory thing. But the pious condescension of divine goodness wished to declare, what merit of guest Pagan had received in hospitality;
While the thief leads the horse, such great stupor oppresses him, That knowing not how to return thereafter, and bring back the stolen goods.
For he so permitted the sense and understanding of the thief to be blinded, by the thief himself he is brought back, that he did not at all recognize the places, ways, villages in which from his very infancy he had been nurtured; but thought Mortagne was Bellême; and conversely from Bellême he made Mortagne in his mind: and it came about, that through that whole night he avoided Bellême, as the hostile land of the Mortagnese; and fled to the Mortagnese village, as to the safe hiding place of Bellême.
[68] By this blinding therefore deceived, he returned to Mortagne, and standing before the door of Pagan's house, he thought himself to be in the place to which he had intended to flee with the horse. Who holding, and asked for what cause he had returned, he himself not concealing the truth, answered that divine power had thus compelled him, that on the same night he should return.
Thus Bernard acts by prayers, thus he returns the lost.
with great admiration for him. These are your great works, O Christ: these are your powers, O Christ: this most beautiful spectacle for the merit of your friend you offer to the world, that the thief thus drunken and senseless you should render by his own malice, that from those from whom he had by theft led away the horse, to them as to receivers of the theft he should lead it back; and whom the guilt of his deed warned to avoid under the peril of his head, to them as to faithful defenders of his life he should hasten. Which Pagan considering in mind, from that time strove to admire and love the man of God, not as much as he wished, but as much as he could; and afterwards conferred much money on his monastery.
[69] Bernard indeed, the journey which he had begun having been completed, gathered his disciples, and leading them with him to Tiron, there with them thenceforth dwelt. He begins the monastery in the year 1109, Therefore in the year of the incarnate Word one thousand one hundred and nine, with the disciples gathered, having received the blessing from Dom k Ivo of good memory, then Bishop of the Church of Chartres, he celebrated the first Mass on the holy day of Easter in the wooden monastery now built, in the possession which the mentioned Prince Rotrou had given him. In this solitude very much loved by him, because it had been divinely shown beforehand, the man of God acted constantly and manfully, and zealously encouraged the Brothers to the building of the place, he rouses the disciples to the exercise of virtues, and more studiously informed them with the disciplines and teachings of heavenly life, saying: "Behold, dearest Brothers, now a desert, a place sufficiently competent for us, sufficiently open, congruent for silence and quiet, and opportune for divine meditations and prayers. Here the cross of Christ must be borne: here the unfading crown of life must be earned, which your devotion long sought, which the pious condescension of divine largesse has afterwards deigned to confer on you. But if it displeases you, because its fitness does not agree for the uses of men; yet let this please you, that only for religious men and those seeking the solitary life is the opportunity of its solitude fitting. This moreover will confer on you the roughness of this place, that a feigned society of false brothers, corrupting good morals by depraved conversations and sinister examples, will not be yours longer, even on account of the very scarcity of things."
[70] At that time on account of a certain overflow of rains, which had preceded in the previous years, with the soil of the earth not being able to yield fruits, so great a famine was, In a public famine that many thousands of men died from the compulsion of the scarcity of bread. But the multitude of monks, which was with Bernard, was wholly lacking in provisions, but also in money from which it could be bought; and yet, obeying the Gospel oracle, more attentively sought the kingdom of God, and did not fear that other things were to be denied to them. With them therefore by no means doubting the divine largesse, and persistingly pressing on with prayers and labor, from Count of Nevers he who had mercy on his servant Daniel, and through Habakkuk sent dinner from Judea to Babylon, that same one moved the mind of m William, then Count of Nevers, that to the man of God Bernard, receives a golden vessel, hiding in the most hidden solitudes of the woods of Perche, whom he had known not yet except by fame, he should send a huge golden vessel from n Burgundy; which being sold, provisions could be bought which might suffice for the monks living with him at that time, as well as for beggars. Animated therefore by such a divine omen, and comforted by the frequent admonitions of the man of God, he builds the monastery; they gird themselves to the building of the place, press on with labors; yet in such a way that they do not put off the zeal of prayer and silence and religion.
[71] For they were kindled with the fervor of sanctity, prepared to bear any burden of poverty, wholly unknown to the inhabitants of that country, he clothes his subjects with the cheapest garment; having indeed the habit of a monk, but cheap, uncouth, shaggy, very dissimilar from the habit of other monks, very similar to the sheep themselves from which it had been taken. For the command of poverty compelled them to have garments which could be procured more cheaply; from which also the Rule of St. Benedict, of which they were professors, by no means disagreed. Now the rude and bestial men dwelling in those parts, because they had not known such a habit before, abhorred it; and thought them not monks, but Saracens, come through underground caverns to spy out their fellow citizens. Moved by which rumor, the neighboring natives send scouts: who, immediately approaching, consider the men unwarlike and unarmed, plotting no evil, weaving modest cells, not erecting castles or towers; who did not murmur wars, but ruminated Psalms and hymns.
[72] They return bringing back better hopes, beating their guilty breasts, he instructs the neighbors flowing together, and report to their own, that not Saracens, but new Prophets, sent by God, had settled in the desert. When this was divulged, peoples rush, rich and poor alike, desirous to see. The holy man, therefore, seeing so great a multitude coming, goes out to the public, addresses the people, teaches whom they ought to fear and whom to serve: exhorts them to prefer heavenly things to earthly, to exchange transitory things for eternal. While therefore he was instructing those flowing to him, and declared how glorious and wonderful it is for a man to be deified by participation in the highest good, demonstrated how wretched and transitory is the happiness of this life, and proved what dire and permanent torments remain for sinners in hell after death; many, terrified and compunct, renounced the world; and taking up the monastic habit, submitted themselves to his teaching.
[73] Let our page also, as if making light of certain very small things, not neglect to narrate those things, through which the highest providence wished diligently to make manifest the sanctity of his soldier. Therefore the man of the Lord, while he was a new dweller in the solitude of Tiron, it happened that the Herdsman of his cattle, on a certain day perhaps acting more negligently, left a calf in the wood: whom finding he had lost, traversing the wood he most studiously sought, the calf left in the wood, and did not find it. But the man of the Lord, after two days, outside the door of his little cell, sitting with some Brothers under the shadow of a certain tree, sees from the shadow of the woods a wolf coming out, leading a calf with a slow step; and lest it should stray from a certain path, received from a wolf which had led it back. which from the wood extended to the cell of the man of God through a certain plain of fields, gently threatening it with the stroke of its tail. O wondrous thing!
The biting wolf becomes the guardian of the calf and its leader back, And restrains its hungry and rapacious teeth.
Who when by a straight path he approached nearer; the monks, who were with the servant of God, recognize the calf to be their own, which their shepherd had lost; and that the rapacious maw of wolfish rage had not only spared it, but also guarded and led it back, stunned in mind, they marveled beyond what is credible. But the wolf, by no means frightened by the presence and sight of the monks, did not fear to come near almost to the feet of the man of God: and looking upon him with flattering countenance, stopped for a little, and with head lowered to him, as if commending his calf to him, returned to the woods. O powerful innocence of most holy Bernard! O most imperious humility! which so binds beastly ferocity, that it cannot harm him, rather is compelled to profit him.
[74] he receives to the monastic state whoever asks: Now the man of God Bernard, diffuse in the bowels of divine charity, and trusting in the largesse of God's goodness, and strengthened by the example of him saying, "Him that cometh to me I will not cast out," wished to exclude no one; but strove by word and example to make all conformable to Christ. John 6:37 Many also monks, holy and religious men, from diverse monasteries, moved by the fame of his sanctity, hastened to concur to him, that they might see a new Anthony dwelling in the desert, and adhere to the footsteps of his poverty. Very many nobles also came from every side, and applying themselves to the apprenticeship of omnipotent God, sought his cohabitation. Some also offered their sons and kinsmen to the Lord, to be instructed through his teaching; of whom many arrived at the summit of great perfection, by the example and institutions of the servant of God; who afterwards being taken to govern churches, stood forth as Abbots of various cenobiums.
[75] over whom the heaven is seen to rain roses. On a certain day, therefore, while the man of God Bernard was blessing monks, a certain monk, Ligerius by name, a religious man and a Priest, was present, who saw from on high in the air flowers of roses, over
Those whom he associates with himself as monks and figures with the habit,
descending. For the Lord wished to show, through the sign of an exterior miracle, either the merit of his Confessor, or that he renewed the consciences of men to the flower-bearing life of sanctity. at other times dew and snows. Then the course of one year having passed, a certain monk, to whom the name was Antiquillus, a man of great simplicity and innocence, who was present, saw that
Certain ones Bernard the elder, not slow to good, While he offers to the supernal ones, and utters the words of prayer, Snow and dew together over these fall, and openly From on high flowers at the same time come, and fragrances.
For by such a showing of prodigy it pleased the divine
will to declare the privilege of his soldier, or the purity of the monastic life, and celibacy.
[76] On a certain day, while the man of the Lord Bernard was intent on contemplation in the oratory, and the Brothers were laboring on high, a fire in the spring time invaded the dry wood: which, driven by the vehement blowing of the winds, came as far as the greatest thickness of brambles, a fire arising in the wood, by which on every side their little cell was surrounded: which thickness of brambles, seized by the flames, nearly burned all their workshops. But the Brothers, struggling long and much, trying to extinguish the impetus of the fire, were unable. and having advanced even to the cells, Wherefore despairing they enter the cell, and bring all their furniture to the plain of the fields, and leave, weeping, their whole habitation, which they soon thought would be burned by the fire. But the servant of the Lord hearing their tumult, he checks it with blessed water. went out from the oratory, and soon,
When he sees the great wind, pitying also the fire,
he sprinkled blessed water against the flames now almost invading the workshops, and thus
Repressing the heat of the flame, and the fury of the blast, He makes it go back by his prayers, lest it rush inward.
For the fire did not presume to pass the bounds of that sprinkling; but turned back against the impetus of the wind, and broken upon itself, subsided to nothing. O man of great merit, at whose judgment even the very elements are restrained!
NOTES.
CHAPTER IX.
The monastery constructed near the river Tyronum. Benefits bestowed on Count Rotrou.
[77] Under the same time, lest to the soldier of Christ Bernard should be lacking the fight of labor and tribulation, a the monks of whom we have already made mention said that the tithes of the land which the aforesaid Count had given him, and the bodies of the dead, were of their b right. Compelled by this calumny, with a lawsuit over tithes begun he deserts the place, he deserted the buildings which his disciples had made with the greatest labor; and intended to seek another soil of the earth, in which it might be permitted him to dwell. Therefore he approached the venerable Bishop of that most celebrated Church of Chartres, dedicated in honor of the holy and ever Virgin c Mary, namely the aforesaid Ivo, and the Canons at that time, and asked that they would give him some little portion of that estate, which they had contiguous to his little possession, for founding his monastery. For there was a certain little village of the aforesaid Canons, another estate having been obtained, joined to the little land which the Count had given to the man of God, by name Sarzeia. They received the servant of God with due veneration, heard him with clement goodness, and according to the magnificence of their nobility and the munificence of their largesse, grant more land than he had asked for. Indeed having made the donation they make a d charter; and direct Dom Gaufred, Canon of the same Church and e Provost of that same territory, with certain persons to show the land. Who after they came to the aforesaid f estate, by the decree of the Chapter, near the rivulet which is called g Tyronus, for making the workshops of his monastery, near the river Tyron they grant the land which he had asked, as h free as they themselves had held it.
[78] Now a certain matron i sprung from royal stock, namely Adela, Countess of Blois, at that time was offering to St. Bernard broader expanses of land, for building his monastery, and places much more useful; which nevertheless he was refusing, preferring to place the seat of his cenobium under the protection of B. Mary ever Virgin, than under the patronage of any secular person whatever. But the aforesaid Canons, having received so great a guest on the estate of their Church, he builds the monastery, rejoiced not moderately; and loved him all the time of their life with a great affection of piety, and conferred on him very many benefits and also ecclesiastical ornaments, and took care with watchful zeal to apply the patronage of their protection to the affairs of his monastery, and skillfully opposed the shield of their defense against certain infestors. Bernard indeed, with his habitation founded in the possession of the blessed Mother of God, strove thenceforth to venerate her with such great affection, that in her honor a special Mass of her, and that daily a Mass be made for benefactors for the salvation of all bestowing benefits on his monastery, and especially the aforesaid Canons, he established to be celebrated perpetually each day, which is solemnly celebrated up to the present day.
[79] Meanwhile it came to pass, that the often-mentioned Count Rotrou, whom the holy Bernard of the Lord loved more than any mortal, Count Rotrou, was violently taken away by Fulk, Count of Anjou, and from this k King of Jerusalem; from the power of a certain one, who held him l bound; not that he was disposed to free him, sold by Fulk of Anjou to Robert of Bellême, but that through his cause he might extort the greatest money from Robert of Bellême, a beast of m most savage cruelty. Which aforesaid Robert bought the Count from the already mentioned Fulk for a huge price paid, not that he wished to accept any redemption from him, but that he might make him perish by various tortures in his prisons. For he held him in such hatred, as one by whom he had been publicly defeated and put to flight in war with his army, n bound in atrocious chains, that he did not more wish prosperous life for himself, than a wretched death for him. By the order of the aforesaid tyrant therefore it is plotted and prepared, how the noble feet of the Prince should be constrained in wooden torture; the shins are wound around with as many rings and fetters as possible, hands and arms are condemned with iron gauntlets, immense weights of iron and various chains are suspended from his neck. Hence under a very short and pressing covering, made for this with cunning industry, and enclosed in a foul prison, bent, in the dungeon not to be drawn forth thenceforth, he is thrust back; and lest he fail too quickly, he added, that twice nevertheless in the week he should be in some way sustained.
[80] Which after it was made known to the Count, to his mother and to the nobles of his power through o a legate he sends word, that judging him now as dead, they should establish another Lord for themselves. He also asked to be made known to the man of God Bernard through his mother herself, that he should intercede for the salvation of his soul, and should now by no means be solicitous for the rescue of his body, which henceforth could not be made. Which hearing, the man of God is soon bathed in tears: and then filled with prophetic spirit, he foretells that he will be freed, and Robert punished: he admonishes those announcing, that they should presume on the mercy of God, and by no means doubt of his liberation. Adding that that very adversity would be changed for Rotrou into prosperity, for Robert however into the greatest adversity. Which was also done. For by the sole provident dispensation of him, who knows how to catch the wise in their own craftiness, after a rather brief course of days passed, as the man of the Lord had foretold, the Count free and unharmed is restored to his country, and [p] Robert, in those very chains which we have mentioned, by the order of King Henry, transported to England, until the day of his death was bound in perpetual prison. O man worthy of the most excellent proclamation! by whose tears the very fountain of piety is moved; by whose admonitions the widowed country is strengthened; at whose prediction with the captive freed, the tyrant ensnared in the very snares which he had stretched, is delivered to exile.
[81] The Count therefore being restored to his country and to his former prosperity, soon obtained the castle of [q] Bellême and also the adjacent territories, having returned to his own he sets them to piety, and subjugated them to be possessed both by himself and by his heirs hereafter. [r] Hence as quickly as he could he came to the man of God Bernard, by whose merits and prayers he had been freed, and rendered the thanks which he owed, not so much by words as by tears and subsequent indications: whom afterwards he so loved with affection, that he obeyed him in many things, and tempered himself from plunders and cruelties by his teachings,
he reformed his life to better things; and lest he should appear ungrateful for so great a benefit, he conferred many gifts on him, which we decline to enumerate, lest we bring weariness to devout readers. For if we wished to discuss each thing which in manifold ecclesiastical ornaments, in gems, in golden or silver vessels, in the pleasantnesses of lands or estates or woods, and very many gifts he receives from him. in the dominions of ponds or vineyards or mills, in the returns of various tithes, he gave to our monastery, we would be proved to no longer describe the deeds of the holy man, but to weave any history whatsoever. Also the territory, which, as we premised, deceived by the counsel of certain ones, he had taken away from the blessed man, [s] he restored; and there he expanded very many of his monks, with suitable dwellings constructed and very many revenues designated. The aforesaid Beatrice, his sanctity having been recognized, and also from his mother and sister. deserting the habitation of her castles, at Tiron, with dwellings built, henceforth dwelt as long as she lived; and there she built a huge Basilica, with much money spent; whom on departing from this life [t] her daughter Juliana, heir of maternal probity, succeeded: who with many expenses laid out, afterwards most diligently completed a not small part of our workshops.
[82] Therefore while Bernard was building his monastery in France, [u] Robert of Abrissel had built his in Aquitaine, namely of Fontevraud, he completes the monastery, as others then elsewhere. Ralph of Fustine in Brittany, and Vitalis of Mauritonio was building his in Normandy, namely Savigny in the diocese of Avranches, which afterwards [x] yielded to Dom Bernard with the monasteries [y] depending from it. Whom the supernal Arbiter willed to remain placed far from one another, and separated in diverse regions: because each one of them built so many and so great monasteries, that one region could not by any means contain them, one province did not suffice for the congregations gathered by them. Furthermore Christ's soldier Bernard, after he had placed the seat of his cenobium on the estate, which his Mother had given him through the hand of her Canons; no calumny expelled him thence, no adversity of stormy tempest could move him thence; because he had clung to Christ, who is the firm solidity of immovable stability.
NOTES.
CHAPTER X.
Revelation concerning the eternal salvation of 2 monks. Other miracles.
[83] On a certain night, while the Brothers in the oratory were singing the psalmody of the nocturnal synaxis, The funeral of a dead brother it happened that a certain Brother came to his end. On which account, according to the rite, the tablet having been struck, the Brothers assembled. Who while they wished more quickly to complete the obsequies of the now deceased Brother, and to return to the oratory, that they might pay out what remained of the interrupted psalmody; it happened otherwise than they had intended: because a certain delay of retardation intervening, it held them there longer, because the matter required it. For the infirmarian, not having water with which he might wash the lifeless limbs of the deceased brother, could not bury him, demons delay having taken away a certain key, because he could not find the key of a certain door, through which was the exit to the spring. Wherefore greatly disturbed, he seized an axe to break the door. But the holy Bernard of God lightly restrained the motion of his disturbance, and restored to him the key taken by the devil, which he had long sought and not found. And so finally the obsequies performed, they returned to the church, and completed the duty of divine service, which they had not yet completed. Now on the morrow when the Brothers were conversing among themselves about this delay, Christ's soldier Bernard asserted that a certain Brother had been present at the obsequies, because they had not been able to hinder his salvation: who had seen so great a multitude of demons come to accuse the soul of the Brother, that they filled the whole valley, in which the monastery is situated. But because they could not take away his salvation, as they were trying, they brought in this impediment of delaying his burial. But because we knew for certain that he had spoken falsely, and that no one had been present at the obsequies except him who saw what he reported, we do not doubt that he spoke of himself.
[84] At the same time, while the monks were preparing to hand over to burial the body of a certain Brother, who had led a very religious life, commending his soul to God, and were paying the duty of the due psalmody; the man of God Bernard, that he might pray more secretly, withdrew to the oratory, and there for a long time commended the soul of the deceased Brother to God in prayers. Whom the supernal piety graciously heard, as will be declared in what follows, and at once, lest he should hesitate in any way about his salvation, benignly wished to be certified. For the Brother, whose body was in the bier, clothed in white vestments, having a maniple in his hand, he sees it now glorious, appeared most splendid to him, as we have said, insisting on prayers: and asking from him a blessing, entered into conversation: and most diligently begged him to greet the confreres on his behalf, and that they might be told that he was now enjoying rest.
[85] In the neighborhood of our monastery a certain soldier, a Robert of Moteja by name, was dwelling, who at that time did not yet overflow with abundance of things, Robert of Moteia, as we afterwards experienced. For he was oppressed with prolonged penury, not without the wonder of his neighbors; although he seemed enriched with very many revenues of villages and estates. He himself marveled at the misfortunes of his poverty more than the rest, especially because by all he was said to arrange his affairs with skillful industry and circumspect prudence. being asked he visits, Wherefore, coming to the man of God with good-hearted company, whose familiarity he had already obtained, with devout prayers he begged that he might honor his house with his own presence, and presumed to add that he would deign to lodge with him for the space of one night. Bernard, however, as he was most benign, graciously acquiesced to his pious petition, came to the house, received hospitality. What more?
Full of riches, but not of perishing census, As the new guest enters the hospitality of the needy soldier, He drives away his poverty with the gift of him who fills all things.
For such great abundance, as afterwards became manifest in public, from that time came into the house of the aforesaid Soldier; and makes him from poor rich, so that he rejoiced that he had not received the servant of God, but the very Lord of all largesse and goodness in his own hospitality. Who afterwards, being not forgetful of so great
opulence of external things which he had obtained at his entrance, was by no means ungrateful; but from that time, as he was able, he ministered to him incessantly; and after his death conferred some benefits on us, and enriched our monastery with very many revenues of tithes.
[86] At b St. Leobinus of Five-Fountains there was a certain little boy, on whom a fleshy tumor growing over had covered the whole eye from the very day of his birth: A little boy blind in one eye whose mother hearing that the man of the Lord Bernard would have a passage through the same village; as quickly as she could she presented herself and her offspring to his sight; and with tears took care to extort that he would lay his hand on her only son. Then pitying the maternal cries, and acquiescing to satisfy the surrounding people,
That he might procure praise to Christ and health to the blind; He drives away the disease from the one he saw, whom he saw bereft, with the sign of the Cross he heals: The holy man fitting a worthy sign of the Cross with prayer
Whom he restored to health so swiftly, that every disease vanished with the sign of the Cross.
[87] Therefore there flowed to the servant of God from here and there so great a multitude of men, He has under him 300 monks, desiring to renounce the world, and desiring to submit themselves to his teachings, that within three years c he was Father of five hundred monks. O marvelous man, born not for himself alone, but for all! See that he labored not for himself alone; but also for all seeking the truth. In this alone was pleasing to the Holy Spirit, what with Solomon as witness are proved before God and men, the concord of Brothers and the love of neighbors. Ecclus. 25:2 Of whom he retained three hundred with him; but two hundred others, of these he sends 200 elsewhere; through diverse parts of the world, in cells he determined to live twelve at a time. To whom oppressed with too great poverty, the wide dispensation of divine piety, which does not cease to feed the birds of the sky, most benignly provided; and on account of the faith of the holy man ministered provisions to them. Yet on many days bread was so lacking, that it was necessary for a pound of bread to be divided between two, in great scarcity of food, drink, and sometimes between four. Sometimes they were wholly without bread; but sustained their life only with herbs and legumes. About wine however I think it better to be silent, than to say anything. They did not have wine: and clothing joyful, they did not at that time desire to have wine. Furthermore in the very harshest winter many were without furs and even more without cowls, when the fragile bodies of mortals, on account of the excessive immensity of cold, could scarcely live even sufficiently clothed. And when they were oppressed by such great scarcity of temporal things, they rejoiced not moderately to bear the burden of immense poverty for Christ. For they had a great sufficiency of temporal goods in the full presence of their most holy father Bernard of divine consolation. For when he, sitting in the midst, refreshed their minds with celestial words of doctrine, whom he makes cheerful by his visitation. so great love of divinity was in the disciples, that they rejoiced more in the affection of such teaching, than if with him absent they would abound in the plenty of transitory things. For indeed when bread was entirely lacking to them, refreshed only with herbs, as we said, or legumes, they were so strengthened by the consolation and presence of the man of God, that more briskly than usual they rendered thanks to God, and believed themselves visited and consoled by him. But there was in them greater abstinence in food or drink and in garments, than the Rule of St. Benedict Father and founder of monks prescribes, or the institutes of any other scripture command.
[88] He heals an energumen with the sign of the Cross. At the same time the man of the Lord Bernard restored to former health a certain Brother filled with a demoniac spirit, Odo by name, opposing to him the sign of the Cross; and commanding him to be loosed from the chains, with which on this account he had been bound. Who being loosed, immediately was rendered so quiet and peaceful, as if he had not suffered any insanity before. Let us add to this miracle another also, through which we may make manifest that Christ's soldier Bernard shone with the spirit of prophecy. For on account of the cause of a certain business he went to d Chartres on a certain day: but before he had begun to deal with that, with his companions who had gone with him marveling, absent he knows that a monk is possessed by a demon, he returned to the monastery unexpectedly. And when he had asked from the Brothers, if after he had departed from them anything of trouble had happened, they announced that a certain Brother, named Gervase, agitated by a malignant spirit, was being held bound in the cell of the infirm. Which immediately the man of God, that while he was at Chartres, both knew, and therefore had returned so quickly, he intimated to us who had gathered there, and frees: and commanded that he be loosed from the chains and brought to him. Who being brought, by the sign of the Cross impressed upon him by the servant of God, immediately sat down peaceful, after divine benignity, on account of the merit of his Confessor, freed him from the insanity.
[89] In the summer time, therefore, when the Brothers were giving effort to gathering the hay, and conveying it with carts and other vehicles to be stored within the enclosure of the monastery; by his permission without whose nod not a leaf falls from a tree, A boy crushed by the wheels of a laden cart, a certain misfortune occurred on a certain day, which nevertheless disturbed their minds: For a certain small boy, whose name was Amelin, while, for the sake of helping, he was hastening less cautiously to approach a certain cart (which seemed so loaded with hay, that scarcely by e ten or more was it drawn), fell backward, and soon anticipated by the ponderous rolling of the wheels coming from the side, until straightway they passed through him, lay on his back underneath. And when those standing around believed him nearly dead; and judged that only his burial ought to be considered, with tears they gathered his shattered limbs on a shovel, which is commonly called a winnowing-fan, he restored to health, and carried him half-dead and scarcely breathing to the cell of the infirm. Which after Bernard, as usual standing in the oratory, observed, with inconsiderate steps to the pallet, on which the pitiable little soldier was lying, as quickly as possible he hastened; and first, not unmindful of the Lord's oracle, with the sign of the blessed Cross he did not fail to salute the aforesaid little cell with peaceful words. Wondrous thing! he who was thought to be as if lifeless, awakened by his voice, opened his eyes at his entrance; and soon as the same servant of God laid his hand upon him, he so recovered, that he who had been carried there by the hands of others as if to be buried, rose on his own feet, and returned to the company of those outside (with us seeing, and over this magnifying the Lord) unharmed.
[90] Therefore as long as the man of God held the mortal airs, no one of his disciples was idle: but each one, unless detained by ill-health, at the appointed hours labored with his own hands. For there were among them several craftsmen, who exercised each art with silence: over whom always guardians of order presided, who with the Father commanding diligently observed the strictness of regular observance. he prescribes labors to be performed in silence, But if inevitable necessity compelled anyone to speak, he avoided much talk and vain talk: because their institution did not let such things go unpunished. The venerable Father indeed, although he had imposed guardians of order, as we said, on each; nevertheless, going around all, recalling that Apostolic saying, "He who does not labor, let him not eat"; permitted no one to be idle. 2 Thess. 3:10 So great humility had grown in their hearts, through the example of the man of God, that they would perform even any cheap tasks with their own hands in rivalry, would carry wood on their shoulders from the wood, would do the kitchen in turn without any help of servants, he instills humility in their minds and knew no rebellion nor disobedience, or contumelious word at all. The example of the man of God also had raised their minds to the heights of such great charity, that they loved one another without dissimulation, prevented one another in honor in rivalry; and charity. leaving their own wills, served those of others; putting off their own conveniences, fulfilled those of others; and in all ways condoled with fraternal miseries.
NOTES.
CHAPTER XI.
Hospitality. Prophetic spirit. Fame of sanctity.
[91] A certain one of the man's disciples, newly professed a monk, began to marvel, with himself exceedingly astonished,
Why such great heralds of fame followed him,
whom he did not see raise the dead from death, By night he is seen to walk, cleanse lepers, illumine the blind: less attending, that the performance of miracles does not confer sanctity of life, but the operation of light and justice. Who when for a long space of time did not rest from this thought, but was a diligent explorer of his life, on a certain night
A great lantern, full of radiant light, He saw carried by no one, and brought back by no one, Leading the steps or returns of Bernard.
For it was his custom never to carry a lantern before himself, either by himself or by anyone: with a lantern which no one carried shining before. and when he was admonished by us, why he permitted light to be lacking to himself at night; he answered, that, as we, he knew the entrance of all the doors of the house. Wherefore that investigator
Was amazed, marveling at so great a lantern:
and as quickly as he could on the morrow set forth to the man of God what he had seen; and did not blush to confess, how he had hitherto judged his life. But holy Bernard asserted that his eyes could have been deceived; and forbade him, threatening, lest henceforth he should be deceived in this matter. It is clear indeed that the Lord wished to designate, through the lantern, the bearer of light to travelers, the shining abundance of the works of his Confessor, going before all following him.
[92] The man of the Lord Bernard so diligently showed hospitality to all comers, he receives all of whatever condition: that he excluded no one from hospitality; and taught his monks to receive all; he excluded none of the rich, the poor, the lame, the weak, little children, little women, lepers, any sick persons, no sex, no age; but gathering absolutely every kind of men into hospitality,
he met all their necessities, as much as he could, and the more they were poor, the more willingly he served them: he, a cheerful giver, prepared provisions and bedding, in as far as his means sufficed. Often the bread, He gives the bread taken from the brothers' table, which had been placed before the Brothers in the refectory, because he had no other, he took from the tables, and with joy set before his guests. He made all his things common to all, and even to shoe the horses of his guests, he sometimes unshod his own. In the harshest winter also, in the cold he offers his own garments taken off, he often took away from himself clothing not superfluous, with which he mercifully clothed the naked limbs of the poor. No one of the needy returned from him empty. He despoiled his own, to clothe the unknown, and to help all. How often he wished to be a debtor, or how often for this cause he remained naked, covered only with a cowl; he alone, whom nothing escapes, knows. No one gave more to the poor, than he who left nothing for himself. And since there are three kinds of martyrdom without the shedding of blood, generous in poverty itself: namely chastity in youth, abstinence in abundance, generosity in poverty; because he had already triumphed over two in Aquitaine, that he might obtain the palm over the third also, in France he was daily a Martyr. For although afflicted by too great poverty, what he could have, taking it away from himself and his own, he gave to the poor and to those coming. Hence also the custom given by him and instituted b up to today in our monastery is retained, that all without exception are gathered into hospitality, and to them necessary things of food and beds, in which his means suffice, are supplied.
[93] No one, God being witness, of mortals in our times shone more than he with the virtue of charity and generosity: no one more attentively held the zeal of hospitality and humility, no one more put off the care of his own flesh. For with such great rigor of abstinence he afflicted himself, from every comfort in illness he abstains, that he never treated his body with the aid of medicines, never with diminution of blood, never with the frequenting of baths; nor even, that he might refresh his limbs, after he was professed a monk, sat down by a fire. For by the force of fevers, when he was a young man, most gravely detained, he did not for the space of one day desert the community. Then now old, a misfortune happening, having suffered the fracture of one rib, nevertheless on account of the relief of this misfortune, he showed himself no medicine: but did not even indicate to anyone that he was suffering such damages, until he had recovered health. By the negligence of the refectorians, it often happened that water was not placed on his table (for he used such a drink): even from the drink of water, and so for three days or four he ate without drink, nor did he signify to anyone that he was lacking drinks. For he rejoiced to have found a torment of greater abstinence and affliction with which he might afflict himself; and to his ministers, accusing themselves for this, he forbade that they should speak of such things thereafter. If therefore the parsimony of any, who put off only those things which could intoxicate, is set forth as admirable to all; what worthy thing can be conferred on Bernard, who abstained from water itself? Give me someone restraining himself from more delicate foods, content with barley bread; I give you Bernard often sustaining himself in some way on raw roots of herbs, and very sparing even in these. In the community and with the Brothers he always ate; and as by seat he preceded his disciples, so by the virtue of abstinence he was preeminent. Any incitements of taste, which were not generally common to all, he by no means permitted to be ministered to himself: indeed he abstained from certain things, which others were eating.
[94] That divine grace had conferred the spirit of prophecy on his Confessor Bernard, we clearly demonstrate, if of the many things, [he knows in the spirit that a certain one with a theft committed, is meditating flight,] which he knew by prophetic spirit, we relate even a few. There was a certain monk in his monastery, Vitalis by name, a Priest by order; who had committed a theft of the things of the Brothers, proposing in mind, that he would return to the vomit of secular life, which he had deserted: who on a certain night while he stood with those singing in the choir, suddenly fell. On the morrow, however, when the Brothers inquired from him, for what cause he had fallen so ignominiously; he answered that sleep had pressed him, and had cast him down. But holy Bernard, bringing forth the contrary, said: "Brother, it is not so, as you assert: but truly on this night I saw a demon, who, rising horrific against you, brought in this fall; and unless you more quickly strive to purge your conscience from the perpetrated crime through confession, and urges him to penance, and come to your senses from the purpose of evil will, with which you are still entangled, he will drive you to a worse fall.
O wondrous and especially venerable man, From whose mind what the tongue does not reveal is not hidden, He discerns both the affections and the meditations of the monk, Making manifest his past acts and rages:"
to whom the mask-like forms of demons are opened, who knows the sins of men, from whom the secrets of hearts are not hidden. And truly, as the same had foretold, not long after, as we ourselves saw, so it happened to him: because deserting the habit of the monastery, but in vain, he returned to his former depravity; and clung again for five years to the concubine, whom, before he had professed himself a monk, he had abused.
[95] Now therefore the fame of the holy man, daily growing more and more, with the swiftness of its wings carrying the marks of his virtues throughout the world, so depicted him to the hearers, that it would tell the measure of his stature; and describe the lineaments of his simple countenance, in which the goodness of manners, the piety of innocence, the gentleness of mind, as on his seal appeared; and designated the rigor of abstinence and the sanctity of life, the age of longevity, On account of the fame of sanctity spread far and wide the whiteness of his head; and so by designating, would show him absent as if present before their eyes; and thus would make him known and lovable to all. Whence it came about, that it not only filled the nearer parts of the Gallican region: but also passed through the farthest ends of the Burgundians, c Alans, and Aquitanians: but also obtained the boundaries of the Bretons, and Normans, and English, and arrived as far as Alba of the Scots: as later was made clear by the very effects of things. he instructs those coming even from England and Scotland, For from the boundaries of all these regions, many hastened to him, that they might see the bodily presence of him, whom fame had already made known to them, and perceive the admonitions of saving doctrine from his own mouth, and know the marks of his virtues through themselves. Of whom some took care to bestow many benefits on his monastery, in things of movable money: but some, because they could not have him present with them in their own borders, taking twelve of his monks, built monasteries for them in their own territories.
[96] being asked, he goes to Henry King of England: Of whom one was Henry King of the English and Duke of the Normans, who, having sent two most excellent d Princes, namely Theobald Count of Blois and Rotrou Count of Perche, with great prayers was beseeching, that the same servant of the Lord coming as far as Normandy, would show him his bodily presence; excusing himself that on account of unexpected events of diverse happenings, he did not dare to go beyond the boundaries of his borders. To which he agreeing, as soon as the King saw him, he extended both hands to heaven, and rendered immense thanks to its inhabitant, namely Christ; and with mutual embraces given, received him with due honorific-ness. After hearing his competent doctrine, he offered many gifts: moreover he gave fifteen marks of silver to his monastery, from him he received annual revenues: to be had in perpetuity each year. Out of the great sweetness of love, which thereafter he had for the Confessor of Christ, he loved his monks so much as long as he lived, that each year, besides the revenue which we have said, he sent them sixty or fifty marks of silver, or more or less; and diligently admonished, that the religion of his institution should not decline. He also undertook the buildings of our dormitory to be made, which the Royal magnificence completed with much money spent.
[97] But also the King of the Franks [e] Louis, kindled with the same desire as the aforesaid King, invited, he goes to the King of France, and is munificently honored by him. after he had conversation with him, conferred the territory of Cintray, which we possess up to today, as a gift. To his successors also after his death he showed the greatest reverence, so that by them he wished his children, namely f Philip and g Louis, afterwards Kings, to be received from the sacred font; and in our monastery up to the day of his death conferred innumerable benefits. Theobald, of whom we made mention above, besides two cells, which with him living he built for us, conferred so many and so great ornaments and other gifts to our church after his death, he receives various gifts from Theobald that it would be tedious to enumerate them on account of the multitude. He also had built at his own expense a sufficiently suitable habitation for the infirm.
[98] If we wished to touch in particular about the others, who flowed to him to be seen from various kingdoms and regions, and conferred on him very many gifts and territories, and built cells, and bestowed benefits known to God alone, as for example about h William Duke of the Aquitanians, Fulk Count of Anjou, hence King of the Jerusalemites, Robert Count of Gloucester, Henry Count of i Nevers, Guy the Younger Count of Rochefort, and other chief Princes, William Count of Warwick, Robert son of Martin, k Guichard of Beaujeu, l Geoffrey Viscount of Chateaudun, Giraud Berlay, Brice of Chillo, and many others; we would not be able to be freed from the entanglement of this work with a brief account. Some of whom the cells which they had first built, after the death of the man of God, on account of reverence for him, expanded with larger fiscs and revenues and also possessions of territories, to such a degree that, overcome by their petition, who erect various Abbeys, subject to this. we imposed Abbots there; yet with this condition, that they themselves and their successors should obey our orders in all things; should not deviate in anything from our customs; but in the same tenor in which the Priors had before ruled the cells, they should be wholly subject to the laws and institutions of our jurisdictions.
[99] At the same time a certain m Robert, of most noble family, approached the holy man from the parts of the Ocean, other monks led into Wales, and taking with him thirteen of his disciples, passed through the borders of Normandy and England, and reaching the uttermost boundaries of the n regions of the Welsh, on the shore of the Hibernian sea near the river Tevi, first indeed built a cell; then, with as many monks and an Abbot obtained, by the pact we have said, constructed a cenobium suitable for all uses. At the same time o David of the Lothians and Northumbrians, and afterwards King of the Scots, learning by the report of fame the marks of the merits of our most blessed Father still living, to others in Scotland King David erects a new Abbey, through the most strenuous envoys led to himself no small congregation of his disciples, and in Lothian, which on one side touches on Alba of the Scots, on the other side the borders of Northumbria
is joined, he built for them a cenobium in a suitable site near the river [p] Tweed, which he sufficiently enriched with broad possessions and revenues. For indeed after he had done this, ardently thirsting to see the man of God, he took up the journey from the Arctic shores, and the borders of many intervening regions passed, the space of the British sea traversed, and the provinces of Normandy crossed over, who coming to Tiron finds Bernard dead he arrived as far as Tiron. But because the holy Father had already departed to the higher ones, he could not see him as he had wished. But lest he should appear to the court of so great a man empty or ungrateful, after, with the pride of Royal dignity laid aside, with bent knees he presented himself to his sepulchre with due reverence, he expanded the monastery which he had already founded with larger fiscs and territories, and taking with him twelve monks with an Abbot obtained under the order and law premised, besides those whom he had already had, with the labors of the longest journey completed, at length reached the provinces of his kingdom.
[100] The names of certain Kings, Dukes, Counts, Nobles, who took care to see the man of God Bernard, and to augment his monastery with their possessions, we have noted in letters; but on account of the multitude we have briefly touched on, excerpting a few from many. For truly, if we wished to weave into this Writing all, who in diverse kingdoms built cells for him and enlarged our monastery; the little book would exceed the measure, and not to say the fastidious, but the studious reader would incur weariness. For who could express by name the buildings of [q] the hundred cells, which our church had before this little book was composed? Who would designate the situations of so many places or territories, in which we possess them, and naming them with names unheard of by our own people? A hundred monasteries subject to him. Who would turn over by reading volumes of such great length, if such were written, which nevertheless the series of the narration would demand to be described?
[101] The aforesaid servant of God also so abounded in the bowels of compassion, that if anyone confessed to him a grave crime (for on this account very many came to him), he so affected himself, The defects of others, as his own he weeps, as if he himself had committed the very crime, that he would move even the guilty one to tears with his weeping. For so great constancy of contemplation and prayer the grace of the Holy Spirit had conferred on him by the infusion of its own sweetness; in contemplation he is watered with tears, that in their assiduity he consumed the greatest part of the day and night, and flowed with such great abundance of tears in them; that if anyone wished to look at his face, he would see as it were two rivulets flowing from his eyes. For the sweet-flowing taste of divine sweetness had bedewed him with the dripping of the torrent of God's pleasure, and with the upper watering had fertilized the land of his heart, and so had raised him up to the desire of the Deific beatitude. And because he was even for a moment absent from his presence, on account of too great sorrow he tortured himself with his own laments; and so he mourned, if he had committed light sins, he aspires to the heavenly fatherland: that you would believe him guilty of the most grievous crimes. His mind also, affected by the wearinesses of the present life, vehemently bewailed the prolongation of his sojourn: and because he saw the reprobate, in a frenzied manner rejoicing when they do evil, and exulting in the worst things; he deplored their perdition with fraternal piety.
[102] And because the abundance of grace had joined his mind to the divine mind with such great affection and assiduity, as the Apostle says, "He who cleaves to the Lord is one spirit"; his face, drawing the form of such a conjunction, he appears with an Angelic face bore in himself the likeness of an Angelic countenance. 1 Cor. 6:17 For it seemed to those beholding him, that in him there was an Angelic countenance, and that his face shone with the sweetness of a certain brightness; especially when he celebrated the sacrosanct solemnities of the Masses, then most of all he overflowed with such great abundance of tears, moved by the bodily presence of his Creator, especially when he celebrated Mass: that even his priestly garments were thoroughly wet with the shower of tears. But if he blessed monks, or performed the Office of deceased Brothers, or sent any of his disciples to distant regions; suffused with the bowels of fraternal piety, he could not abstain but wept, and by his weeping stirred others to tears.
[103] Nor is it to be wondered at if such a wide effusion of tears was in him, to whom the grace of the Holy Spirit had conferred the increases of all virtues. For such great prudence flourished in him, that whatever he thought or did, he excels in prudence, he directed all things to the norm of reason, and wished or did nothing except what was right, and provided for human acts, as by divine judgments; and through the contemplation of divine things he despised this world and all things that are in the world; and directed every thought of the soul only to divine things: not as if he profited in loftiness, but as if he knew those things alone, and beheld them with his mind, as if no others existed, and by a certain flight of human things he inserted himself only into divine things. From which virtue were born to him reason, understanding, circumspection, providence, docility, and caution. Fortitude also had so strengthened him, in fortitude, that it carried his mind above every fear of misfortune, and he feared nothing except base things; bore adverse or prosperous things strongly; and by no means dreaded the dissolution of body and soul; and his virtue of fortitude had already ceased not only to overcome vices, but to ignore them, so that he knew no longer how to be angry, and desired nothing. And fortitude conferred on him magnificence, magnanimity, confidence, security, tolerance, firmness, and constancy.
[104] Temperance also had so moderated him, that he sought nothing to be repented of, in temperance, in nothing exceeded the law of moderation; reduced under the yoke of reason all things which the use of the body requires, as far as nature bears it; put off all things to reason; nor did he any longer restrain earthly desires, but as if by a certain forgetfulness wholly wiped them out of himself: whence were begotten to him modesty, shamefacedness, abstinence, chastity, honesty, moderation, justice. pudicity, parsimony, and sobriety. But also justice had so bound him to itself, that he rendered to each what is his own; and to the one way of this his purpose, he turned the service of each virtue; so that he joined the intention of his mind with the divine mind, so that imitating it he entered into a perpetual covenant with it: from which virtue indeed came to him innocence, friendship, concord, piety, religion, affection, and humility.
NOTES.
CHAPTER XII.
The final illness: double exhortation to his own. Last Sacraments received.
[105] Bernard therefore, like the fragrant nard, which not by chance, but, as I think, by the providence of the highest Disposer, is found expressed in the letters of the name; with the fragrance of such great virtues, bore the breaths of most sweet odor to the languors of worldly depravity, as a little rod ascending through the desert of this life from the aromatics of myrrh and frankincense, He falls into the final illness on the 11th day of the Resurrection. or like a heaped abundance of every powder of the perfumer. But with the end imminent, when the Creator and Redeemer of the human race, munificent Rewarder of his athletes, wished to put an end to so many and such great labors of the same, to inestimable rewards, a on the eleventh day of this Resurrection, he is invited by bodily trouble. What more? Nevertheless presuming on divine clemency, inasmuch as the mind conscious of all purity made him confident, in the time of the nocturnal office, having dismissed the Lord's service (in which he was present with the disciples in the nocturnal time), alone he goes out of the Church, and having entered the gate of the cloister, no comfort summoned, alas!
with the disease compelling, he is prostrated, and falls into most grievous ill-health, rather finds what he desired, that he might henceforth leave us. Some of us however, shocked that he had not returned to desert the choir of those singing, because he had not been accustomed to such a thing before; following him, sought him here and there, who was always present at other psalmodies: and found him lying in the aforesaid place. For the canonical Hours, both of day and of night, any secular cause or most powerful person did not take him away, although by this he was most frequently disturbed while he lived, nor did any bodily trouble render him slower; except this alone, by which happy he completed his happy course. For to these he always strove to be present first, or among the first, until they were completed; and so he provoked others more by example than by terror, with due paternity, to imitation of himself. Who, drawing deep sighs from their hearts, he is led to the nearest small room led him to a small room situated opposite, revolving in mind what afterwards happened.
[106] At last the psalmody according to custom having been performed, the crowd of monks, about soon to be widowed of the presence of so great a patron, with the monks weeping, seeking him with tearful and unconsidered steps circled around here and there: whom because they could not find according to wish, they wept irremediably. O incomparable desolation over the death of him which was about to afflict the assembly: on account of whose momentary, so to speak, absence, you perceive it shaken with grave sadness! What, pitiable flock, have you noticed? What do you bewail, whom you have not yet lost? What grief has struck you? who has made you conscious of the secrets of God? The Shepherd is not yet struck, and you seek where to flee. Now indeed, because he is absent for an hour, you lament; but when the certainty of the matter shall be made known, as I think, you will be wholly desolated. Gather that your Shepherd is mortal, and that he can in no way evade the laws of mortality. Thus the most holy Father, somewhat deprived of the strengths of the body, first, at his own command, is led by the hands of others into the Chapter, led into the Chapter and with the virtue by which he was able, he addresses his sons, inconsolably lamenting, and tries to moderate their weeping with adorned and reasonable arguments. He showed them that they were going against the divine disposition, out of grief for his dissolution: but the force of their love and sorrow could not be repressed by the laws of reason.
[107] Nevertheless, with their grief-sounding groans somehow repressed, the most holy Father begins with these words: "Fear not, little flock, he addresses the subjects: because it hath pleased your father to give you a kingdom. For if, mindful of my most humble poverty, whatever examples I shall have shown you, whatever institutes I shall have handed down, you shall wish to follow, rejecting contrary sects; you will not be burdened, with me dead, with so great scarcity of things, as has pressed you hitherto, with the Lord permitting, assiduously. Let the laws suffice you therefore, dearest ones, which you have found; seek not higher things, and look not for greater things; and do not presume to annihilate the Catholic institutions of him, he exhorts them to observe the institutions given: to whose teaching for Christ you have freely subjected yourselves. For I chose you, not you me, and put not off that I entered into my labors, not you into yours. All things, which you have so far perceived only by hearing, believe me as one experienced, lend me an ear, without hesitation acquiesce to me as you ought, my bowels. For I do not hand you a stone for bread, nor a scorpion for an egg; or, God being witness, I do not place a serpent for a fish: and although I do not doubt that some of you will degenerate in very many things, yet I pay what is mine. I do not say these things to confound you; but I strive to render my dearest sons forewarned. Wherefore do not wholly reject the trembling admonition of your old Father; unless perchance you shrink from being imitators of Christ himself, the poor Priest crucified for you. For if you scorn to obey him crying out, 'Learn of me because I am meek and humble of heart,' since the servant is not greater than his Lord, he promises to be a protector in heaven: you are vehemently mistaken. Matt. 11:29 Absent I will be able to help your necessities more, than here present in the exile of this most miserable pilgrimage: and by this argument you will know me powerful in the court of heaven, if after my departure such great penury of temporal things shall not afflict you. For the more a servant has been admitted to the secret things of his master, the more strongly he will be able to help his fellow servants with him."
[108] Thenceforth the desirable treasure, which rested in his mouth, is brought forth in common; the supernal joys, how great, of what kind, and for whom they are prepared, are declared; the infernal torments also, whom they await, are not silent; eternal blessedness, promised indeed to those beginning well, but to be given only to those persevering, is intimated with evident reason; the many mercies of the Lord, not to be despaired of, are persuaded; the cunning machinations of the ancient and most crafty enemy are made manifest; and, to gather very many things compendiously, new and old are brought forth; not as much as the mind of the most eloquent orator could, but as the capacity of the lamenting flock knew how to bear. "At the end I, brothers," he says, "looking to the salvation of your souls, have perhaps been troublesome and difficult among you: and therefore I beseech you, he asks pardon if he has offended in anything: that whoever grieves anything should forgive me: and if our severity has perhaps transgressed in anything the due measure, pray that the Lord may not impute this to me as a sin." And when the blessed man was expressing such things with tearful sobs, with all falling upon their knees similarly, unanimously acclaiming that he had always been good, always discreet, always affable, and, as was fitting, vigilant for the salvation of all; with a tearful farewell said to the Brothers, he is led back, with the weeping subjects he weeps: and he who hitherto by Apostolic authority was accustomed to rejoice with those rejoicing; now with fraternal compassion weeps with those weeping.
[109] For indeed against the hope of all, governed by the help of God's prevenient mercy, from the infirmity of the body he took larger strengths of mind; and the more abstinent the weaker, he was continually thinking of perpetual salvation: but bodily health he committed to the Lord's judgment. in great abstinence he lives: Therefore while the little body, which by incredible abstinence and too great fasts he had contracted, was being vexed; he was sustained only with those things, in the taking of which some thought themselves most abstinent, so that with these even they gorged the belly, they suspected they had obtained all chastity. And while he freely provided all things to others sick, and denied nothing necessary for his little means; now he reckoned in others hardness, in himself clemency. No young man with a sound and vigorous body had given himself to such great continence, as this one with a broken and aged and weakened little body. he does not admit more delicate foods, But when he was asked by many most honorable persons, who from every side flowed to him, that he should refresh himself with more delicate foods; "We know," he said, "that from feasts life is accustomed to be preserved, health cannot be conferred. For if, that infirmity may be healed, the desire of the gullet seems to need to be filled, why do even those get sick who are daily fattened with more delicate banquets?"
[110] or a bath, With the physicians persuading that he should use bathing washings, "Can baths," he said, "make a mortal man, his time of life completed, not die? If indeed death is approaching, neither can the fomentations of warm waters repel it; why, I beseech you, do you persuade me, that I should dissolve the rigor of a profession long kept at the end?" I confess in this matter he was more persistent, so that not even old age spared him, that he yielded to no one admonishing. Let the prudent reader say he is writing reproach in place of praises. I testify to Jesus whom he served, to whom I too desire to serve, that I feign nothing on either side; but as a Christian of a Christian bring forth what is true: his vices are the virtues of others. I call vices, according to the mind and desire of all, who love him, and seek him absent. We do not grieve that we have lost such a one; but we give thanks, that we had such a one; indeed we have. Moreover he has completed his course, and kept the faith, and now enjoys the crown of justice: he follows the Lamb wheresoever he shall go: he is satisfied because he hungered, and joyful sings, "As we have heard, so we have seen in the city of the Lord of hosts, in the city of our God." Ps. 47:9 O blessed change of things! He wept, that he might always laugh; he thirsted, that he might find the fountain, the Lord. Whether grief afflicted him, or fever inflamed him, or weariness dissolved him; among so many most acute passions of bodily infirmity, clothed in harshest garments, he by no means used better or spare clothes; as he would now use whites, and say, "Thou hast rent my sackcloth, and hast clothed me with gladness."
[111] He bore infirmity therefore patiently, exercised abstinence humbly enough. he bears the pains of illness most patiently For considering little all that he had done, from day to day he desired to become better: and among the stings of pain, which with wondrous patience he sustained, forgetful of his age and bodily fragility, he did not permit any soft beddings to be placed under himself. The poor in spirit was following the poor Lord to death, rendering to him what he had received, made poor for him. We know that very many have given alms, but have given nothing from their own body: have extended their hand to the needy, but overcome by the pleasure of the flesh, have whitened what was outside, and within have been full of the bones of the dead. But not such was Bernard, in fasting and the hardness of the bed. who at the very moment of death was of such great continence, that he almost exceeded measure, and contracted the weakness of the body with excess of fasts and the rigor of lying. The compassionate and merciful Lord, strengthening this purpose of his heart with the help of supernal aid, had conferred on him such great constancy, that no groan could the fiery sting extort from him. But he himself, pierced with frequent transfixion, for the increase of virtue rendered thanks with tears. But what am I doing? Passing over the order of narration, while I am held in particulars, as seems of many, I do not keep the precepts of speaking. Always envy follows virtues, and lightnings strike the highest mountains. Nor is it to be wondered at if I say this of men, when even the Lord was crucified by the zeal of the Pharisees, and all Saints had rivals, in Paradise also there was the serpent, by whose envy death entered the world. I testify by Truth itself, and by its holy Angels, and by that Angel, who was the guardian and companion of the admirable man, that I say nothing in favor of him in the manner of praisers; but whatever I am going to say, I say for testimony, and that it is less than his merits, whom the whole world proclaims.
[112] b Therefore on the fifth day of his indisposition, on the very little bed in which the most holy sick man was lying, he is carried likewise into the Chapter: on the 5th day of illness again carried to the Chapter, before the venerable countenance of the Crucifix the blessed Cross-cultivator is set down. Thence addressing his gathered soldiers, inconsolably lamenting, and with ears erect thirsting for the last admonition of their Advocate, the veteran having begun; because from the abundance of the heart the mouth speaks; what obtains among the first of the chief virtues, charity, through which chiefly each one is summoned to the array of faith, wisely he first put forth to be preserved by him. Because indeed the disciple is not above the master (which Christ about to return to the Father, to be retained above all, on the day before he suffered, by bidding farewell to his followers made known), lest the blessed Christ-cultivator should seem to err in anything from him, whose place he was taking, that same, about to depart from the world, with due paternity, to whom he should, as was fitting, he intimated. He instructs that all virtues are to be emptied out except this one,
and to be wholly destroyed, with authentic teachings: but this one, covers a multitude of sins, is the more certain seal of those warring for God, is the sum of the divine precepts, he asserts with very many testimonies: and that by this alone the disciples of Christ are to be distinguished from the accomplices of Antichrist, supported by the oracle of Truth itself, with opinions strengthened by his powers, he eloquently pleaded.
[113] "In this alone," he said, "will men know, that you are Christ's disciples; not if you have been observers of superstitious traditions, but if you have love for one another. and he prefers it to Monastic traditions. For those generate not so much edification as prevarication: these also, dearest ones, I have knowingly dissembled to you, because I was not ignorant that they would not profit so much as harm; as I myself had been subject to them for no small time, and had imposed them on others to be persistently borne through some courses of years. And although I did not at all doubt that some of you were longing and sighing for these; judging it more salutary that there should be something which the strong would desire, than that the weak would flee, I by no means acquiesced on many occasions; avoiding useless inventions, by which I would make you prevaricators: yearning for these things, by which to the most necessary, as a father to sons, I might lead you forward. For where there is no law, neither is there prevarication."
[114] c Having diligently instructed them with such and similar documents, with such voice as he could, he added: "About to enter, with the Lord granting, the way of all flesh, destitute now of the strengths of others, and of my own, as you yourselves see, to you, O little sons, I have come to say farewell; he rouses them to joy over his departure, and I have approached your presence most desired by me, since now I am being poured out, and the time of my dissolution is at hand. But by no means, dearest ones, let the absence of our little body make you sad: allow me to depart briskly from this arena, and to arrive at the starry possessions full of delights. Let your tears, I ask, be turned into joy. For you ought not lament as for one about to die, whom you believe will reign with Christ. But because no one is clean from filth, not even an infant, whose life is of one day upon earth; of all the excesses, which by mouth, heart, and deed I have committed, from the broad and inestimable bosom of mercy, and from you I ask pardon: and what is owed to all Christ-cultivators, that you render to me, he asks pardon for faults: I suppliantly beg." Things unseen to the present, never credible to the absent, sighs follow this voice.
[115] Thereafter he is anointed with the sacred Unction according to custom: and fortified with the reception of the Lord's Body and Blood, with us standing by, what he had asked having been obtained, after a tearful farewell said, and his flock commended to the highest Shepherd not so much by words as by tears; fortified with the last Sacraments the pious Pastor is carried back to the cell, from which he had been brought. he is carried back to the cell, Whom the weeping and wailing crowd of disciples follows: tearful voices, accompanied by tearful sighs, are raised on high: and proclaiming themselves wretched, themselves orphans, they irremediably lament. "Alas," they say, "you depart, most holy Father, by whose tenor we prevailed, by whose vigor we stood, with whom falling we slip, with whom failing we are prostrated. Why do you desert us beginning? why do you disperse us not yet gathered? with the subjects following desolated. What is the measure of our desolation? what the end of our dispersion? what the limit of our destruction? In what now will the counsel of life be had? in what hope? in what salvation? in what refreshment? under whose protection a refuge? Who now the truculent rage of wolves, the Shepherd being taken away, from the tearing of the sheep will restrain? Who will further be a consoler of misery? who a provider of utility?"
NOTES.
CHAPTER XIII.
The remaining preparation for death. Revelations, death, burial.
[116] With these and such things by some of them being cried out, and with others lying on the earth, with a convulsion coming over them as if dying; the man of pious execution is compelled to go into ambiguity about what he should prefer; for he did not wish to desert the desolate flock, nor to be absent longer from the presence of the highest good. O man snared with too great compassion and equally with the hope of supernal things! Therefore with his hands lifted on high with his lights; "O God," he said, "most beautiful fabricator of all beauty, before whom is all my desire, and from whom my groaning is not hidden; He acquiesces in the Divine pleasure, you know with how great ardor of desire my soul thirsts to see you, and with what love of you, by weariness of this exile affected, it languishes. Nevertheless, if you command me still to stand in the contest of the struggle for the protection of your own, whether to migrate to God, I do not refuse: and hard sweats, as long as it shall please you, I will bear. or still live." Committing therefore all things to the judgment of the divine will, he unceasingly longed for the joys of the impending happiness.
[117] Now two days before the man of God went to the heavenly seats, a certain matron, by name Mary (who, on account of the works of piety to which she was devoted, was most familiar to him) before the relics of many Saints, which at that time were contained in the tower of the Castle of Nogent, for the sake of honor had kindled a candle according to custom, he appears to a matron praying at Nogent and before them prostrate lay in prayers. She had a virgin daughter, whom the servant of God had asked from her mother, that she might be consecrated to Christ. She therefore, as we have premised, praying, the aforesaid relics in the great chest in which they were kept gave a noise, and rendered her exceedingly frightened. And hence it seemed to her, that from our monastery up to the same tower, which was distant at least three stades, among white-clad monks, a multitude of white-clad monks extended, proceeding as in the manner of a procession, and the man of God, distinguished with Sacerdotal garments, preceding. When she was trembling awaiting the outcome of the unusual vision, the same tower suddenly shone inside, as if the very rays of the sun were enclosed in it. With this splendor gradually increasing, the Confessor of the Lord Bernard, to the frightened matron, removing all fear by his presence, appeared; and said to her: "Tomorrow, bringing your daughter with you to me, she is invited to come to him with her daughter: soon about to pass from this world, hasten; knowing for certain, that unless you also hasten, you will not see me again, dearest." And saying these things, with the splendor with which he had come accompanying, he disappeared.
[118] She indeed, returning home, not without the greatest wonder of the neighbors, for the space of almost two hours remained as mute. At length to those inquiring, what misfortune had befallen her, she related in order the whole vision. On the following day therefore, according to the precept of the holy man, with her daughter accompanying her, as quickly as possible she hastened to him; and to him in the presence of those who were there: "Obeying your precepts, my Father," she said, "I have come: I have brought my daughter, whom you commanded, with me." "Well," the elder responded: "for if for a little, dearest, you had delayed, who offered to him indeed you would have returned unsaluted. I wish therefore, that, what hitherto you have delayed, you should not hesitate to hand over your daughter to me." Then the mother, "Most willingly," brought forth: "whatever pleases your paternity I grant." Whom after, with all who stood by marveling, he received among his hands; blessing them he sent them back to their own. after some days dies. She indeed not many days after, without doubt to be joined to the virgin choirs, immaculate rested; and exchanged the light of this world for the eternal light, none the less by the merits of the holy man. O glory of death, which is considered better than life! because what she took from the earth, she sent to heaven. Truly, as I consider, so to die was more than to be raised again. For certain salvation is not to be contaminated with sins. How many would desire, with all things given up along with life, to buy such a passage, if perhaps they could find a merchant!
[119] With his members thus failing and the moment of death approaching, the holy man commands the Brothers, who were serving him, to refresh their weary limbs by sleeping, because they had been long watching in his vigils: who laying themselves on the ground somehow, began to doze; but awakened by his voice, perceive him conversing with certain ones. He is visited by the monks holy in death: For the multitude of monks came with so great glory, that it soon filled Bernard, dying, with joy. They indeed, with ears erect, coming nearer, try to extort what he had seen. "Oh," he said, "how immense the bowels of exceptional piety! how benign his clemency! I had indeed heard, Lord, that he who for you is humbled for a time on earth, by you is exalted in the heavens: but now by your grace you have wished me to be eternally certified, with how great joy they are gifted, who have submitted themselves to our smallness. Delightful servitude, which such great reward follows! Truly to serve you is to reign."
[120] he understands that all who died under him have attained blessedness, With these and such things the most holy Father applauded over the vision shown him from heaven; thus finally he brought forth with weeping vows: "Most certainly, you will know, dearest ones, that all the professed of this church, taken away from this mortality, are now gifted with ineffable glory, are most certain of their salvation, but most solicitous about yours. For they themselves, clothed in white and cheerful, a little before me being gathered to them, now appeared; and inviting to the Lord's supper, about to reign forever with Christ, with you now approaching here: bidding farewell departed: by whose flashing radiance the solar rays are beaten back, whose fragrances surpass balsams, by whose beauty lilies and roses are overcome." Again with tears arising; "How blessed," he said, except one existing in torments, "the mothers who bore them; how blessed the knees that supported them! how happy the breasts which they sucked!" Those present, mindful of a certain monk, about whose salvation they doubted, inquire, if he had been seen with the others. He denied, saying; "Nay, he is in torments." Likewise inquiring, if any end would be imposed to his misery. "By pains," he said, "he will be worn down most grievously." Who again more expressly searching, if he would ever obtain any pardon; they could extort nothing else, except that he would be afflicted with many tortures. Because we have made mention of him, we judge worthy to briefly intimate how he lived or died.
[121] This one, indeed entangled in many crimes, moreover having been perfected in no grade of sacred Order (which is even wondrous to say) for the course of many years, had usurped to fulfill the Priestly office: who without the grade of sacred Order, had long acted as a Priest: and hence coming to the man of God, he took the monastic habit, nor yet revealed to anyone what he had committed. Therefore after six months, coming to the end, what he had hitherto concealed, he made known; the blessing of the Crown, which he had not yet received, he received with the Viaticum, and died. Whose departure, at whose death a great tempest arising, with the serenity of the air changed, suddenly terrible thunderclaps followed, terrifying lightnings came, there was an immense inundation of rain, and at the same time the flashing of horrendous flames; and there was such great concussion of the elements, as if the whole air were crashing at once: nor yet was this commotion of the air seen or heard by any, except those who were present in our dwellings. But on the following day with us gathered as usual in the Chapter; "How intolerable," said the man of God, "the tribulation which remains for sinners in hell? when on account of one wretched one such great disturbance of the elements has come upon us. How great indeed the unhappiness of this one was, the immensity of the tempest has not been silent. For indeed on this night I saw demons, dragging the wretch through the window, and also among them the fiercest conflict for his soul
I saw: [and he confessed himself uncertain about the salvation of the soul snatched by the demons.] but what the end of the contest was, I am wholly ignorant." Such an end the pitiable one sustained, who did not deserve to appear beatified with the rest.
[122] Now the man of the Lord, certified by the aforementioned vision, and gladdened with due joy, if anything else he was compelled to say, soon his words flowed back to these things, nor could he scarcely speak anything, except what he had seen and heard. Whence some of those standing by, stung with heartfelt grief over his dissolution, burst forth in these words: "This account does not go to prosperity for us; for, now abhorring our fellowship, he nonetheless longs for the company of those whom he saw." At last he commanded the disciples to come to him unanimously, He instructs all called to him, whom according to the singular strictness of orders, as he could, he again instructed. He admonished the Priests and other ministers of God, that they should so serve the altar, that they themselves might become a living host. He exhorted the little boys, whom he had received and whom he had brought up with paternal piety, that they should guard their virginity, as an irrecoverable treasure, and that they should sagaciously gird themselves that it might be preserved inviolate. At the end he admonishes the illiterate, that as skins and sackcloth of the Lord's tabernacle, they should protect the purple, byssus, and hyacinth from the rainy storms; and that the divine office, which they could not administer, by serving in outward things, they should render their own.
[123] Hence in order, with the kiss of peace given with tears: "May he himself," he said, "henceforth provide you with a suitable Shepherd, who is the most benign consoler of all grievers." The bowels were tormented, and as if drawn from their own members, fought with pain; and in this he was more admirable to all, that with great charity he overcame the torment. Among the hands of enemies, amid the bitterness of dire death, and the hard necessity of captivity, nothing is more cruel than to be separated from sons. We grieved our own way, and seemed rather to envy his glory: amid pains he closes his eyes: he with eyes closed, as if now despising human things, did not open them until the expiration of the soul. What are you doing, page? Why do you fear to come to his death? Already for a long time we compilers writing these things are gnawed, and already for a long time a longer book is being forged, while we fear to arrive at the last, as if with us silent and occupied in his praises, the falling down could be delayed. Up to this we have sailed with prosperous winds, and the gliding keel has ploughed the rippling plains of the sea. Now the oration runs upon rocks, and with the swelling mountains of the waves the present shipwreck of innumerable ones is threatened; so that we are compelled to say, "Master, save us, we perish"; and that, "Arise, why sleepest thou, O Lord?" Matt. 8:25; Ps. 34:23 For who could narrate Bernard dying with dry eyes?
[124] Not many days had flowed, and behold the good Lord was requiring the faithful servant. He was hastening the passage, who was calling to glory: and weary from labors he is invited to rewards. With the hour then coming of blessed and long-longed-for reward with innumerable sighs, at which the husbandman, about to receive the fruit of pious labor from the munificent father of the family, from the snares of this present life should ascend to the eternal kingdoms; his members, broken with happy length of years and wholly dead with incredible parsimony, because the poor of Christ did not have more dearly, he entrusted to the Church of Tiron by hereditary right, he returns his spirit to heaven: the spirit entrusted to him from heaven he returned to heaven; and with such an end he completed the course of his sojourn. O happy course, whose prize is paradise!
O happy end, which eternal life follows! Life of the blessed, witness and reward of labors.
O what a good fight thou hast fought, what a happy course thou hast completed, what unshaken faith thou hast kept, pious Confessor of Christ!
Glowing with so many titles thou hast departed, thou hast not died, Joined to the dwellers of the ever-blooming fatherland, Heir of the perpetual kingdom and coheir with Christ: Whom Zion, the city of peace most placid, full of quiet, Now fosters and nourishes, and also opens her joys.
O how faithful, to whom thou hast entrusted thy own labors and sweats, which thou hast now received with such great interest; from whom that desirable, that distinguished, that incomparable, "Well done," thou hast deserved to hear. For to thee indeed, by the most grateful voice of his piety, on this day it was said: "Well done, good and faithful servant, enter into the joy of thy Lord."
O happy one, now associated with the starry choirs,
The course of thy pleasant navigation has now reached the borders of the supernal Jerusalem: whose ship's anchor, directed by a fortunate pilot, with the hope of remission, reaching the port of eternity,
Has now escaped the waves of the sea, and the chains of death, And now the port holds the hoped-for fatherland.
[125] Thence the extinguished Shepherd, carefully adorned with sacred garments, as his excellence required, and placed above a most becomingly draped bier, was carried on Sacerdotal shoulders into the church, The body is laid out in the church for three days which he himself had founded. In which before he was handed to burial, he remained three days and as many nights. Whose death some of the disciples; living near the river Rhone in the b territory of Beaujolais, on the following same day knew by this indication. For they had brought some of his beard, while he was still alive, as Relics; The hairs of the beard, in a small box, emit a wondrous fragrance which, placed reverently in a pyx, they sometimes washed for the health of the sick; and from the reception of this washing they returned unharmed. But at that hour, at which the servant of God departed from this life, from the aforesaid pyx came forth such a fragrance of wondrous odor, as if diverse kinds of aromatics had been heaped with it. By which sweetness the Brothers, enticed, noticed the truth of the matter as it was, and grieved with fraternal compassion for us deprived of such a great light. At the same hour also a certain monk, staying in Brittany, saw his triumphal funeral rites being made in Gaul.
[126] Meanwhile with fame flying around on the swiftest wings, when it was learned that the consoler of this country had migrated from this world; with the greatest concourse the funeral rites are held, the Priests and Clerics, Abbots and monks, Counts and Nobles, and from every side of the territory an innumerable multitude of people, deeply grieving for the surrounding cities, flowed together in troops, striving earnestly to be present at his memorable funeral rites, which they believed to be rather a triumph than a funeral. Whom of the monks lying hidden in the desert did his cell hold? What hidden secrets of chambers concealed matrons? He thought it sacrilege, who had not rendered to such a man the last office. No delay in coming detained anyone: not the occupation of public affairs, not fragility of sex, not womanly modesty, not domestic necessity; not finally the dignity of any administration, however highest, could retain anyone, but all hastened there in rivalry, where they might add sorrows to sorrows, inflict sighs upon sighs, wring out laments from laments, heap up tears upon tears. For they hastened not to any ridiculous spectacle with laughter. c
NOTES.
CHAPTER XIV.
Analecta on various deeds in the Life.
[127] Foods prepared for himself alone, he mixes with common ones, If anyone desires to hear how intolerably he bore that anything better than the rest should be set before him in the refectory; let him hear what he often did. On a certain day, entering the kitchen, he saw a small vessel cooking with others at the fire; and asking whose it was, he knew it was his own, whence not a little indignant he seized it, and pouring it into others mixed it. After this, he severely rebuked the Brother who had done this uncommanded. Likewise at the hour of refection entering the refectory, he gives the better bread to an elder. he had approached the counter to ring the bell; and there seeing bread placed whiter than the others, he secretly hastened to seize it, and hiding it before a a certain elder, he took his own bread to himself. The refectorarian Brother also b, forgetting to put water in his cup, often cast himself at his feet, and confessing his fault, with water not placed, he willingly bears thirst: asked pardon with tears. Whom the most gentle man of God raising up, benignly consoled, saying: "Do not be sad over these things, son: for, as you thought, this is not your fault; but by the will of God, disposing all things, it has been done: who because he knows me not to be in need, considered it superfluous to suggest to you to place it." No one either so solicitously took care to escape the snares of gluttony or boasting: for lest he should be struck by the dart of vain glory, whatever was placed before him he first tasted; and lest the gullet should flatter him, the things tasted he quickly rejected from himself.
[128] He bore the care of the sick and weak with solicitude, but most of all he was vigilant to come to the aid of the diseases of souls. That he was by no means an acceptor of persons, shone in the grateful and assiduous conversation of the poor which was pleasing to him: to whose familiarity, most sweet to him, he wholly indulged himself. The characters, A diligent Physician of souls, the life and minds of all, a diligent scrutinizer, he did not neglect to inquire: for he understood himself to be a physician sent from God rather for the infirmities of souls than of bodies. Those therefore, making light of them, he dissembled: but diligently inquiring into the languors of souls, he strove altogether to heal them; because he rejoiced above all things in the salvation of souls, not in the summit of Prelacy, as many; making little of their own, not to say others', souls. What more? This heavenly light, which for the illumination of the world, having had mercy on him, the clement Founder of brightness had kindled, had wished to lie hidden in the obscurity of this desert: but omnipotent God, whose counsel remaining forever, changes the counsels of men, because he had disposed otherwise, had now spread his rays far and wide; and illumined the world with the splendor of so great a light.
[129] Therefore roused by the famous opinion of so most distinguished a man, innumerable peoples of diverse nations hastened to him, as to a light raised by God for them on the candlestick of the holy Church. Whom the admirable servant of God, refreshing with the grace of the divine word inwardly, that he might lead men from sins, foretold to flee the vanities of this fleeting life and the worldly follies, saying that he was not a man of sound mind, who would hesitate to exchange the least things for the greatest, the cheap for the precious, the transitory for the everlasting. For he said that the joys of fleeting short life vanish like dreams; and that the last day lies in wait for man as an enemy; by warning salutary things. which would plunge the guilty and unbelieving into the abyss, to burn perpetually with the devil and his angels; but would let the Saints go from the exile of this life into the liberty of the glory of the sons of God. Therefore while the man of God was saying these and similar things, now so many clung to him, worldly vanity having been left, that of them well exchanged it could not undeservedly be said, "This is the change of the right hand of the highest." What wonder? For he himself, according to what is read in Isaiah, was "as a watered garden, and as a fountain of waters whose waters shall not fail." Isa. 58:11 And there were built in him the deserts of ages, and he raised up the foundations of generation and generation. Rightly therefore is he called a builder of hedges, turning the paths into quiet.
Therefore there dwelt in the desert as it were a certain great heavenly army, keeping watch, until their King should come, with hymns and praises.
[130] Let him who can say, if he has ever read or heard, that in the breast of any man such unheard-of breadth of charity abounded: with the greatest charity he receives whomsoever: for I am not sufficient to wonder enough, much less could I express it in word. For no one coming to him did he repel, no one wishing to dwell with him did he reject; not the blind, not the lame, not the crooked-footed, not the hunchbacked, not the maimed; but he gathered all alike in the bosom of mercy dilated: men with women, carrying their nursing infants on their shoulders, he did not hesitate to receive: no one weak, or contemptible, no one most poor went away repelled. Which wards and orphans hearing, seeking food for themselves by begging, or pasturing others' cattle through the fields, exhorted one another, saying: "Let us also go to the port which receives all." And when sitting in the midst of them (let me not be ashamed to say, Brothers, nor you to hear, what the most clement man of God was not ashamed to do: for he considered nothing shameful except sin) Let us then say: When he was sitting in the midst of them, and saw those with crooked feet, those lame or half-men, or blind or scrofulous, or maimed or distorted, tacitly thinking with himself, he said in mind: "These perhaps are those cheap things, by which the Lord crushes the strong, and of such is said to be the kingdom of heaven. For God chose the weak things of the world, that he might confound the strong."
[131] And consoling them he exhorted them to bear with equanimity for a little the inconveniences of brief life, saying: "My little sons, endure a little while not failing, and be strengthened hoping in the Lord, he teaches the poor to bear patiently the inconveniences of life: who never forsakes those hoping in him. For the Lord looseth those that are fettered; the Lord enlightens the blind, the Lord lifts up the cast down, the Lord loves the just; the Lord maketh poor and maketh rich, he humbleth and he exalteth; he raiseth up the needy from the dust, and lifteth up the poor out of the dunghill, that he may sit with Princes, and hold a throne of glory: the Lord alone is the refuge of the poor, a helper in opportunities, in tribulation. Fear, dearest ones, the Lord: for nothing is wanting to them that fear him; and know that a little is better for the just above the many riches of sinners, who treasure up and know not for whom they gather them. Sing therefore in your hearts to the Lord, saying: 'Lord, before thee is all my desire, and my groaning is not hidden from thee. Hear our prayers, and lead us out of the pit of misery and from the mire of dregs.' And God will wipe away every tear from your eyes, and your sadness will be turned into joy, and you will be satisfied when his glory shall appear."
[132] With such bread did this your faithful and prudent servant, whom you had set over your family, that he might give them in time the measure of wheat, feed your little wards, O Christ. With spiritual food, therefore, he often tempered the scarcity of poverty, which, as has been said above, sometimes vehemently oppressed them. For it was most often announced that bread was lacking, and that his little ones were lacking food, and he relieves their scarcity: as well as that crowds of visitors were present, whom coming from afar it was fitting not to send away fasting. What therefore? Do you think, reader, that the most faithful servant of God, to whom bread was lacking, and the people to be fed was present, do you think that he hesitated even for a little as if anxious about what to do? He did not hesitate: he did not waver: for his wondrous faith had been accustomed to presume upon the largesse of God. Therefore he was promising securely what he did not have: because, trusting in the goodness of the Omnipotent, he believed he would truly have it. For if sometimes, solicitous in heart for the flowing crowds, he asked of the Lord that which the Apostles, when the crowds hastened to the Lord, not having from which they might feed them, are reported to have asked, saying; "Lord, send away the crowds, that they may go into the towns and villages to buy themselves food, for here we are in a desert place"; to whom the Lord said, "Give ye them to eat"; If, I say, sometimes having compassion not dissimilarly on the multitude flowing together from every side, he asked the Lord with contrite heart, saying, "Lord, send them away, that they may go to richer places, where they may have the necessaries, because here we are in a desert and dry place": immediately he understood the Lord divinely inspiring him, suggesting what he said to the Apostles: "Give ye them to eat." Matt. 14:15
[133] With confidence therefore he invited all to dinner, who had the Founder of heaven and earth as his steward. O thrice blessed soul, temple of God the Father, seat of Wisdom, rest of the Holy Spirit, dwelling of the Most Holy Trinity! It is fitting to believe, that the divine grace, with necessaries wondrously provided by God, which dwelt in you, revealed to you before they came to pass the things which it was going to do through you. For with what mind would you, not having bread, invite those coming so many times to dinner, unless, the Lord providing, you considered with spiritual eyes that it would soon be present. Therefore he who gives to beasts their food, and to the young ravens calling upon him; do you think he would not give stipend to his soldier, and to his fellow-soldiers? He gave indeed, and so abundantly, that all marveled, especially the unbelieving and faithless. For very often it happened that which was done once in the times of Elisha. Samaria is read to have been held in the Book of Kings closed by siege; but was perishing more gravely afflicted by famine. 4 Kings 6 & 7 Therefore the King, grieving with the citizens failing in scarcity, came to Elisha; who not being ignorant of the cause of his coming, soon said to him, "Hear the word of the Lord: Tomorrow," he said, "at the same time in the gate of Samaria, a bushel of fine flour shall be at a stater, and two bushels of barley at a stater." To whom one of the Dukes, on whose hand the King was leaning, incredulous at his word, responded: "If the Lord should even make floodgates in heaven, could this be, with the wonder of many. that you speak?" "You shall see," said the man of God, "with your eyes, and you shall not eat thereof!" Not otherwise some, agitated with the curiosity of seeing, came to the man of God, arguing with him as if by consulting why he received so many and such, who did not have from which to feed them: when he responded to them with a faithful and most constant voice, that the Lord, not himself, had them as steward: "For he," he said, "who feeds the beasts of the earth and the birds of the sky, do you think he can forget men, formed in his image and likeness?" They however, as being of little faith, despaired of this being able to happen, which the man of God promised, even if the Lord should make floodgates in heaven.
[134] Do not be indignant, dearest Brothers, at me repeating so often of his humility and delight in poverty. Believe me, there are many and distinguished miracles which he performed by divine power: Above the gift of miracles is to be esteemed his conversation with the poor: which although he curiously sought to cover, more than a wicked man to hide his crimes, yet he could not all, because divine goodness did not wish very many things to be hidden which would profit posterity. But I, dearest Brothers, whatever others feel, more admire the humble conversation of this most glorious man among the poor of Christ, than the virtue divinely given to him, however much flashing with miracles. For these have cast many down from the summit of Angelic life; but that has raised up the humble to higher things. The man of God knew this: therefore he loved and cultivated that; but this, in so far as it was permitted him, he shunned and declined to exercise. But what would not the compassion for the sick and suffering extort from the bowels of his charity?
[135] Therefore, that we may speak first, as is fitting, of spiritual diseases; what proud or haughty man came to him, and did not immediately return cast down and humiliated? What adulterer or fornicator? what avaricious or covetous man? what envious or malignant one; and his sagacity for healing the diseases of the soul, on hearing him did not immediately convert himself and change? For raiders ceased to raid, the cruel laid aside their cruelty, tyrants ceased from tyranny, the wicked gave up their wickedness; the rich making little of their riches, knew that they were a weight to themselves, not a support; the powerful understood the summit of sublimity to be not security to themselves, but a precipice; the lovers of the world learned that they had served vanity. What more? The eyes of the blind, full of the dust of worldly dregs; that they might see the true sun, he opened: the ears, which the Lord complains are closed in the human race, he unlocked with a heavenly song: the steps of the lame he directed into the way of peace and justice. If anyone had taken the poison of serpentine suggestion by the pestilent draught; he cured with the antidote of the divine oracle: the sick in faith, hope, and charity, as a spiritual physician, he healed. Who is he who can say, how many vexed by demons with powerful virtue he freed? how many from the jaws of the ancient serpent he drew out, and, faithful servant, restored to God? He recalled to life dead men, not only those of two days or three days, but even of four days. For those whom he found dead by the pernicious delight of deadly thoughts, yet still enclosed under the dwelling of the breast; or those raised up by the deadly perpetration of pestilent work, or those bound by the most wretched habit of sinning, or overwhelmed as with earth by stinking opinion, to raise all from the burial of such dead men, the divine virtue of celestial grace was not lacking to him.
[136] These therefore are the divine miracles, which the omnipotent Founder was working through him, which is the proper virtue of Apostolic men. rightly so much more to be admired as more salutary. For these are what free the soul with the body from perpetual death, and give life with eternal life. These therefore are that saving power to the world, which the Gospel word testifies that the Savior handed down to the Apostles and Apostolic men. Matt. 10:8 This he taught, this he commanded to be shown to the languishing world, saying to his disciples: "Go, heal the sick, cleanse the lepers, illumine the blind, raise the dead, cast out demons." Therefore if we rightly think of the Lord, we plainly understand that he preferred his disciples to exercise these things in souls rather than in bodies. For as the Gospel elsewhere indicates, on a certain day with joy, because the demons were subject to them, returning to him; seeing them cast down by the elation of vainglory, as if indignant he said to them: "I saw Satan like lightning falling from heaven." To those also who are puffed up by the curing of diseases, and the expulsion of demons, he is going to say at the end: "I know you not." Luke 10:18
[137] Therefore this most blessed worshipper of God was cautious of pleasing man, lest he displease the sinner; and the grace of such miracles, which he understood to be common to him with the reprobate, above the grace of curing bodies he made light of exercising; rather, as harmful to many, as has been said, he declined, unless the wholly pitiable compassion for the vexed and grieving forced and compelled him. Luke 13:25 For he was not of those who strive to walk in great and marvelous things above themselves. Why do we linger? Now at last let us make known what he hid, by which nevertheless Bernard shone: let us reveal what he wished to be concealed: because hidden wisdom and an invisible treasure, what utility is in either? Let us say therefore,
who had a head or other member in pain, and did not immediately, at the touch of his sacred hand, feel relief? O how many have I heard testifying to have proved this through themselves? Who disturbed by diabolical suggestions, fleeing to him, confessing by what stings of temptations he was pressed, having obtained a remedy, did not at once grow quiet?
[138] A certain Brother (whose name I suppress because he is still living) agitated by the suggestions of unbelief through evil angels, He frees a monk, being asked, from a troublesome temptation: fled disturbed to the man of God: and confessing the intolerable labor of his mind, he begged that he might be helped by his most holy prayers. Sympathizing with his anxious vexation, the most merciful servant of God said: "Be of equal mind, son; for this temptation, as you fear, has not come to you for ruin but for proving, with the Lord permitting. For the most pious Founder is accustomed to prove his soldiers with temptations. Stand therefore in the contest as a strenuous athlete, undoubting of God's aid: because he will not be crowned except who shall have fought lawfully." When the Brother, with tears, contested that he was tempted beyond his powers, as it seemed to him; the most blessed man said to him: "If therefore you wish to lack this trouble, go, trusting that the Lord will send you help from the holy place." From that hour therefore (as the Brother himself used to tell me with his own mouth) he so rested from that attack, as if he had never been tempted at all.
[139] It also happened at a certain time that he had a journey with his Brothers through a village: in the middle of which when they met a woman, he jokingly rebukes the incontinence of the eyes, adorned with cultivated attire; the servant of God noticed, as a shepherd solicitous for his sheep, that some had cast their eyes upon her more incautiously. And when they had passed by, he said to them: "Beautiful that woman would be, whom we met, unless she were one-eyed." Who, not knowing why he had proposed this, answered him, that she was not one-eyed; but they had seen her looking clearly with two eyes. To whom he himself: "Believe me, dearest Brothers, that I did not strive much to care, whether she had one or two eyes." Hearing which, they at length understanding themselves circumvented by the most cunning craftiness of the man of God, blushed.
[140] If anyone again desires to hear how skillfully he proved human minds, and by proving corrected them, let him hear what follows. Having disciples, one irascible, While, fleeing worldly noise, he resided on that island which surrounded by the sea, touched no land, as long ago with huge vows he had sought, being free for prayer and reading, wholly in heavenly contemplation indefatigably satisfied his mind with divine theories; yet he had disciples, procuring bodily support for him by the labors of their hands: to whom laboring, after the contemplation of prayers and the meditation of reading, he went out to see them. Of these one was mild in spirit; but the other was impatient: who not together but separately worked. By such an art therefore the wise man examined their spirits by proving. Coming to the first, "Bless," he said. Then as if wishing to labor, he took the iron tool from the Brother's hands; the mild other, and meanwhile ordered him to rest. And when digging, he threw the clods here and there, and did not take care to observe in what place or order he ought to place them; he asked the Brother, whether he was doing well: who, because it pleased him very much, whatever the holy man did, answered him, that he was doing it most excellently. Then going to another when likewise he did, that impatient one, when he threw the clods more negligently, strove to teach him, how he ought to place them.
[141] Seeing therefore that the most blessed man could not do anything according to the will of that Brother, withdrawing from him he returned to the other, teaching him something of the Scriptures amid the works of labor. Seeing which, the other envied, and groaned that he preferred him to himself. by the example of one Who at length approaching the venerable man of God, was complaining with tears, why he despised him, and preferred another to himself; consoling him, teaching him, instructing him with divine words: loving him more, and himself less. To whom the prudent man answered rebuking, saying: "But to you, brother, why do you complain that I do not go, to whom displeases all that I can do. For your impatience shows, he prudently corrects the other. that I am rather harming than helping you: but the meekness of the other, to whom good is what I know how to do, testifies that I am not harming him, but helping. Not undeservedly therefore do I forsake you, whom I harm; and go to him whom, as he himself rejoicing testifies, I believe I am helping." At these medicines of the skilled physician the Brother, compunct, prostrate at his feet, asked pardon, confessing his fault; which he not with difficulty obtained, thereafter was emended. Behold how cunningly the eminent shepherd knew how to snatch wandering or lost sheep from the jaws of wolves.
[142] Let us insert into our reading this also, which we have thought by no means to be kept silent. He denies that breads are to be kept under lock A servant was serving in the service of the man of God and the Brothers, who, to eat, as is often wont to be done by such, stole provisions. Which the Brothers having learned, they placed the food under lock; but because the lock was not able to keep away the rapacious hands of the servant, it was made known to the most holy Father by the Brothers. To whom the man of God, very angry, said: "What is this, not Brothers, but fratricides, what have you done? Why him, whom you ought to have loved as yourselves, have you unmercifully driven into the pit of this ruin of a murderer? You, I say, you have done this: you have forced the hungry Brother to theft, to whom Christ the bread of life never denied himself, when you enclosed bread under lock. You, offenders and guilty, are held by the guilt of this wrong, unless you quickly come to your senses." Which hearing, the Brothers, fearing and terrified, prostrated on the ground, asking pardon, what they should do, beseeching the most holy man asked. Who, after prayers first poured out to the Lord for them, "Go," he said, "and with all the locks removed, permit the Brother to take food for himself freely; persuade him to take as much as he wishes: this alone I see as the remedy for your and his evil, with charity helping." O wisdom not human, but divine! not earthly, but heavenly! not from man, but from God! not of the world, but from heaven! c