creatures: so love you, and not otherwise. Others, even
women, attained this standard. In the legend, St. Elizabeth
of Himgary gives thanks that she loves her own children no
more than others'. She is no mother, but a saint. So
Guigo will love all — love indeed? one queries. Thus also
will he* have others hold themselves toward him, lest he
be a stiunbling-block in their or his salvation.

Yea, salvation! If indeed this monk shall not have
attained that, of a truth he would be of all men most miser-
able — save for the quiet, thought-filled calm which is his
inner and his veritable Ufe. It is a calm not riven by the
storms which drove the soul of Peter Damiani. God was
not less to Guigo; but the temperaments of the two men
differed. Nor beyond or out of one's nature can one love
or yearn, or even know the stress of storm.



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CHAPTER XVIII

THE QUALITY OF LOVE IN SAINT BERNARD

Through the prodigious power of his personality, St.
Bernard gave new life to monastidsm, promoted the reform
I of the secular clergy and the suppression of heresy, ended
a papal schism, set on foot the Second Crusade, and for a
quarter of a century swayed Christendom as never holy man
before or after him. An adequate account of his career
would embrace the entire history of the first half of the
twelfth century.^

The man who was to move men with his love, and quell
the proud with fear, had, as a youth, a graceful figure, a
sweet countenance, and the most winning manners. Later
in life he is spoken of as cheerfully bearing reproaches, but
shamefaced at praise, and his gentle manners are again
mentioned.

"As a helpmeet for his holy spirit, God made his body to
conform. In hb flesh there was visible a certain grace, but
spiritual rather than of the flesh. A brightness not of earth shone
in his look ; there was an angelic purity in his eyes, and a dove-
like simplicity. The beauty of the inner man was so great that it
would burst forth in visible tokens, and the outer man would seem
bathed from the store of inward purity and copious grace. His
frame was of the slightest (tenuissimum), and most spare of flesh;
a blush often tinged the delicate skin of his cheeks. And a certain
natural heat (quidquid caloris naturalis) was in him, arising from
assiduous meditation and penitent zeal. His hair was bright

> A bibliography of what has been written on Bernard would make a volume.
His own writings and the Vita€ and Acia (as edited by Mabillon) are printed in Migne,
tomes 183-185. The Vie de Saint Bernard, by the abbt Vacandard, in two volumes,
is to be recommended (and ed., Paris, 1897).

408



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CHAP, xvm SAINT BERNARD 409

yellow, his beard reddish with some white hairs toward the end of
his life. Actually of medium stature, he looked taller." ^

This same biography says :

"He who had set him apart, from his mother's womb, for the
work of a preacher, had given him, with a weak body, a voice
suflSciently strong and clear. His speech, whatever persons he
spoke to for the edifying of souls, was adapted to his audience ;
for he knew the intelligence, the habits and occupations of each
and all. To country folk he spoke as if bom and bred in the
coimtry ; and so to other classes, as if he had been always occu-
pied with their business. He was learned with the erudite, and
simple with the simple, and with spiritual men rich in illustrations
of perfection and wisdom. He adapted himself to all, desiring to
gain all for Christ." *

Bernard was bom of noble parents at the ChJLteau of
Fontaines, near Dijon, in the year 1090, and was educated
in a church school at Chatillon on the Seine. It is an oft-
told story, how, when little more than twenty years of age,
he drew together a band formed of his own brothers, his
uncle, and his friends, and led them to Citeaux,' his ardent
soul unsatisfied so long as one held back. Three years
later, in 1115, the Abbot, Stephen Harding, entrusted him
with the headship of the new monastery, to be founded in
the domains of the Count of Troyes. Bernard set forth
with twelve companions, came to Clara Vallis on the river
Aube, and placed his convent in that austere solitude.

Great were the attractions of Clairvaux (Clara Vallis)
under Bernard's vigorous and loving mle. Its monks
increased so rapidly and so constantly that during its
founder's life sixty-five bands were sent forth to rear new
convents. Meanwhile, Bemard's activities and influence
widened, till they seemed to compass western Christendom.

^ VUa prima, iii. cap. i (Migne, Pai. Lai, 185). This VUa was written by
contemporaiies of the saint who knew him intimately. But one must be on one's
guard as to these apparently dose descriptions of the saints in their vUae; for they
are commonly conventionalised. This description of Bernard, excepting perhi^
the colour of his hair, would have fitted Francis of Assisi.

* VUa prima, iii. 3. Bernard himself said that his aim in preaching was not
so much to expound the words (of Scripture) as to move his hearers' hearts {Strmo
xvi. in Caniica caniicorum). That his preaching was resistless is universally
attested.

* See, e.f ., Vacandard, ox. chap. i.



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4IO THE MEDIAEVAL MIND book in

He had become a power in the politics of Church and State.
In 1 130 he was summoned by Louis le Gros practically to
determine the claims of the rival Poi>es Innocent H. and
Anacletus II. He decided for the former, and was the
chief instrument of his eventual reinstatement at Rome.
Before this Bernard's health had been broken by his extreme
austerities. Yet even the lamentable failure of the Second
Crusade, zealously promoted by him, did not break his
power over Europe, which continued unimpaired until his
death in 1153.

This active and masterful man was impelled by those
elements of the vita contempUUiva which formed his inner
self. First and last and always he was a monk. Had he
not been the very monk he was, he would not have been the
dominator of men and situations that he proved himself to
be. Temperament fashions the objects of contemplation, and
shapes the yearning and aversions, of great monks. The
temperamental element of love — the love of God and man,
with its appurtenant detestations — made the heart of
Bernard's vita cantemplativa, and impassioned and empowered
his active faculties. It was the keynote of his life : in his
letters it speaks in words of fire, while other writings of the
saint analyze this great human quality with profundity and
truth. In these he renders expUcit the modes of affection
which man may have for man and above all for God; he
sets them forth as the path as well as goal of life on earth,
and then as the rapt summit of attainment in the Ufe to
come. Through all its stages, as it flows from self to fellow,
as it rises from man to God, love still is love, and forms the
unifying principle among men and between them and God.

Let us trace in his letters the nature and the power of
Bernard's love, and see with what yearning he loved his
fellows, seeking to withdraw them from the world ; and how
his love strove to be as sword and armour against the flesh
and the devil. By ea^ transition we shall pass to Bernard's
warning wrath, flimg against those who would turn the
struggling soul aside, or threaten the Church's peace ; then
by more arduous, but still unbroken stages, we may rise to
the love of Jesus, and through love of the God-man to love
of God. We shall realize at the close why that last mediaeval



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CHAP, xvm SAINT BERNARD 411

assessor of destinies, whose name was Dante Alighieri,
selected St. Bernard as the exponent of the blessed vision
which is salvation's crown in the paradise of God.^

The way of life at Clara Vallis might discourage monks
of feeble zeal. Among the brethren of these early days was
one named Robert, a cousin of the Abbot, seemingly of weak
and petulant disposition. Soon he fled, to seek a softer cell
in Cluny, the great and rich monastery to which his parents
appear to have dedicated him in childhood. For a while
Bernard suppressed his grief; but the day came when he
could endure no longer Robert's abandonment of his soul's
safety and of the friend who yearned for him. He stole out
of the monastery, accompanied by a monk named William.
There, in the open {sub dio), Bernard dictated a long letter to
be sent to the deserter. While the two were busy, the one
dictating, the other writing, a rainstorm broke upon them.
WiUiam wished to stop. ''It is God's work; write and fear
not," said Bernard. So William wrote on, in the midst of
the rain; but no drop fell on him or the parchment; for
the power of love which dictated the letter preserved the
parchment on which it was being written.'

Whoever has read this letter in its own fervent Latin
will not care to dispute this miracle, for which it stands first
in the collection of Bernard's correspondence. Bernard does
not recriminate or argue in it ; his love shall bring the young
monk back to him. Yes, yes, he says to all that the other
has urged regarding fancied slights and persecution :

''Quite right; I admit it. I am not writing in order to con-
tend, but to end contention. To flee persecution is no fault in
him who flees, but in him who pursues ; I do not deny it. I pass
over what has happened ; I do not ask why or how it happened.
I do not discuss faults, I do not dispute as to the circumstances,
I have no memory for injuries. I speak only what is in my heart.
Wretched me, that I lack thee, that I do not see thee, that I am
living without thee, for whom to die would be to live; without
whom to live, is to die. I ask not why thou hast gone away ; I
complain only that thou dost not return. Come, and there shall
be peace ; return, and all shall be made good.

> Past, Clu4>ter XLIV.

* Vita prima, i. cap. ii. This WillUm became Abbot of St. Thierry and one
of Bernard's biographers.



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412 THE MEDIAEVAL MIND book m

"It is certainly my fault that thou didst go away. I was too
austere with thy young years, and treated thee inhumanly. So
thou saidst when here, and so I hear thou dost still reproach me.
But that shall not be imputed to thee. I never meant it harshly ;
I was only indiscreet. Now thou wilt find me different, and I thee.
Where before thou didst fear the master, thou shalt now embrace
the companion. Do not think that I will not excuse any fault of
thine. Dost thou wish to be quite free from fault? then return.
If thou wilt forget thy fault I will pardon it ; also pardon thou me,
and I too will forget my fault."

Bernard then argues long and passionately against those
who had led the young man away and received him with such
blandishments at Cluny ; and {>assionately he argues against
the insidious softening of monastic principles.

"Arise, soldier of Christ, arise, shake off the dust, return to the
battle whence thou hast fled, and more bravely shalt thou fight
and more gloriously triumph. Christ has many soldiers who
bravely began, stood fast and conquered ; He has few who have
turned from flight and renewed the combat. Everything rare
is precious; and thou among that rare company shalt the more
radiantly shine.

"Thou art fearful? so be it; but why dost thou fear where
there is no fear, and why dost thou not fear where everything b to
be feared? Because thou hast fled from the battle-line, dost thou
think to have escaped the foe? It is easier for the Adversary to
pursue a fugitive than to bear himself against manful defence.
Secure, arms cast aside, thou takest thy morning slumbers, the
hour when Christ will have arisen! The multitude of enemies
beset the house, and thou sleepest. Is it safer to be caught alone
and sleeping, than armed with others in the field? Arouse thee,
seize thy arms, and escape to thy fellow-soldiers. Dost thou
recoil at the weight of thy arms, delicate soldier ! Before the
enemy's darts the shield is no burden, nor the hehnet heavy.
The bravest soldiers tremble when the trumpet is heard before
the battle is joined ; but then hope of victory and fear of defeat
make them brave. How canst thou tremble, waUed round with
the zeal of thy armed brethren, angels bearing aid at thy right
hand, and thy leader Christ? There shalt thou safely fight,
secure of victory. battle, safe with Christ and for Christ!
In which there is no woimd or defeat or dromivention so long
as thou fleest not. Only flight loses the victory, which death
does not lose. Blessed art thou, and quickly to be crowned.



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CHAP, xvm SAINT BERNARD 413

d3ang in battle. Woe for thee, if recoiling, thou losest at once the
victory and the crown — ^which may He avert, my beloved son,
who in the Judgment will award thee deeper damnation because
of this letter of mine if He finds thee to have taken no amendment
from it."

"It is God's work," said Bernard to the hesitating scribe.
These words suggest the character of the love which inspired
this letter. He loved Robert as man yearns for man; but
his motive was to do God's will, and win the young man
back to salvation. In after years this young man returned
to Clara Vallis.

It was Bernard's lot to write many letters urging pro-
crastinators to fulfil their vows,^ or appealing to those who
had laid aside the arms of austerity, perhaps betaking them-
selves to the more worldly life of the secular clergy. This
seems to have been the case with a young canon Fulco,
whom an ambitious uncle sought to draw back to the world,
or at least to a career of sacerdotal emolument. In fact,
Fulco at last became an archdeacon ; from which it may be
inferred that in his case Bernard's appeal was not successful.
He had poured forth his arguments in an ardent letter.*
Love compels him to use words to make the recipient grieve ;
for love would have him feel grief, that he might no longer
have true cause for grief — good mother love, who can cherish
the weak, exercise those who have entered upon their course,
or quell the restless, and so show herself differently toward
her sons, all of whom she loves. This letter, like the one to
Robert, concludes with a burning peroration :

"What dost thou in the city, dainty soldier? Thy fellows
whom thou hast deserted, fight and conquer ; they storm heaven
(codum rapiunt) and reign, and thou, sitting on thy palfrey
(ambulatorem), clothed in purple and fine linen, goest ambling
about the highways ! "

Bernard also wrote letters of consolation to parents whose
sons had become monks, or letters of warning to those
who sought to withdraw a monk from his good fight. In
one instance, his influence had made a monk of a youth
of gentle birth named Godfrey, to his parents' grief. So
Bernard writes to them :

» E.g. JS^. 107. *Ep.2,



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414 THE MEDIAEVAL MIND book in

''If God makes your son His also, what have you lost, or
he? He, from rich, becomes richer, from being noble, still more
illustrious, and what is more than all, from a sinner he becomes
a saint. It behoved him to be made ready for the Kingdom pre-
pared for him from the foundation of the world, and for this
reason it is well for him to spend with us his short span of da3rs,
so that clean from the filth of living in the world, earth's dust
shaken off, he may become fit for the heavenly mansion. If you
love him you will rejoice that he goes to his Father, and such a
Father! He goes to God, but you do not lose him; rather
through him you gain many sons. For all of us who belong to
Clara Vallis have taken him to be our brother and you for our
parents.

" Perhaps you fear this hard life for his tender body — that were
to fear where there is nothing to fear. Have faith and be com-
forted. I will be a father to him and he shall be my son until
from my hands the Father of Mercies and God of all consolation
shall receive him. Do not grieve ; do not weep ; your Godfrey is
hastening to joy, not to sorrow. A father to him will I be, a
mother too, a brother and a sister. I will make the crooked ways
straight, and the steep places plain. I will so temper and provide
for him that as his spirit profits, his body shall not want. So shall
he serve the Lord in joy and gladness, and shall sing before Him,
How great is the glory of the Lord." ^

Young Godfrey was a daintily nurtured plant. For all
the Abbot's eloquence he did not stay in Clara Vallis.
The world drew him back. It was now for the saint to weep :

"I grieve over thee, my son Godfrey; I grieve over thee.
And with reason. For who would not lament that the flower of
thy youth which, to the joy of angels, thou didst offer unsullied
to God in the odour of sweetness, is now trampled on by demons,
defiled with sins, and contaminated by the world. How could
you, who were called by God, follow the devil recalling thee?
How could you, whom Christ had begim to draw to Himself,
withdraw your foot from the very entry upon glory? In thee
I see the truth of those words : * A man's foes are they of his own
household.' Thy friends and neighbors drew near and stood
up against thee. They called thee back into the jaws of the lion,
and have set thee again in the gates of death. They have set
thee in darkness, like the dead; and thou art nigh to go down
into the belly of hell, which now is ravening to swallow thee.

1 Ep, no (this is the whole letter).



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CHAP, xvm SAINT BERNARD 415

''Turn back, I say, turn back, before the ab3rss swallows you
and the pit closes its mouth, before you are engulfed whence you
shall not escape, before, bound hand and foot, you are cast into
outer darkness where there is weeping and gnashing of teeth,
before you are thrust into darkness, shut in with the gloom of
death.

"Perhaps you blush to return, where you have only now fallen
away. Blush for flight, and not for turning to renew the combat
The conflict is not ended ; the hostile arrays have not withdrawn
from each other. The victory still awaits you. If you are ready,
we would not conquer without you, nor do we envy you your share
of the glory. Joyivi we will run to thee and receive thee in our
arms, crying : 'It is to meet to make merry and be glad; for this
our son was dead and is alive again, was lost and is found.' " ^

Who knows whether this letter brought back the little
monk? Bernard wrote so lovingly to him, so gently to
his parents. He could write otherwise, and show himself
insensible to this world's pestering tears. To the importimate
parents of a monk named Elias, who would drag him away
from Clara Vallis, Bernard writes in their son's name
thus:

''To his dear parents, Ingorranus and Iveta, Elias, monk but
sinner, sends daily prayers.

"The only cause for which it is permitted not to obey parents
is God ; for He said : 'Whoso loveth father or mother more than
me is not worthy of me.' If you truly love me as good and faith-
ful parents, why do you molest my endeavour to please the Father
of all, and attempt to withdraw me from the service of Him, to
serve whom is to reign? For this I ought not to obey you as
parents, but regard you as enemies. If you loved me, you would
rejoice, because I go to my Father and yours. But what is there
between you and me? What have I from you save sin and
misery? And indeed the corruptible body which I carry I admit
I have from you. Is it not enough that you brought miserable
me into the misery of this hateful world? that you, sinners, in
your sin produced a sinner? and that him bom in sin, in sin you
nourished? Envying the mercy which I have obtained from
Him who desireth not the death of a sinner, would you make me
a child of hell?

^Ep, II a (the entire letter). The Latin of this letter is given post, Chapter

xxxn.



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4i6 THE MEDIAEVAL MIND book m

"O harsh father! savage mother! parents cruel and unpious
— parents! rather destroyers, whose grief is the safety of the
child, whose consolation is the death of their son! who would
drag me back to the shipwreck which I, naked, escaped; who
would give me again to the robbers when through the good
Samaritan I am a little recovering from my woimds.

"Cease then, my parents," concludes the letter after many
other reproofs, "cease to afflict yoiurselves with vain weeping and
to disquiet me. No messengers you send will force me to leave.
Clara Vallis will I never forsake. This is my rest, and here shall
be my habitation. Here will I pray without ceasing for my sins
and yours; here with constant prayer will I implore that He
whose love has separated us for a little while, will join us in another
life happy and inseparable, — in whose love we may live forever
and ever. Amen." ^

If Bernard was severe toward those who threatened
some loved person's weal, his anger burned more fiercely
^against those whom he deemed enemies of God. Heavy
was his hand upon the evils of the Church: "The insolence
of the clergy — to which the bishop's neglect is mother-
troubles the earth and molests the Church. The bishops
give what is holy to the dogs, and pearls to swine." ^

Likewise, fearlessly but with restraint arising from bis
respect for all power ordained of God, Bernard opposes
kings. Thus he writes to Louis the Fat, in r^ard to the
election of a bishop, with many protests, however, that he
would not oppose the royal power — ^for which we note his
reason: "If the whole world conspired to force me to do
aught against kingly majesty, yet would I fear God, and
would not dare to offend the king ordained by Him. For
neither do I fol'get where I read that whosoever resisteth
power, resisteth the ordinance of God." But — ^but — ^but —
continues the letter, through many qualifyings which are
also admonitions. At last come the words: "It is a fearful
thing to fall into the hands of the living God, even for thee,
O king." Thereupon the saint does not fail to speak his mind.'

Bernard's fiercest denunciations were reserved for heretics
and schismatics, for Abaelard, for Arnold of Brescia, for
the Antipope Anacletus — ^were they not enemies of God?

> Ep, ziz. * Bp, 152, od Imm o cttUi m m P€pom, aj>. 1135.

* Ep, 170, od Ludaviewm. Written in IZ3S.



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CHAP, xvm SAINT BERNARD 417

Clearly the saint saw and understood these men from his
point of view. Thus in a letter to Innocent n.^ he sums
up his attitude towards Abaelard: "Peter Abaelard is
tr3ring to make void the merit of Christian faith, when he
deems himself able by human reason to comprehend God
altogether. He ascends to the heavens and descends even
to the abyss ! Nothing may hide from him in the depths of
hell or in the heights above ! The man is great in his own
eyes — this scrutinizer of Majesty and fabricator of heresies.'*
Here was the gist of the matter. That a man should be great
in his own eyes, apart from God, and teach others so, stirred
Bernard's bowels.*

Of Arnold, the impetuous clerical revolutionist and pupil
of Abaelard, Bernard writes with fury: "Arnold of Brescia,
whose speech is honey and whose teaching poison, whose is
the head of a dove and the tail of a scorpion, whom Brescia
vomited forth, Rome abhorred, France repelled, Germany
abominates, Italy will not receive, is said to be with you." *
Again, Bernard rejoices with great joy when he hears that
the anti-pope who divided Christendom was dead.*

It is pleasant to turn back to Bernard's lovingness and
mercy. His God would not condemn those who repented;
and tihe saint can be gentle toward sinners possibly repentant.
He urges certain monks to receive back an erring brother:
"Take him back then, you who are spiritual, in the spirit of
gentleness; let love be confirmed in him, and let good
intention excuse the evil done. Receive back with joy him
whom you wept as lost."* In another letter he urges a
coimtess to be more lenient with her children;* and there
is a story of his begging a robber from the hands of the
executioners, and leading him to Clara Vallis, where he
became at length a holy man.^

^Mp. 191.

*Cf. posi. Chapter XXXVII. I., regarding this instance of Bernard's seal.
His position is critically set out in Wilhelm Meyer's "Die Anklages&tse des h.
Bernard gegen Abaelard," GMngiscke gelekrte NackrickUn, phiM. hist. Klasu,
1898, pp. 397-468.

* Ep. 196, ad Gmdancn; cf. Ep. 195 (aj>. 1140). See for the Latin of this letter
^011, Chapter XXXn.

« Ep, 147, to Peter the Venerable, Abbot of Quny (aj>. 1138).

* Ep, loi, ad reUgios0s; cf. also Ep. 136.
•£^300.

' Viia prima, lib. viL cap. 15.