Bernard of
Clairvaux
From An Aplogia for
Abbot William
Distractions of
ornamentation
But what can justify
that array of grotesques in the cloister where the brothers do
their reading, a fantastic conglomeration of beauty ! misbegotten
and ugliness transmogrified? What place have obscene monkeys,
savage lions, unnatural centaurs, manticores, striped tigers,
battling knights or hunters sounding their horns? You can see a
head with many bodies and a multi-bodied head. Here is a quadruped
with a dragon's tail, there an animal's head stuck on a fish. That
beast combines the forehand of a horse with the rear half of a
goat, this one has the horns in front and the horse's quarters aft.
With such a bewildering array of shapes and forms on show, one
would sooner read the sculptures than the books, and spend the
whole day gawking at this wonderland rather than meditating on the
law of God. Ah, Lord! if the folly of it all does not shame us,
surely the expense might stick in our throats?
From On
Consideration
What is
God?
So, what is God?
With respect to creation, its end; to election, salvation; to
himself, he alone knows. What is God? All-powerful will, all-benign
power, eternal light, immutable reason, blessedness supreme.
Creator of beings to partake of him, he quickens men to perceive
him, disposes them to desire him, enlarges them to receive him,
justifies them that they may deserve him, fires them with zeal,
fertilizes them that they may bear fruit, directs them in the way
of justice, moulds them to kindness, contempers them to wisdom,
strengthens them to virtue, visits them with consolation,
enlightens them with understanding, preserves them unto
immortality, fills them with felicity and keeps them safe in his
encircling arm.
To Brother G.,
greetings from Brother Bernard, styled Abbot of
Clairvaux.
Correcting
proofs
Regarding the
interpretation I defended recently while talking about the text of
the Gospel with the lord bishop and yourself: I don't want you to
write it up until you have first talked it over with me once again.
And if by chance you have already made a fair copy, don't give it
to anyone to read until I have seen it. Pondering later on what we
said at the time, I realized that, intent as we were on discovering
the moral sense, we had in certain places strayed in error from the
facts of the story, and I now consider myself to have pointed this
out to you as well. The first mistake is that there are not, as we
thought, fifty days between the Nativity of the Lord and the
Purification of the Blessed Virgin, but only forty. Then we said
that Mary and Joseph were on their way to Jerusalem when the child
was born, and this was incorrect. And lastly, as for the eight days
leading up to the Circumcision for which we developed the moral
sense: counting forward from the day on which the child was, as it
were, born, that is to say the moment when the intention became
firmly fixed in the heart, the circumcision took place not on the
eighth but on the ninth day after. The other points, as far as I
can judge, are correct and these can easily be put
right.
As for the rest, you
should know that we were very upset at your leaving us without the
escort promised to you, though no one but yourselves could properly
be held responsible for this. Farewell.