II. To Herlwin, Gondulf, and Maurice, Monks of Bec sojourning in Christ Church, Canterbury.
St. Anselm The Devotions of Saint Anselm Archbishop of Canterbury that you should be with me, I answer that as I wish you that which I understand to be most pleasing to God and most profitable to you, I will, if I find I can, try to bring it about. Meanwhile do cheerfully the business which you are about: for God loveth a cheerful giver.224
As to your complaint of being hindered by your business from close attention to reading or prayer, let it be a great consolation to you that charity covereth the multitude of sins.225 For by your being drawn back another is drawn on; by your carrying of the burden another is relieved; by your being heavy laden another is carried on his way. And remember that the servant who returns with his hands empty, runs quicker; but it is the servant who comes home laden that the whole household meets with greater joy.
Nor is he blamed by any because he came more slowly than the other; but because he is tired by useful work, he is bidden sit down and rest. But if you say that your zeal or diligence are not sufficient for the duty laid upon you, I answer that (taking you at your own estimation, not at mine) one weak eye cannot see as well as two, yet it does not refuse to do what it can, since no other part of the body can do it.
But because my letter is already too long, and your other matters will be better discussed by word of mouth than in writing; for written advice you will find in abundance in Holy Scripture; we will for the while commit them in trust to God and pray earnestly concerning them, looking forward both of us to meeting and agreeing to end our correspondence here.
II226
2 Cor. ix. 7.
1 Pet iv. 8.
This is Letter XLIII. of Book I. in Gerberon's edition.
St. Anselm The Devotions of Saint Anselm Archbishop of Canterbury To Herlivin,227 Gondulf228, and Maurice,229 Monks of Bec sojourning in Christ Church, Canterbury.230
TO his brethren and dearest friends, Dom Herlwin, Dom Gondulf and Dom Maurice, Brother
Anselm, with the hope that going from strength to strength231 they may attain unto Christ who is the supreme strength of God.
Since you have all one purpose and I have one desire for you all, I join you together and address you all at once in the same letter. If your kindness remembers what manner of men I always wish to see you when you are with me, you know well enough what manner of men I constantly desire to hear you are when you are away from me. For since, as my conscience bears witness, I have from my heart—I do not say, expended—but wished to expend on all of you the love of a brother and on one of you232 the care of a father, no interval of land or sea has been able to break off this affectionate regard of mine for you. And so, although you have incentives enough to duly progress in the good course on which you have entered; for you have the counsel and advice of our reverend
Lord and Father the Archbishop233 close at hand, you have that constant custom of private meditation which your monastic profession imposes on each one of you, you have the frequent excitement of zeal by mutual religious conversation; yet my unceasing love for you makes me unwilling you should miss my poor exhortations also, though you are absent from me and need them not. And so I admonish and entreat you, my dearest friends, that nothing may distract the mind from watchfulness over self. Let it anxiously consider what gain and progress it makes every day,—lest which God
Herlwin is often mentioned in St Anselm's correspondence. From the roll of monks of Bec he seems to have been considerably the senior of Anselm in the monastery. He was a namesake, perhaps a kinsman, of the founder.
Gondulf was one of St Anselm's dearest friends. He became a monk of Bec very shortly before Anselm himself, was brought to England by Lanfranc, and raised to the see of Rochester in 1077. He died at the age of eighty-four in 1108 and was buried by Anselm's side at Canterbury. He was the architect of the White Tower of London.
Maurice was an intimate friend and frequent correspondent. He was one of those who urged Anselm to write the Monologium.
The cathedral clergy of Canterbury were at this time Benedictine monks, and therefore under the same rule as the monks of Bee, of which Anselm was Prior at this time, and to which his correspondents belonged. During the primacy of Lanfranc and Anselm there was much intercourse between Bee, of which both arch bishops had been prior and Anselm also abbot, and Christ
Church, Canterbury, of which convent the Archbishops were considered to be ex officio Abbots, the actual governor bearing only the inferior title of Prior.
Ps. lxxxiv. 7.
Maurice.
Lanfranc.