2. To Odo And Lanzo.
The Letters of St. Anselm
of religious houses as well as two bishops and two archbishops; see Heads; and Southern, Anselm, 246-273.
2. TO ODO AND LANZO.
Anselm offers this letter as a token of his lasting love for both and, as requested by Lanzo, encourages spiritual love through Scripture and his own words.
TO HIS LORDS, FRIENDS AND MOST BELOVED BROTHERS, ODO AND
LANZO1: BROTHER ANSELM OF BEC, SINNER IN LIFE, MONK BY
PROFESSION, DESPISING THE TEMPORAL FOR THE ETERNAL AND
STRIVING FOR THE ETERNAL IN PLACE OF THE TEMPORAL.
WHEREAS TRUE LOVE honorably bestowed demands to be loved blamelessly in return, I do not consider myself shameless if I display my love for you to some extent either to gain yours for me or, having gained it, to render it more perfect. But because of the very great distance separating us, you are not able to experience my love for you either by acts of kindness on my part or even by conversations: may this letter of greeting be a sign to you that the memory of your love thrives within me. For when your respected fraternity first made itself known to my lowliness by its presence, my soul so deeply marked it by drawing you close in the embrace of charity that, by loving you, it impressed a clear image of you on itself. By this, despite your absence, you are always present to me. Yet however rare our meet ings may be, my affection is not intermittent but continuous.
Till now my spontaneous greeting was addressed to both of you; but from now on the exhortation I owe you is ex tended to one of you, for it is conveyed to the one who re quested it. Yet I shall rejoice in a double recompense for my labor should it be received by each of you as if addressed to himself.
Indeed I remember, my lord and friend Lanzo, that in your holy fervor for living a good life, you begged me with
The Letters of St. Anselm many prayers, languid as I am, to inspire you to spiritual love by a letter of instruction. Since I considered it incon sistent that cold should attempt to heat up what is hot, I wanted to refuse; but on reconsidering that a burning fire is intensified by a blast of cold air I could not completely refuse what I was asked for. Wherefore, although you can find what you require of me much better anywhere in Holy
Scripture, yet, I willingly choose to obey your sweet ear nestness, as well as I can, out of respect for you. Therefore
I shall choose the middle path, first of all requiring you to study Holy Scripture, then, on my own account but not on my own authority, I shall add some exhortations out of these very Scriptures.
I admonish and implore you2, therefore, dearest friend, as it is written: use all watchfulness to keep your heart true3 so that nothing may catch your mind off guard. Let it examine carefully what it has gained by daily progress lest—God for bid!—it lose ground by becoming disheartened. For in the matter of virtue, as it is harder to attain a quality which one did not earlier possess than it is to do without it by idle ness, so it is harder to regain what one has lost by negli gence than to obtain what one knows he has not yet possessed. Always consider, therefore, most beloved friend, past achievements as if they were of little value, so that you do not despise maintaining what you have achieved, and always aspire, although hindered by infirmity, to add some thing to it by perseverance. For we are all told by Truth that, from among many called, few are chosen.4 We are certain that all [are called] but just how few [are chosen] we are uncertain of because Truth is silent. Wherefore, anyone who does not yet live as one of the few must either join himself to the few by changing his life-style, or else fear reproba tion with certainty. For indeed, someone who already judges himself to be among the few should not immedi ately trust that he is chosen. In fact, since nobody among us knows to how few the number of the chosen is limited, so nobody knows if he is already among this small number
The Letters of St. Anselm
of the chosen, even if he is like one of the few among the many called. Therefore, nobody, looking behind him,5 should contemplate how many he outstrips on the road to the celestial country, but continually looking ahead, let him consider anxiously whether he is advancing in the same way as those whose election none of the faithful doubts. Take care, dearest friend, lest the fear of God which you have conceived cool down; but always, as if fanned by continu al attention, let it flame daily higher and higher until, trans formed, it lights your way into eternal security.
Take care, most beloved brother, that you avoid what many people do—and indeed they are not as numerous as their folly is great—who, the longer they live, cherish the more the hope of living and, banishing the fear of fastapproaching death, they fall away from their intention [of living] a holy life. For it is true that the longer someone has lived, the shorter he has still to live; and the farther away he is from the day of his birth the nearer he is to the day of his death and to recompense for the whole of his life.
Therefore, just as with every single day you see your past life growing longer, so you may be certain that your span of time for living a good life is daily getting shorter. So take care, my friend, to spend the lifespan left to you—because you never know how short it is—in such a way that day by day you make progress toward what is better in the holy intentions of your mind. If you find it difficult to lead a good life, consider that the more you see your labor hastening to an end and yourself approaching repose and reward, the harder you should work and, comforted, the more joyfully you should persevere while progressing courageously. Do not therefore give up through lassitude what you have be gun, but rather, hoping for aid from above, do what is good for you and what you have not yet attempted for the love of a joyful reward, so that with Christ's guidance you may reach the blessed company of the saints.
Our letter is already too long. But that it may end equally with the same people with whom it jointly began, take note.
The Letters of St. Anselm my two friends. Listen, both my beloveds. Accept, the end of my foolish exhortation, I beg you, in memory of our mutual affection. My talk I call foolish because it is mine, but not its content, for that comes from God. Listen, there fore, and do not despise what comes from God because of my part in it. If ever the world smiles on you with any of its favors, do not return the smile. For the world does not smile that you may laugh in the end but rather that, once subject to its jeering prince, you may lament when he la ments. Instead, whenever it smiles at you, shrink from its smile, mock the smiler with horror so that afterwards you will be able to jeer at its mockery and laugh when it laments.
My friends, do not bestow your love on the world, nor on what the world has to offer.6 For it is truly written that the world and its gratifications will pass away,1 and that the friend... of the world will be considered the enemy of God.8 The world has no hay on its horn. It has gold on its horn, but look behind.
It has hay on its rear and it butts with its rear.9 Beware, be wared say, and farewell. c. 1070/71.
NOTES 1. They both appear to be laymen therefore dominis is translated 'lords', not 'fellow-monks'. Lanzo later entered Cluny and became prior of the Cluniac house Saint Pancras at Lewes, 1077-1107, see Ep 37; Heads,
119; D. Knowles, The Monastic Order in England (Cambridge2, 1966) 151-156.
2. Compare the following with the second half of Ep 51 3. Prov 4:23.
4. Mt 20:16, 22:14.
5. Lk 9:62.
6. 1 Jn 2:15.
7. 1 Jn 2:17.
8. Jm 4:4.
9. Cf. Vergil, Eclogue IX.5.25.