43. To The Same.
The Letters of St. Anselm
43. TO THE SAME.
Despite the difficulty of finding reliable messengers, Anselm assures Maurice of his continual love and care by sending him two letters. He leaves his friend's request to return to Bee to the discretion of Archbishop Lanfranc. In case of an immediate return Maurice is to bring whatever he has faithfully copied of De aphorismo and have the rest completed by Gundulf.
TO HIS BROTHER AND DEAREST SON MAURICE: BROTHER ANSELM,
WISHING HIM DIVINE PROTECTION WHEN THINGS ARE GOING WELL
AND STRENGTH WHEN THINGS ARE DIFFICULT.
IF TFIIS IS WHAT YOUR LOVE, dear to me, complains of in your second letter to me, that I neglected you and did not contact you by letter after you had crossed the sea, I would not defend myself against any assertions that I be haved extremely inappropriately, and even if everyone were silent I would blame myself in no small way. Far be it from me to neglect now the person whom, from boyhood and since our first meeting—and you are witness to this—I have loved with great fervor according to the measure of my abil ity, now when you are making progress towards an upright life and towards the love of God which divine clemency has bountifully deigned to grant you so generously, and are striving daily to make progress; for indeed this is what my heart has always wished for you and what has occupied my efforts.
In any case, before you sent me your first letter I had made arrangements to send you mine by the first suitable mes senger available. But although I thought that the bearer of your letter could be the return messenger of mine, it came about that, contrary to his hope and wish and mine, he was long delayed, and my letter, already written in answer to your first, was withheld from your sight until after your second had reached me. For even if many Normans1 cross over to England there are very few who do so to my knowledge; among these very few there is scarcely anyone to whom I would entrust our commission and who would carry it out conscientiously and without delay. But so that
The Letters of St. Anselm this fact may excuse me to my accuser, I am sending my two letters in reply to your two by the bearers of yours. And since it distresses me that I could not send each at its own time, I have arranged to have them sent together in order to convince your disbelief and to satisfy your suspicion.
With regard to what you entreated me earnestly to press on the holiness of our reverend father and lord, the arch bishop,2 I have attempted in that particular letter which I sent him to do it as zealously as I could according to your will. If therefore it should come about that, thanks to his favor always embracing us, and according to what is ad vantageous to you and what you and I long for, you return to us, bring with you whatever has been written of the Aphorisms.3 In the meantime, however, copy as much as you can without too much inconvenience, first from the text and then, if you are permitted, from the commentary; but you should watch out for this above all: that whatever you bring from there will have been very carefully corrected.
If any of it still remains to be done when you do return and if Dom Gundulf can conveniently have this done by some body, then leave it to the person chosen by him. It would be much better, however, if the same Dom Gundulf could acquire a copy of his own so that he could lend it to me.
Greet Dom Herluin, asking him to be mindful of me both for his sake and mine. Farewell. c. 1073/74.
NOTES 1. In the normanization of England after 1066, a great number of AngloSaxon lords, spiritual and temporal, were replaced by Normans, caus ing constant traffic of people of every stratum of society across the Channel.
2. See Ep 42.
3. Opus medicinae hippocraticae, ed. C.G. Kuehn, vol.23, t.III (1827) 706-768, see Ep 60.