68. To The Monk Gundulf.
The Letters of St. Anselm to love all those loved by your fraternity, dear to me, so Dom Osbern, having gained my love, may greatly rejoice that yours for him has also grown. Farewell. c. 1076.
NOTES 1. See Epp 39, 149, 152, 182.
2. Having been sent to Bee for disciplinary reasons by Archbishop Lanfranc about 1073/74 he returned after about two years; see Southern,
Anselm, 248-253.
68. TO THE MONK GUNDULF.
Anselm apologizes for his long silence, thanks Gundulf for his gift and even more for their mutual, fraternal love, undiminished by their separation. He passes on the thanks of Lord Hugh and Lady Basilia of Goumay.
TO HIS FELLOW-MONK, HIS BROTHER AND HIS DEAREST FRIEND,
DOM GUNDULF: BROTHER ANSELM SENDS HIS WHOLE SELF.
AS YOU ARE UNABLE TO BESTIR my laziness by en treaties that I send you a letter of greeting, you have changed to a different method and jolt me by your gifts to send you at least a letter of thanks. And although flattery does not avail to lure me to write, at least shame should be able to urge me to give thanks. Therefore I do give thanks to your love, which is dear to my heart, not so much because your gifts are precious to me but because more precious by far is charity, by which your gifts are given and seasoned, and [these gifts] savor of it. Your charity is, in fact, more precious to me than anything you can give me, still more so because you can dispatch what you give from afar but you cannot dismiss your charity. The one can cross the sea without you, but the other cannot leave your heart. Certainly, whether you give me this or give me nothing, I know that this charity always burns in you. To this charity, whether I speak or