72. TO LANFRANC,: Archbishop Of Canterbury.
The Letters of St. Anselm
72. TO LANFRANC,
ARCHBISHOP OF CANTERBURY.
Anselm sends his teacher, Archbishop Lanfranc, his first philosophical-theological work (later called the MonologionJ for approval, and asks him to suggest a title. The book is to be given to Maurice, who was one of those who urged An selm to write the work. If Lanfranc disapproves of the work, his copy as well as Anselm's copy at Bee, are to be destroyed.
THE SERVANT TO HIS LORD, THE SON TO HIS FATHER, REVEREND
ARCHBISHOP LANFRANC: BROTHER ANSELM.
HAD THE OPPORTUNITY PRESENTED ITSELF I would
myself gladly have read aloud, for your examination, in your presence, the little work which I am now sending to your paternity for criticism.1 But since at the moment this can not be, I would like earnestly to request that your paternal prudence, dear to me, not disdain listening2 to it and decid ing what should be done about it even though it is read by someone else, if I did not fear being unnecessarily burden some to your honor, who is, I do not doubt, continually engaged in numerous and weighty deliberations on more important matters. Wherefore, since I want nothing to please me in a way that displeases you, just as it rests en tirely with your experience to judge how much you will al low of what I say I greatly desire, so it is up to you to decide whether it pleases you. However, I will not cease demand ing this of your authority, even with importunity: that your authority decide what is to be done about this little work, whether heard or unheard.
I have not, however, suggested any title for it since I con sider it of so little importance that I do not think it deserves a name of its own. If therefore it suits your judgement that what I have written, I have written,3 then, from him, from whom it receives confirmation, let it receive a name. And let it be given by you to your servant, my beloved brother and fellow-servant, Dom Maurice,4 who is one of those at whose insistence it was mostly written. If, however, your
The Letters of St. Anselm examination should decide otherwise, the copy I am send ing you should not be returned either to me or to the afore mentioned brother, but have it disposed of by one of the elements, either buried or sunk or burnt or somehow scat tered abroad.5 So whatever your judgement decides, I be seech you to let me know somehow what you have ordered done, so the copy I have kept may receive the same fate as the one I sent you.
As to my most beloved, your nephew,61 pray with heart and tongue and letter as hard as I can that when you per ceive that he has regained his normal health, you should let his lovable company be lacking to me no longer. For in deed I must tell you this: while he was here he showed such qualities to me and to all our brothers who love good be havior that we are forced to long for him while he is away, if only he can be sent back without any inconvenience to himself—which we in no way wish. end of 1076.
NOTES 1. The opusculum—Anselm's way of using a topos of humility (cf. Epp 74, 77, 83)—was the Monologion; it seems to have been completed dur ing the second half of 1076, see TlOO 56*. Its genesis is described in the letter of dedication, in this letter and in Epp 74 and 77. Lanfranc did not give a very favorable judgement nor did he suggest a title for the work. Anselm called it Exemplum meditandi de ratione fidei; see
AOO 70*. At the request of Archbishop Hugh of Lyon he changed it to Monoloquium de ratione fidei, see Ep 100 about 1083/84. Soon after, by deleting de ratione fidei, he gave it the final title Monologion-, see
Ep 109; also VA 29; Preface of Proslogion, AOO I: 93, 94; J. Hopkins, A Companion to the Study of St Anselm (Minneapolis, 1972) 10, 11.
2. Was Lanfranc's eyesight failing, or is it merely that solitary reading was a rare practice in medieval life?
3. Cf. Jn 19:22.
4. See Ep 34.
5. Cf. 2 Th 2:7.
6. Lanfranc, the Archbishop's nephew, had been sent to Canterbury to be treated by Albert the physician; see Ep 39.