82. To Countess Ida.
The Letters of St. Anselm
82. TO COUNTESS IDA.
Anselm thanks Countess Ida of Boulogne for her kind deeds and particularly for the generosity she lavished on a certain brother.
TO HIS REVEREND AND DEAREST LADY, COUNTESS IDA,1 MOST
DISTINGUISHED BY NOBILITY BOTH OF BIRTH AND OF LIFE:
BROTHER ANSELM, WISHING SHE MAY PROGRESS FROM VIRTUE TO
VIRTUE AND RISE FROM EARTHLY DIGNITY TO THE HEAVENLY
KINGDOM.
TO SAY NOTHING of your other good works, for which the reputation of your nobility breathes the scent of your gentle holiness far and wide and all around; you surely lav ish so many and such great acts of kindness on people in all walks of life who travel to or from our monastery that we are already so accustomed to them and they are so familiar to us that it could be burdensome to you for us to order thanks to be given you by word or letter for every single act, nor are we able to repay whatever we might ac cording to your merits. Wherefore we commend you to God and we place him between us and you, so that just as you do what you do for his sake, so he may repay you on be half of us for whom you do good.
Therefore at the insistence of the brother abandoned by his family whom you sent to us and to whom you showed very generous consolation in his great desolation, I write this letter to your reverend holiness. From it you will dis cover that I am as grateful for what you did for him as [I would be] if you had done it for me, and that everything he said about himself and his situation is true and that he observed your instructions in all the things you ordered us through him, and your man, serving him faithfully, kindly brought him to us according to your command. May God reward you for these and your other good works with eter nal happiness. Do not fail in doing good for in his good time you will reap if you do not fail.2 c. 1077/78.