Letter CCCLXXXV. To the Same

[Formerly No. 341: the former No. 385 is. now No. 418.]

Bernard congratulates them on their better observance of their Rule, and exhorts them to preserve an earnest desire for religious perfection, and to make continual efforts to attain it.

To the whole community at the monastery of S. Bertin, most dear to him in Christ, Brother Bernard, called Abbot of Clairvaux; health and the assurance of his prayers.

1. Thus, thus act, I pray you, my dearly beloved. The disciple who makes progress is the glory of his master. Whosoever does not profit in the school of Christ is unworthy of His training: especially when we consider that in the present life no one remains in the same condition, and that therefore not to make progress is without doubt to fall back. Let no one therefore say: It is enough for me: I wish to remain as I am: it is sufficient for me to be to-day what I was yesterday and the day before. He who is of that mind is, so to speak, sitting down on the road; he is halting on the ladder on which the patriarch saw angels, but all either ascending or descending. (Gen. xxviii. 12).

I say then: Let him that thinketh he standeth, take heed lest he fall (1 Cor. x. 12). Steep and narrow is the way to salvation, not a spot to halt and settle down upon: and in the House of the Father only L it that there are many mansions (S. John. xiv. 2). Therefore he who says that he abides in Christ ought himself also so to walk, even as He walked (1 S. John ii. 6). Now Jesus Himself, as the Evangelist declares, increased in wisdom and in ' stature and in favour before God and men (S. Luke ii. 52). He instead of coming to a standstill, rejoiced as a giant to run his course (Ps. xix. 5): and we also, if we are wise, shall be attracted by the fragrance of His virtues, and follow swiftly in His footsteps. Otherwise, if it shall happen that we allow Him to pass far away into the distance, the road shall become far more laborious and even dangerous to the slothful soul, when it cannot be quickened by the influence of His virtues, nor perceive the clear traces of His footsteps because of the distance in front at which He is.

2. So then, brethren, run that ye may obtain (1 Cor. ix. 24). This indeed you may succeed in doing, if you clearly understand that not yet have you attained, if forgetting those things which are behind, ye press forward to those things which are before (Phil. iii. 13), if ye faithfully carry out your Rule, lest God be displeased with you, and so ye perish out of the right way (Ps. ii. 12). He who eateth me, saith Wisdom, shall still hunger, and he who drinketh me shall still thirst (Ecclus. xxiv. 29). Let then the slothful soul, who deserves to be polluted with the filth of the oxen (Ecclus. xxii. 2) understand that the distaste which it feels [for that which is spiritual (E)] comes not from being filled and satisfied with it, but from the abstaining from spiritual food.

3. Finally, since all things work together for good to those who are called to be saints according to the Divine purpose (Rom. viii. 28), let the example of those who are influenced by worldly ambition, move us to imitate it. For what man who is ambitious of worldly honours do we ever see content with those he has obtained, and not desirous of more? So also the eager and inquisitive, whose eye is not satisfied with seeing, nor his ear with hearing. What! do not those who are the slaves of avarice, who are lovers of pleasure, who strive to gain the empty praises of men, by their eager and passionate desires, reprove our negligence and lukewarmness? Is it not plainly a disgrace that we should be found less ardent in the pursuit of spiritual good? Let the soul which has been devoted to the Lord blush to follow after righteousness with less earnestness than at an earlier time it followed iniquity. For what a difference in value between the one cause and the other! The wages of sin is death; but the fruit of righteousness, eternal life (Rom. vi. 23). It should shame us to go onward to eternal life with less eagerness than we used to go towards death; and to be less desirous to augment our portion of salvation, than of condemnation. For we are all the more inexcusable, the more easy it is to run quickly along the way of salvation: and the light yoke of the Saviour is the more easily borne the heavier it seems to be. Does not the very number of the wing-feathers of little birds help to bear them up, not to weigh them down? If you take them away, then the rest of the body sinks by its own weight. Thus it is with the discipline of Christ, with His easy yoke and light burden; the more we put it off our shoulders, the more we are borne down towards the earth, because it bears us up, rather than is borne by us. The discipline of silence, for example, is weighty and painful to some; but yet the Prophet regarded it as a source of strength rather than a burden, for he says: In silence and in hope shall be your strength (Isaiah xxx. 15, Vulg.) In silence, he says, and in hope, because it is good that a man should both hope and wait in silence for the lord (Lam. iii. 26). In truth, the consolation and sweetness of the present life weakens the soul, while the expectation of the future life strengthens it. You have therefore done well, dearest brethren, in adding something to your former rule of silence,¹ since, according to the Prophet previously quoted, silence is the work of righteousness (Isaiah xxxii. 17, Vulg.). You have also done well in withdrawing yourselves more and more from the doings of the world, which constitutes pure religion and undejiled (S. James i. 27). A very little leaven, my brethren, corrupts the whole mass (1 Cor. v. 6), and dead thes destroy the sweetness of ointment (Eccles. x. 1). Would it not be pity to endanger, or even to render less acceptable the merits of a life filled with so much labour and discipline both of soul and body, by mixing it with some worthless consolation, or rather desolation? Who knows what obstacle may be put in the way of the sweetness of the interior consolations, or of the graces of Divine visitation, by some fugitive and trifling solace of this kind? Especially we monks, whose life is, whether we will or no, to be passed in labour, should be the most miserable of all men, if for such trifling gratification we should incur losses so great. What foolishness, what even insanity would it be, should we who have renounced matters of more importance, cling to those of less at such great risk to ourselves! If we have held the entire world as a worthless thing, if we have renounced the affection of relatives, if we have immured our own selves in monasteries as if in a prison; and far from doing our own will, have subjected ourselves to the command of others: what ought we not to do, in order that we may not lose by our foolishness or lukewarmness the fruits of our sacrifices?

Be of good courage, then, dearest brethren, and study to persevere in those things which you have begun, and to abound in them more and more; and that the fruits of your righteousness may increase day by day. Remember that he who sows sparingly, shall reap also sparingly; and he who sows bountifully shall reap also bountifully (2 Cor. ix. 6). And be ye certain of this, that even a little increase in the seed shall be followed by an increase in the harvest by no means little. These few words, brethren, I have deemed it my duty to write to you, in the joy and gladness of my soul, at hearing of your progress in holiness, and with the wish to admonish you to practise willingly and gladly those holy and salutary observances which you have embraced, and which are able to save your souls. For you know that the Lo7'd loveth a cheerful giver (Ibid. v. 7). Pray for me; and may Jesus Christ have your whole community in His holy keeping.

Footnotes

1. Bernard regarded the practice of silence as eminently favourable to religious perfection, as we see in Epistle 91, to the Abbots assembled at Soissons, and in many other passages of his works. Nor is this surprising. It would be, on the contrary, very strange to suppose that the religious life could subsist without the strict observance of silence. It is called by Bernard “the guardian of religious life.” Ser. ii. for the Octave of the Epiphany, No. 7. ↩