ST BERNARD’S MIRACLES.
The biographers and chroniclers ascribe abundant miracles to St. Bernard. A boy with an ulcer in his foot begged the holy man to touch and bless him, and the sign of the cross was made and the lame was healed. Once a knight had been suffering from a quartan fever for eighteen months, and used to foam at the mouth and lie unconscious; but Bernard cured him instantly with a piece of consecrated bread. Young Walter of Montmirail, when three months old, was brought by his mother to be blessed; the conscious child clutched at Bernard’s hand and kissed it. Once an incredible number of flies filled the church at Foigny at the time of its dedication, and their noise and buzzing were an intolerable nuisance; but the saint merely said, “I excommunicate them,” and next morning they were all dead, and had to be shovelled out with spades. On another occasion, as Bernard was returning from Chalons, the wind and rain and cold were fierce, and one of the company by some accident lost his horse, which scampered away over the plain. Bernard said, “Let us pray,” and they were scarcely able to finish the Lord’s Prayer before the horse came back tame and mild, stood before Bernard, and was restored to its owner.
THE MONK BERNARD AND HIS FASHIONABLE SISTER.
St. Bernard had at an early age converted his brothers and made monks of them; but he had a sister, Humbeline, who showed no enthusiasm for a nunnery. She married a man of rank and affluence, and did her part in the gay world. One day she thought she would like to go and visit her brothers in the monastery, and with great pomp and retinue she drove to the gates of Clairvaux and asked to see Bernard. But he, “detesting and execrating her as a net of the devil to catch souls,” refused to go out and meet her. Her brother Andrew, whom she encountered at the gate, also treated her with harshness, and observed with unbecoming contempt upon her fine apparel. She burst into tears at this coldness, and at last exclaimed, “And what if I am a sinner? It is for such that Christ died! It is because I am one that I need the advice and conversation of godly men. If my brother despises my body, let not a servant of the Lord despise my soul. Let him come and command: I am ready to obey.” This speech brought out Bernard, who ordered her to imitate her saintly mother: to renounce the luxuries and vanities of the world, to lay aside her fine clothes, and to become a nun inwardly even if she could not assume the outward appearance. The sister went home, thought over all this, and ended by coming round to Bernard’s views. She astonished her friends and neighbours by the sudden change in her ways of life. Her fastings, prayers, and vigils showed that she also had a turn for the monastic life. She got permission from her husband and retired to the convent of Juilly, where she emulated his austere devotion, and became worthy of such a brother as Bernard.
ST. BERNARD AND HIS RIVAL, PETER THE VENERABLE.
A rivalry sprang up between the monks of Cluny and those of Citeaux, the white dress of the latter causing much bitterness to those in black. Bernard of Clairvaux was the champion of the Cistercians, and Peter of the Cluniacs. Bernard blamed the Cluniacs for their luxury and secular habits. He said many of the monks, though young and vigorous, pretended sickness, that they might be allowed to eat flesh. Those who abstained from flesh indulged their palate without stint in exquisite cookery; while, in order to provoke the appetite, they drank largely of the strongest and most fragrant wines, which were often rendered more stimulating by spices. At table, instead of grave silence, light worldly gossip, jests, and idle laughter prevailed. The Cluniacs had coverlets of fur or of rich and variegated materials for their beds. They dressed themselves in the costliest furs, silk, and cloth, fit for robes of princes. Even the stuff for a cowl was chosen with feminine and fastidious care. This excessive care for the body betokened a want of mental culture. Even the mode of worship and magnificence of the churches were excessive in splendour. The churches were elaborately adorned and the poor were neglected. There were pictures and monstrous and grotesque carvings in the walls, wholly unsuited to sacred worship and apt to distract the mind. The chandeliers and candlesticks were of gold and silver and set with jewels; the pavements were inlaid with figures of saints and angels, whose character was thereby degraded. The golden shrines containing relics seemed only to flatter the wealthy and allure them into opening their purse-strings. These abbots travelled at home with a pomp and retinue of sixty horses, only suited to distant undertakings of great pith and moment. All these unseemly practices cried aloud for redress.
PETER THE VENERABLE REPLIES TO BERNARD.
Peter the Venerable replied to St. Bernard and defended the Cluniacs. He retorts that the white dress of the Cistercians was too significant of pride, while the black dress of Cluny was better suited to the grave and sad. The severity of the Cistercian discipline was excessive, and only drove monks out of the order. The use of furs and materials for dress and bedding and the relaxation of fastings were properly made to suit the diversities of climate. Moreover, as coats of skins were given to Adam and Eve, not for pride, but for shame, the use of furs might well serve to remind us that we were exiles from our heavenly country. If the Cluniacs had lands, they were at least more indulgent to their tenants; if they had serfs, this was because these could not be separated from the lands. If the Cluniacs had castles, these were generally turned into houses of prayer; if they had tolls, they were reminded that St. Matthew came from the class of toll-collectors; if they had tithes, they at least had forsaken all earthly possessions before entering the order, and gave an ample equivalent in the prayers and tears and alms which the monks used for the benefit of the public. It was not necessary for the monks to work at manual labour when they had ample employment in spiritual concerns and priestly exercises. The washing of feet on receiving pilgrims and strangers always involved a great waste of time. Though the Cluniacs were blamed for having no bishops, this was sufficiently explained from their being under the Bishop of Rome.
THE SCHOOLMEN AND DOCTORS OF THE MIDDLE AGES.
The subtle and ingenious schoolmen and doctors of the Middle Ages were too often only “madly vain of dubious lore.” One doctor of Paris, named Simon Churnai, having acquired great fame in 1202 by his defence of the doctrine of the Trinity, was so conceited as to say, “Oh, poor Jesus! how greatly have I confirmed and exalted Your position! If I had chosen to attack it, I could have destroyed it by much stronger reasons and objections!” Peter Lombard, friend of St. Bernard, and author of the popular work entitled “The Sentences,” ventured to discuss such problems as the following: When the angels were made, and how; whether they be all equal in essence, wisdom, and freewill; whether they were created perfect and happy, or the reverse; whether the demons differ in rank among themselves; whether they all live in hell, or out of it; whether the good angels can sin, or the bad act virtuously; whether they have bodies; and whether every person has or has not a good angel to preserve him and a bad one to destroy him. The most famous of the doctors had their favourite adjectives, as in the following list:—