XV.

A  DAY AT CITEAUX.

 

 St. Robert and St. Alberic had both a share in the establishment of the new monastery; it was Stephen, however, exclusively, who framed the order of the Cistercians. Before his time it was only a single convent; but under him it grew into the head of a vast monastic federacy, extending through every country in Europe. He was the author of the internal arrangement of this large body; and let no one suppose, that legislating for many thousands of monks is at all an easier task than settling the constitution of an equal number of citizens.

 Before, however, proceeding to consider Citeaux in this dignified capacity, as the queen and mother of an order, it will be well to go through the daily exercises of a Cistercian convent, that the reader may know what it is that is growing up before him. Suppose the monks all lying on their beds of straw, ranged in order along the dormitory, the abbot in the midst. Each of them lay full dressed, with his cowl drawn over his head, with his cuculla and tunic, and even with stockings on his feet. His scapular alone was dispensed with. Doubtless no one complained of heat, for the bed-clothes were scanty, consisting of a rough wollen cloth between their limbs and the straw, and a sort of woolen rug over them. The long dormitory had no fire, and currents of air had full room to play under the unceiled roof, left in the native rudeness of its beams. A lamp lighted up the apartment, and burned all night long.

At the proper hour the clock awoke the sacristan, who slept, not in the dormitory, but near the church. He was the timekeeper of the whole community, and regulated the clock, which seems to have been something of an alarum, for he used to set it at the right hour overnight. His was an important charge, for he had to calculate the time, and if he was more wakeful than usual, or if his clock went wrong, the whole convent was robbed of a part of its scanty rest, and the last lesson had to be lengthened that the hour of lauds might come right again.

The time for rising varied with these strict observers of the ancient rule. St. Benedict commands that his monks should get up at the eighth hour of the night during the winter. In his time, however, the length of the hours varied in summer and winter. Day and night were each divided into twelve hours; but as the day dawns earlier in some parts of the year than in others, the twelve hours of night would then be distributed over a less space of time at one period than at another, and would therefore be shorter. The eighth hour of the night would thus, though always two hours after midnight, be sometimes closer to it than at others. It, however, always fell about two o'clock, according to our mode of reckoning. In summer, the hour of matins was so fixed, that they should be over a short time before lauds, which were always at day-break. The sacristan, as soon as he was up, trimmed the church lamp, and that of the dormitory and rang the great bell; in a moment, the whole of this little world was alive; the sole things which a minute ago looked as if they were watching were the two solitary lamps burning all night long, one in the dormitory, the other in the church, as if they were ready trimmed with oil for the coming of the Lord; but now every eye is awake, and every hand is making the sign of the cross. Most men find it hard to leave even a bed of straw, and the seven hours in winter and six in summer were but just enough for bodies wearied out with hard work, and always hungering; doubtless the poor novice often stretched himself, before the tones of the bell which had broken his slumbers fully roused him to consciousness; but starting from bed, and putting himself at once into the presence of his Lord, was but the work of a moment for the older monk.

The prayer which they were to say in rising is not prescribed in the rule; it is probable, however, that after crossing themselves in the name of the Holy Trinity, they repeated the psalm, Deus in adjutorium meum intende, and then walked towards the church. One by one these white figures glided along noiselessly through the cloister, keeping modestly close to the walls, and leaving the middle space free, where none but the abbot walked. Their cowls were drawn over their heads, which were slightly bent down; their eyes were fixed on the ground, and their hands hung down motionless by their sides, wrapt in the sleeves of the cuculla. The old Cistercian church, after the model of which was built even the stately church which afterwards contained all the brethren in the flourishing times of Citeaux, was remarkable in its arrangement. It was intended for monks alone; few entered it but those guests who happened to come to the abbey, and they were not always allowed to be present.

It was divided into four parts; at the upper end was the high altar, standing apart from the wall: the sole object which Cistercian simplicity allowed upon it was a crucifix of painted wood; and over it was suspended a pix, in which the Holy Sacrament was reserved, with great honor, in a linen cloths, with a lamp burning before it day and night. There do not appear to have been any candlesticks upon the altar, though two large lights burned during the time of mass immediately before it. The part in front of this most sacred place was called the presbyterium, and there the priest, deacon, and subdeacon, sat on chairs placed for them when the holy sacrifice was to be celebrated. Next came the choir itself, where the brethren sat in simple stalls, ranged on each side of the church. In front of the stalls of the monks were the novices, kneeling on the pavement, and sitting on low seats. The stall of the abbot was on the right hand, in the lower part of the choir, and the prior's place was on the opposite side, just where the head of a college and his deputy collegiate chapels.  Beyond this was the retro-chorus, which was not the Lady Chapel, but was at the other end of the church nearest the nave, and was the place marked out for those in weak health, but still well enough to leave the infirmary.

Last of all came the nave, which was smaller than the rest of the church, unlike the long and stately naves of our cathedral churches. Into this church, called by the modest name of oratory, the first fathers of Citeaux entered nightly to sing the praises of God, and to pray for the world, which was lying asleep beyond the borders of their forest. It had many separate entrances, by which different portions of the convent flocked in with a quick step to rouse themselves from sleep; but all in perfect silence: by one side entrance the brethren came in between the presbytery and the stalls, while the abbot and prior, and those about him, entered at the lower end; there was also a door leading into the cloister, through which processions passed. Each brother as he came in threw back his cowl, and bowed to each altar that he passed, and then to the high altar. They then, except on Sundays and some feast days, knelt in their stalls with their hands clasped upon their breasts, and their feet close together, and said the Lord's Prayer and the Creed. In this position they remained till the Deus in adjutorium had been said, when they rose and remained standing during the rest of the service, except where it was otherwise especially marked.

Matins lasted for about two hours, during which they chanted psalms, interspersed with anthems; the glimmering light of the lamp was not intended to do more than pierce through the gloom of the church, for the greater part of the service was recited by heart, and a candle was placed just in that part where the lesson was to be read; if it were not that their lips moved, they might have been taken for so many white statues, for their arms were placed motionless upon their bosoms in the form of a cross, and every movement was regulated so as to be as tran­quil as possible. The sweet chanting of the early Cistercians struck some of their contemporaries as something supernatural. “With such solemnity and devotion do they celebrate the divine office”, says Stephen of Tournay, “that you might fancy that angels' voices were heard in their concert; by their psalms, hymns, and spiritual songs, they draw men to praise God, and they imitate the angels”.

Yet this effect was simply produced by common Gregorian chants, sung in unison; as in the other parts of divine worship, the Cistercians were reformers in church music. They sent, in their simplicity, all the way to Metz to procure the antiphonary of that church, as being the most likely to be pure from innovation, probably because Amalarius, a deacon of Metz, was a celebrated liturgical writer in the time of the son of Charlemagne; but they soon found that many ages had passed over the Church since the time of the great emperor of the West. The book was very defective, and was filled with innovations, and they immediately set about correcting it.

Monastic music had suffered, as well as other portions of St. Benedict's rule; and our Cistercians speak with contempt of womanish counter-tenor voices, which they inexorably banished from their churches. Their chanting was especially suited for contemplation: they dwelt on each syllable, and sucked in the honied sense of the Psalms as they pronounced the words. It is not wonderful if the men of that time believed that devils trembled, and angels noted down in letters of gold the words which dropped from their lips, as these grave and masculine voices chanted through the darkness of the night the triumph of good over evil, and the glories of the Lord and of His Church. Few, indeed, are worthy to chant the Psalms: who can repeat, for instance, the 119th Psalm as he should? But Stephen and his brethren might pronounce those burning words of the Spirit without shame, for they had indeed given up the world. "Ignitum eloquium tuum vehementer, et servus dilexit Mud."

After matins were over they never returned to sleep, but were permitted either to pray in the church, or to sit in the cloister. In summer, when the day dawned upon the convent almost as soon as matins were over, the time thus allowed was very short, for lauds followed close on the first glimmer of morning light. In winter there was a considerable interval between lauds and matins, and it was during this part of the day that the monk was left most to himself. This was the time allotted to mental prayer, and many a monk might then be seen kneeling in his stall, occupied in that meditation which, according to St. Bernard, "gathers itself up into itself and by Divine help, separates itself from earthly things, to contemplate God." It was one of the rules of the order that they were not to prostrate themselves full length on the ground in church, but should keep their souls in quiet before God, without violent action. Others again remained in the cloister, which, with all its strictness and tranquility, was a busy scene. Let no one think of the cloister as it is now, in a state of desertion, about our cathedrals, cold and comfortless, with all the glass taken out of its windows; its religious silence has given place to the silence of the churchyard. It was formerly the very paradise of the monk, from which all the rest of the convent was named; it shut him out from the world "with its royal rampart of discipline," and was an image of the rest of heaven. It was the passage by which every part of the convent buildings were connected, and around which on Palm Sunday they walked in procession, with green palms in their hands. At the east end of the church, at right angles with it, was the dormitory, opposite the church was the refectory, and adjoining the church was the chapter­house; in the centre was a cross. After matins, then those of the brethren who were not in the church were all together in the cloister. In one part was the cantor marking out the lessons, and hearing some brother repeat them in a low suppressed tone; or else a novice would be learning to recite the psalter by heart. In another part, ranged on seats, the brethren would sit in unbroken silence reading, with their cowls so disposed about their heads, that it might be seen that they were not asleep.  

 It was here that St. Bernard gained his wonderful knowledge of the Holy Scriptures, meditating upon them before the morning light.

In another corner of the cloister, the boys of the monastery would be at school, under the master of the novices. The library, from which the monks took the books in which they read, was between the church and the chapter-house, and was under the care of the sacristan: and let no one despise the library of a Cistercian convent. St, Augustine seems to have been a favorite author with them, and Citeaux itself had no lack of expositions of Scripture by the Fathers.   

Shall we not be surprised to find a copy of the Koran in the armarium of Clairvaux and yet there it was, the gift of Peter the Venerable, who had ordered it to be translated carefully. Citeaux had its scriptorium as well as its library, where manuscripts were copied by the brethren. It is true that the antiquary would despise the handiwork of the Cistercians, for no illuminated figures of saints, elaborate capital letters, or flowers in arabesque creeping up the margin, were allowed; jeweled covers and gold clasps were also forbidden; but instead of this, religious silence was strictly observed, and the scriptorium was a place for meditation as much as the cloister itself. Their labours did not consist in simply copying the manuscripts; they took pains to discover various readings, and to compare editions. It might have been supposed, that the cold winds of the forest, with the burning sun and drenching rain, must have fairly bleached out of Stephen's mind all the learning which he had gathered in the schools of Paris. But he left behind him a work, which proved that he kept under his Cistercian habit the same heart which had urged him to leave his old cloister of Sherborne to study in Scotland and in France. A manuscript edition of the Bible, written under the eye of our abbot himself, was preserved with great reverence at Citeaux up to the time of the French Revolution. Not content with consulting Latin manuscripts, he even had recourse to the Rabbins, in order to settle the readings of the Old Testament. In this way there could never be a lack of books for the brethren to read in the cloister, since there was at home a power of multiplying them as long as there were friendly monasteries to lend them new manuscripts to copy when the original stock of the library had failed:

As the Cistercians followed the natural divisions of the day, the hours in winter and in summer differed considerably, as has been already mentioned; again, the ecclesiastical divisions of the year altered their mode of living to a great degree. From Easter to Holy Cross day, that is the 14th of September, they broke their fast after sext, and had a second meal after vespers, except on Wednesdays and Fridays, which were fast-days: during the rest of the year, from Holy Cross day to Easter, they never had but one meal a day, and that after nones, up to Ash Wednesday, but during Lent not till after vespers. It will be necessary, therefore, to give a sketch of their mode of living, first in summer and then in winter. Lauds, as has been said before, followed matins very soon in summer, after which an interval was allowed, during which the brethren might go to the dormitory to wash themselves, and change portions of the dress in which they had slept.   

As soon as the day had fully dawned, prime was sung, and then they went into the chapter. If ever there was a scene revolting to human pride, it was the chapter; more than any other part of the monastic life, it shows that a convent was not a place where men walked about in clothes of a peculiar cut, and spent their time in formal actions, but a school of humiliation, where the very last roots of self-love were plucked up, and the charity of the Gospel planted in its stead. Humility was the very soul of the cloister, and a great part of St. Benedict's rule is taken up with an analysis of the twelve degrees of humility, which form the steps of a Jacob's ladder, leading up to perfect love, which casts out fear.   

Our Cistercians had studied this part of the rule well, and St. Bernard's earliest work is a sort of a comment upon it. The chapter-house was the place where this mingled humility and love was most of all exercised. Around it were ranged seats, one above another; the novices sitting on the lowest row, or rather on the footstools attached to the seats; in the midst was the abbot's chair. The chapter opened with the martyrology, and with those parts of the service now attached to the office of prime. Then followed the commemoration of the faithful departed, and, in some cases, a sermon; after which a portion of St. Benedict's rule was read. Then each brother, who had in the slightest way transgressed the rule, came forward and confessed it aloud before the whole convent. He rose from his seat and threw back his cowl that all might see his face, then he muffled up his face and head, and threw himself full length on the low stool of the lectern, without speaking a word. At length the abbot spoke, and asked him, "What say you? The brother answered, "Mea culpa", "It was by my fault"; then he was bidden to rise in the name of the Lord, and he again uncovered his features, and confessed his faults, and after receiving a penance, if it were necessary, he went back to his seat at the bidding of his superior.

When all had confessed their own sins, then a still more extraordinary scene followed: each monk accused his brother if he had seen or heard anything amiss in him. He rose, and mentioning his name, said, "Our dear brother has committed such a fault." Happy they who could thus bear to hear their faults proclaimed in the face of day, without being angry. The angels are blessed because they cannot sin; next to them in happiness are those who are not wrathful when rebuked. But what shall we say to the punishments for greater offences against the rule? The monk who had grievously offended stripped himself to his waist, and on his knees received the discipline at the hands of a brother in the face of the convent. Blessed again are they who thus are willing to suffer shame on earth, if by any means they may escape shame at the dreadful day of judgment. It was not, however, only in public that they confessed their sins; any mortal sins against the rule were to be confessed over again to a priest for the benefit of absolution, though they had already been proclaimed in the chapter; and during all the intervals of work, before they had broken their fast, the brethren might confess their sins in private in the chapter. An instance is incidentally related, in which a novice, on entering into Clairvaux, made a general confession of the sins of his whole life, and this was probably a common practice, though not enjoined by the rule; at least it had become common at the end of the century in which Stephen lived.

After the chapter was over, the brethren went out to manual labor; this was one of the peculiarities which distinguished Citeaux from Cluny. Their labor was good hard work by which they gained their livelihood, and with the help of their lay-brethren supported themselves, and gave abundant alms to the poor. Few things are more remarkable than this mixture of all the details of spades and forks, ploughing, haymaking, and reaping, with the meditation and constant prayer of the Cistercians.

During the harvest-time, the daily mass was, if the abbot so willed, attended only by the sick and all who were too weak to work, for the whole convent was in the fields. And when mass was said, the priest put off chasuble and stole, and with his assistants followed the brethren who had gone before to work. St. Bernard put off the finishing of one of his wonderful sermons on the Canticles, because the brethren must go to the work which their rule and their poverty required. It was a peculiarity of the Cistercians, that they did not sing psalms, but meditated while they worked; again, no one was allowed to take a book with him into the fields. This last regulation was probably made by Stephen himself, for it is recorded of St. Alberic that he took the psalter with him when he worked. Field-work was not, however, it may be said by the way, the only labor of the Cistercian; he took his turn to be cook, which office went the round of the convent, and was changed weekly. Again, he might be cellarer, infirmarian, master of the novices, or porter, with a variety of other offices, which would give him employment enough. The cellarer, especially, was an officer of considerable dignity in the community: he had the whole of the victualling department under his care; cooks and lay-brethren especially referred to him in all matters which came under his jurisdiction, and he had to weigh out the proper quantity of food for each of the monks. Prudence and experience were not, therefore, qualities thrown away in a convent, which, as has been said, was a little world in itself, and even, in its way, a busy world. But each servile occupation was hallowed by obedience and religious silence, in which the Lord spoke to the heart.

The brethren left the fields as soon as the first stroke of the bell for tierce was heard. The early Benedictines said tierce in the fields, and continued working till near 10 o'clock, thus giving two hours and a half to manual labor. The reason why the Cistercians worked for a shorter time was, because mass followed immediately upon tierce. In St. Benedict's time there was no daily mass, but since then a change had taken place in the discipline of the Church, and the holy sacrifice was offered up every day at Citeaux. At this mass any one might communicate who had not communicated on the Sunday, which was the day on which the whole convent received the Body and Blood of our most blessed Lord, who was at that time given to the faithful under both kinds. After the celebration of these adorable mysteries, the brethren again retired into the cloister to read, or went into the church for meditation. At about half-past eleven the bell rang for sext, after which the convent assembled in the refectory, for the first and principal meal of the day, except on the Wednesdays and Fridays out of the Paschal time, on which days, as has been said before, they had only one meal, and that after nones.

The Cistercian dinner, or breakfast, as it might be called, needed the seasoning of early rising and hard labor to make it palatable. It consisted of a pound of the coarsest bread (one-third of which was reserved for supper if there was one), and two dishes of different sorts of vegetables boiled without grease. Their drink was the sour wine of the country, well diluted with water, or else thin beer or a decoction of herbs called sapa, which seems to have been more like vegetable soup than any other beverage. Even fish and eggs, which had always been considered to he legitimate diet for monks, were excluded. Their contemporaries wondered at their austerity; how, weak and delicate bodies, worn out by hard labour and by night-watching, could possibly subsist on such coarse food: but St. Bernard tells us what made it palatable. "You fear watchings, fasts, and manual labor," he says to a runaway Cistercian, "but these are light to one who thinks on the eternal fire. The remembrance of the outer-darkness takes away all horror from solitude. Think on the strict sifting of thine idle words which is to come, and then silence will not be so very unpleasing. Place before your eyes the everlasting weeping and gnashing of teeth, and the mat or the down pillow will be the same to thee." And yet theirs was not a service of gloom or fear. Christ rewarded the holy boldness of these noble athletes, who thus afflicted their bodies for His sake, by filling their souls with the joys of devotion.

“Oh! that by God's mercy," says St. Bernard to one whom he was persuading to quit the world, "I could have you as my fellow in that school where Jesus is the master! Oh! that I could place your bosom, if it were but once pure, in the place where it might be a vase to catch that unction which teach us of all things—Think you not that you would suck honey from the rock, and oil from the rugged stone”.

Every action was sanctified to the monks, even at their meals a strict silence was observed, and one of the brethren read aloud some religious book, during the time that they were in the refectory. After it was over, according to the custom of hot climates, and in order to make up for the shortness of the night in summer, they went into the dormitory to sleep. After about an hour's rest the bell rang to rouse them up, and in the interval between nones, they washed themselves, and either sat in the cloister or repaired to the church. Nones were said at half-past two, after which they were allowed a draught of water in the refectory before they returned to manual labor, which lasted till half-past five, when they sang vespers. The vesper-hour was especially the monk's season of quiet, when the day was over with all its work, and the shades of evening were closing about him. St. Bernard interprets the evening in Scripture to mean the time of quiet, and Cistercian writers, even in late times, are fond of collecting together all the mystical import of the time of vespers.

They went into the refectory after returning from their work, and partook of a slight repast, consisting of the remainder of their pound of bread, with a few raw fruits, such as radishes, lettuces, or apples furnished by the abbey gardens.

Before we close the day with compline, it will be necessary to mark the difference between the summer and winter rule. Their seasons followed the ecclesiastical division of the year; summer was reckoned from Easter to the middle, of September, and the rest of the year was called winter. The Church in winter sits in expectation of her Lord's coming, and the Cistercians redoubled their austerities during this long period of the gloom of the year. They arose in all the cold and snow of winter, in the dark and dreary night, to watch for the coming of the Lord, and to pray for the world which was lying without in the darkness and shadow of death. As the world is engaged in turning day into night, in order to have its fill of pleasure, so they multiplied time for devotion, by stealing from the hours when men are asleep.

On Christmas night a fire burned merrily in the calefactory, and all with glad hearts might cluster around it; but at other times no fire is mentioned during the night hours, and it was in cold and hunger that they waited for the nativity of the Lord, and thought upon the cold cave at Bethlehem, where the Blessed Virgin waited for the time when He, who is the only joy of the faithful, came forth from her to save the world. He was the centre of all their exercises, and His holy fire burning in their hearts, gave them heat and light in the dreariness of their watching. Winter brought its compensation with it at Citeaux, as well as to the rest of the world. It was then that they had most time for meditation and prayer in the cloister, or in the church after matins for lauds were never said till, the early dawn, which would of course be then much later than in summer.

Prime followed immediately upon lauds, and would generally begin about seven o'clock. Then came the mass, tierce, and the chapter, so that they did not begin to work till after the time prescribed by St. Benedict, which was after tierce, or about half-past nine or ten. The chapter is not here noticed, nor indeed is it mentioned systematically anywhere in his rule; it probably be­came a system, and the hour for it was fixed, after St. Benedict's time. From the time that they went into the fields after the chapter, till nones, which were said between two and three, they worked on without breaking their fast till after the hour was said, that is between half-past two and three. After the meal was over, they walked into the church two and two, chaunting the Miserere, and there said grace. Vespers followed soon after; for it seems probable that they were said about sunset, but before the twilight had so far faded away as to require candles. Such is Cardinal Bona's opinion, himself a Cistercian, and the lighting of lamps for vespers is not mentioned among the duties of the servant of the church, as he was called. In summer, when a slight repast was allowed in the evening, the quiet of the twilight hour was necessarily interrupted; but in winter, when nothing was permitted after their one meal, but a draught of water, nothing broke the repose of the monks after vespers were said. The most breathless stillness reigned in the convent. The brethren sat reading in the cloister, and even signs were forbidden except on special occasions. The evening twilight between vespers and compline was the monks' sabbath.

They were forbidden expressly to get into knots and talk together, and almost the only sign allowed was when one brother motioned to another to take care of his book, if anything called him out of the cloister. Strange accidents happened to books in those ages, which might have made this precaution necessary, as when a bear swallowed or at least sadly mangled the manuscript of St. Augustine's Epistles at Cluny; though it is true such visitors would hardly enter a cloister full of monks.

During Lent, as their bodily labors were greater, so a longer time was allowed them for meditation and reading. As they did not break their fast till about five o'clock in the evening, they said sext and nones in the fields, or at least they returned to their work as soon as they had said them, and continued working till four o'clock. But a longer time was allowed for reading in the morning, and additional mental prayer is especially enjoined at this season.   

The only reading allowed seems to have been the Holy Scriptures; and on the first Sunday in Lent, the cantor distributed a portion of the bible to each brother, which he was to receive reverently, and stretching out both hands "for joy at the Holy Scriptures." 

No greater proof of their austere penitence in the time of Lent can be found, than the way in which St. Bernard speaks of it. Sweetly, and with the tenderness of a mother, does he always speak to the brethren at that time. "Not without a great touch of pity, brethren", he once said, "do I look upon you.  I cast about for some alleviation to give you, and bodily alleviation comes before my mind; but if your penance be lightened by a cruel pity, then is your crown by degrees stripped of its gems. What can I do? You are killed all day long with many fasts, in labous oft, in watchings over much, besides your inward trials, the contrition of heart, and a multitude of temptations. Yea, you are killed; but it is for His sake who died for you. But if your tribulation abounds for Him, your consolation shall abound through Him. For is it not certain, that your sufferings are above human strength, beyond nature, against habit? Another then does bear them for you, even He doubtless, who, as says the Apostle, bears up all things by the word of His power."            

Two things alone remain to be noticed, which throughout the whole year were the last events of a Cistercian day, and those are the collation or the reading of the collations of Cassian, and compline. At Citeaux these collations, which were a collection of the lives of the early monks, or else some of the books of saints' lives, was read aloud in the cloister. On the finishing of the reading, all turned their faces to the east, and the abbot said, "Our help is in the name of the Lord;" the convent responded, "Who hath made heaven and earth;" and then they proceeded into the church to sing compline, which was the last office of the day. The time for compline varied according to the hour when they retired to rest, which in winter would be about seven, and in summer about eight.   As their motions were regulated according to the duration of the light, an approximation only can be made as to their hours of going to bed and rising. After compline the abbot rose and sprinkled with holy water each brother as they went out in order. They then pulled their cowls over their heads and walked into the dormitory.

Such was the Cistercian life in its first fervor, as it was under Stephen and St. Bernard. Put down upon paper it appears but a dead letter of outward observances; the spirit of obedience, humility, and charity which animated the whole cannot be described in words. The angelical countenances and noiseless regulated motions of the monks, which had a certain monastic grace of their own, are all missing to light up the whole. The presence again of such an abbot as Stephen must be taken into account, before a correct idea can be obtained of Citeaux. He could modify the rule to the weak, and direct the energies of the strong; he could call the faint-hearted into his presence in the parlour, and give them words of holy counsel. Many things are scattered up and down St. Bernard's writings, which show that a rule without the living tradition is not fully intelligible. For instance, from scattered hints it appears, that the monks had sometimes a certain time allowed them for conversing together, though that is not mentioned at all in St. Benedict's rule. The fact is, that silence was the general order of the day, but the abbot might allow those whom he judged fit to converse together. In after ages, and not so long after Stephen's time, these conversations were systematized, and placed at set hours; but before then they seem to have been at the discretion of the abbot. How naked and dead are the words of a rule without the living abbot to dispense them, to couple together the strong and the weak, that the sturdy warrior might help on the trembling soldier, and to mingle the roughness of discipline with the tender hand which dropped oil and wine on the wounded heart. Stephen, though God had removed the pains which had so long afflicted him, had now an anxious charge upon his hands, no less than the training up of St. Bernard.

STEPHEN AND BERNARD.