=Source.=--William of Malmesbury, _De gestis regum Anglorum_, ed.
Stubbs, vol. ii., p. 380. (Rolls Series.)
In his (William Rufus’) days was founded the Cistercian order, which
is now believed and alleged to provide the surest path to Heaven. To
speak of this here is not irrelevant to the work I have undertaken,
since it is England’s glory to have bred the man who was at once the
founder and the organizer of this rule. To us he belongs, and in our
schools as a boy he passed his early years. Therefore, if we are
without envy, we shall the more gratefully cherish his worth, the more
intimately we learn of it; at the same time I am myself disposed to
sing loud his praises, because it is a noble trait to approve in others
those qualities, the lack of which in yourself you regret. Harding was
his name among the English, and he was born of no very illustrious
parentage. In early youth he was a monk at Sherborne, but when, as he
grew up, worldly desires troubled him, disgusted with his cloth, he
went first to Scotland and afterwards to France. There, after some
years education in the humanities, he felt the prickings of the love
of God, for, after his manhood had put away childish follies, he went
to Rome with a clerk, his fellow-student; neither the length nor the
difficulty of the journey, nor their poverty, could restrain them from
chanting daily the whole psalter as they went and returned. Already,
indeed, the renowned man was meditating at heart the purpose which by
God’s grace he began to execute soon after; returning to Burgundy, he
received the tonsure in Molesme, a new and great monastery, and readily
acknowledged the first principles of the rule, as he had formerly
seen them; but when other observances were proposed to him which he
had neither read in the rule nor ever seen, he began to press for the
reason of the same, humbly and as becomes a monk.... His opinions,
spreading, as happens, from one to another, justly moved the hearts of
such as feared God, lest perchance they should run or had run in vain.
The question, therefore, was debated in many chapters, and ended in
the agreement of the abbot himself that superfluous observances should
be given up and only the essential principles followed. Thereupon two
of the brethren were chosen, of equal learning and piety, to enquire
by vicarious research touching the will of the founder of the rule,
and to expound the results of their enquiry to the others. The abbot
strove earnestly to obtain the consent of the whole convent, but it is
difficult to uproot from men’s minds old habits of thought, since they
are reluctant to eschew what they have earliest digested; so well-nigh
all refused to accept the new doctrine, because they loved the old.
Only eighteen, among whom was Harding (who is also called Stephen),
persisted in their holy determination, and left the community with
their abbot, declaring that the rule could not be observed in its
purity in a place where the soul, in spite of struggle, was overwhelmed
by wealth and gluttony. So they came to Cîteaux, a place once simple
woodland, but now so marked by the abundant piety of monks, that it is
deservedly held to be conscious of the divine presence itself. There,
by the countenance of the archbishop of Vienne, now Pope, they entered
upon a labour worthy of renown and reverence for all time.
Truly many of their rules seem severe, but these especially: they wear
no fur or linen, nor that finely woven woollen cloth which we call
_staminium_; they never have breeches, except when they are sent on a
journey, and then they wash and give them up on their return; they have
two gowns with hoods, but put on no added garment in winter; but in
summer, if they choose, they lighten their clothing. They sleep robed
and girt, and never return to their beds after matins, but they so
order the hour of matins that it shall be light before the _laudes_;
they are so careful of the rule that they deem no jot or tittle should
be disregarded. Immediately after the _laudes_ they chant the prime,
whereafter they go forth to work for stated hours. They accomplish all
their labour and chanting for the day without any artificial light.
None is ever absent from the daily services, none from compline,
except the sick; the cellarer and hospitaller, after compline, serve
the guests, observing however the strictest silence. The abbot allows
himself nothing that is not allowed to others, and is everywhere
present, everywhere tending his flock; only he eats not with the rest,
since his table is always with pilgrims and the poor. None the less,
wherever he be, he is sparing of speech and food, for neither for
him nor for others are laid more than two courses; only the sick may
have lard and meat. From 5 September to Easter, regarding no festival
except Sundays, they break their fast but once a day. They never leave
the cloister except to work, nor do they converse then, or at any
time, except in turn to the abbot or prior. They observe unwearied the
canonical hours, adding nothing foreign thereto, except a vigil for
the dead. They use in divine offices the Ambrosian chants and hymns, so
far as they could learn them at Milan. They bestow care on guests and
the sick, but inflict intolerable crosses on their own bodies for the
salvation of their souls.... In a word, the Cistercian monks are to-day
a pattern for all monks, a mirror for the diligent, a spur to the
slothful.