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This page intentionally left blank
Language and Mind

This is the long-awaited third edition of Chomsky’s outstanding collection

of essays on language and mind. The first six chapters, originally published
in the 1960s, made a groundbreaking contribution to linguistic theory. This
new edition complements them with an additional chapter and a new pref-
ace, bringing Chomsky’s influential approach into the twenty-first century.
Chapters 1–6 present Chomsky’s early work on the nature and acquisition of
language as a genetically endowed, biological system (Universal Grammar),
through the rules and principles of which we acquire an internalized knowl-
edge (I-language). Over the past fifty years, this framework has sparked an
explosion of inquiry into a wide range of languages, and has yielded some
major theoretical questions. The final chapter revisits the key issues, reviewing
the “biolinguistic” approach that has guided Chomsky’s work from its origins
to the present day, and raising some novel and exciting challenges for the study
of language and mind.

n o a m c h o m s k y is Professor of Linguistics at Massachusetts Institute of

Technology. His many books include New Horizons in the Study of Language
and Mind (Cambridge University Press, 2000) and On Nature and Language
(Cambridge University Press, 2002).
Language and Mind
Third Edition

Noam Chomsky
Massachusetts Institute of Technology
  
Cambridge, New York, Melbourne, Madrid, Cape Town, Singapore, São Paulo

Cambridge University Press

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© Noam Chomsky 2006

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First published in print format 2005

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 Contents

Preface to the third edition page vii

Preface to the second edition xiii
Preface to the first edition xvii

1 Linguistic contributions to the study of mind: past 1

2 Linguistic contributions to the study of mind: present 21
3 Linguistic contributions to the study of mind: future 57
4 Form and meaning in natural languages 88
5 The formal nature of language 102
6 Linguistics and philosophy 143
7 Biolinguistics and the human capacity 173

Index 186

v
 Preface to the third edition

The first six chapters that follow are from the late 1960s, mostly based on talks
for general university audiences, hence relatively informal. The final chapter is
from 2004, based on a talk for a general audience. This recent essay reviews
the “biolinguistic approach” that has guided this work from its origins half a
century ago, some of the important developments of recent decades, and how
the general approach looks today – to me at least.
The dominant approach to questions of language and mind in the 1950s was
that of the behavioral sciences. As the term indicates, the object of inquiry was
taken to be behavior, or, for linguistics, the products of behavior: perhaps a
corpus obtained from informants by the elicitation techniques taught in field
methods courses. Linguistic theory consisted of procedures of analysis, primar-
ily segmentation and classification, designed to organize a body of linguistic
material, guided by limited assumptions about structural properties and their
arrangement. The prominent linguist Martin Joos hardly exaggerated in a 1955
exposition when he identified the “decisive direction” of contemporary struc-
tural linguistics as the decision that language can be “described without any
preexistent scheme of what a language must be.”1 Prevailing approaches in
the behavioral sciences generally were not very different. Of course, no one
accepted the incoherent notion of a “blank slate.” But it was common to sup-
pose that beyond some initial delimitation of properties detected in the environ-
ment (a “quality space,” in the framework of the highly influential philosopher
W. V. O. Quine), general learning mechanisms of some kind should suffice to
account for what organisms, including humans, know and do. Genetic endow-
ment in these domains would not be expected to reach much beyond something
like that.
The emerging biolinguistic approach adopted a different stance. It took the
object of inquiry to be, not behavior and its products, but the internal cognitive

1 Chapter 3, note 12. Joos was referring explicitly to the “Boasian tradition” of American struc-
turalism, and had only a few – rather disparaging – remarks about European structuralism. But
the observations carry over without too much change.

vii
viii Preface to the third edition

systems that enter into action and interpretation, and, beyond that, the basis in
our fixed biological nature for the growth and development of these internal sys-
tems. From this point of view, the central topic of concern is what Juan Huarte, in
the sixteenth century, regarded as the essential property of human intelligence:
the capacity of the human mind to “engender within itself, by its own power, the
principles on which knowledge rests,”2 ideas that were developed in important
ways in the philosophical–scientific traditions of later years. For language, “the
principles on which knowledge rests” are those of the internalized language (I-
language) that the person has acquired. Having acquired these principles, Jones
has a wide range of knowledge, for example that glink but not glnik is a possible
lexical item of English; that John is too angry to talk to (Mary) means that John
is to be talked to (if Mary is missing) but John is to do the talking (if Mary is
present); that him can be used to refer to John in the sentence I wonder who John
expects to see him, but not if I wonder who is omitted; that if John painted the
house brown then he put the paint on the exterior surface though he could paint
the house brown on the inside; that when John climbed the mountain he went up
although he can climb down the mountain; that books are in some sense simul-
taneously abstract and concrete as in John memorized and then burned the book;
and so on over an unbounded range. “The power to engender” the I-language
principles on which such particular cases of knowledge rest is understood to
be the component of the genetic endowment that accounts for their growth and
development.
Linguistics, so conceived, seeks to discover true theories of particular I-
languages (grammars), and, at a deeper level, the theory of the genetic basis
for language acquisition (universal grammar, UG, adapting a traditional term
to a new usage). Other cognitive systems, it was assumed, should be conceived
along similar lines, each with its own principles, and powers of engendering
them.
Within this framework, cognitive systems are understood to be, in effect,
organs of the body, primarily the brain, to be investigated in much the manner
of other subcomponents with distinctive properties that interact in the life of the
organism: the systems of vision, motor planning, circulation of the blood, etc.
Along with their role in behavior, the “cognitive organs” enter into activities
traditionally regarded as mental: thought, planning, interpretation, evaluation,
and so on. The term “mental” here is informal and descriptive, pretty much on
a par with such loose descriptive terms as “chemical,” “electrical,” “optical,”
and others that are used to focus attention on particular aspects of the world
that seem to have an integrated character and to be worth abstracting for spe-
cial investigation, but without any illusion that they carve nature at the joints.
Behavior and its products – such as texts – provide data that may be useful as

2 Chapter 1, pp. 8–9.

 Preface to the third edition ix

evidence to determine the nature and origins of cognitive systems, but have no
privileged status for such inquiries, just as in the case of other organs of the
body.
The general shift of perspective is sometimes called the “cognitive revolu-
tion” of the 1950s. However, for reasons discussed in the early essays that follow,
I think it might more properly be considered a renewal and further development
of the cognitive revolution of the seventeenth century. From the 1950s, many
traditional questions were revived – regrettably, without acquaintance with the
tradition, which had been largely forgotten or misrepresented. Also revived was
the view that had been crystallizing through the eighteenth century that proper-
ties “termed mental” are the result of “such an organical structure as that of the
brain” (chemist–philosopher Joseph Priestley). This development of “Locke’s
suggestion,” as it is called in the scholarly literature, was a natural, virtually
inevitable, concomitant of the Newtonian revolution, which effectively disman-
tled the only significant notion of “body” or “physical.” The basic conclusion
was well understood by the nineteenth-century. Darwin asked rhetorically why
“thought, being a secretion of the brain,” should be considered “more wonder-
ful than gravity, a property of matter.” In his classic nineteenth-century history
of materialism, Friedrich Lange observes that scientists have “accustomed our-
selves to the abstract notion of forces, or rather to a notion hovering in a mystic
obscurity between abstraction and concrete comprehension,” a “turning-point”
in the history of materialism that removes the surviving remnants of the doctrine
far from the ideas and concerns of the “genuine Materialists” of the seventeenth
century, and deprives them of significance. They need be of no special concern
in the study of aspects of the world “termed mental.”
It is perhaps worth noting that this traditional understanding is still regarded
as highly contentious, and repetition of it, almost in virtually the same words,
is regularly proposed as a “bold hypothesis” or “radical new idea” in the study
of the domains “termed mental.”3
Another significant feature of the original cognitive revolution was the recog-
nition that properties of the world termed mental may involve unbounded capac-
ities of a limited finite organ, the “infinite use of finite means,” in Wilhelm von
Humboldt’s phrase. The doctrine was at the heart of the Cartesian concept
of mind. It provided the basic criterion to deal with the problem of “other
minds” – to determine whether some creature has a mind like ours. Descartes
and his followers focused on use of language as the clearest illustration. In
a rather similar vein, Hume later recognized that our moral judgments are
unbounded in scope, and must be founded on general principles that are part of
our nature – genetically determined, in modern terms. That observation poses

3 For examples and discussion, see my New Horizons in the Study of Language and Mind
(Cambridge, 2000).
x Preface to the third edition

Huarte’s problem in a different domain, and is, by now, the topic of intriguing
empirical research and conceptual analysis.
By the mid twentieth century, it had become possible to face such problems
as these in a more substantive way than in earlier periods. There was, by then, a
clear general understanding of finite generative systems with unbounded scope,
which could be readily adapted to the reframing and investigation of traditional
questions that had necessarily been left obscure. Another influential factor in the
renewal of the cognitive revolution was the work of ethologists and comparative
psychologists, then just coming to be more readily accessible, with its concern
for “the innate working hypotheses present in subhuman organisms,” and the
“human a priori,” which should have much the same character.4 That framework
too could be adapted to the study of human cognitive organs and their genetically
determined nature, which constructs experience – the organism’s Umwelt, in
ethological terminology – and guides the general path of development, just as
in all other aspects of growth of organisms.
Meanwhile, efforts to sharpen and refine procedural approaches ran into
serious difficulties, revealing what appear to be intrinsic inadequacies. A basic
problem is that even the most simple elements of discourse are not detectable
by procedures of segmentation and classification. They do not have the required
“beads on a string” property for such procedures to operate, and often cannot
be located in some identifiable part of the physical event that corresponds to the
mind-internal expression in which these elements function. It became increas-
ingly clear that even the simplest units – morphemes, elementary lexical items,
for that matter even phonological segments – can be identified only by their role
in generative procedures that form linguistic expressions. These expressions,
in turn, can be regarded as “instructions” to other systems of the mind/body
that are used for mental operations, as well as for production of utterances and
interpretation of external signals. More generally, study of the postulated mech-
anisms of learning and control of behavior in the behavioral sciences revealed
fundamental inadequacies, and even at the core of the disciplines serious doubts
were arising as to whether the entire enterprise was viable, apart from its utility
for design of experiments that might be useful for some other purpose.
For the study of language, a natural conclusion seemed to be that the I-
language attained has roughly the character of a scientific theory: an integrated
system of rules and principles from which the expressions of the language can
be derived, each of them a collection of instructions for thought and action.
The child must somehow select the I-language from the flux of experience.
The problem appeared to be similar to what Charles Sanders Peirce had called
abduction, in considering the problem of scientific discovery.5 And as in the

4 Konrad Lorenz; chapter 3, pp. 83–84, below.

5 See chapter 3, pp. 79–81, below.
 Preface to the third edition xi

case of the sciences, the task is impossible without what Peirce called a “limit
on admissible hypotheses” that permits only certain theories to be entertained,
but not infinitely many others compatible with relevant data. In the language
case, it appeared that the genetic endowment of the language faculty must
impose a format for rule systems that is sufficiently restrictive so that candidate
I-languages are “scattered,” and only a small number can even be considered in
the course of language acquisition. In later work in the cognitive sciences, such
approaches are often called “theory theory” conceptions.6 Like abduction, and
for that matter every aspect of growth and development, language acquisition
faces a problem of poverty of stimulus. The general observation is transparent,
so much so that outside of the cognitive sciences the ubiquitous phenomenon
is not even dignified with a name: no one speaks of the problem of poverty of
stimulus for an embryo that has somehow to become a worm or a cat, given
the nutritional environment, or in any aspect of post-natal development, say
undergoing puberty.
In the essays reprinted below from the 1960s, the nature and acquisition of
language presented and discussed adopts the general framework just outlined.
“The most challenging theoretical problem in linguistics” was therefore taken to
be “that of discovering the principles of universal grammar,” which “determine
the choice of hypotheses” – that is, restrict the accessible I-languages. It was
also recognized, however, that for language, as for other biological organisms,
a still more challenging problem lies on the horizon: to discover “the laws that
determine possible successful mutation and the nature of complex organisms,”
quite apart from the particular cognitive organs or other organic systems under
investigation.7 As the same point was made a few years earlier: “there is surely
no reason today for taking seriously a position that attributes a complex human
achievement entirely to months (or at most years) of experience [as in the
behavioral sciences], rather than to millions of years of evolution [as in the study
of the specific biological endowment, UG in the language case], or to principles
of neural organization that may be more deeply grounded in physical law”8 –
a “third factor” in growth and development, organ- and possibly organism-
independent. Investigation of the third factor seemed too remote from inquiry
to merit much attention, and was therefore barely mentioned, though, in fact,
even some of the earliest work – for example, on elimination of redundancy in
rule systems – was implicitly guided by such concerns.
In the years that followed, the topics under investigation were substantially
extended, not only in language-related areas but in the cognitive sciences gen-
erally. By the early 1980s, a substantial shift of perspective within linguistics
6 Advocates of these approaches disagree, but mistakenly, I believe. See L. Antony and
N. Hornstein, Chomsky and his Critics (Blackwell, 2003), chapter 10, and reply.
7 Pp. 47, 85f., below.
8 Chomsky, Aspects of the Theory of Syntax (Cambridge, Mass: MIT Press, 1965), p. 59.
xii Preface to the third edition

reframed the basic questions considerably, abandoning entirely the format con-
ception of linguistic theory in favor of an approach that sought to limit attain-
able I-languages to a finite set, aside from lexical choices (these too highly
restricted). This Principles and Parameters approach may or may not turn out
to be justified; one can never know. But as a research program, it has been
highly successful, yielding an explosion of empirical inquiry into a very wide
range of typologically varied languages, posing new theoretical questions that
could scarcely have been formulated before, often providing at least partial
answers as well, while also revitalizing related areas of language acquisition
and processing. Another consequence is that it removed some basic conceptual
barriers to the serious inquiry into the deeper “third factor” issues. These topics
are reviewed in the lecture that closes this collection. They raise possibilities
that, in my personal view at least, suggest novel and exciting challenges for the
study of language in particular and problems of mind more generally.
 Preface to the second edition

The six chapters that follow fall into two groups. The first three constitute the
monograph Language and Mind, published in 1968. As the preface to Lan-
guage and Mind, reprinted below, explains, the three essays on linguistic con-
tributions to the study of mind (past, present, and future) are based on the
Beckman lectures, delivered before a university-wide audience at the Univer-
sity of California, Berkeley, in January 1967. These essays constitute a unit
distinct from the three chapters that follow them.
Chapter 4, “Form and meaning in natural languages,” is the approximate
text of a rather informal lecture given in January 1969 at Gustavus Adolphus
College in Minnesota to an audience consisting largely of high school and
college students and teachers. It reviews some of the basic notions presented
in Language and Mind and other works, and in addition presents some later
work on semantic interpretation of syntactic structures. This material, I believe,
reveals some of the limitations and inadequacies of earlier theory and suggests a
direction in which this theory should be revised. More technical investigations of
this and related matters appear in forthcoming monographs of mine, Semantics
in Generative Grammar and Conditions on Rules, to be published by Mouton
and Co., The Hague, in 1972.
Chapter 5 is a considerably more technical study, exploring in some detail
material that is presupposed or only informally developed in Language and
Mind. The intended audience in this case consisted primarily of psychologists
and psycholinguists. This chapter, which originally appeared as an appendix to
Eric Lenneberg’s Biological Foundations of Language, is an attempt to give a
concise and systematic presentation of the theory of transformational-generative
grammar and to explore its potential significance for human psychology. The
monographs just cited carry the technical investigations further, in part, in direc-
tions that are briefly indicated in this chapter, which was actually written in 1965
and is therefore the earliest of the essays collected here.
Chapter 6 was directed to a rather different audience, namely, professional
philosophers. This was a contribution to a symposium on linguistics and phi-
losophy held at New York University in April 1968. The purpose of this lecture
was to explore the points of contact between contemporary linguistics and

xiii
xiv Preface to the second edition

philosophy – in particular, epistemology and philosophy of mind. The sugges-

tion has been made that current work in linguistics has interesting insights to
offer into the nature of human knowledge, the basis for its acquisition, and the
ways it characteristically is used. In part, this essay is concerned with the debate
that has arisen over these issues; in part, with the issues themselves.
There is a certain degree of redundancy in these essays. Chapters 4, 5, and 6
are each more or less self-contained. Each presupposes very little, and therefore
some of the expository sections overlap, and overlap further with the chapters
that constitute Language and Mind. I hope that the somewhat varying formula-
tions of basic points may prove helpful. In fact, even the simplest and most basic
points discussed in these essays have been widely misconstrued. For example,
there has been a tendency in popular discussion to confuse “deep structure”
with “generative grammar” or with “universal grammar.” And a number of pro-
fessional linguists have repeatedly confused what I refer to here as “the creative
aspect of language use” with the recursive property of generative grammars, a
very different matter. In the hope that such questions as these will be clarified,
I have not eliminated redundancies in collecting these essays.
Chapters 4–6 extend and enlarge upon the ideas and material discussed in
the Beckman lectures. All of these essays are concerned primarily with the
area of intersection of linguistics, philosophy, and psychology. Their primary
purpose is to show how the rather technical study of language structure can
contribute to an understanding of human intelligence. I believe, and try to show
in these essays, that the study of language structure reveals properties of mind
that underlie the exercise of human mental capacities in normal activities, such
as the use of language in the ordinary free and creative fashion.
At the cost of a final redundancy, I would like to underscore here the observa-
tions in the preface to Language and Mind concerning the so-called “behavioral
sciences.” Currently there is a good deal of discussion – and not infrequently,
rather extravagant claims – concerning the implications of the behavioral sci-
ences for human affairs. It is important to bear in mind that there are few non-
trivial empirical hypotheses relating to the question of how humans behave and
why they act as they do under ordinary circumstances. The reader who under-
takes the useful exercise of searching the literature will discover, I believe,
not only that there is little significant scientific knowledge in this domain, but
further that the behavioral sciences have commonly insisted upon certain arbi-
trary methodological restrictions that make it virtually impossible for scientific
knowledge of a nontrivial character to be attained.
We can begin to see how human knowledge and systems of belief might
be acquired, in certain areas. The case of language is particularly interesting
because language plays an essential role in thinking and human interaction,
and because in this case we can begin to describe the system of knowledge
that is attained and to formulate some plausible hypotheses about the intrinsic
 Preface to the second edition xv

human capacities that make this achievement possible. These glimmerings of

understanding are interesting in themselves and suggestive as well for other
studies. We can be reasonably certain that the investigation of direct relations
between experience and action, between stimuli and responses, will in general
be a vain pursuit. In all but the most elementary cases, what a person does
depends in large measure on what he knows, believes, and anticipates. A study
of human behavior that is not based on at least a tentative formulation of relevant
systems of knowledge and belief is predestined to triviality and irrelevance. The
study of human learning can begin, in a serious way, only when such a tentative
formulation of systems of knowledge and belief is presented. We can then
ask by what means these systems are acquired, given the data of experience.
Similarly, the study of human behavior can hardly be undertaken in a serious
way unless we are in a position to ask how what a person does is related to what
he knows, believes, and expects. Only when we have formulated some tentative
hypotheses as to what is learned can we undertake a serious study of human
learning; only when we have formulated some tentative hypotheses as to what
has been learned – what is known and believed – can we turn in a serious way
to the investigation of behavior. In the case of language, we can present some
tentative but rather detailed and complex formulations of what is known, what
has been learned by the normal speaker-hearer. For this reason, the study of
language seems to me of particular interest for the study of human learning and
behavior.
But it must be emphasized that language may be a rather special case. Knowl-
edge of language is normally attained through brief exposure, and the character
of the acquired knowledge may be largely predetermined. One would expect
that human language should directly reflect the characteristics of human intel-
lectual capacities, that language should be a direct “mirror of mind” in ways in
which other systems of knowledge and belief cannot. Furthermore, even if we
were able to account for the acquisition of language along the lines discussed
in these essays, we would still be left with the problem of accounting for the
normal use of the acquired knowledge. But this problem is, at the moment, quite
intractable. It lies beyond the scope of scientific inquiry. Of course, it would
be entirely irrational to argue that certain phenomena and certain problems do
not exist, merely because they lie beyond the scope of scientific inquiry – at
present, and perhaps intrinsically because of the scope of human intelligence,
which after all is itself structured and bounded in ways that are unknown in
any detail. Given the primitive character of the study of man and society and its
general lack of intellectual substance, we can only speculate about the essential
and basic factors that enter into human behavior, and it would be quite irrespon-
sible to claim otherwise. Speculation about these matters is quite legitimate,
even essential. It should be guided, where this is possible, by such limited and
fragmentary knowledge as exists. But speculation should be clearly labeled
xvi Preface to the second edition

as such and clearly distinguished from the achievements of scientific inquiry.

This is a matter of considerable importance in a society that tends to trust in
professional expertise and to rely on professional judgments. The scientist, in
particular, has a responsibility to the public in this regard.

Massachusetts Institute of Technology N. C.

 Preface to the first edition

The three chapters of this book are somewhat elaborated versions of three
lectures, the Beckman lectures, that I delivered at the University of California,
at Berkeley, in January 1967. The first is an attempt to evaluate past contributions
to the study of mind that have been based on research and speculation regarding
the nature of language. The second is devoted to contemporary developments
in linguistics that have a bearing on the study of mind. The third is a highly
speculative discussion of directions that the study of language and mind might
take in coming years. The three lectures, then, are concerned with the past, the
present, and the future.
Given the state of research into the history of linguistics, even the attempt
to evaluate past contributions must be regarded as highly tentative. Modern
linguistics shares the delusion – the accurate term, I believe – that the modern
“behavioral sciences” have in some essential respect achieved a transition from
“speculation” to “science” and that earlier work can be safely consigned to
the antiquarians. Obviously any rational person will favor rigorous analysis
and careful experiment; but to a considerable degree, I feel, the “behavioral
sciences” are merely mimicking the surface features of the natural sciences;
much of their scientific character has been achieved by a restriction of subject
matter and a concentration on rather peripheral issues. Such narrowing of focus
can be justified if it leads to achievements of real intellectual significance, but in
this case, I think it would be very difficult to show that the narrowing of scope
has led to deep and significant results. Furthermore, there has been a natural but
unfortunate tendency to “extrapolate,” from the thimbleful of knowledge that
has been attained in careful experimental work and rigorous data-processing,
to issues of much wider significance and of great social concern. This is a
serious matter. The experts have the responsibility of making clear the actual
limits of their understanding and of the results they have so far achieved, and a
careful analysis of these limits will demonstrate, I believe, that in virtually every
domain of the social and behavioral sciences the results achieved to date will
not support such “extrapolation.” Such analysis will also show, I believe, that
the contributions of earlier thought and speculation cannot be safely neglected,
that in large measure they provide an indispensable basis for serious work today.

xvii
xviii Preface to the first edition

I do not attempt here to justify this point of view in general, but merely assert
that it is the point of view underlying the lectures that follow.
In the second lecture I have made no attempt to give a systematic presenta-
tion of what has been achieved in linguistic research; rather, I have concentrated
on problems that are at the borderline of research and that still resist solution.
Much of the material in this lecture is to appear in a chapter entitled “Prob-
lems of Explanation in Linguistics” in Explanations in Psychology, edited by
R. Borger and F. Cioffi (New York: Cambridge University Press, 1967), along
with interesting critical comments by Max Black. Lectures 1 and 3 make use
of some material from a lecture delivered at the University of Chicago in April
1966 that appears in Changing Perspectives on Man, edited by B. Rothblatt
(Chicago: University of Chicago Press, 1968). A portion of the first lecture was
published in the Columbia University Forum, Spring 1968 (Vol. XI, No. 1), and
a portion of the third lecture will appear in the Fall 1968 issue (Vol. XI, No. 3).
I would like to express my thanks to members of the faculty and the student
body at Berkeley for many useful comments and reactions and, more generally,
for the rich and stimulating intellectual climate in which I was privileged to
spend several months just prior to these lectures. I am also indebted to John
Ross and Morris Halle for helpful comments and suggestions.
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Christianity had shone forth over all the north of England for two
hundred and forty years. This closing scene in the history of
northern monasticism exhibits to us the monks of Lindisfarne in the
hour of their sorest trial, surrounded by their school. There were in
the monastery, says Simeon of Durham, a certain number of youths,
brought up there from their infancy, who had been taught by the
monks and trained in the singing of the Divine Office. These boys
entreated Eardulf to suffer them to follow him. They set out,
therefore, monks and children together, carrying the bier with the
holy relics, their sacred vessels, the Holy Book of the Gospels, and
their other books, and commenced that melancholy journey which,
after seven years of wandering, was to bring them at last to the
“grassy plain, on every side thickly wooded, but not easy to be made
habitable,” where afterwards grew up, on the site of their wattled
oratory, the princely city of Durham.
By these and similar calamities, extending not over one district,
but over every part of the country, England was plunged back into
the barbarism out of which she was but just emerging: her seats of
learning were all swept away, and during the century that elapsed
from the first landing of the Danes to the accession of Alfred, a night
of gloomy darkness settled over the land.
 C H A P T E R I V.
ST. BONIFACE AND HIS COMPANIONS.
a.d. 686 to 755.
The prominent importance attaching to the schools of Kent and
Northumbria must not lead us to regard them as the only learned
foundations existing in England during the early period of which we
have hitherto been speaking. The spread of the monastic institute
among the Anglo-Saxons was so rapid and so universal, that we are
sometimes led to wonder how a country so thinly populated as
England must have been in the seventh century, could have
furnished those crowds of religious men and women who hastened
to people her newly-erected cloisters. And wherever those cloisters
were reared a knowledge of letters and the civilised arts was soon
introduced, and pursued with as much ardour at Selsey as at
Lindisfarne, among the nuns of St. Mildred or St. Hildelitha as among
the brethren of Jarrow.
If the bold and mountainous scenery of Northumbria has become
indelibly associated in our mind with the lives of those saintly
scholars who have been made known to us by the pen of Bede, far
away at the other extremity of England there is a province which still
claims as its patron saint one whose learning was as great as theirs,
and whose action on the Church was even yet more important. St
Boniface, or Winfrid, as he was called before he entered on his
apostolic labours, was born in the same year that witnessed the
entrance of Bede into the monastery of Jarrow. They were therefore
contemporaries, though widely different in character, as in the career
which awaited them. The simple-hearted scholar whose holy happy
life flowed calmly on from childhood to old age within his convent
walls, like some quiet stream that never overpasses its verdant
banks, is a contrast indeed to the great apostle who, after having
evangelised half Europe, and ruled the churches of France and
Germany, as Vicar of the Vicar of Christ, with a spiritual sway larger
than any ever exercised save by the successors of St. Peter, died, as
was fitting, a martyr’s death, saluting with his parting words the joy
and glory of that “long-expected day.”[62] Yet both in different ways
exhibit to us the noblest features of the Anglo-Saxon race, whose
simple piety and strong good sense are as apparent in Bede, as the
ardour of its active charity is in Boniface.
He was a native then, not of the bleak and hardy north, but of the
softer climate of that southern province,

Where the salt sea innocuously breaks,

And the sea-breeze as innocently plays
On Devon’s leafy shores.

It took its name from the deep hollows where the apple-blossoms
clustered as thickly then as now, and the clematis wove its tangled
wreaths in as wild profusion over bank and wood. Still covered with
those grand primeval forests which made perpetual shadow in its
pathless valleys, and, fearless of the billows that lost their fierceness
as they broke upon that gentle shore, clothed even the purple rocks
themselves with verdure, and bent their branches into the briny
waves, it merited to receive from St. Aldhelm the title of dire
Dumnonia. Perhaps he could not resist the tempting alliteration, or
perhaps the wooded hollows of Devonshire oppressed with their
leafy gloom the senses of the traveller who, as he tells us, had just
passed over the barren hills of “Cornwall, void of flowery turf.” It
formed the border-land of English Saxony, and touched on that
unfriendly territory still inhabited by the Britons, who saw in the
newly converted Saxons only a race of giants and savages, with
whom they refused to hold any intercourse.
The Dumnonians, however, from the first era of their conversion,
showed the same readiness to welcome the establishment among
them of monks and schools as was elsewhere exhibited, and the city
of Exeter is said to have received the name of Monkton from the
number of religious which it contained. It was probably some of the
Exeter monks who, in the course of a journey which they had
undertaken for the purpose of preaching to the inhabitants of the
wild Western districts, were hospitably received and entertained at
Crediton by the father of Winfrid. The passing visit left an indelible
impression on the boy’s heart, and he grew up with the fixed desire
of becoming a monk and a scholar. His father did what he could to
turn him from his purpose, but finding himself forced at last to yield
to his son’s entreaties, he committed him to the care of Wulphard,
abbot of Exeter. Winfrid was at that time thirteen years of age. His
education had not been neglected in his father’s house, and he now
threw himself into his studies with an ardour which made it evident
that he deserved some higher kind of teaching than the monks of
Exeter could supply. The school of Nutscell, in Hampshire, a
monastery afterwards destroyed by the Danes, possessed as high a
reputation as any in Wessex, so thither Winfrid was transferred, and
placed under the direction of the learned abbot Winbert. In this
monastery Winfrid was able to satisfy his thirst for grammar, poetry,
and the sacred sciences, and at last, being appointed to the care of
the school, he drew students to hear him from all the southern
provinces. In short, the scholasticus of Nutscell became a famous
man; he taught not only the monks but even the nuns of that part of
the world to study grammar and write hexameter verse; he attended
royal councils and episcopal synods, and he even appeared in the
character of an author, and composed a treatise on the Eight Parts
of Speech. “Yet, though indued with such excellent knowledge,” says
his biographer, “he was nothing puffed up in mind, nor did he
despise any who were of meaner abilities, but the more his learning
increased so much also did he increase in virtue, only showing
himself the more humble, devout, pitiful and obedient.” Both King
Ina, of Wessex, and Archbishop Bretwald, of Canterbury, knew his
worth, and desired nothing better than to raise him to the highest
dignities; but neither the charms of a studious life in his own cloister,
nor the certain prospect of court preferment, sufficed to satisfy his
ambition. He had within him in its fullest measure the apostolic
fervour which animated so many of his countrymen, and led them to
carry back to the old Germanic soil from whence they sprang the
new faith which they had learnt in Britain. Year after year there
came the news of English missionaries who had passed over into
that huge province which then extended between the Elbe and the
Rhine, the greater part of which was swallowed up in the inundation
of 1287, and now forms the bed of the Zuyder Zee. It was called
Friesland, and was the chief seat of the English missions. The first
man who gave a certain sort of shape and system to these missions
was an English priest named Egbert, who had been educated at
Lindisfarne by Bishop Colman, and afterwards passed over to Ireland
to improve himself in her schools. The Anglo-Saxon scholars were
accustomed at this time to resort in great numbers to the sister isle,
going about from one master’s cell to another, to gather from each
the science for which he was most renowned. The Irish received
them hospitably, and furnished them with food, books, and teaching,
gratis.
Egbert and his friend Edilhun were studying in the monastery of
Rathmelsigi, in Connaught, when the great pestilence of 664 broke
out, which caused such terrible ravages both in England and Ireland.
It was on this occasion that St. Ultan, bishop of Ardbraccan,
collected all the children who were left orphans, and had them
brought up in a hospital or asylum at his own charge. The two
English students were attacked by the plague, and Egbert, believing
his last hour was at hand, went out in the morning, and sitting alone
in a solitary place thought over his past life, and being full of
compunction at the thought of his sins, watered his face with his
tears, praying to God that he might yet have time granted him to do
penance. He also made a vow that should it please God to spare his
life, he would never return to his native land, but live abroad as a
stranger; and that besides the Divine Office of the Church he would
every day recite the entire Psalter, and every week pass one whole
day and night fasting. Edilhun died the next night, gently
reproaching his friend for having thus prevented their entering into
everlasting life together; and Egbert kept his vow and remained in
Ireland, doing good service as well to the Scots and Picts as to his
countrymen, for it was through his influence that the former at last
conformed to the Roman method of observing Easter, and his school
was resorted to by every Anglo-Saxon student who crossed the sea
in search of Divine wisdom. In his heart, however, Egbert nursed a
great design, which he was never suffered to carry out in person. He
desired to carry the Gospel among the races of Germany whence the
English were originally descended, and Wicbert, one of his
companions, being filled with the like desire, did actually proceed to
Frisia, and there preached for two whole years among the heathen,
but without much fruit. Egbert, understanding that it was not the will
of God that he should himself embrace a missionary life, and being
warned that his vocation lay rather among his own people, cherished
the hope of at least inspiring some of his scholars with the apostolic
spirit. Among these was Wilibrord, who, after receiving his early
education among the monks of Ripon, had passed over into Ireland
in his twentieth year, attracted by the excellent science which then
flourished in her schools, and the fame of his learned countryman. It
appears probable that the two Ewalds, martyred in Friesland in 695,
were likewise pupils or friends of Egbert’s, for Bede tells us that they
were living strangers in Ireland for the sake of the eternal kingdom;
that both were pious, but that Black Ewald was the more learned of
the two. Wilibrord departed for Friesland in 696, accompanied by
twelve fellow-missionaries; and the protection of Pepin, who then
ruled the Franks as mayor of the palace to the Merovingian
monarch, enabled him to pursue his apostolic career in spite of the
opposition of Radbod, the Pagan duke of the country. It would be
pleasant, did space permit it, to say something of his labours;—to
relate how he found his way into Denmark and brought away thirty
young Danes, whom he sent to be instructed in the schools which he
had founded at Treves and Utrecht; how on his voyage back to
Friesland he landed at Heligoland, the holy island of the Saxons, but
which then bore the name of Fosetesland, from the hideous idol to
whose worship it was dedicated. It was a wild, mysterious spot. No
animals that had once grazed on its sacred herbage were suffered to
be molested, and near the altar of the god a clear stream bubbled
up of which the natives never drank save in awful silence, for the
utterance of a single word would, as they believed, bring down on
them the vengeance of the dreaded Fosete. Wilibrord caused some
of the cattle to be killed for food, and baptized three converts in the
fountain, over the waters of which he broke the mystic silence by
pronouncing the invocation of the Holy Trinity. This daring act
excited the direful wrath of Radbod, and on the death of Pepin, in
714, Wilibrord found himself forced to leave the country. He was,
however, reinstated in his bishopric of Utrecht by Charles Martel, and
in 717 we find him engaged in destroying another Frisian idol in the
isle of Walcheren.
Tales like these fired the heart of Winfrid with the desire of sharing
in such glorious enterprises. After a journey to Rome, whither he
went to obtain the authority and blessing of Pope Gregory II., he
joined Wilibrord at Utrecht, and for some time laboured under his
direction. But finding that the bishop intended to have him
appointed his successor, he fled away in alarm, and took refuge in
the heart of Germany, where he continued until 723, preaching
among the Saxons and Hessians. According to the old writer, Adam
of Bremen, “Winfrid, the philosopher of Christ,” as he calls him, is
undoubtedly to be regarded as the first apostle of that part of the
country. It was at this time that he gained a young disciple, whose
story is sufficiently connected with the subject which we wish to
illustrate to justify its insertion here. Adela, the daughter of King
Dagobert II., had founded a monastery at Treves, where, on his
journey from Friesland into Hesse, Winfrid was hospitably received
and entertained. After he had said mass, he sat down to table with
the abbess and her family; and her young grandson, Gregory, a boy
of fifteen, who had just come from the court school, was summoned
to read aloud the Latin Scriptures, according to custom, during the
repast. Having knelt and received the holy missionary’s blessing, he
took the book, and acquitted himself of his task with sufficient
success. “You read very well, my son,” said Winfrid, “that is, if you
understand what you are reading.” Gregory replied that he did, and
was about to continue the lecture, when Winfrid interrupted him.
“What I wish to know, my son, is whether you can explain what you
are reading in your native tongue.” The youth confessed that he
could not do this, but begged the missionary to do so himself. “Begin
again then,” said Winfrid, “and read distinctly;” and this being done,
he took occasion to deliver to the abbess and the rest of the
community, a discourse so sublime and touching, that when they
rose from table Gregory sought his grandmother, and announced his
determination of following their guest, that he might learn the
Scriptures from him, and become his disciple. “How foolish!” said the
abbess; “he is a man of whom we know nothing: I cannot tell you
whence he comes, or whither he goes.” “I care nothing for that,”
replied Gregory; “and if you will not give me a horse, I will follow
him on foot.” His importunity prevailed, and he was permitted to join
the company of Winfrid, and journey with him into Thuringia.
The prodigious success that accompanied the labours of Winfrid,
having reached the ears of Pope Gregory II. he was summoned to
Rome, and there consecrated bishop of the German nation. At the
same time he received his new name of Boniface, and solemnly
signed an oath of fidelity to the Holy See, which he placed on the
tomb of the Apostles. Then returning to Germany he pursued his
apostolic career along the banks of the Rhine and the Danube; he
penetrated into the wild fastnesses of Hesse, cut down in the
ancient Hercynian forest the huge Donner Eiche, or thunder oak,
sacred to Jupiter, and erected a wooden chapel out of its timbers, on
the spot where now stands the town of Geismar. Within the space of
twenty years one hundred thousand converts had abjured their idols
and received baptism, but the work as it grew on his hands required
additional labourers. The eloquence which in old time had earned for
the monk Winfrid a scholar’s fame, was now employed to rouse the
apostolic spirit in the hearts of his countrymen, and a circular letter
addressed to the bishops and abbots of England, painted the wants
of the German mission in such moving terms that his appeal was
quickly responded to, and he soon found himself surrounded by a
noble band of missioners, among whom were Burchard, Lullus,
Wilibald, and Winibald, the two last named being nephews of the
saint.
 We find from the lives of these great men, written by their
immediate followers, that the same form of community life was
adopted among them which we have seen had been already
established in the English dioceses. The bishop and his clergy
formed a kind of college;[63] and, in this episcopal monastery, as it
may be called, the younger clerics were trained in letters and
ecclesiastical discipline. The college thus founded by St. Wilibald at
Ordorp, became so famous as to draw learned men from all parts of
Europe to take part in his labours among the populations of Hesse
and Thuringia. Yet more renowned was the episcopal seminary,
founded at Utrecht by St. Gregory, the young disciple of St. Boniface
already named, who, after completing his studies at Ordorp, and
following the saint through the long course of his missions, was sent
by him a little before his death to administer the see of Utrecht, then
vacant by the death of Wilibrord. Gregory formed his clergy into a
community, which he governed in person, and was joined by many
illustrious Englishmen, among whom was St. Lebwin, the apostle of
Overyssel, and the patron saint of Deventer. The seminary of Utrecht
produced some famous alumni, of whom I will name but one whose
history cannot be altogether passed over in a narrative of schools
and schoolboys. Luidger was the son of a Friesian noble, who
confided him to St. Gregory’s care at a very early age. In fact,
Luidger’s somewhat premature commencement of his school life was
the result of his own entreaties. He was a precocious child, who
cared nothing at all for play, and so soon as he could walk and talk
gave signs of a passion for books and reading. Whilst his
companions were engaged in the sports of the age he would gather
together pieces of bark off the trees and busy himself in making little
books out of these materials. Then he would imitate writing with
whatever fluid he could find, and running to his nurse with these
fine treasures, bid her take care of them, as though they had been
the most precious codices. If any one asked him what he had been
doing all day, he would reply that he had been making books; and if
further questioned as to who had taught him to read and write, he
would answer “God taught me.” It will not seem astonishing that a
child of this temper should be possessed with a strong desire to
learn how to read and write in good earnest. Yielding to his
persevering request his parents accordingly sent him to Utrecht,
where Gregory placed him in his school and gave him the tonsure.
The Monk of Werden, who wrote his life, records his sweetness with
his companions, and his devotion in church. He was always reading,
singing, or praying; and always to be seen with a bright and smiling
countenance, though seldom moved to laughter. And there was
something about him so winning and amiable, that master and
schoolfellows all loved him alike. In course of time he was sent to
England to receive deacon’s orders, Gregory himself not having
received episcopal consecration; and here, for the first time, he
became acquainted with Alcuin, whose scholastic career was just
then commencing. Luidger returned to Utrecht, but an unfortunate
blunder which he made in the public reading of a lesson, and which
drew down on him a severe reproof from his abbot, suggested to
him the desirableness of a further course of study, under the great
English master. Gregory reluctantly consented to his plan, and
Luidger undertook a second voyage to England, and spent three
years and a half in the school of York. Here he was as popular as he
had formerly been at Utrecht, and his biographer seems half
disposed to think that the extraordinary signs of affection lavished
on him by his masters and fellow-students require some excuse, for
he tells us they really could not help it, and that any one who had
known him must have done the same. To none, however, was he so
dear as to Alcuin, who always bestowed on him the title of “son.”
During his residence in York, Luidger read through the whole of the
Old and New Testaments besides a great many books of secular
literature, and thoroughly studied the monastic rule as it was carried
out in the English monasteries; and at the end of that time he
returned to Utrecht, laden with books, and well fitted to instruct
others. Alberic, the successor of Gregory, ordained him priest, and
sent him to preach in his own country, till the Saxons drove him out,
and then he became the apostle of that people also. Charlemagne
heard of his merit from Alcuin, who by that time was fixed at the
imperial court, and by his orders, sorely against the will of the
missioner, Luidger was consecrated first bishop of Mimigardford in
Saxony. He immediately founded a great monastery of regular
canons to serve his cathedral, from which circumstance the name of
the place was changed to Minster, or Münster, which it still bears.
But his favourite foundation was at Werden, a spot which he had
chosen in the midst of the huge virgin forests which clothed the
banks of the river Rura. The old legend makes us understand what
sort of work was involved in these foundations, when it tells us that
the bishop and his companions, having pitched their tents, prepared
to cut down the trees and clear a space large enough to contain a
few rude huts; but they were dismayed when they beheld the
massive trunks of the growth of centuries, with their branches so
thickly interlaced that they could catch no glimpse of the sky, while
the summits of the mighty oaks seemed to touch the clouds. They
determined to wait till morning to commence their task; and
meanwhile Luidger knelt down beneath one of the largest oaks, and
was soon absorbed in his devotions. It was then a clear and
beautiful night, the moon and stars shining unclouded in the
heavens. Gradually, however, the clouds gathered, the wind arose,
and a furious tempest burst over the forest. The monks heard the
crash of falling trunks and trembled with fear; they guessed not that
the stormy elements were being forced to do them service. When
morning dawned there was an open space around them, the trees
lay prostrate on all sides, and a sufficient space was cleared for the
foundation of the monastery. One tree alone remained untouched, it
was that beneath which St. Luidger had prayed, and which was long
reverentially preserved. When at last it was cut down, a stone was
placed on the site in memory of the event.
In these episcopal monasteries Luidger established a course of
sacred studies, over which he personally presided. Such was, in fact,
the universal discipline observed by the German missionaries, and
hence the institution of cathedral schools spread over every province
from Denmark to the mountains of the Tyrol. There we find the
same class of foundations established by St. Virgil, Bishop of
Saltzburg, concerning whom it will be necessary to speak a little
more particularly. He was a native of Ireland, and held to be one of
the most learned men of his time. It appears probable, though it is
by no means certain, that he is the same Virgil who, when still a
simple priest, was sent into Bavaria, together with Sidonius, and was
there reported to have given expression to certain scientific theories
of doubtful orthodoxy. It is not easy at the present day to determine
precisely what the supposed errors were, as the only notice of them
that remains occurs in a letter from St. Boniface to Pope Zachary,
wherein Virgil is charged with teaching “that there is another world,
and other men under the earth, another sun and another moon.”
The reply of the Pope was to the effect that if on examination by a
council Virgil should be convicted of teaching this “perverse
doctrine,” he should be degraded; and the matter was finally settled
by his being summoned to Rome, where inquiry was made into the
facts of the case. It would seem that his explanation of his own
doctrine must have proved satisfactory, if the priest Virgil here
spoken of were the same who was shortly afterwards raised to the
see of Saltzburg, and who in 1233 was solemnly canonised by Pope
Gregory IX. These facts have, however, furnished the groundwork of
a story which has been repeated by D’Alembert, and adopted with all
its crowd of attendant blunders by a host of modern imitators.
According to this version, Virgil, Bishop of Saltzburg, was
excommunicated by St. Boniface for teaching the existence of the
antipodes, and this sentence is represented to have been confirmed
by Pope Zachary.[64] It will be seen, however, that the person of
whose doctrines Boniface complained was not a bishop, but a priest;
that the opinions attributed to him bore no reference to the
antipodes; that he was not excommunicated; and that so far from
either passing or confirming such a sentence, the Holy See
examined, and it is to be presumed approved his doctrine, since it
raised him to a bishopric, and at a subsequent period canonised him.
St. Boniface reported the supposed errors of Virgil as they were
reported to him, and whatever may be understood by the
expressions which he quotes, they cannot be held to signify a belief
in the antipodes. They rather seem to point to some theory of the
existence of another race of men, distinct in origin from the sons of
Adam, who therefore shared neither in original sin nor the benefits
of redemption, errors which, as Baronius shows, might reasonably
be styled ‘perverse.’ It is indeed true that Bede, and other early
writers on natural philosophy, did not believe in the antipodes; not,
as Mr. Turner remarks, from “any superstitious scruple,” but because
they followed the geographical system of Pliny, who imagined the
climate of the southern hemisphere to be incapable of supporting
human life. Yet this history of Virgil and his condemned propositions
has been made the occasion of impeaching St. Bede, St. Boniface,
and the whole race of monastic scholars, not only of considering a
belief in the antipodes as heretical, but of denying the spherical form
of the earth, a point which was certainly never involved in the
controversy.[65]
Next to the foundation of churches and monasteries, St. Boniface
trusted to the establishment of public schools for the consolidation
of the faith in the newly converted countries. In every place where
he planted a monastic colony a school was opened, not merely for
the instruction of the younger monks, but in order that the rude
population by whom they were surrounded might be trained in holy
discipline, and that their uncivilised manners might be softened by
the influence of humane learning. At Fritislar and at Utrecht, as
afterwards at Fulda, public schools were therefore opened, and how
nearly the maintenance and prosperity of these schools lay at the
heart of their founder, may be gathered from the epistle which he
wrote shortly before his martyrdom to Fulrad, the councillor of King
Pepin, in which he implores the protection of that monarch for such
of his disciples as were engaged in the work of educating children.
We also find incidental notices in his letters of certain monks
appointed by him to the post of schoolmasters (magistri infantium).
St. Lullus, who has been named above among the companions of
St. Boniface, and who was destined in after years to become his
successor, had been educated at Malmsbury, whence he removed to
Jarrow and finished his studies under Bede. Nine of his letters are
preserved among those of St. Boniface, and in one of them,
addressed to Cuthbert, abbot of Wearmouth, he entreats that copies
of the works of his venerable master may be sent to him without
delay. Cuthbert’s reply shows in what esteem Bede was already held
as a writer, both at home and abroad, and how great was the
demand for his works, which the copyists could not multiply fast
enough. He begs for a little indulgence, seeing that the terrible cold
of the past winter has disabled the hands of his best writers. “Since
you have asked me for some works of the Blessed Bede,” he says, “I
have prepared, with the help of my boys, what I now send you,
namely, his books in prose and verse on the man of God, Cuthbert. I
would have sent you more had I been able. But this winter the frost
in our island has been so severe, with terrible winds, that the fingers
of our transcribers have been unable to execute any more books.”
Here is a glimpse into what one may call the real life of the
scriptorium, which we are sometimes disposed to regard in a certain
picturesque and sentimental light. Incessant labour and chapped
hands formed part of the business, and the severities of climate
made themselves felt in rooms entirely destitute of the appliances of
modern comfort. Cuthbert goes on to entreat St. Lullus to send him
if possible some foreign artificers skilled in the art of making glass
vessels, and also a harper. “I have a harp,” he says, “but no one
who knows how to play on it.” The whole correspondence of St.
Boniface and St. Lullus bears witness to the deep interest felt by
their countrymen in the work on which they were engaged. Their
letters are addressed to bishops, abbots, monks, and nuns, and
show how close an intercourse was kept up with England in spite of
the difficulties of communication. Presents are exchanged between
the absent missionaries and their friends at home. While the English
kings and prelates send contributions of books and altar-plate, and
the English nuns despatch a welcome supply of clothing, Boniface
sends back a chasuble, “not all of silk, but mingled with goats’ hair,”
and some linen cloths, which, before the linen manufactory had
been introduced into England, were highly prized luxuries. To
another friend he presents some fine German falcons. Some of the
letters preserved are of peculiar interest, as showing us what kind of
learning was then pursued in the religious houses of England, and
specially in those of the English nuns, whom Mabillon calls, “the
peculiar glory of the Order.” Boniface in former years had directed
the studies of several convents of religious women, and kept up an
active correspondence with his old pupils, who entered heartily into
all his interests, and forwarded them to the best of their power.
Naturally enough, their talk is often of books. In one of his earliest
letters, addressed to the Kentish abbess Eadburga, he begs her to
send him the “Acts of the Martyrs;” and in her reply, which is written
in Latin, she informs him that, together with the literary offering, she
has sent him fifty pieces of gold and an altar carpet. Her liberality
encourages him to beg for new favours; and whilst he thanks her for
her present, he petitions that she will get written out for him, either
by herself or her scholars, the Epistles of St. Paul in letters of gold,
in order to inspire his neophytes with greater reverence for the Holy
Scriptures. In his next epistle he rewards her diligence with the
appropriate present of a silver pen.
Eadburga removed to Rome, whence many of her letters to
Boniface were afterwards addressed. But the correspondence
continued to be carried on by some of the pupils whom she had left
behind her in England, and specially by a relation of the saint’s
named Lioba, then a religious in the convent of Wimbourne.
Of this convent and its learned inmates I must say a few words, as
they deserve a place in our catalogue of English scholars. The
present collegiate church of Wimbourne, ancient as it is—and the
architecture of its tower bears out its claim to have been founded by
the Confessor—does but mark the site of that far more ancient
minster which owed its erection to the two sisters of good King Ina,
Cuthburga and Guenburga by name. This was one of the very
earliest convents of women founded in England, and is noticed by
St. Aldhelm in a letter written in 705, wherein he declares that he
has purposed, in the hidden recesses of his soul, to grant the
privilege of free election to certain monasteries in his diocese;
among others, that which lieth by the river Wimburnia, presided over
by Cuthburga, sister to the king. Perhaps he was moved to this act
of favour by the fact that Cuthburga and Guenburga were pupils of
his old friend the abbess Hildelitha, the first of English virgins who
had consecrated herself to Christ. Hildelitha received her education
at Chelles, in France, and brought into the cloisters of Barking all the
learning of that famous school. This she increased by her intercourse
with St. Aldhelm; and her disciples, as we have seen, were rather
profoundly versed in sacred letters. Neither did the Wimbourne
scholars decline in learning under the good abbess Tetta, who was
governing a community of five hundred nuns with admirable wisdom
at the time when Lioba first introduced herself to the notice of St.
Boniface in the following graceful letter:—
“To the most noble lord, decorated with the pontifical dignity,
Boniface, most dear to me in Christ, and, what is more, united to me
by the ties of blood, Leobgitha, the last of the handmaids of Christ,
health and salvation.
“I beg your clemency to condescend to recollect the friendship
which you had some time ago for my father. His name was Tinne; he
lived in the western parts, and died about eight years ago. My
mother also desires to be remembered by you; her name is Ebba,
she is related to you, and suffers much from infirmity. I am their only
daughter, and desire, though unworthy, to claim you as my brother,
for there are none of my relations in whom I have so much
confidence as in you. I send you a little present, not as being worthy
of your greatness, but that you may preserve the memory of my
littleness, and may not forget me on account of the distance which
separates us. What I chiefly ask of you, dearest brother, is that you
will defend me by the buckler of your prayers from the hidden
snares of the enemy. I beg you to excuse the rustic style of this
letter, and not to refuse me a few words from your affability which
may serve me as a model, and which I shall be eager to receive. As
to the little verses you will find written below, I have endeavoured to
compose them according to the rules of poetry, not out of
presumption, but as a first attempt of my weak little genius, desiring
the help of your elegant mind. I learnt this art from Eadburga, who
ceased not to meditate on the Divine law day and night. Farewell;
live long and happy, and pray for me.”
Then follow four rhymed hexameters in Latin, wherein she not
inelegantly commends him to the protection of Heaven. This was a
common way of concluding a letter in the eighth century, and St.
Boniface, in his epistles to his friends, frequently relieves the graver
subjects of which he treats by a Latin distich or acrostic; sometimes
also by a scrap of Saxon verse. He responded very heartily to Lioba’s
appeal, and a familiar correspondence was at once opened between
them. It is supposed, with every show of probability, that the lady to
whom St. Boniface afterwards dedicated his poem on the Virtues
was no other than the Anglo-Saxon nun. In the dedication to this
poem he says, “I send to my sister ten golden apples gathered on
the tree of life, where they hung amid the flowers.” These golden
apples are ten enigmas, each containing the definition of some
virtue, the name of which, in true Saxon taste, is formed by the
initial letters of the lines.
Another of the most constant correspondents and advisers of
Boniface was his old diocesan, Daniel of Winchester, whom he
frequently consulted in the difficulties with which he was beset.
Ozanam observes that the former grammarian and scholasticus
peeps out in one of the questions he sends for solution; namely, if
the baptism were valid, administered by a certain priest who was in
the habit of using the form, In nomine Patria et Filia, et Spiritui
Sancta?[66] But we may, I think, acquit our great apostle of the
charge of pedantry, founded on this passage. He was engaged in
planting the Church on a new soil, and a scrupulous exactness, in
preserving the sacramental forms of words from corruption, need
not be taken as a sign of scholastic priggishness. There is no saying
where the “Patria et Filia” might have ended, or what more
extensive variations might not have been added by the il-literati of
Thuringia. Bishop Daniel gave him a great deal of excellent advice,
and was of considerable service to Boniface by supplying him with
books. On one occasion we find the missionary writing to his good
friend, begging him to send the book of the Prophets “which the
abbot Wimbert, my master, left at his death. It is written in large and
very distinct letters; I could not have a greater consolation in my old
age, for there is no book like it in this country, and as my sight
grows weak I cannot distinguish the small letters which run together
in the volumes I now have.”
In 732, Boniface received the pallium from the hands of Pope
Gregory III., together with the authority of Papal Legate and Vicar
over the bishops of France and Germany. This office empowered him
to take every step necessary for the firm establishment of the faith
in the newly converted countries, and at the same time he was
charged with the far more difficult task of restoring Church discipline
in the Gallican provinces, where, owing to the barbarism of the
times, a frightful state of anarchy prevailed. We shall chiefly follow
him in his apostolic career in Germany, where his first care was to
provide for the necessities of the infant Church by the erection of
several new sees. Burchard was consecrated Bishop of Wurtzburg,
and Wilibald was appointed to the see of Eichstadt, a woody district
overspread with oaks, which as yet contained but one small church.
Other prelates were named to fill the sees of Erfurt, Ratisbon, and
Friesingen. The care of the Archbishop was next directed to
providing a succession of clergy for the new dioceses, and with this
view he founded several monasteries, one of which became in after-
times the greatest monastic school in Germany. In the year 730,
when Boniface travelled into Bavaria, to re-establish ecclesiastical
discipline in that country, many Bavarian nobles committed their
sons to his care, and among these was Sturm, who was offered by
his parents to the service of God. Boniface placed him in the
monastery he had recently founded at Fritzlar, under the care of
Wigbert, one of his English disciples, and took great care of his
education. The innocence and humility of the youth made him dear
to all his masters, and he quickly learnt the Psalter by heart, and
studied the hidden sense of the sacred Scriptures. Being ordained
priest, he preached among the neighbouring population for three
years, but at the end of that time he was seized with the desire to
seek out some solitude where he might found a religious house; and
Boniface, approving his design, sent him into the forest of Buchonia
to choose a fitting site. Taking two companions with him, they
travelled on for two days, seeing nothing but the earth and the sky,
and the huge trees through which they made their way. At the end
of the third day they reached Hirsfield, where they built themselves
some rude huts with the bark of the trees which they felled, and
began the practices of a religious life. Boniface, however, was not
satisfied with their choice of a situation, and at his desire, Sturm,
after exploring the upper course of the river Fulda without success,
set out alone, mounted on an ass, on a journey into the wilderness,
through which he travelled for days, seeing nothing but the huge
trees, the birds, and the wild beasts that roamed at large in the
forest glades. At night he cut down wood enough with his axe to
make a little enclosure, within which he fastened his beast to save it
from the wolves; but for himself he feared nothing, and after
tranquilly making the sign of the cross on his forehead, he lay down
and slept till morning. At last he reached a vast and woody solitude,
which Prince Carloman, the owner, bestowed on him as a free gift,
and here, in the year 744, nine years after their settlement at
Hirsfield, Sturm, with seven companions, laid the foundation of the
Abbey of Fulda. St. Boniface gave them the necessary instructions,
and visited them every year; but being desirous to establish among
them the rule of St. Benedict in its perfection, he sent Sturm into
Italy to visit the monastery of Monte Cassino, and others most
renowned for their strict observance, that he might be the better
able to form his own community in regular discipline. After a year
thus spent in studying the monastic rule, Sturm returned to Fulda,
where, before he died, he had the consolation of seeing a zealous
community of 400 monks serving God in what had before been a
desolate wilderness, and the abbey, like all those founded by St.
Boniface, became quickly renowned for the sanctity of its inmates,
and the good scholars whom it nurtured within its walls.
To complete the conversion and civilisation of the country,
Boniface conceived the plan of bringing over some religious women
from England, and establishing them in various parts, that they
might provide the means of education to their own sex. Othlonus, in
his history, names Chunihilt and her daughter Berathgilt as the first
Englishwomen who passed over into Germany at the invitation of
Boniface, and calls them valde eruditæ in liberali scientia. But their
renown has been eclipsed by that of St. Lioba, to whom the
archbishop naturally turned as the likeliest of his English friends to
aid him in his great designs. In fact, there were many at Wimbourne
disposed to enter heart and soul into the interests of the German
mission. Lioba and her cousin Thecla were nearly related to the
archbishop, and Walburga was sister to his two companions,
Winibald and Wilibald. He knew that their acquirements qualified
them to teach others. They had all been carefully trained by the
abbess Tetta, and were skilful, not merely in the womanly art of the
needle, but likewise in sacred literature. Lioba’s accomplishments
may be truly called surprising, when we remember that their owner
was a nun, living in the middle of the eighth century in a remote
abbey of a half-barbarous land. Instructed from her childhood in
grammar, poetry, and the liberal arts, she had increased her treasure
of learning by assiduous reading. She had attentively studied the Old
and New Testaments, and committed a great part of them to
memory. She was familiar with the writings of the Fathers, and with
the decrees and canons of the Church—grave sort of reading for so
fair a student—(and I do not use the epithet in a conventional sense,
for her biographer tells us she was named Lioba, or the beloved one,
because of her exceeding beauty); but in those days lighter
literature there was none. As we have seen, she could write in the
Latin tongue with a graceful simplicity, both in prose and verse.
When not engaged in study she worked with her hands, as was
enjoined by the rule, but she greatly preferred reading, or hearing
others read, to manual employments. Indeed, it was not easy to
satisfy her in this respect. When abbess, she insisted on all those
under her charge taking that midday repose allowed by the rule of
St. Benedict, chiefly, as she said, because the want of sleep takes
away the love of reading. But when she herself lay down at these
times to rest, she had some of her pupils to read the Scriptures by
the side of her couch, and they could not omit or mispronounce a
word without her correcting it, though apparently she might be
asleep. Yet all this learning was accompanied with a modesty and
humility that made her seek in all things to be regarded as the least
in the house. There was nothing of arrogance in her behaviour,
nothing of bitterness in her words, says her biographer, Ralph of
Fulda. “She was as admirable in her understanding as she was
boundless in her charity. She liked to wash the feet of her spiritual
children, and to serve them at table, and she did this when she
herself was fasting. Her countenance was truly angelic, always sweet
and joyful, though she never indulged in laughter. No one ever saw
her angry, and her aspect agreed with her name, which in Saxon
signifies the Beloved, and in Greek, Philomena.”[67]
It was in 748 that the letters from St. Boniface reached
Wimbourne, requesting that Lioba, Thecla, and Walburga might be
sent over to him, together with as many of their companions as
might be willing to share in their enterprise. Thirty nuns at once
offered themselves, and the little colony, after a stormy passage
across the sea to Antwerp,[68] was met at Mentz by the archbishop,
who proceeded to establish Lioba in a monastery he had built for her
at Bischoffsheim, where she very soon collected a numerous
congregation of holy virgins. Walburga went on to Thuringia, where
her brother, Winibald, was superior of seven houses of monks. He
had long purposed retiring to some greater solitude, and, with the
advice of his brother, he chose a wild valley in the diocese, clothed
with majestic forests and watered by mountain streams. It bore the
name of Heidensheim; and here, in 752, Winibald, having cleared
the ground, erected a church and two monasteries, one for himself
and his monks, the other for Walburga’s community. The savage
natives beheld with jealous eyes this intrusion into their solitudes,
and the destruction of their sacred oaks; but ere a few years had
passed, the minster of Heidensheim stood in the centre of a
Christian population, and the wild pagan forest had been converted
into a smiling land of woods and pastures, where all the arts of
civilised life were taught and practised in a society over which the
abbot presided with something like paternal sway.
Walburga and her nuns seem to have cultivated letters as
diligently in their forest home as by the banks of the Wimburnia. The
travels of St. Wilibald, who had made the pilgrimage to Jerusalem,
and often related what he had seen to his sister and her nuns, were
afterwards written by them, not certainly in very classical Latin, but
with a lucidity and truthfulness of style which appears in all the
Anglo-Saxon writers, and which contrasts very remarkably with the
marvellous narrations of Sir John Mandeville. St. Walburga appears
also to have been the author of the “Life of St. Winibald,” and it is
quite clear that the singular taste for literature existing among
German nuns in the tenth century formed part of the tradition which
they had received from their Anglo-Saxon foundresses. Mabillon
praises not merely their erudition, but the zeal they displayed in
employing it for the good of their neighbours, and says that, moved
by a laudable emulation, they devoted themselves to study and the
transcription of books with no less energy than the monks. He
particularly praises the nuns of Eiken, who employed their time in
reading, meditating, transcribing, and painting; specially the two
abbesses Harlinda and Renilda, who wrote out the Psalter, the four
Gospels, and many other books of Holy Scripture, adorning them
with liquid gold, gems, and pearls.
The after-career of St. Boniface exhibits him to us reforming the
Frankish Church, long vexed with schism and other frightful
disorders, which had grown out of a century of treasons and civil
distractions unequalled in any history. The enemies of discipline were
naturally enough enemies also to the authority of the Holy See. They
had taken advantage of the chaotic state to which society had
returned to reject the law of clerical celibacy, and to establish the
practice of simony on a gigantic scale. St. Boniface struck at the root
of the evil by enforcing obedience to the Roman pontiff, and, happily
for the future destinies of the French Church, his efforts were
heartily supported by the brothers Carloman and Pepin, the two
mayors of the palace, and the real sovereigns of Gaul. His canons of
reform were promulgated in a grand national council, and in 748
Pope Zachary established the authority of the see of Mentz over all
the German provinces from Utrecht to the Rhetian Alps. One would
have thought that the government of such a province would have
sufficed to employ the energies of one man; but Boniface kept a
place in his thoughts for the necessities of his native land. Exile as
he was, he never forgot that he was an Englishman, and though it
does not appear that he ever revisited his own country, he took a
very active part in some of her affairs. It is rather puzzling to make
out how in those days of rude civilization the German missionaries
contrived to carry on their voluminous correspondence with friends
at home, for the transmission of letters was certainly not provided
for by any international postage regulations. It appears, however,
from many passages in the letters of St. Boniface that his mails were
brought to him by the Anglo-Saxon pilgrims who were continually
streaming from England to Rome. Some of these were students,
going to make their studies in the Saxon school, lately established in
the holy city by King Ina; others were devout monks; and others,
unhappily, rather indevout and disedifying characters, who made
their pilgrimage a pretext for gadding about the world, and casting
off the restraints of respectability. The see of Canterbury was at that
time filled by a great friend of St. Boniface, named Cuthbert, who
applied to him for help and advice in the sore troubles which
surrounded him. The evil example of Ethelbald, King of Mercia, was
causing a grievous relaxation of discipline among the clergy,
whereby many grave scandals were brought on the Church, and St.
Boniface did not hesitate to address the king a letter of
remonstrance, which seems to have produced its effect. In 747, the
Council of Cloveshoe was summoned for the reform of abuses by
command of Pope Zachary, Ethelbald also giving it the weight of his
presence and authority.
The Fathers of this Council owed much to the advice of Boniface,
and their decrees, which are exceedingly interesting, have a good
deal to say on the subject of education. They ordain that priests
should constantly teach and explain the Creed and the “Our Father”
in the vulgar tongue; that bishops, abbots, and abbesses do by all
means diligently provide that all their people incessantly apply their
minds to reading; that boys be brought up in the ecclesiastical
schools, so as to be useful to the Church of God, and that their
masters do not employ them in bodily labour. Sunday is to be strictly
observed, and no man is to dare to do any servile work on that day,
save for the preparing of his meat; but if it be necessary for him to
journey on that day he may ride, row, or travel by any conveyance
he chooses, provided he first hear mass. It is only fitting that every
man should honour that day, on which God created light, sent
manna to the Israelites, rose from the dead, and sent down the Holy
Ghost, and it is also fitting that Christian men should prepare for its
celebration by coming to church on Saturday, bringing a light with
them, and then hearing evensong, and after midnight, prime also;
being careful whilst there to keep a peaceful mind, and not to
dispute or quarrel. Our forefathers were not left in uncertainty as to
what was comprised under the head of servile work, for on this point
Archbishop Theodore had laid down rules of great exactness. He
divided it into two heads, man’s work, and woman’s work; the first
of which comprised husbandry, garden work, the felling of trees, the
building of houses and walls, the quarrying of stone, and the digging
of ditches; while to the gentler sex belonged weaving, washing,
sewing, baking, brewing, wool-combing, the beating of flax and the
shearing of sheep. The feeling with which the observance of the
Sunday was regarded is best expressed by the beautiful Saxon word
by which it was called, the freolsday, or day of freedom, on which
even serfs did not do serfs’ work. The freolsung, or Sunday freedom,
lasted from noontide on Saturday to the dawn of light on Monday
morning—other similar seasons of freedom being established at the
greater festivals. The council likewise enjoined the exercise of
private prayer after the accustomed formula, wherein prayer to the
saints and intercession for the dead are specially named. In church
schools every one is to learn the psalter by heart, even if he cannot
master the art of chanting it, and the chant itself, as well as the
ritual for the administration of the Sacraments, the order of feasts,
and everything else appertaining to divine worship, is ordered to be
exactly conformed to the custom of the Roman Church.[69]
It may be asked what are the schools to which reference is made
in these decrees? Chiefly, no doubt, the Episcopal and monastic
seminaries; but it would seem that the mass priest’s school is also
intended, of which mention is often made in the Anglo-Saxon
councils. Among our Saxon forefathers the education of the children
of his parishioners was recognised as one of the chief duties of the
parish priest. “Mass-priests shall always have in their houses a
school of learners; and if any good man will trust his little ones to
them for lore, they shall right gladly receive and kindly teach them.
For ye shall remember that it is written: ‘They that be learned shall
shine as heaven’s brightness; and they that instruct many to justice
shall shine as stars for ever.’ They shall not however, for such lore,
demand anything of the parents, besides that which the latter may
give of their own will.”[70] This decree, the parentage of which is to
be traced to the Council of Vaison, reappears in the acts of several
councils of England, France, and Italy, the very language being
preserved in the Carlovingian Council of Orleans, and in the
Constitutions of Atto of Vercelli. And here we see the origin of our
parochial schools, which are as emphatically the priest’s schools, as
the seminaries are the schools of the bishop.
The career of Boniface was now drawing to its close, and he
seized the occasion of Pepin’s coronation to obtain the sanction of
the new monarch to a design he had long secretly cherished. It was
that of resigning his dignities, and ending his life, as he had begun
it, in humble missionary labours. He accordingly wrote, entreating
the king’s protection for his churches, clergy, and scholars. “I beg his
highness,” he says, “in the name of Christ, to let me know, while I
live, in what way he will deal with my disciples after my death. For
they are, almost all of them, foreigners; some are priests established
in distant places, others monks employed in their different cloisters
in the education of youth, some of them are old men, who have
been for years the companions and sharers of my labours. Therefore
I am most anxious that they should not be disturbed after my death,
but should remain under the protection of the king.” Pepin having
fully granted all his wishes, and recognised Lullus, whom, by
permission of Pope Zachary, Boniface had named as his successor,
the archbishop published the charter granted by the Holy See to the
abbots of Fulda, which exempted it from episcopal jurisdiction, and
made over to Lullus the church of St. Martin at Utrecht, the ancient
see of his predecessor and countryman, St. Wilibrord. When all
these arrangements had been made, St. Boniface joyfully prepared
for his fourth and last expedition to Frisia, where he seems to have
already anticipated receiving the martyr’s crown. He wrote to Lullus
early in 755 telling him that the end of his life was approaching, and
bidding him finish the church of Fulda, in which he desired that his
body might be laid. “Prepare all things for my journey,” he says, “and
do not forget to enclose with my books a shroud, to contain my
mortal remains.”
He would not depart without bidding farewell to St. Lioba, whom
he recommended to his successor, giving orders that at her death
she also might be buried in the church of Fulda, that together they
might await the resurrection. Having nothing of greater value to
bestow on her, he gave her, as his parting gift, his monk’s cowl, a
precious token of his fatherly regard, and of the absolute poverty
which he professed. He then set out, attended by Eoban, an Anglo-
Saxon monk, whom he had consecrated Bishop of the Frisians, and
fifty-one companions, of whom ten only were priests; and, sailing
down the Rhine, made his way into Eastern Friesland. A great
number of the pagans were induced by his preaching to embrace the
faith; and June 5, being the vigil of Pentecost, was fixed for the
administration of Holy Baptism. A tent was erected on a plain near
the banks of a little river, not far from the modern town of Dokkum.
But whilst the saint awaited his converts, the tidings reached him
that a band of pagans were approaching, armed with shields and
spears. The laymen in his company would have offered resistance,
but Boniface forbade them to draw their swords. “Forbear, my sons,”
he said, “for the Scripture teaches us to return not evil for evil, but
rather good. To me the long-expected day has at last arrived: the
time of my departure is at hand. Be comforted, and fear not them
who can destroy the body, for they cannot touch the immortal soul.
Trust in God and rejoice in Him, and fix the anchor of your hope in
Him who will give you a place in His glorious mansion together with
the angels.”
Whilst he was yet speaking, the barbarians rushed on him and
struck him to the ground. As he fell, with the instinct of self-
preservation, he raised the hand which held the Book of the Gospels,
in order to protect his head. A sword-stroke from one ruffian cut
through the book, while at the same time the dagger of another
pierced his heart; and the rest of the band turned on his companions
who stood around, and slaughtered them every one. They then
seized the baggage of the archbishop, which they hoped would
prove a rich booty, but to their disappointment found nothing but
books and holy relics, which they scattered about the surrounding
fields, casting some of the books into a neighbouring marsh, whence
they were afterwards rescued by the Frisian Christians. Three of
them are still preserved at Fulda; they consist of the copy of the
Gospel already mentioned, which had been written out by the saint’s
own hand, and which, though cut through with the sword which
took his life, has not so much as a letter destroyed; a Harmony of
the Gospels or Canons of the New Testament, and a Book containing
various Treatises and Letters, the pages of which are stained with his
blood.
The body of St. Boniface was carried to Mentz, and thence
translated to Fulda, when the church of that monastery was
consecrated by St. Lullus, the whole history of the event being
related by the monk Candidus, in his metrical Life of Abbot Eigil. St.
Lioba survived her friend for twenty-four years, during which time
she founded a great number of convents, all of which she governed
as superior. She received special marks of respect from Charlemagne
and his queen Hildegardis, who often sent for her to Aix-la-Chapelle,
and loved her as her own soul. She frequently visited Fulda, and on
her death, which took place in 779, her body was carried thither for
burial. The elder monks remembered the wish that had been
expressed by St. Boniface, that their bones should be laid together,
but, fearing to open the sepulchre of the holy martyr, they buried St.
Lioba at the north side of the altar, which he had himself
consecrated in honour of the twelve Apostles. There the two saints
still repose, for though the church of Fulda has been rebuilt four
times since the day of its first dedication, the ancient crypt has
always been preserved, and there the English pilgrim may still revere
the relics of his great countryman which are preserved in their
antique shrine, together with two memorials of him, the ivory crosier
which he was accustomed to use, and the dagger that shed his
blood.
 C H A P T E R V.
CHARLEMAGNE AND ALCUIN.
a.d. 747 TO 804.
At the moment when the nascent civilisation of Saxon England
was being doomed to extinction, and the Danish hordes were
everywhere making havoc of those religious houses which for 160
years had been the chief nurseries of learning in the West, light was
beginning once more to dawn over the schools of France, where
under the barbarism of the Merovingian kings liberal studies had all
but entirely decayed. At an earlier period indeed, as we have seen,
the Church of Gaul, far from deserving the charge of barbarism, had
produced a crowd of illustrious writers, by whom the Christian
dogmas were clothed in a classic dress. Down to the end of the sixth
century remains of the old Roman municipal schools continued to
exist, wherein Christian students disdained not “to hold the harp
with Orpheus, or the rule with Archimedes; to perceive with
Pythagoras, to explain with Plato, to imply with Aristotle, to rage
with Demosthenes, or to persuade with Tully”[71]—in other words,
they followed the ordinary course of studies provided in the Roman
schools. Even when these disappeared, the episcopal and monastic
schools continued to preserve some knowledge of letters. The
multiplication of monasteries, even before the arrival of the
Benedictines in 543, had progressed with extraordinary rapidity. We
read of one bishop establishing forty communities in his own
diocese; and during the century that succeeded the first foundation
made by St. Maurus, as many as 238 Benedictine monasteries are
known to have arisen in different provinces of Gaul. It is probable
that most of these monasteries, to whatever rule they belonged,
possessed a school. The monastic rules which sprung up previous to
the arrival of St. Maurus—such as those established by St. Martin,
St. Eugendus, St. Yrieix, and St. Columbanus—all enjoined study and
the transcription of books, as well as manual labour. Nor can it be
doubted that secular as well as religious pupils were received in the
monastic schools, and that the education given was not exclusively
ecclesiastical. It even appears as though the Gallo-Roman nobility of
this period were more solicitous to give their sons a liberal education
than their chivalric descendants of six centuries’ later date. I will give
but two examples. At the monastery of Condat it is expressly stated
that noble secular youths were educated in all the learning of the
times; and what this term implies is explained in the life of St.
Eugendus, who received his entire training there, and never once left
the monastery from his seventh to his sixtieth year. He was as
familiar with the Greek as with the Latin orators, says his biographer,
and was besides a great promoter of sacred studies. The other
example is even more to the point, as showing up to what age
secular youths were then expected to continue students. St. Aicard
received his education in the monastic school of Soissons, about the
middle of the seventh century, and remained there until his
seventeenth year, when he was summoned home by his father to be
introduced at court and to commence his military career—a career,
be it remembered, into which the aspirant to chivalry in the twelfth
century would have been initiated at seven. He afterwards embraced
the religious state, and did much to improve the studies in his
monastery of Jumièges. Then there were the episcopal schools, in
which the learning given was far from being superficial. St. Gregory
of Tours tells us that when King Guntram entered Orleans in 540 he
was met by a band of scholars from the bishop’s school, who
welcomed him in Latin, Greek, Hebrew, and Syriac verses of their
own composition. St. Gregory had himself received his education in
the episcopal schools of Clermont and Vienne, and informs us that
even ecclesiastical students, before entering on their sacred studies,
went through a course of the seven liberal arts, together with one of
poetry and the Cantus.[72] M. Guizot gives a list of the principal
monastic and episcopal schools of which a distant notice is to be
found in the histories of the seventh century. Twenty of them are in