1054-1068 reasoned erroneously-you may disgrace your reputation, but you cannot renounce it; you may misemploy your talents, but you cannot discharge yourself from the responsibility they impose. But Lanfranc yielded to the impulse. Quitting Avranches, he tramped on the road to Rouen. His track conducted him through the forest, of which the essarts still constitute the prominent features of the pleasant region. Robbers attacked him. No use raising the clameur de haro-no one to hear. Stripped, and bound to a tree, he waited for the opening dawn, and attempted to repeat the service appertaining to the circling hours-the three Hallelujah Psalms, concluding the cycle of each day's prayer and praise. But he could not. He had never committed them to memory-and deeply was he stung by the sense of his neglect of holy things; and the preponderating worth he had attached to secular learning. The silent hours continued, and he endeavoured again to repeat the opening services-still he could not. Struck with compunction, he poured forth his mind in prayer; deploring the time he had given to human learning, the labour he had bestowed on literary studies; and now, when he ought to pray, he was unable to perform his duty to the Church; and he would henceforth devote himself body and soul to the Donor of all blessing. In the early twilight morning he heard footsteps approaching him-some peasants released him. During the darkness of the dreary night, his mind suddenly 1054-1068 received a new impulse, and suggested to him the enquiry, whether there might not be some humble and sequestered monastery in the vicinity. What he sought he found, and he was conducted to a mean and humble structure then rising from the banks of a rivulet-the Bec, whence the Monastery derived its honoured name, Bec Herlouin, by which it was afterwards known. Her- Herlonin. louin, the founder, was of noble birth; the real old northern blood flowed in his veins, a knight until he renounced the world. Learning he had none. When he first professed, he could not read a letter, and he subjected himself to all the austerities and privations enjoined by St. Benedict's rule. Manual labour was the employment of the brethren, and much was Herlouin derided by his former companions when they saw his coarse garments, and unkempt beard. Hard and fast Herlouin worked, aiding the building of the Monastery, however coarse or hard; except when chaunting in the choir, or partaking of the one daily scanty meal which he grudged himself, you would always find him digging and delving, or his hand grasping the spade, or with hod on shoulder, as Lanfranc found him, all begrimed with mortar, engaged in vaulting an oven. Lanfranc humbly made his obeisance to the Abbot. His aspect, or perhaps his accent, bespoke his country. "Art thou a Lombard?" said Herlouin, probably actuated by some secret presenti, Receives 1054-1066 ment as to the intentions of the stranger. Lanfranc replied that he sought the cowl. Herlouin, trowel in hand, desired a Monk to bring the volume, containing the rigid rule imposed by their founder; the preface was read, giving the postulant the summary of his duties, expressed with epigrammatic terseness. Faith and works; charity and humility; patience not alloyed by grudging; zeal deprived of asperity; and so on throughout the seventy-three chapters composing the code. Lanfranc disclosed his name, and Herlouin then certified of the stranger's eminence, cast himself at his feet; and Lanfranc was duly admitted into the community. Lanfranc's conduct in this matter was not wise, perhaps scarcely right-for of that which God has given us, it is false modesty to be ashamed. During his novitiate, Lanfranc strove to abdicate his pre-eminence; but the light shone too brightly to be concealed. Bec became proud of her inmate. He felt it his duty to employ his talent. Every member of the Benedictine Order was enjoined to earn his daily bread, by daily labour. But Lanfranc's time had been wasted, had he followed the plough, or trenched in the field; and he performed the duty for which he was so well fitted, that of being an instructor. Bec expanded into a College. He was a recognised professor, but under no pretence would he receive the proffered fees. All the higher talents of the mind were considered gifts of the Holy Teaching of Spirit; and it was deemed simony to employ 1054-1066 them for money. The honorarium fell into the common fund. Scholars resorted to him from Lanfranc. all parts of Christendom. Latin Europe, says Milo Crispin, the Monastic Biographer, acknowledged him as the great restorer of knowledge. Greece, the antient teacher of nations, did not disdain the lessons she received. Men of all condition and age, rich and poor, gentle and simple, smitten with this glorious contagion, came to Bec in frequent resort, bestowing their bounty upon the Monastery; whether in testimony of their respect towards Lanfranc, or in token of the instructions they received. Or, according to that peculiar refinement of feeling, [which we find in early times,] it was considered in those days that learning was too precious an article to be bought or sold, and the gift was received as an honorarium; or according to another view, that receiving money for a God-given talent, was simony. The principle exists in our law-Thus a Physician cannot recover his fees; nor a Barrister, the accompaniment, promised by the marked Brief. Nay, it was simony, at least in theory, for a champion to receive hire. Was not his strength and skill given to him by his Maker? of the Monastery. 10. Bec now flourished as an academy. Progress Scholars encreased rapidly; and with success, emulation; and with emulation, envy, hatred, malice, and all uncharitableness. Parties arose in Cabals against Lanfranc. 1054-1066 Bec. No brightness of spirit can extirpate the jealousies which spring up like ill-odoured weeds, in the damp corners and shady sides of any close community. Many the cabals of which Lanfranc became the object. But he heeded not the strife. He would not vex his spirit by striving against them; and he proposed to quit Bec, and seek his fortune elsewhere. Herlouin prohibited him, and appointed him to the office of Prior. Lanfranc,-he, destined to become so eminent a statesman,--was actively employed in literary, that is to say theological labour. The codices of the Scriptures had become much vitiated by the oscitancies of the transcribers, and manuscripts with his autograph corrections are still subsisting. Upon some portions of Holy Scripture he composed commentaries, but in his own day, the greatest worth was attached to the treatise by which he opposed the formidable Berengarian heresy. His many enemies, for his reputation, and still more his virtues, had raised a host of critics, who maintained, that in opposing heresy, he himself was heretical,-[were roused against him]. Summoned to appear before the Pope, his vindication of his treatise was unanswerable. But the future Archbishop of Canterbury continued the object of much enmity and envy, which he provoked by his ready tongue. He possessed the true Italian love for fun, drollery, or jocularity. His simplicity was |