Page:The Mediaeval Mind Vol 1.djvu/413

From Wikisource
Jump to navigation Jump to search
This page has been validated.
CHAP. XVI
THE HERMIT TEMPER
391

creatures: so love you, and not otherwise. Others, even women, attained this standard. In the legend, St. Elizabeth of Hungary gives thanks that she loves her own children no more than others'. She is no mother, but a saint. So Guigo will love all—love indeed? one queries. Thus also will he have others hold themselves toward him, lest he be a stumbling-block in their or his salvation.

Yea, salvation! If indeed this monk shall not have attained that, of a truth he would be of all men most miserable save for the quiet, thought-filled calm which is his inner and his veritable life. It is a calm not riven by the storms which drove the soul of Peter Damiani. God was not less to Guigo; but the temperaments of the two men differed. Not beyond or out of one's nature can one love or yearn, or even know the stress of storm.