witness to the attractive force of his personality.[1] At
his death, says the biographer of saint Odilo, the study
of philosophy in France decayed, and the glory of her priest-
hood well-nigh perished. But Fulbert’s learning was that
of a divine, though he was a scholar and a mathematician
too. He was wont of an evening to take his disciples apart
in the little garden beside the chapel, and discourse to
them of the prime duty of life, to prepare for the eternal
fatherland hereafter. Without this presiding thought
there was infinite danger in the study of letters by them
selves : they were only worth cultivating in so far as
they ministered to man s knowledge of divine things.
We have little information concerning the fortunes of the school of Chartres after Fulbert’s death in 1029 ;[2] but it is natural to presume that the literary tradition of the city, if not unbroken, was before long restored by the presence, whether his influence was actively exercised or not,[3] of its bishop, the great lawyer Ivo, a religious man, as he is described, and of great learning, who in his youth had heard master Lanfranc, prior of Bee, treat of secular and divine letters in that famous school which he had at Bee. Certainly some time towards the close of Ivo’s life (he died in 1115 [4]) the school emerges again
- ↑ Adelman, scholastic of Liege and afterwards bishop of Brescia, writing to Berengar of Tours, re- calls prettily dulcissimum illud contubernium quod . . . inacade- mia Carnotensi sub nostro illo venerabili Socrate iucundissime duxi . . . Sed absque dubio me- mor nostri, diligens plenius quam cum in corpore mortis Indus pore- grinaretur, invitat ad .se votis et tacitis precibus, obtestans per secreta ilia et vespertina colloquia quae nobiscum in hortulo iuxta capellam de civitate quam Deo volente senator nunc possidet, saepius habebat, et obsecrans per lachrymas . . . ut illuc omni stu- dio properemus, viam regiam di- rectim gradientes : Ep. ad Be- rcng., Max. Biblioth. Patrum 18. 438 D, E.
- ↑ The date I give according to the modern reckoning : see Mabil- ion, Vet. Anal. 231 ed. 1723; Gall. Christ. 8. 1116 B, Paris 1744 folio. The old account makes it 1028 : Max. Biblioth. Patrum 18. 3 A, B.
- ↑ Scholas fecit in the Martyro- logium Ecclesiae Carnotensis pre- fixed to Juretus 1 edition of Ivo’s letters, Paris 1610, and in Gallia Christiana 8. 1133 A, is so far as I am aware a solitary notice : nor need it mean much. The Histoire litteraire 10. 112 says that Ivo rebuilt the schools,
- ↑ The year is certain See the Martyrologium and Gallia Christi- ana 8. 1132 A. Other dates, 1116 and 1117, are probably to be explained by the slowness with which news travelled in those days.
