the chief apostles, my lords Peter and Paul, your friends and protectors, that religious servant of God, Bede, the venerable priest of your monastery; whom, God willing, you may expect to return in safety, when the necessary discussion of the above-mentioned points shall be, by God's assistance, solemnly completed: for whatever may be added to the church at large, by his assistance, will, we trust, be profitable to the things committed to your immediate care."
So extensive was his fame then, that even the majesty of Rome itself solicited his assistance in solving abstruse questions, nor did Gallic conceit ever find in this Angle any thing justly to blame. All the western world yielded the palm to his faith and authority; for indeed he was of sound faith, and of artless, yet pleasing eloquence: in all elucidations of the holy scriptures, discussing those points from which the reader might imbibe the love of God, and of his neighbour, rather than those which might charm by their wit, or polish a rugged style. Moreover the irrefragable truth of that sentence, which the majesty of divine wisdom proclaimed to the world forbids any one to doubt the sanctity of his life, "Wisdom will not enter the malevolent soul, nor dwell in the person of the sinful;" which indeed is said not of earthly wisdom, which is infused promiscuously into the hearts of men, and in which, even the wicked, who continue their crimes until their last day, seem often to excel, according to the divine expression, "The sons of this world are in their generation wiser than the children of light;" but it rather describes that wisdom which needs not the assistance of learning, and which dismisses from its cogitations those things which are void of understanding, that is to say, of the understanding of acting and speaking properly. Hence Seneca in his book, "De Causis,"[1] appositely relates that Cato, defining the duty of an orator, said, "An orator is a good man, skilled in speaking." This ecclesiastical orator, then, used to purify his knowledge, that so he might, as far as possible, unveil the meaning of mystic writings. How indeed could that man be enslaved to vice who gave his whole soul and spirit to elucidate the scriptures? For, as he confesses in his third book on Samuel, if his expositions were productive of no advantage to his readers, yet were they of cou-
- ↑ Seneca, Controvers. lib. 1.
