Memorials of St. Anselm PDF
Preview Memorials of St. Anselm
AUCTORES BRITANNICI MEDII AEVI • I MEMORIALS OF ST. ANSELM EDITED BY R. W. SOUTHERN AND F. S. SCHMITT, O.S.B. LONDON • Published for THE BRITISH ACADEMY by THE OXFORD UNIVERSITY PRESS 1969 % I I ^ I © THE BRITISH ACADEMY 1969 PRINTED IN GREAT BRITAIN DEDICATED TO THE MEMORY OF TWO MASTERS IN THESE STUDIES FREDERICK MAURICE POWICKE ANDRE WILMART, O.S.B. /*08S3 PREFACE It is now a good many years since the two editors of this volume discovered that their interests in these Anselmian texts were sufficiently close to suggest the possibility of collaboration. Since that date both the form of the projected volume and the nature of their collaboration have developed in many ways, and it would be difficult to explain to others the contribution that each has made. Nor is this at all necessary. It is sufficient to say that every text has been worked over and every difficulty discussed in close collaboration. This is especially true of those parts where a complete identity of view is not in this world to be hoped for. Instead of recounting the history of our partnership we shall simply express our gratitude to those who have assisted our work by their advice and help, and by their permission to use and reproduce the manuscripts under their care. Among others Dr. Richard Vaughan and his predecessors in the librarianship of Corpus Christi College, Cam¬ bridge, Dr. G. R. C. Davis at the British Museum, Mademoiselle M. T. D’Alverny at the Bibliotheque Nationale, Mr. Geoffrey Bill and his assistants at the library of Lambeth Palace, Mr. F. C. Morgan at Hereford Cathedral Library, and Professor Carmelo Ottaviano have given us valuable assistance. Dr. R. W. Hunt has found time among his other duties in the service of medieval scholarship to give us the benefit of his unrivalled knowledge and judgement at every stage of the work. We owe a great debt to Mr. F. E. Harrison for his scholarly labour and enthusiasm in reading the proofs, and for his very important help in compiling the index. Professor Norman Davis has saved us from several errors in the English text of the Confessio morientis, and Dr. D. P. Henry has given us valuable help with the philosophical texts in Lambeth MS. 59. We have also to thank the British Academy for publishing this volume in its new series of medieval texts, and Miss D. W. Pearson, the assistant secretary of the Academy, for her unfailing help on many occasions. Finally, the generosity and hospitality of the Warden and Fellows of All Souls College have done much to minimize the difficulties of collaboration at a distance. It may be convenient at this point to add a word about the principles we have followed in printing these texts. With regard to punctuation and the division into paragraphs we have consulted the convenience of the modern reader. In spelling the reader will find many inconsistencies, viii PREFACE but none, we hope, that will cause any difficulty. Most of them are to be explained by the fact that the early twelfth century was a time of transition from classical (or, more precisely, Carolingian) practice to the freer phonetic system of the later Middle Ages. The inconsistencies which are to be found in the following pages reflect the inconsisten¬ cies of the manuscripts themselves, but we are conscious of our own responsibility for some of them. Any attempt to transfer the contents of a medieval manuscript to a printed page raises problems which cannot be solved except by an approximation to the author’s intentions. The philosophical fragments in Lambeth MS. 59 provide many illustrations of this fact, especially at those points where modern practice requires the use of quotation marks to distinguish the words or phrases which are the subject of the argument. The manuscript employs no device of this kind—a fact which may have an important bearing on some aspects of Anselm’s philosophy. We have thought it necessary to use quotation marks, but it does not seem possible to achieve complete consistency in this or any other convention. R. W. S. F. S. S. CONTENTS PREFACE page vii ABBREVIATIONS Xi INTRODUCTION I I. LIBER ANSELMI ARCHIEPI SCOPI DE HUMANIS MORIBUS 37 APPENDIX 94 II. ALEXANDRI MONACHI CANTUARIENSIS LIBER EX DICTIS BEATI ANSELMI !°5 MIRACULA 196 APPENDIX 269 III. EADMERI MONACHI CANTUARIENSIS SCRIPTUM DE BEATITUDINE PERENNIS VITAE 271 IV. MISCELLANEA ANSELMIANA 293 1. Some fragments from Bee 295 2. The Anselmian miscellany in British Museum MS. Royal 8 D viii 296 3. The Anselmian miscellany in MS. Bodley 561 3°3 4. The Anselmian miscellany in Bodleian MS. Digby 158 3r9 5. The Anselmian miscellany in Lambeth MS. 59 333 6. The Dialogue ‘De custodia interioris hominis’ 354 INDICES I. INDEX CODICUM 361 II. INDEX LOCORUM, NOMINUM, ET SCRIPTORUM 363 III. INDEX RERUM ET VERBORUM 367 ABBREVIATIONS BGPTM Beitrdge zur Geschichte der Philosophic und Theologie des Mittelalters De concordia De concordia praescientiae dei et praedestinationis et gratiae dei cum libero arbitrio (Schmitt, ii. 245-88) De sim. De similitudinibus {P.L. 159, 605-705) Ep. Epistolae Anselmi (the number is that of Dom Schmitt s edition followed by the number in P.L. vols. 158-9) H.N. Eadmeri Historia Novorum in Anglia, ed. M. Rule (Rolls Series, 1884) P.L. Migne, Patrologia Latina Schmitt F. S. Schmitt, S. Anselmi Cantuariensis archiepiscopi Opera omnia, i-vi, 1938-61 V.A. Eadmeri Vita Sancti Anselmi, ed. R. W. Southern, 1962 INTRODUCTION 1 he canon of St. Anselm’s genuine finished works can be very clearly defined. I his was the first point that needed to be established in modern Anselmian studies. In the Middle Ages the body of his writings was encumbered with a large baggage of spurious works, and the Maurist edition (1675; 2nd edit., 1721) of Dom Gabriel Gerberon perpetuated this state of confusion until recent times. It was only in 1923 that Dom Andre Wilmart began the systematic work of distinguishing the genuine works from the host of spurious additions, and the succession of his articles from 1923 to 1932 laid the foundation on which all later workers have built. Without undue rashness, it may be said that the task of dis¬ engaging the hard core of Anselm’s works has now been completed. Anselm’s own works stand out stripped of the fictitious additions of several centuries. The main factor in making possible this new clarity was undoubtedly the excellence of the early manuscript tradition. To this may be added Anselm’s own fastidious literary taste, which distinguishes his work from most imitations. Finally, there is the testimony of his biographer, who took care to record the circumstances in which most of his works were written. The result is that we now have a picture of St. Anselm as an author which is not likely to be much altered by future discoveries. Nevertheless the line between the genuine and the spurious is not at all points equally clear. There are degrees of inauthenticity, and not all the works which must be excluded from the inner company of finished works merit total expulsion. To adapt one of Anselm’s own images, there is an inner citadel where all is safe and assured: these are the works which stand beyond all doubt. But outside the citadel there is a bailey, less safe, but still part of this main structure. It is with this that we are here concerned. To put the matter in less picturesque language, we are con¬ cerned with the work of a small group of Anselm’s friends and disciples, who recorded his words, transcribed his writings before they were com¬ pleted, and preserved his unfinished drafts and notes. The evidence of their activity has been preserved in comparative abundance. The very excellence of the early manuscript tradition, which makes it possible to draw a clear line between genuine and spurious works, has also ensured the preservation of much that cannot be assigned to either of these clearly defined categories. Roughly speaking, the works in this inter¬ mediate zone fall into two classes. They are either reports of Anselm’s C 3501 B 2 INTRODUCTION words written by one of his close companions, or they are remains of unfinished works or notes rescued by zealous disciples from the oblivion into which they would otherwise have fallen. The reports of Anselm’s words consist mainly of records made by Anselm’s secretaries, Eadmer and Alexander, between 1093 and 1109. These two monks of Canterbury had unique opportunities for hearing and reporting Anselm’s words during these years. There is not the slightest reason to doubt their good faith, and—whatever we may think of their skill or standards of accuracy—the substance of what they report can confidently be accepted as a record of Anselm’s thoughts. Eadmer was active as a reporter mainly in the years before 1100, and Alexander mainly after this date, so their records give a continuous picture of Anselm’s mind as it appeared to two close observers throughout his years as archbishop. Eadmer’s reports survive partly in his Vita An- selmi and partly in the Scriptum de beatitudine perennis vitae, which is printed below; all that survives of Alexander’s writing is in the Dicta Anselmi and the Miracula, which are here printed as a whole for the first time. Of Anselm’s literary remains which form the remainder of this volume, it is impossible to speak in general terms. Each item must be considered on its merits. But it can be said that drafts and fragments of Anselm’s work, whether written at his dictation or copied from his own notes, were sought with great eagerness by some of his disciples. Anselm him¬ self refers to this snatching of unfinished works from his pen in his preface in the Cur Deus Homo. The process can be illustrated in the defective texts of the De Incarnatione Verbi and in the logical notes which are preserved in Lambeth MS. 59.1 This interest in even the smallest fragments of his work survived his death and was responsible for the preservation of several of the texts which we print. Naturally, however, that which is preserved without the sanction or supervision of the author cannot claim the same status as works completed in his lifetime and circulated on his own initiative. Works which are preserved in an incomplete form by disciples may be added to, and words which were remembered may be the basis of developments which can scarcely claim to represent the thoughts of the master. In this way we begin the steep descent from genuine records to more or less appropriate em¬ broidery, to imitation, and finally to the completely spurious. Nothing that we print here is pure and perfect Anselm: it is Anselm incomplete, or as others heard or thought they heard him. A number of doubts 1 F. S. Schmitt, Ein neues, unvollendetes Werk des hi. Anselm von Canterbury, BGPTM xxxiii. 3, 1936, and below, p. 333. INTRODUCTION 3 therefore hang over these texts which no amount of discussion can wholly dissipate. It is the purpose of the detailed discussions which follow to define the nature of these doubts, and to indicate the extent to which these texts preserve an accurate record of Anselm’s words and thoughts, and extend our knowledge of his teaching and personality.
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