Table Of ContentAUCTORES 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.
