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Upon the bright green grass against the background of hewn stone walls, in the glorious autumn sunshine, Bernard of Clairvaux moved like the supernal vision of a heavenly dream. His head thrown back, the delicate silver-fair beard scarcely shadowing the spiritual outlines of an almost divine face, his soft blue eyes looked upward, filled with a light not earthly.
Abelard, for example, asked the very reasonable question how the guilt of mankind could be atoned for by the greater guilt of those who put Jesus to death. Abelard's famous opponent, Bernard of Clairvaux, also repudiated Anselm's main contention and fell back upon the theory of a satisfaction to Satan.
"By a vow of poverty and penance, by closing his eyes against the visible world, by the refusal of all ecclesiastical dignities, the abbot of Clairvaux became the oracle of Europe and the founder of one hundred and sixty convents.
Bernard of Clairvaux dwells on "that ecstasy of deification in which the individual disappears in the eternal essence as the drop of water in a cask of wine." Says Meister Eckhart, "Thou shalt sink away from they selfhood, though shalt flow into His self- possession, the very thought of Thine shall melt into His Mine;" and St.
Bernard of Clairvaux, a man who, in earnestness and eloquence, closely resembled Pope Urban and Peter the Hermit. Bernard's influence won to his cause not only the common people, but also nobles and kings, and the Second Crusade was led by Louis VII, King of France, and Conrad III, Emperor of Germany. The time of the Second Crusade was 1147-1149.
The Abbot of Clairvaux, as papal legate, raised a force and reduced to submission Roger, Viscount of Beziers, who openly protected heretics; but the crusading army melted away at the end of the time of enlistment, and the only result of the expedition was the exasperation produced by the devastation of the land.
Beech-nuts and roots were at first their main support; but soon the sympathy of the surrounding country brought sufficiency for their frugal needs. Bernard was consecrated Abbot of Clairvaux by the Bishop of Chalons, the renowned William of Champeaux, with whom he established a deep friendship.
We could form some idea of how the field appeared on the eventful day when King William and King James confronted each other across the narrow stream. Then the scene changed and we found ourselves in Mellefont Abbey, the first Cistercian monastery in Ireland, founded by St. Malachy, the friend of St. Bernard of Clairvaux.
As to the horse, as a creature of vanity and pride, it is opposed by Peter Cantor and Adamantius to the ox, which is all gravity and simplicity. It is well, however, to observe that to confuse the matter, by presenting the horse under another aspect, Saint Eucher compares it to a saint, and the Anonymous Monk of Clairvaux identifies the Devil with the ox.
Bernard's ascetic community at Clairvaux excommunicated a vineyard which a less rigid monk had planted near, so that it bore nothing. In 1120 a bishop of Laon excommunicated the caterpillars in his diocese; and, the following year, St.
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