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He adds in a note: "Cesaire se fit moine l'an 1198, au Val de Saint de Pierre, dit autrement Heisterbach, pres de la ville de Bonne, dans le diocese de Cologne, et ne mourut que pres de quarante ans apres. Il avoit ete maitre des novices dans son couvent, et ensuite prieur de la maison de Villiers." 'Discours sur l'histoire de la Vie des Saints. Les Vies Des Saints'. Paris, 1739. T. i., p. xlvii.
But when his victim sank down in agony, the knife dropped from his murderous hand, his courage failed him, and he felt himself driven from the wood as if chased by a demon. After many years had come and gone, a tired wanderer once knocked at the door of the cloister of Heisterbach, which had been erected by St. Benedict's pious disciples in a remote valley of the Seven Mountains.
Since that time, so the country folk relate, the spirits of the banished monks wander nightly among the ruins, raising mute accusations against their persecutors and the destroyers of their cells. Among them there was one, Gebhard, the last Prior of Heisterbach, who now, they say, wanders about the graves of the monks, and also haunts the burial-places of the Masters of Löwenburg and Drachenburg.
In the Middle Ages the monks of Heisterbach were very famous. Many a rare copy of the Holy Scriptures, many a highly learned piece of writing was sent out into the world from this hermitage, telling of the industry and learning of the pious monks. There was one brother, still young in years, who distinguished himself by his learning.
To crown his unpopularity, he was under the ban of the all-powerful Church, for saints days and Lords Day alike he hunted to his hearts content, and once, on receiving a remonstrance, had threatened to hunt the Abbot of Heisterbach himself. So he lived, isolated, except for his troop of jägers, from the rest of mankind. The forest was his world, his only friends the hounds.
Patrick's Purgatory". Paris, 1718. Preface. "Cesario," which carelessness or the exigency of metre has separated from the "Esturbaquense," of the next line is Caesarius of Heisterbach, a well-known hagiological writer of whom Adrien Baillet thus speaks: "Un religieux Allemand de l'ordre de Citeaux nomme 'Cesaire de Heisterbach', qui mourut du tems de l'empereur Frederic II. travailla aussi a la vie des Saints."
Great rejoicings were held among the tribe when the maiden gave her hand to the young chieftain. A Christian temple was erected in the valley, and a splendid castle was built on the summit of the rocks for the newly-married couple. For about ten centuries their descendants flourished there, a very powerful race in the Rhine countries. The Monk of Heisterbach
The abbey of Heisterbach claims this as an event recorded in its books, and its beautiful ruins and wide naves with old trees for columns are, so says popular rumor, haunted by another wanderer, an abbot with snow-white beard, who walks the cloisters at night counting the graves of his brethren, and vainly seeking his own, which if he once find his penance will be over.
In olden times in a lovely valley near the Seven Mountains, stood a cloister called Heisterbach. Even now parts of the walls of this old monastery remain, and it was not by the hand of time, but by the barbarism of foolish warfare, that its halls fell into ruins. The monks were driven away, the abbey was pulled down, and the stones were used for the building of a fortress.
And it was said that many returned from this expedition, not better, but worse than they went. Therefore the monk Cesarius of Heisterbach, who states this, adds: "All depends on bearing the yoke of Christ not one year or two years, but daily, if a man is really intent on doing it in truth, and in that sense in which our Lord requires it to be done, in order to follow him."
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