Note 955 — Chapter IX · THE CLERGY AND MONKS.

Mr. Soames (Anglosax. Church, p. 179, third edit.) says that Dúnstán’s monastery at Glastonbury was the first establishment of the kind ever known in England, and Dúnstán the first of English Benedictine abbots. Nothing can possibly be more inexact than this assertion. Biscop’s foundation at Wearmouth was a Benedictine one. In an address to his monks, he himself is represented to say:—“Ideo multum cavetote, fratres, semper, ne secundum genus unquam, ne deforis aliunde vobis Patrem quaeratis; sed iuxta quod Regula magni quondam abbatis Benedicti, iuxta quod privilegii nostri continent decreta, in conventa vestrae congregationis communi consilio perquiratis, qui secundum vitae meritum et sapientiae doctrinam aptior ad tale ministerium perficiendum digniorque probetur; et quemcunque omnes unanimae charitatis inquisitione optimum cognoscentes eligeretis, hunc vobis, accito episcopo, rogetis abbatem consueta benedictione formari.” Beda, Vit. Bened. § 12. (Opera Minora, ii. 151.) The same author tells us of abbot Céolfrið:—“Multa diu secum mente versans, utilius decrevit, dato Fratribus praecepto, ut iuxta sui statuta privilegii, iuxtaque Regulam sancti abbatis Benedicti, de suis sibi ipsi Patrem, qui aptior esset, eligerent, etc.” Vit. Bened. § 16. (Op. Min. ii. 156.) The author of the anonymous life of St. Cúðberht, which is earlier than that of Beda, says of Cúðberht at Lindisfarne:—“Vivens ibi quoque secundum sanctam Scripturam, contemplativam vitam in actuali agens, et nobis regularem vitam primus componens constituit, quam usque hodie cum Regula Benedicti observamus.” Anon. Cúðb. § 25. (Bed. Op. Min. ii. 271.) At a still later period, viz. the close of the seventh century, we learn that the monastery of Hnutscilling or Nursling in Hampshire was a Benedictine one, and St. Boniface a Benedictine monk. His contemporary biographer Willibald says:—“Maxime suo sub regulari videlicet disciplina abbati, monachica subditus obedientia praebebat, ut labore manuum cottidiano et disciplinali officiorum amministratione incessanter secundum praefinitam beati Patris Benedicti rectae constitutionis formam insisteret,” etc. Vit. Bonif. Pertz, ii. 336. One can hardly imagine how Mr. Soames should suffer himself to be misled by the exaggerations of Dúnstán’s monkish biographers: they are of a piece with their whole story. That the rule had become very much relaxed even in the Benedictine abbeys of this country is not to be doubted: the same thing took place on the continent. Many had perished in the Danish invasions; many had passed insensibly into the hands of secular canons: and it is not at all improbable that in the middle of the tenth century there was not a genuine Benedictine society left in England. But this will certainly not justify the assertions of Bridferð or Adelard, that Dúnstán was the first of English Benedictine monks or abbots. “Et hoc praedicto modo saluberrimam sancti Benedicti sequens institutionem, primus abbas Anglicae nationis enituit,” (Bridferð. MS. Cott. Cleop. B. xii. fol. 72.)—“Monachorum ibi scholam primo primus instituere coepit,”—(Adel. in Angl. Sacra, ii. 101 note) are at the least grave mistakes: one desires to believe that they are not something worse; but they warn us to be extremely cautious how we admit the authority of their writers as to any facts they may please to record.