Adalger

ADALGER (Adalgerus or Algerus; according to B. Pez: Adelher). - A Benedictine of the monastery, it seems, of Augsburg in Bavaria and, according to some, also a bishop; he died in 964.

There remains from him the Admonitio ad Nonsvindam reclusum, a treatise on the virtues, called for that reason also Liber de studio virtutum.

Nonsvinda must have been a spiritual daughter of his; at her desire A. wrote his exhortations. It treats of charity, humility, obedience, continence, mortification, compunction, prayer, the struggle against the passions, suffering, hope of God's forgiveness. In particular it recommends the reading of the Bible: « Quanto quisque in divinis Scripturis assiduus fuerit, tanto ex eis maiorem intelligentiam capiet: sicut terra quanto magis excolitur, tanto amplius fructificat » (ch. 13). He supported his counsels with texts drawn from the Rule of St. Benedict, from the Vitae Patrum, from the Historia Tripartita, from St. Augustine and from St. Isidore, showing himself a good theologian and full of discretion.

This ascetic treatise, remarkable for its order and erudition, for its clear and elegant style, was published in 1721 by Bernard Pez in Thesaurus Anecdotorum novissimus, (II, part 2, pp. 17-50), and reproduced in PL 134, 915-38.