tolerance of every religion and in politics for universal suffrage. In 1644 he returned to England to defend the interests of his colony there, and here he met Milton and Cromwell and wrote his most important work on tolerance: The bloody Tenent of persecution (1644).
He completed his classical studies in Paris (1893–95), where he attended the «École des Hautes études», the «Institut catholique» and the Sorbonne; he began his ecclesiastical studies with the Sulpicians (1897–99), and in September 1899 entered the abbey of Solesmes, from which he was expelled in September 1901, a few months after his religious profession (24 June), following the suppression of the religious Orders. Having taken refuge on the Isle of Wight, he was ordained a priest there on 24 June 1906 and immediately afterward assigned to the abbey of St. Michael at Farnborough, to which he always belonged. At the end of 1928 he was called to the Vatican Library to catalogue the Latin manuscripts in the Queen’s collection, a task to which he devoted himself for eleven years, bringing to it his vast and assured erudition. Three great masters exercised a decisive influence at the beginning of his scientific career, though it subsequently became so personal: Msgr. P. BATIFFOL, PIERRE (v.), who, besides directing him toward the priesthood, initiated him into the study of Christian antiquity; L. Traube (v.), who led him to regard palaeography as a historical discipline; and E. Bishop (v.), who introduced him to liturgical studies, understood as part of ecclesiastical literature.
W., a profound connoisseur of the art of probing the secrets of codices, proceeded during numerous scholarly journeys to examine them systematically for whatever concerned his studies. It is therefore unsurprising that each of his works is regarded as a first-hand contribution. A palaeographer and philologist of rare experience, he was exceedingly accurate in his editions of ancient and medieval texts, which may be held up as models. His works, apart from the unpublished ones, number approximately 380 at a preliminary count, to which more than eighty reviews must be added. He was a regular contributor to many journals, especially the Rev. bénédictine, in which he published 150 articles. A worthwhile collection of his studies scattered through various journals is found in the volume Auteurs spirituels et textes dévots du moyen âge latin (Paris 1932). Here is a brief indication of some of his principal contributions to patristics, liturgy and medieval literature (the year of publication and the consecutive number in the bibliography compiled by J. Bignami Odier are given in parentheses). 1. Patristics: Gregory of Elvira (1906, 1909, 1912, nos. 2, 10, 28, 32), to whom he restored the Tractatus Origenis published by Batiffol with his collaboration (1900, no. 1); Phoebadius of Agen (1908, no. 7); St. Hilary of Poitiers (from 1907 to 1938, 7 studies); St. Augustine (from 1912 to 1938, more than 20 studies, those on the manuscript tradition of the Saint’s works being of fundamental importance, nos. 194, 205, 233, as well as the edition of Possidius’s indicium, no. 232). 2. Liturgy: the Bobbio Sacramentary (from 1909 to 1924, 5 studies); the Psalter of Count Evrard (1911, no. 26); the Masses of Mone (1911, no. 27); the liturgical manuscripts of Corbie (1913, no. 36); the Comes of Murbach (1913, no. 37); the letters of the pseudo-Germanus of Paris on Gallican liturgy (1924, no. 125); the Lectionary of Alcuin (1937, no. 322); the collects of the Psalters (1949, no. 365); and E. Bishop’s booklet, Le Génie du rit romain, a French translation enriched with numerous notes, to which W. was so devoted that he called it the substance of his creed as a historian of the liturgy (1919, 1920, nos. 54, 55). 3. Medieval literature: St. Anselm (from 1923 to 1937, about twenty studies); John of Fécamp (from 1926 to 1937, 6 studies); Guigo I the Carthusian (from 1924 to 1936, 4 studies and the edition of the meditations, no. 311); Hildebert of Lavardin (from 1935 to 1939, 4 studies); John, abbot of S. Maria in Trastevere (1938, no. 332); the edition of the Precum libelli of the Carolingian age (1940, no. 357); the edition of the Jubilus on the name of Jesus (1943, no. 360). 4. Methodology and description of codices: the article Delisle in DACL (1916, no. 46); the review of Sacramentaires et Missels... de France by V. Leroquais (1925, no. 156); the catalogue of 500 Reginenses latini codices (1937, 1945, nos. 321, 362), together with the Analecta Reginensia (1933, no. 261).
W. was always generous with advice and assistance to all who devoted themselves seriously and purposefully to their studies; it is enough to recall his generous gesture toward Fr. G. M. Hanssens, S. J., the learned editor of Amalarius’s liturgical works (cf. Amalarii Episcopi opera lit. omnia, I, Vatican City 1948, p. 7).