Letters335 Letter CCCXXXV. 1140) to a certain Cardinal presbyter.-'
Letter CCCXXXV. 1140) to a certain Cardinal presbyter.-'
Also against Peter Abelard.
To the CARDINAL PRESBYTER, BERNARD, Abbot of Clairvaux, wishes health and happiness in the Lord.
Let no one despise your youth. It is not white hairs nor weight of years that is required by the Lord, but maturity of mind and a blameless life. Neither Jeremiah nor Daniel feared nor trembled, though both of them were young men, before old men disgraced by vice, though heavy with the weight of ill-spent days. And I might rightly, perhaps, treat as disgraced that man, who tried to corrupt the beauty of the Church, and to stain the purity of the Faith. That is Peter Abaelard, who disputes and defines as he chooses, and differently from accepted tradition, upon matters of faith, upon the Sacraments, and the mystery of the holy Trinity. Now, after having disturbed the Church and thrown it into confusion, he presents himself to the Curia, not that he may make amends for the mischief he has done, but because he relies upon the crafty subterfuges that he has at his command to conceal his errors. It is now that those who know themselves to be the Church's sons will stand firmly in her defence.
Cardinali presbytero, BERNARDUS Clarae-Vallis abbas, salutem et dilectionem in Domino.
Nemo adolescentiam tuam contemnat. Canities quippe non capitis, sed mentis requiritur a Domino, et aetas senectutis vita immaculata. Non expavit Jeremias, non formidavit Daniel, licet ambo pueri essent, senes impudicos, inveteratos dierum malorum. Impudicum et ego merito appellaverim illum qui decorem Ecclesiae, qui fidei maculat castitatem. Hic est Petrus Abaelardus, qui de fide, de sacramentis, de mysterio sanctae Trinitatis, praeterquam accepit, disputat, dividens singulis prout vult. Nunc autem ingreditur curiam, postquam Ecclesiam commovit, et conturbavit eam, non ut sanet contritiones ejus, sed quia declinavit in verba malitiae, ad excusandas excusationes in peccatis. Confidenter pro Ecclesia stabunt qui se filios esse Ecclesiae cognoscunt.