Bernard of Cluny

“ Are dimmed by the Lustre which circles their Christ.
O Day without Time, O Sea without Shore,
O sweet Fountain flowing with Wine evermore,
The Waters of Life come gushing alone,
From thy Wells which are set in the pure living Stone. ”

“ The chief Defect of the Poem is its Want of Progress. It eddies round the Subject, recurring again and again to Illustrations and Thoughts which before have been thoroughly treated and dismissed. This Blemish has been obviated, as far as possible, in this free Translation. But the hopeful, liberal, and humane Theology which breathes through the whole Poem, the Spirit of which is indicated in the Lines above quoted, has been rendered according to the obvious Tone and Inspiration of the Poet. ”

“ The feeling of heavenly homesickness has never been expressed with more thrilling power of intensity than in this grand mediæval poem.
Bernard, a monk of the celebrated Monastery of Cluny, under the Abbot Peter the Venerable, was born of English parents at the old seaport of Morlaix, in Brittany, and lived in the twelfth century. Thus being a contemporary of the greater Bernard, Abbot of Clairvaux. This is all we know of the author of the poem on Contempt of the World.
E. W.⁠ Feast of St. Matthew.
⁠✠⁠✠⁠✠⁠✠⁠✠⁠✠ The
Celestial Country⁠
THE world is very evil,
⁠The times are waxing late ”

“ The following Lines, with which the subjoined Translation commences, show the Structure of the Verse:
"Hic breve vivitur, hic breve plangetur, hic breve fletur,
Non breve vivere, non breve plangere, retribuetur. ”