ol of the king, making it increasingly
useful and likewise profitable to him, and for this reason I had
good hope of easily winning the support of the king and those about
him.

Thus, indeed, did it come to pass. But in order that the monastery
might not be shorn of any of the glory which it had enjoyed by
reason of my sojourn there, they granted me permission to betake
myself to any solitary place I might choose, provided only I did
not put myself under the rule of any other abbey. This was agreed
upon and confirmed on both sides in the presence of the king and
his councellors. Forthwith I sought out a lonely spot known to me
of old in the region of Troyes, and there, on a bit of land which
had been given to me, and with the approval of the bishop of the
district, I built with reeds and stalks my first oratory in the
name of the Holy Trinity. And there concealed, with but one
comrade, a certain cleric, I was able to sing over and over again
to the Lord: "Lo, then would I wander far off, and remain in the
wilderness" (Ps. IV, 7).

CHAPTER XI

OF HIS TEACHING IN THE WILDERNESS

No sooner had scholars learned of my retreat than they began to
flock thither from all sides, leaving their towns and castles to
dwell in the wilderness. In place of their spacious houses they
built themselves huts; instead of dainty fare they lived on the
herbs of the field and coarse bread; their soft beds they exchanged
for heaps of straw and rushes, and their tables were piles of turf.
In very truth you may well believe that they were like those
philosophers of old of whom Jerome tells us in his second book
against Jovinianus.

"Through the senses," says Jerome, "as through so many windows, do
vices win entrance to the soul. The metropolis and citadel of the
mind cannot be taken unless the army of the foe has first rushed in
through the gates. If any one delights in the games of the circus,
in the contests of athletes, in the versatility of actors, in the
beauty of women, in the glitter of gems and raiment, or in aught
else like to these, then the freedom of his soul is made captive
through the windows of his eyes, and thus is fulfilled the
prophecy: `For death is come up into our windows' (Jer. ix, 21).
And then, when the wedges of doubt have, as it were, been driven
into the citadels of our minds through these gateways, where will
be its liberty? where its fortitude? where its thought of God? Most
of all does the sense of touch