308 Elbert N. S. Thompson 
and disregard his mental attainments, to win the love of God. At 
this point Bernard fancies that Satan is before him, muttering be- 
tween his teeth as of old, “ All that a man hath will he give for his 
life,” and accordingly the preacher turns to show Satan that Clement 
had offered even his life for Christ.1_ Bernard almost feels that the 
saint had actually despised his body, until Clement assures him in the 
words of Paul, “no man ever yet hated his own flesh.”?2 But some 
one of the auditors is here supposed to object that he, too, could 
show the same fortitude were the time of persecution not passed, 
and thus is introduced Bernard’s homily on steadfastness in minor 
trials. In this original sermon, Bernard has obliterated all distinc- 
tions of space and time to bring together a number of characters, 
the devil and the saint, Bernard himself and a member of his con- 
gregation, in a conversation purely didactic in character. Here, then, 
is a very significant example of the homiletic rendering of little 
dramas that bear a strong resemblance to the moral plays. 
But the clergy found not only its medium of communication in 
the widespread dramatic impulse of the age; they found in it 
as well their expository method; for the use of allegory as a means 
of embodying moral principle, which is the distinctive feature of 
the moralities, sprang directly from the inability of the mind to con- 
ceive sheer abstractions, and the consequent tendency to represent 
them as living beings. The essays of the Alexandrian philosopher 
Philo, dealing with subjects like Justice and Sobriety, undoubtedly 
gave an incentive to psychic study. But the poets imbued these 
qualities with human life. One of the popular fables of Phaedrus 
relates the experiences of two travelers, Truth and Falsehood.* 
In the Metamorphoses of Apuleius, likewise, Terror and Fear appear 
as servants of Minerva at the judgment of Paris, just as in the story 
of Cupid and Psyche such characters as Sobriety and Solicitude 
take their parts. The poet Claudian, of the fourth century, was 
especially fond of such personifications, introducing freely virtues 
and vices as human beings. Such a method of personification 
immediately recommended itself to Christian writers. Poets and the 
authors of religious and educational treatises were soon using alle- 
gory as their means of exposition. The preachers, therefore, who 
would place their teaching on the stage, found at hand a popular, 
and, on the whole, an effective, method of vivifying the abstract 
principles of their faith. 

1 Job 2. 4. 2 Kphesians 5. 29. 
3 Hervieux, 2. 139—40. * See Ebert, 1. 287-88. 
