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acknowledge Innocent II. as legitimate pope, in opposition 

 to his competitor Anaclete (V Art de verifier les dates, Con- 

 cilium Stampenae and Innocent II.), and afterwards suc- 

 ceeded in obtaining the same acknowledgment from Henry 

 I. of England. Some time after he was sent to make some 

 arrangements with the clergy of Milan, who conceived such 

 an admiration for him, that at the close of the negotiation, 

 they offered him the archbishoprick of that city, which he 

 refused. In the course of his life he also refused the arch- 

 bishopricks of Genoa and Rheims, as well as many other 

 ecclesiastical dignities. Having condemned as heretical 

 some propositions in the works of the celebrated Abelard, 

 he was challenged by him to a public controversy. At first 

 he wished to decline the challenge, but at last accepted it, 

 at the pressing instances of his friends. In the year 1 140 

 they met at the council of Sens in Champagne, but before 

 the discussion was completed, Abelard appealed to the pope ; 

 the council agreed with Bernard in condemning the propo- 

 sitions, and by order of the pope, Abelard was confined in 

 the monastery of Cluni, in Burgundy. 



At the council of Vezelai, on the confines of Burgundy 

 and Nivernois, in the year 1 1 40, Bernard persuaded the 

 king and nobility of France to enter on a crusade. On this 

 occasion he went so far as to claim inspiration, and to pro- 

 phecy the success of the undertaking. This is the most 

 reprehensible part of his career, and the quibble by which 

 ho attempted to cover the failure of his prophecy is truly 

 contemptible. (Bayle, Diet. Hist.) In the same year a 

 council was held at Chartres, where the crusaders offered 

 St. Bernard the command of the army, which he refused. 

 In 1147, at the council of Paris, he attacked the doctrine of 

 Gilbert de la Porree, bishop of Poitiers, on the Trinity ; and 

 in the following year, at the council of Rheims, procured 

 its condemnation. During the course of his life he success- 

 fully combated several other heresies. The last act of his 

 career was his mediation between the people of Mentz and 

 some neighbouring princes. On his return to his convent 

 he fell ill and died, A.o. 1153. He was canonized in the 

 year 1 174, by Pope Alexander III., and the Roman church 

 celebrates his festival on the 20th of August. 



There is perhaps no instance on record of such extensive 

 influence, obtained by the mere force of personal character, 

 without any adventitious advantages ; and upon the whole, 

 St. Bernard's influence does not appear to have been unde- 

 served, though it was occasionally misused. In our esti- 

 mate of his character, and particularly of his conduct with 

 respect to the crusades, we must make great allowances for 

 the spirit and feelings of the age. It is much to his credit, 

 that, attached as he was to the papal supremacy, he laid 

 open with an unsparing hand the vices and corruptions of 

 the Roman court ; and on all occasions he seems to have 

 acted in a spirit of fervent zeal, and, for that age, of Chris- 

 tian charity. His works, which have procured for him from 

 Roman Catholic writers the honourable appellation of the 

 last of the fathers, have been repeatedly published. The 

 best edition is that by Mabillon, 2 vols. folio, Paris, 1719, 

 which, besides his undoubted works, contains several pro- 

 ductions attributed to him on less authority, and some lives 

 of him by monkish writers, to which those who wish for an 

 account of his miracles and austerities are referred. (See 

 Milner's History of the Church, vol. iii. p. 330 ; Wadding- 

 ton's History of the Church, p. 325 ; Mosheim's Ecclesias- 

 tical History ; Neander's St. Bernard and his Times, Ber- 

 lin, 1813.) 



BERNARD, SAINT, one of the chief mountain-passes 

 in the Pennine chain of Alps between the Swiss Valais 

 and Piedmont. This road leads from Martigny and the 

 Tillages of Liddes and St. Pierre in the Valais to St. Remy, 

 and Aosta in Piedmont. This pass, which is rather more 

 steep and difficult on the Swiss than on the Italian side 

 (as was found by the French army which crossed the 

 mountain in May, 1800), is only practicable the whole 

 way for mules and pedestrians ; though, at times, the 

 light chars-d-bana of the country go with difficulty as far 

 a the Hospice. The most elevated part of the passage 

 of the St. Bernard is a long and narrow valley, the bot- 

 tom of which is occupied by a lake. The height of this 

 valley above the level of the sea is stated by M. Saussure, 

 on the authority of M. Pictet, at 1246 toises, or aboul 

 7963 English feet ; and by Mr. Brockedon at 8200 English 

 feet. At the eastern extremity of the lake, which is frozen 

 over during eight or nine months of the year, stands the 

 celebrated Hospice, or house of reception, or monastery o 



St. Bernard ; and at the other end of the lake there is a 

 small level space, called the Plain of Jupiter, or Jove, 

 where in ancient times there stood a temple of that god, and 

 probably a house of refuge, built by the Romans. From 

 the temple the mountain derived its name, it being antiently 

 called Mont Jovis, which Latin denomination was cor- 

 rupted into Mont-Joux ; and it bore the latter name until 

 'as it is generally stated) the celebrity of the hospice of St. 

 Bernard gave it a new and a Christian designation. This 

 ast opinion has, however, been controverted ; and it ap- 

 pears not improbable that the mountain owed its name of 

 Bernard not to a saint, but to a soldier. M. Saussure says 

 t was so styled more than a century before St. Bernard ; and 

 le thinks the name may have arisen from Bernard, or 

 Bernhard, the uncle of Charlemagne, who took that pas- 

 sage for his army across the Alps in his famous expedition 

 against Astolphus, the last Lombard sovereign but one of 

 Upper Italy. 



According to general report, the hospice, or monastery, 

 was built by St. Bernard about A.D. 962 ; but, again, it 

 seems evident that there was a monastery, with an abbot, 

 styled of Mont-Joux, long before that period, at or near the 

 site of the present edifice. As it is not probable that this 

 oass into the fertile plains of Piedmont was ever wholly 

 abandoned, and as it must always have exposed travellers 

 to danger and great fatigue, it is reasonable to suppose that 

 some house of refuge was kept up from the time of the 

 Romans, or even before. M. Saussure and other tra- 

 vellers saw a number of ancient ex-votw tablets and images 

 which had been found in the pass, where they had been 

 offered to the pagan temple by the way-farers of old, in gra- 

 titude for their safe journey. 



The monastery of St. Bernard has been twice consumed 

 ay fire. Its sainted founder is said to have lived forty years 

 on the desolate spot. The monks are of the order of St. 

 Augustin. Considerable landed property was once attached 

 to this humane and useful establishment, but it now mainly 

 depends on annual allowances made by the Swiss and 

 Piedmontese governments, and on voluntary donations of 

 private individuals and rich travellers. It extends relief 

 and eleemosynary hospitality (when needed) to all classes 

 and conditions of men ; and, without heeding the general 

 nature of monastic institutions or the distinctions of creeds, 

 the Protestant Swiss contribute as readily to it as the Ca- 

 tholic Italians. The exertions of these monks to rescue lost 

 travellers from the snow and the avalanche, and the stories 

 of their dogs, are well known. 



The monastery of the Great St. Bernard is the most ele- 

 vated fixed habitation in Europe, and close upon the limits 

 of perpetual snow. Tremendous rocks and peaks rise above 

 it, to the height, according to Saussure, of 663 toises, or 4 240 

 English feet, in their highest part. About half of the moun- 

 tain-mass may be said to belong to Italy, and half to Switzer- 

 land ; and not far from the lake there is a barrier, marking 

 the frontier or line of demarcation between Piedmont and 

 the Valais. A torrent which descends towards Aosta and 

 Italy is called Le Butier, and another torrent which rushes 

 in the opposite direction towards St. Pierre and the Valais 

 is named La Drance du St. Bernard. 



Besides the St. Bernard, there is the Little St. Bernard, 

 which lies between Tarentaise and Piedmont, and forms 

 part of the chain of the Graian Alps. This passage is de- 

 scribed in the article ALPS. 



See Saussure, Voyage dans les Alpes ; Brockedon's 

 Passes of the Alps. 



BERNARDINES, a branch of the Benedictine Ordei 

 of Religious, more frequently called Cistercians. Their 

 name of Bernardines was derived from St. Bernard, abbot 

 ofClairvaux, or Clareval, in the diocese of Langres, about 

 A.D. 1115, who was a great promoter of their order. They 

 were called Cistercians from Cistertium or Ctsteaux, in the 

 bishopric of Chalons in Burgundy, where the order was 

 begun in the year 1098 by Robert abbot of Molesme in 

 that province, hut brought into repute by Stephen Harding, 

 an Englishman, third abbot of Ctsteaux, who is therefore 

 reckoned the principal founder. They were also called 

 White Monks from the colour of their habit. Fuller, in 

 his Worthies, book iii. p. 164, probably errs, when he makes 

 the Bernardines to be a stricter order of Cistercians. 



The monasteries of the Bernardine or Cistercian Order, 

 which became very numerous in a short time, were gene- 

 rally founded in solitary and uncultivated places, and were nil 

 dedicated to the Virgin Mary. It was a rule with the Cis- 

 ' 2 R 2 



