The Treatise of St. Bernard Abbat of Clairvaux: Concerning Grace and Free Will, Addressed to William, Abbat of St. Thierry
Overview
Watkin W. Williams translates from the original Latin into English St. Bernard of Clairvaux’s treatise Concerning Grace and Free Will. Williams provides abundant notes and commentary on St. Bernard’s exposition, as well as an in-depth introduction.
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This product is part of The Medieval Preaching and Spirituality Collection (34 vols.).
- Offers an in-depth introduction, as well as notes and commentary
- Presents and English translation of Clarivaux’s Latin treatise
- Provides insight into the Middle Ages
Top Highlights
“God is the author of salvation; free will is merely receptive thereof; none can grant it save God alone, nothing can receive it save the free will. Thus then salvation is given by God alone, and it is given only to the free will; even as it cannot be wrought1 without the consent of the receiver, so cannot it be wrought without the grace of the giver.” (Page 5)
“Where, therefore, there is consent, there is an act of will. Moreover, where there is an act of will, there is freedom. In this sense it is that I understand the term free will.” (Page 6)
“God worketh in us these three, that is to say, to think, and to will, and to perform, what is good according to His good will; the first, assuredly, He doth without us, the second with us, and the third by means of us.” (Page 79)
“freedom from sin might, perhaps, more fittingly be called free counsel,5 and freedom from misery free pleasure” (Page 20)
“everywhere there is freedom: necessity yieldeth to will” (Page 20)
- Title: St. Bernard of Clairvaux’s Life of St. Malachy of Armagh
- Author: Bernard of Clairvaux
- Translator: Watkin W. Williams
- Publisher: SPCK
- Publication Date: 1920
- Pages: 183
- Christian Group: Catholic
- Resource Type: Topical
- Topic: Medieval Church
About the Author
Bernard of Clairvaux O. Cist (1090–1153) was a French abbot and the primary builder of the reforming Cistercian order. After his mother’s death, he sought admission into the Cistercian order. Three years later, he was sent to found a new abbey at an isolated clearing in a glen known as the Val d’Absinthe, about 15 kilometers southeast of Bar-sur-Aube. According to tradition, Bernard founded the monastery on June 25, 1115, naming it Claire Vallée, which evolved into Clairvaux.
About the Translator
Watkin Wynn Williams is the author and translator of numerous books, including Monastic Studies, Studies in St. Bernard of Clairvaux, The Moral Theology of the Sacrament of Penance, and St. Bernard: The Man and His Message.