308 ANSELM(ANDGAUNILO)
PROSLOGION [in part]
PREFACE
Some time ago at the pressing invitation of some brethren I did a small work* as a
sample of meditation based on faith. The work was written in the person of one seeking
to throw light on an area of ignorance by silently reasoning with himself. Reflecting that
what I had woven together was really a chain of many arguments, I began to ask myself
whether one might not be able to find a single argument, needing no proof beyond itself,
which would suffice by itself to link together such conclusions as that God truly exists,
that he is the highest good—needing no other but needed for the existence and well-
being of all else-and whatever else we believe to be true of the divine being. Diligently
and often did I pursue this quest. Sometimes the solution seemed almost at hand; at
other times it simply eluded the grasp of my mind. Finally I decided in despair to cease
the search for something so impossible to find. But when I tried to put the matter out of
mind lest I waste time that might profitably be spent on other matters in such a fruitless
quest, it continued to importune me despite my unwillingness and efforts at resistance.
And so it was that one day when I was weary of struggling against this obsession the
solution I had despaired of finding suddenly appeared amidst the welter of my conflict-
ing thoughts and I eagerly seized the idea I had been so strenuously fending off.
Thinking that, if I put down in writing what I was so happy to find, others too
would find pleasure reading it, I did the following little tract which takes up this and
some allied matters from the viewpoint of one who tries to bring his mind to contem-
plate God and seeks to understand what he believes....
CHAPTER 1
... It is not your sublimity, O Lord, I seek to penetrate, for my mind is no match for
it, but I do desire to understand something of your truth which I believe and love in
my heart. For I seek not to understand that I may believe, but I believe that I may
understand. For this too I believe: “Unless I believe, I shall not understand!”
CHAPTER 2
O Lord, who grants understanding to faith, make me, so far as is good for me, to under-
stand that you exist, as we believe, and that you are what we believe you to be. Now we
believe you to be something greater than which we can conceive of nothing.** Could
From John F. Wippel and Allan B. Wolter, eds.,Medieval Philosophy: From St. Augustine to Nicholas of Cusa
(New York: The Free Press, 1969).
*[Monologion(i.e., a soliloquy)]
**[This complicated formulation is difficult to understand, yet cannot be easily simplified without
losing Anselm’s meaning. Throughout this reading I have stayed with Wolter’s wording. It might help the
student to think of the phrase, “something greater than which we can conceive of nothing,” as a single entity.
For a discussion of this complicated formulation, see M.J. Charlesworth,St. Anselm’s Proslogion(Oxford:
Oxford University Press, 1965).]