It is unnecessary to add much more in this introduction—­(for the story will tell its own tale)—­beyond saying that the re-translation of the French fragment into English has been to me a source of considerable pleasure.  I have done my best to render it into the English of its proper period, including even its alliterations, while avoiding needless archaisms and above all arbitrary spelling.  But no doubt I am guilty of many solecisms.  I have attempted also to elucidate the text by a number of footnotes, in which I have explained whatever seemed to call for it, and have appended translations to the numerous Latin quotations in which Sir John indulges after the manner of his time.  I must apologise for these footnotes—­(such are always tiresome)—­but I could think of no other way by which the text could be made clear.  They can always be omitted without much loss by the reader who has no taste for them.

Sir John’s style is a little difficult sometimes, especially when he treats in detail of his friend’s mystical experience, but he has a certain power of word-painting (unusual at his date) in matters both of nature and of grace, and it is only when he has been unduly trite or obscure that I have ventured, with a good deal of regret, to omit his observations.  All such omissions, however, as well as peculiar difficulties of statement or allusion, have been dealt with in foot-notes.

With regard to the function of the book, at any rate since its first translation into French, it is probably safe to conjecture that it may have been used at one time for reading aloud in the refectory.  I am led to make this guess from observing its division into chapters, and the quasi-texts appended to each.  These texts are of all sorts, though all are taken from the Book of Psalms; but their application to the matter that follows is sometimes fanciful, frequently mystical, and occasionally trite.

If the book receives any sympathy from English readers—­(an eventuality about which I have my doubts)—­I shall hope, at some future date, to edit others of the MSS. still reposing in the little room under the roof between the Piazza Navona and the Piazza Colonna in Rome, to which I have been generously promised free access.

I must express my gratitude to the Superior of the Order of ——­ (to whose genius, coupled with that of another, I dedicate this book), for giving me permission to edit his Ms.; to Dom Robert Maple, O.S.B., for much useful information and help in regard to the English mystics; and to Mme. Germain who has verified references, interpreted difficulties, and assisted me by her encouragement.

Robert Benson.

Cambridge,
Feast of SS.  Peter and Paul, 1905.

How Sir John visited Master Hermit:  and found him in contemplation

Protexit me in abscondito tabernaculi sui.