Book 4
PREFACE
Having completed the third volume on the blessed Samuel, I thought, after some time had passed with the pleasure of meditation or writing restored through rest, that I would finally set my hand to the beginning of the fourth. However, this same rest — if it can be called rest when it involves unexpected mental anxiety — came about much more protracted than I had decided, due to a new change in surrounding circumstances, especially by the departure of my most reverend abbot, who, after a long supervision of monastic care, suddenly decided to go to Rome, and to yield his last breath as an old man among the places sacred to the bodies of the blessed apostles and martyrs of Christ, which greatly perturb the spirits of those entrusted to him, and all the more because it was an unexpected shock. But He who set Joshua the son of Nun over the leadership when Moses, advanced in years, was taken from human affairs, who substituted Eleazar in the priesthood for his father Aaron, the same one who substituted Huetbert, a young man whom love and zeal for piety long ago gave the surname Eusebius, to govern the souls of the faithful with priestly leadership and spiritual influence, in place of the aged Ceolfrid hurrying to the holy thresholds of the blessed apostles. I confirmed the degree of this substitution after the fraternal election by your, most beloved bishop, office of blessing. As the state of the times returns to tranquility, thereby also returns to me the leisure and the delight of examining the marvels of Holy Scripture with my whole soul and diligent intention. Therefore, beginning the fourth little book of allegorical exposition on Samuel, from the victory of the blessed David, in which he saved the inhabitants of Keilah and defended them from the irruption of the attacking Philistines, with your prayers, most beloved of pontiffs, I will endeavor to share whatever mystical insights I am able, as He reveals who holds the key of David, with the readers.