ther, we embrace you all as our true brothers, with
the unstinted yearning of charity, so also concerning yourselves,
spiritual kinship persuades us that you are like-minded.

4. But we exhort you, brothers, that you be always careful to _walk in
the steps of_ this _our_ blessed _father_,[999] by so much the more
zealously as by daily proofs his _holy conversation_[1000] was more
certainly known to you. For in this you shall prove yourselves to be his
true sons, if you manfully maintain the father's ordinances, and if, as
you have seen in him, and heard _from him how you ought to walk, you so
walk that you may abound more and more_:[1001] for the glory of a father
is the wisdom of his sons.[1002] For even for us the example of so great
perfection in our midst has begun in no slight degree both to expel our
sloth and impel us to reverence. And would that he may in such wise
_draw us after him_ that he may draw us to the goal, _running_ more
eagerly and more quickly in _the fragrance_ which his virtues have left
so fresh behind them.[1003] May Christ guard all of you _while you pray
for us_.[1004]

FOOTNOTES:

[924] When this letter was written certain brothers, sent by Malachy
after his return from Rome (October 1140), had arrived at Clairvaux,
and had spent some time there (see notes 5, 7); and the brothers left
there on his return journey had had a considerable amount of
instruction (n. 7). The date is therefore not earlier than 1141. But
it is evidently earlier than that of Letter ii.

[925] Cp. Hor., _Sat._ i. 2. 110.

[926] Ps. vi. 3.

[927] Josh. ix. 6.

[928] These were some of the brothers sent from Ireland (_Life_,
Sec. 39).

[929] Ps. xxiii. 4.

[930] Song of Three Children, 16.--They had evidently been a good
while under St. Bernard's eye.

[931] Rom. viii. 28.

[932] No doubt the four brothers who had been left at Clairvaux
(_Life_, Sec. 39).

[933] Matt. xxv. 32.

[934] Gal. iv. 19.

[935] 1 Sam. xxv. 28.

[936] Luke xxiv. 49.

[937] Ps. cxxxvii. 4.

[938] 2 Pet. iii. 15.

[939] John xiv. 2.

[940] Rev. i. 3; xxii. 10.

[941] Cp. Rom. vi. 6; Eph. ii. 15; iv. 22, 24.

[942] Dan. ii. 20, etc.

[943] Coll. for 13th Sunday after Pentecost.

[944] 1 Cor. iii. 6.

[945] Acts xv. 36.

[946] Luke i. 77.

[947] 1 Cor. ix. 16.

[948] Jas. iii. 2.

[949] John xiii. 8 (inexact quotation).

[950] Mellifont was probably founded immediately after the brothers
mentioned in the