Earning Much, Keeping Nothing

Each one of them may bring in to the monastery every day, by his work and labor, so large a return that out of it he could not only meet his own modest needs but also supply in abundance the wants of many. Yet he is in no way puffed up, nor does he flatter himself over his toil and this large gain from his labor. Apart from two biscuits, which sell there for barely three pennies, no one thinks he has a right to anything more. Among them there is nothing (and I am ashamed to say this, and heartily wish it were unknown in our own monasteries) that any of them claims as his special property, I will not say in deed, but even in thought. He believes that the whole granary of the monastery is his wealth, and as lord of it all he gives his whole care and energy to all of it. Yet in order to keep that excellent state of want and poverty which he has gained, and which he strives to keep unbroken and perfect to the very end, he regards himself as a foreigner and an outsider to it all. So he conducts himself as a stranger and a sojourner in this world, and thinks of himself as a pupil of the monastery and a servant, rather than imagining that he is lord and master of anything. [a]