ABSTRACT
William of Malmesbury tells how St Dunstan, during a meal at Bath, was ‘carried to heaven in his mind [‘animo caelum transuectus’], and saw the soul of a certain pupil from Glastonbury being borne into the sacred places of heaven amid loud applause from the angels’ (ii.16.1), and how on another occasion, during sleep, Dunstan ‘escaped in mind to heaven’ (‘mente in caelum euasit’), and saw his mother seated on a high throne in heaven during a crowded festival, ready to marry a high king; Dunstan, captivated by the harmonies of ineffable sweetness, is taught a song of praise, which he subsequently teaches to the monks and clerks at Canterbury (ii.27). It was a sign of Dunstan’s asceticism and compunction that ‘his bodily and spiritual sight was cleansed, and he could see with the eyes of both kinds the secrets of heaven [‘diuina misteria’] even while he was still burdened with the weight of earth’ (ii.26.5). ‘[H]e saw with his eyes and heard with his ears what other holy men can only long with a great and long-lasting desire should be conceded them in a future life’ (ii.28.3).2
