Page:Dictionary of National Biography volume 45.djvu/58

 of their contents as printed by Goussainville is given in the ‘Histoire Littéraire’ (xv. 345–400).

II. . Peter was the author of a number of short treatises on various subjects, to which he refers himself as his ‘Opuscula’ (cf. Ep. 215). In his ‘Invectiva in depravatorem operum’ (Opera, ii. p. lxxxvi) he gives the following list, which he does not profess to be complete: ‘Compendium super Job,’ ‘Liber Exhortationum’ (i.e. sermons), ‘Dialogus ad Regem Henricum,’ ‘De Ierosolymitana Peregrinatione,’ ‘De Præstigiis Fortunæ,’ ‘De Assertione Fidei,’ ‘Contra Perfidiam Judæorum,’ ‘De Confessione et Penitentia,’ and ‘Canon Episcopalis.’ The following extant treatises are ascribed to Peter: 1. ‘De Silentio servando,’ a fragment (, ii. pp. iii–iv). 2. ‘De Ierosolymitana Peregrinatione acceleranda’ (ib. pp. iv–xxi); written in 1188–9 to urge on the third crusade. 3. ‘Instructio Fidei Catholicæ ab Alexandro III ad Soldanum Iconii’ (ib. pp. xxi–xxxii). This is not a work of Peter of Blois; it is preserved by Matthew Paris (ii. 250–60), and is by him assigned to 1169. It has been wrongly confused with the ‘De Assertione Fidei,’ to which Peter, writing about 1198, refers as ‘opus meum novellum;’ the ‘De Assertione Fidei’ seems to be lost (cf. Opera, ii. p. lxxxvi; Histoire Littéraire, xv. 402–3). 4. ‘De Confessione Sacramentali’ (, ii. pp. xxxii–liii). 5. ‘De Pœnitentia, vel satisfactione a Sacerdote injungenda’ (ib. ii. pp. liv–lxi). 6. ‘Canon Episcopalis, id est, Tractatus de Institutione Episcopi’ (ib. ii. pp. lxi–lxxxii). This treatise is addressed to John of Coutances, who was bishop of Worcester from 1196 to 1198, and may therefore be assigned to 1197. 7. ‘Invectiva in Depravatorem Operum Blesensis’ (ib. ii. pp. lxxxi–c). This treatise was written, apparently about 1198, in reply to strictures which had been passed on his ‘Compendium super Job.’ 8. ‘De Arte Dictandi.’ Giles only gives the prefatory epistle, since the tract is merely an abridgment of a work of St. Bernard. 9. ‘De Transfiguratione Domini’ (, iii. 1–13); addressed to Frumold, bishop of Arras before 1183 (Hist. Litt. xv. 402). 10. ‘De Conversione S. Pauli’ (, iii. 13–19). These last two treatises are included by Merlin in Peter's sermons, to which class they more naturally belong. 11. ‘Compendium super Job’ (ib. iii. 19–62); also styled ‘Basiligerunticon, id est Ludus Henrici senioris Regis;’ written at the request of Henry II, after the two previous pieces. 12. ‘Contra Perfidiam Judæorum’ (ib. iii. 62–129). 13. ‘De Amicitia Christiana et de Caritate Dei et Proximi: Tractatus Duplex’ (ib. iii. 130–261); also attributed to Cassiodorus, and included in his works in the ‘Bibliotheca Patrum Maxima,’ xi. 1326–1354, ed. Lyons. But the prefatory epistle seems to show that it is by Peter of Blois. 14. ‘Passio Reginaldi Principis olim Antiocheni’ (ib. iii. 261–89). This deals with the death of Reginald of Chatillon in 1187, and seems to have been written in 1188. Peter states that he obtained his information from letters addressed to the pope and archbishop of Canterbury (p. 278). 15. ‘Dialogus inter Regem Henricum II et Abbatem Bonævallensem’ (, iii. 289–307). The last two were first printed by Giles. 16. ‘De Utilitate Tribulationum’ (ib. iii. 307–33). The numerous copies of this tract are mostly anonymous, though it is ascribed to Peter in two late manuscripts (Merton College, Nos. 43 and 47). M. Hauréau (Notices et Extraits, iv. 125–8) thinks that it is not by Peter, and was probably written at the end of the thirteenth century. 17. ‘Tractatus Quales sunt’ (, iii. 333–40). This is probably not by Peter, but by William de Trahinac, prior of Grandmont (Hist. Littéraire, xv. 406–8). 18. ‘De Divisione et Scriptoribus Sacrorum Librorum’ (, iii. 403–11). 19. ‘Remedia Peccatorum,’ omitted by Giles as being only a compilation from St. Gregory (ib. iv. 376). In addition to these works Peter wrote, 20. ‘De Præstigiis Fortunæ.’ This tract, which is several times mentioned in Peter's letters (Epp. 4, 19, 77; cf. Contra Depravatorem Operum, ii. p. lxxxvi), was written in praise of Henry II, and is perhaps the ‘Liber de actibus regis’ of which he speaks in Epistle 14 (Op. i. p. 46). It has unfortunately perished, though Oudin (De Script. Eccl. ii. 1647) thought he had seen a copy. The fragment printed by Goussainville appears to be really an extract from the ‘Policraticus’ of John of Salisbury. 21. ‘Vita Wilfridi.’ Leland (Coll. iii. 169) says that he saw a copy of this work, dedicated to Geoffrey, archbishop of York, at Ripon (cf., Hist. of Church of York, ii. 480); an extract preserved by Leland is given in the ‘Monasticon Anglicanum’ (ii. 133). Other treatises ascribed to Peter are merely copies of isolated letters, e.g. the ‘De Periculo Prælatorum’ is Epistle 102, and the ‘De Studio Sapientiæ’ Epistle 140.

III. . Sixty-five sermons are printed in Goussainville's edition, and in the third volume of Giles's edition. Bourgain praises them for their straightforward vigour (La Chaire Française, p. 63). In Busée's edition of 1600 some sermons of Peter