Letters

This second volume of the Mediaeval Continuation contains Letters 31-60 of Peter Damian, the 11th-century monk and man of letters. While his epistolary style is varied - exhortatory, occasional, pastoral, reforming - his message is singular and simple in urging strict adherence to the canons of the Church. In Letter 31, also known as the Book of Gomorrah, Damian deplores the degradation of the priesthood through the vice of sodomy and appeals to Pope Leo IX to educate and purge the clergy. In Letter 40, called the Liber gratissimus he opposes the reordination of those ordained by simonists.