"Hunc spectans tumulum, titulo cognosce sepultum; Est via virtutis nôsse quis ipse fuit. Dum quater hic denos ævi venisset ad annos, Quæ fuerant secli sprevit amore Dei. Mutans ergò vices, mundi de milite miles Fit Christi subito, Monachus ex laïco. Hinc sibi, more patrum, socians collegia fratrum, Curâ, quâ decuit, rexit eos, aluit. Quot quantasque vides, hic solus condidit ædes, Non tàm divitiis quàm fidei meritis. Quas puer haud didicit scripturas postea scivit, Doctus ut indoctum vix sequeretur eum. Flentibus hunc nobis tulit inclementia mortis Sextilis quinâ bisque die decimâ. Herluine pater, sic cÅ"lica scandis ovantèr; Credere namque tuis hoc licet ex meritis." In number of inmates, extent of possessions, and possibly, in magnificence of buildings, other Norman monasteries may have excelled Bec: none equalled it in the prouder honor of being a seminary for eminent men and especially for those destined to the highest stations in the church. Lanfranc and Anselm were not the only two of its monks who were seated on the archiepiscopal throne at Canterbury. Two others, Theobald and Hubert obtained the same dignity in the following century; and Roger, the seventh abbot of Bec, enjoyed the still more enviable distinction of having been unanimously elected to fill the office of metropolitan, but of possessing sufficient firmness of mind to resist the attractions of wealth, and rank, and power. The sees of Rochester, Beauvais, and Evreux were likewise filled by monks from Bec; and it was here that many monastic establishments, both Norman and foreign, found their pastors. Three of our own most celebrated convents, those of Chester, Ely, and St. Edmund's Bury, received at different epochs their abbots from Bec; and during the prelacy of Anselm, the supreme pontiff himself selected a monk of this house as the prior of the distant convent of the holy Savior at Capua.--The village of Bec, which adjoins the abbey, is small and unimportant.