To bring about an increased interest in learning was generally regarded as the first of monastic reforms.[138] This opinion was so common that it almost became proverbial: Claustrum sine armario castrum sine armamentario.[139] How was this interest in letters to be secured? Obviously by requiring the monks to spend a greater amount of time in study, and by causing them to copy a greater number of books, which would afterwards be available for the use of the monastery. The first of these was, as we have seen, an essential reform at Cluny, the model for the English monastic reformers. A considerable amount of evidence is available to show that the new abbots of the monasteries regarded it as important that their libraries should be well stocked with books. At St. Albans the Abbot Paul built a scriptorium in which hired writers copied the MSS. lent him by Lanfranc, and he provided an endowment to secure the continuance of the work.[140] A subsequent abbot, Simon de Gorham, initiated the custom that the abbot should always maintain one writer in the scriptorium at his own expense.[141] At Malmesbury the Abbot Godfrey paid special attention to the formation of a library and to the education of the monks. Under his rule the monks, who had previously been considered as ignorant, equalled, even if they did not surpass, those of any other monastery in the country.[142] Other instances which may be quoted are those of Bath,[143] Thorney,[144] and Abingdon.[145] II.--THE PROVISION OF SCHOOLS. The question of the provision of schools by monasteries is a matter of considerable controversy. Turning first to the continental custom, we note, on the one hand, that the decree of the Council of Aix-la-Chapelle of 817 provided that "schola in monasterio non habeatur nisi eorum qui oblati sunt"[146]; and, on the other hand, that there is the incontrovertible case of the school in connection with the monastery of Bec, conducted first by Lanfranc and later by Anselm.[147] In addition, reference might also be made to the hostel maintained at Cluny, at the expense of the monastery, for clerks of noble birth who attended the schools in the town.[148] It is not suggested that any general conclusion as to the existence of external monastic schools can be drawn from these instances, but it does establish the point that the decree of the Council of Aix-la-Chapelle alone cannot be considered as sufficient evidence that, after the ninth century, the monasteries ceased to interest themselves in the provision and maintenance of schools.