Abbreviata species facti in causa abbatis Anselmi in Monte S. Michaëlis prope Bambergam Ordinis S. Benedicti quoad spiritualia

The abbatial office was disturbed in various ways, both by the monks themselves and by the Bamberg Vicariate assisting those monks. It reached a point where the Abbot was not permitted to obey God and the Church, so that he might duly care for the eternal salvation of the souls committed to him and promote divine worship to the best of his ability by faithfully executing the Decrees of the Council of Trent issued on this matter. This is certainly a most deplorable affair, especially when one lives in a Catholic and simultaneously Episcopal principality. For this reason, the Abbot, having left special instructions for the interim administration of the Monastery and having duly arranged all other matters regarding the support of both the religious and secular family and the necessary expenses to be made, set out on his journey on May 28, 1740. He intended to ascend to the place which the Lord has chosen, namely, to the Apostolic See, the teacher of all the Faithful, to obtain the assistance of the Supreme Pontiff. Sustained by this, he would thereafter be able, without further delay, to administer and dispense what was entrusted to him according to the Law of God, the Church, and the Holy Order, faithfully, justly, and usefully. Furthermore, while the Abbot was staying in Innsbruck Oeniponti Innsbruck in the Tyrolean metropolis for two months to treat his severely damaged health (an action taken in addition to the previous appeal made to the Holy See, which was further confirmed by the very act of embarking on this journey), he once again made a most decent formal notification to the Most High Bishop of Bamberg. He provided this candid declaration: that he wished to treat the entire business of restoring discipline and confirming the restored Provostry Praepositura a subordinate monastic house or administrative office peacefully, without a clamorous process and even without initiating an action for recovering the exemption of his Monastery. What more could be expected from an Abbot so peaceful and so submissive toward the Most High of Bamberg?

See Letters W. & Z.
Letter W.
& Z.
See Letter S.
Letter S.

But behold, scarcely six weeks after these letters were most assuredly delivered into the hands of the Most High—and indeed communicated to his primary Ministers—and scarcely after the election of the Most Holy BENEDICT XIV around the beginning of September 1740, the Abbot ANSELM was despoiled of his abbatial administration entirely by the authority of the Most High of Bamberg, against all Laws and with the order of Law and Judgment totally inverted, while he was still on his journey to the Holy See at Verona in Italy, lying lethally ill. This same harsh lightning bolt simultaneously struck the newly restored Provostry of Saint Faith S. Fidis Saint Faith. Among the executors of this excessive spoliation were two Benedictine Abbots, one from Lower Austria and the other from Franconia. These acts of violence, to be shuddered at for all time, were committed without any warning or citation issued to the Abbot, who was legitimately absent. This most violent execution was performed without any sentence having been previously promulgated against the Abbot. Therefore, in whatever way the Most High of Bamberg proceeded—whether as the ordinary Visitor of the Monastery or as a judge of the first instance in a controversial case—he acted in every respect against divine and human laws. All acts thus performed were in part invalid, in part illicit, and entirely violent and truly despoiliatory, just as it is read that it was expressly sentenced in a similar case against the Archbishop of Canterbury in Chapter 7, concerning the restitution of what was despoiled. The aforementioned spoliation was, in itself, especially qualified due to the simultaneous contempt shown toward the Holy See (to which the Abbot had already appealed), and it was further aggravated by other subsequent disruptive acts, which were alien to all Law. Among these are rightly counted both the ordination of younger brothers into the priesthood, despite the Abbot’s prior prohibition for relevant reasons, and the admission of six novices not only to the year of probation but even to solemn profession itself (without the Abbot's knowledge, without his consent, and indeed notwithstanding the contradiction interposed by the Abbot regarding this). This was done by the Most High of Bamberg himself See Letters W. & Z., leaving aside other matters here regarding temporal and civil affairs Letter W. & Z.. Oh, the illustrious effects, as they say, that are irregular and stem from a subjection of the Monastery violently sought! This says nothing of the corruption of the monks, who resisted to the face of the Prior with reckless daring when he wished to interpose a protest against such violence based on the Abbot’s instructions. Oh, the illustrious sons of their mother (the Monastery itself), who are, as they say, domestic enemies! Oh, the illustrious method of reforming collapsed discipline, and of correcting an Abbot who had earned the highest merit from the Abbey and the entire fatherland, that is, the Bamberg Episcopate! The Most High himself had, shortly before 1739, declared him in writing to be full of merit, and had approved his prudent and pious intention in the novices accepted at Saint Faith See Letter S.. If the two aforementioned Abbots had been willing to hear their Confrere of the Order, the Abbot of Saint Michael, even from afar before acting, as the law of nature and divine law dictate, they would never have dared to cooperate in such an excessive spoliation, committed against an entirely innocent Abbot and against a newly restored Provostry—a plant of the Holy Order still very tender—regarding persons, monies, and precious objects, especially in those circumstances of fact and time when the Abbot was an actual traveler to the Holy See with an excellent title from Chapter "All causes," 20, in Trent, Session 24, on Reformation, and from the Bull of Pius IV on the Confirmation of the Council of Trent, which begins: