Inspired by a mysterious voice which bade him ‘build a sanctuary worthy of his filial love and the divine majesty,’ Fulbert now set about procuring funds to build first a veritable crypt, and then above it the new Cathedral, adopting, however, the general plan of the church left by his predecessor in order to make use of the enormous existing foundations.[38] The subterranean aspect of the old church, built about the grottoes and heaped round by the rapid deposit of rubbish which continually raised the soil of mediæval towns, would naturally suggest this scheme. But to carry it out funds beyond the ordinary were needed.
Fortunately Fulbert was no ordinary beggar. Not only did he know how to use the usual means of encouraging gifts, in money and in kind, from the clergy and people of the diocese by holding special assemblies on the site of the proposed church, and by sermons which promised heavenly rewards for those who took part in the building, but he used his connections with the great world and his power of letter-writing to the best advantage.
He wrote first of all to ‘his beloved Lord,’ the ‘good King Robert,’ in whom the historian sees more of a monk than of a sovereign.
‘All our resources fail us for the rebuilding of our church, and a great necessity is upon us. Come then to our aid, O holy father; strengthen our weakness and succour our distress to the end that God may reward your soul with all blessings.’
And doubtless the ‘father of religious architecture’ responded generously to this eloquent appeal from his former teacher.
Meanwhile every belfry in the diocese attested by its silence the disaster of the church and the sorrow of its bishop. ‘On account of the disaster,’ he writes, ‘which has befallen my church, I wish to make known my profound grief to all. In consequence I have commanded that all the bells which are wont to ring with joy and gladness shall attest henceforth by their silence my bitter sadness.’
Fulbert wrote next to his most beloved and pious Duke of Aquitaine, and he received handsome annual subscriptions from him whilst the Cathedral was a-building. ‘Your marvellous and inexhaustible charity,’ writes the bishop, ‘is pleased to overwhelm me with many gifts which I do not deserve. I should blush to receive your offerings were I not sure that you will be magnificently rewarded hereafter.’