Anglo-Saxon Literature Part 19

[112] "The 'Dialogues' were printed as early as the year 1458."--T.D.

Hardy in Willelmi Malm. "Gesta Regum," i., 189.

[113] Here Gregory begins. The translation sometimes deviates from the text:--"Quadam die nimis quorundam saecularium tumultibus depressus, quibus in suis negotiis plerumque cogimur solvere etiam quod nos certum est non debere, secretum loc.u.m petii amic.u.m maeroris, ubi omne quod de mea mihi occupatione displicebat, se patenter ostenderet, et cuncta quae infligere dolorem consueverant, congesta ante oculos licenter venirent.

Ibi itaque c.u.m afflictus valde et diu tacitus sederem, dilectissimus filius meus Petrus diaconus adfuit, mihi a primaevo juventutis flore amicitiis familiariter obstrictus, atque ad sacri verbi indagationem socius. Qui gravi excoqui cordis languore me intuens, ait: Num quidnam tibi aliquid accidit, quod plus te solito maeror tenet? Cui inquam: Maeror, Petre, quem quotidie patior, et semper mihi per usum vetus est, et semper per augmentum novus."

[114] An nunne. This word is of two syllables; there is no silent e final in Anglo-Saxon.

[115] Ic saet me on anum leahtrice, tha com heo and bat me!

[116] See Skeat, "Etym. Dict.," _v._ "heel" (2).

[117] This term appears in charters of the tenth century; also a.s.ser styles the king "aelfred Angulsaxonum rex," "Mon. Hist. Brit.," 483 C.

See Freeman, "Norman Conquest," vol. i., Appendix A.

CHAPTER X.

aeLFRIC.

Alfred died in 901. From this to the Norman Conquest there are 165 years, and the middle of this period is characterised by the works of the greatest of Anglo-Saxon prose-writers.

The productions of Alfred and the scholars that surrounded him, are to be understood as extraordinary efforts, and as beacons to raise men's minds rather than as specimens of the state of learning in the country, or even as monuments of attainments that were likely soon to become general. Although the literary movement under Alfred was so far sustained that it did not subsequently die out, yet it would perhaps be too much to say that he achieved a complete revival of learning. In the inert state of the religious houses, the soil was unprepared. Still, a taste was kindled which continued to propagate itself until the time when the religious houses became active seats of education. This did not happen until the second half of the tenth century, when the reform of the monasteries by aethelwold and Dunstan produced that great educational and literary movement of which the representative name is aelfric.

The impetus which Alfred had imparted did not cease with his life. If we look into the Chronicles, we see that the Alfredian style of work is continued down to the death of his son Edward, in 924, and that from that point the stream of history dwindles and becomes meagre. This may be typical of what happened over a wider surface. The impulse given to translation may be supposed to have continued, and we may specify two translations likely to have been made at this time. These are the Four Gospels[118] and the poetical Psalter.[119]

A feature of the Gospels is that the name of Jesus is regarded as a descriptive t.i.tle, and subjected to translation. It never appears in its original form, but always as "Se Haelend"--that is, The Healer, The Saviour.

To this period, the first half of the tenth century, must be a.s.signed some translations of another sort. There are some considerable remains of a translating period that gave to the English reader a ma.s.s of apocryphal, romantic, fantastic, and even heretical reading; and that period can hardly be any other than this. I imagine that now as a consequence of the new literary interest awakened by King Alfred, many old book-chests were explored, and things came to light which had been stored in the monasteries of Wess.e.x ever since the seventh and eighth centuries. These writings claim a manifest affinity with the early products of the Gaulish monasteries, and from these they would naturally have been diffused in southern Britain. But, since the religious life of Gaul had been touched and quickened with the reform of the second Benedict in the ninth century, some old things would have been condemned and rejected there, which might still enjoy credit with the old-fashioned clergy of Wess.e.x.

Of apocryphal materials in Anglo-Saxon literature there are several varieties. First, there is the so-called Gospel of Nicodemus. This is from a Latin version of the Greek "Acts of Pilate," and it is our earliest extant source for that prolific subject, the Harrowing of h.e.l.l.

The Greek text laid claim to a Hebrew original:--

--her onginnath tha gedonan thing the be urum Haelende gedone waeron . eall swa Theodosius se maera casere hyt funde on Hierusalem on thaes Pontiscan Pilates domerne . eall swa hyt Nychodemus awrat . eall mid Ebreisc.u.m stafum on manegum boc.u.m thus awriten:

--here begin the actual things that were done in connexion with our Saviour, just as Theodosius the ill.u.s.trious emperor found it in Jerusalem in Pontius Pilate's court-house; according as Nicodemus wrote it down all with Hebrew writing on many leaves as follows.

The "Dialogues of Solomon and Saturn" belong to a legendary stock that has sent its branches into all the early vernacular literatures of Europe. The germ is found in the Bible and in Josephus. In 1 Kings x.

1, we read that, when the Queen of Sheba heard of the fame of Solomon, she came to prove him with hard questions. Josephus, in the "Jewish Antiquities," vii. 5, tells a curious story about hard questions pa.s.sing between Solomon and Hiram, king of Tyre. From such a root appear to have grown the multiform legends in various languages which pa.s.sed under such names as the "Controversy of Solomon," the "Dialogues of Solomon and Saturn," or of "Solomon and Marculfus." This became at length a mocking form of literature; often a burlesque and parody of religion. Mr. Kemble traces these legends to Jewish tradition; but of all the examples preserved he says "the Anglo-Saxon are undoubtedly the oldest.... With the sole exception of one French version, they are the only forms of the story remaining in which the subject is seriously and earnestly treated; and, monstrous as the absurdities found in them are, we may be well a.s.sured that the authors were quite unconscious of their existence."[120] There are, however, some places in which one is moved to doubt whether the extravagance is the product of pure simplicity, and without the least tinge of drollery.

But the reader may judge for himself. The fragments preserved are partly poetical and partly in prose: the poetry is rather insipid; our quotation shall be from the prose. The subject is the praise and eulogy of the Lord's Prayer, which is personified and anatomised. Saturnus asks, "What manner of head hath the Pater Noster?" And, again, "What manner of heart hath the Pater Noster?" We quote from the answer to the latter question:--

Salomon cwaeth. His heorte is xii thusendum sitha beohtre thonne ealle thas seofon heofenas the us sindon ofergesette, theah the hi syn ealle mid thy domiscan fyre onaeled, and theah the eal theos eorthe him neothan togegnes birne, and heo haebbe fyrene tungan, and gyldenne hracan, and leohtne muth inneweardne ... ... he is rethra and scearpra thonne eal middangeard, theah he sy binnan his feower hwommum fulgedrifen wildeora, and anra gehwylc deor haebbe synderlice xii hornas irene, and anra gehwylc horn haebbe xii tindas irene, and anra gehwylc tind haebbe synderlice xii ordas, and anra gehwylc ord sy xii thusendum sitha scearpra thonne seo an flan the sy fram hundtwelftigum hyrdenna geondhyrded . And theah the seofon middangeardas syn ealle on efn abraedde on thisses anes onlicnesse, and thaer sy eal gesomnod thaette heofon oththe hel oththe eorthe aefre acende, ne magon by tha lifes linan on middan ymb faethmian. And se Pater Noster he maeg anna ealla gesceafta on his thaere swithran hand on anes waexaepples onlienesse gethyn and gewringan. And his gethoht he is springdra and swiftra thonne xii thusendu haligra gasta, theah the anra gehwylc gast haebbe synderlice xii fetherhoman, and anra gehwylc fetherhoma haebbe xii windas, and aura gehwylc wind twelf sigefaestnissa synderlice.--Kemble, pp. 148-152.

Solomon said: His heart is 12,000 times brighter than all the seven heavens that over us are set, though they should be all aflame with the doomsday fire, and though all this earth should blaze up towards them from beneath, and it should have a fiery tongue, and golden throat, and mouth lighted up within ... ... he is fiercer and sharper than all the world, though within its four corners it should be driven full of wild deer, and each particular deer have severally twelve horns of iron, and each particular horn have twelve tines of iron, and each particular tine have severally twelve points, and each particular point be 12,000 times sharper than the arrow which had been hardened by 120 hardeners. And though the seven worlds should be all fairly spread out after the fashion of this one, and everything should be there a.s.sembled that heaven or h.e.l.l or earth ever engendered, they may not encircle the girth of his body at the middle. And the Pater Noster, he can by himself in his right hand grasp and squeeze all creation like a wax-apple. And his thought it is more alert and swifter than 12,00 angelic spirits, though each particular spirit have severally twelve suits of feathers, and each particular feather-suit have twelve winds, and each particular wind twelve victoriousnesses all to itself.

I do not undertake to a.s.sert that this piece is as old as the first half of the tenth century; it is placed here only because this seems to be the most natural place for the group of literature to which it belongs.

As I said, the reader must judge for himself whether this is perfectly serious. I believe that these "Dialogues" are the only part of Anglo-Saxon literature that can be suspected of mockery. The earliest laughter of English literature is ridicule; and if this ridicule seems to touch things sacred, it will, on the whole, I think, be found that not the sacred things themselves, but some unreal or spurious use of them, is really attacked. So here, if there is any appearance of a sly derision, the thing derided is not the Pater Noster, but the vain and magical uses which were too often ascribed to the repet.i.tion of it.

Here we must find a place for the translation of "Apollonius of Tyre."

This has all the features of a Greek romance, but it is only known to exist in a Latin text, so that it has been questioned whether this Latin romance is a translation from a Greek original, or a story originally Latin in imitation of the Greek romancists. With those who have investigated the subject, the hypothesis of translation is most in favour, and for the following reason. The story presents an appearance of double stratification, such as might naturally result if a heathen Greek romance had been translated into Latin by a Christian. Although the phenomenon could be equally explained by supposing a Latin heathen original which had been re-written by a Christian editor, yet the former is the more natural and the more probable hypothesis.[121]

We now come to the Blickling Homilies, a recently-published book of great importance. It is not a h.o.m.ogeneous work, but a motley collection of sermons of various age and quality. Some of the later sermons are not so very different from those of aelfric; but these are not the ones that give the book its character. The older sort have very distinct characteristics of their own, and they furnish a deep background to the Homilies of aelfric. They are plainly of the age before the great Church reform of the tenth century, when the line was very dimly drawn between canonical and uncanonical, and when quotations, legends, and arguments were admissible which now surprise us in a sermon. Indeed, one can hardly escape the surmise that the elder discourses may come down from some time, and perhaps rather an early time, in the ninth century. One of the sermons bears the date of 971 imbedded in its context; and this, which is probably the lowest date of the book, is twenty years before the Homilies of aelfric appeared. Speaking of that frequent topic of the time, the end of the world, which is to take place in the Sixth Age, the preacher says:--

--and thisse is thonne se maesta dael agangen, efne nigon hund wintra and lxxi. on thys geare.--P. 119.

--and of this is verily the most part already gone, even nine hundred years and seventy-one, in this year.

Perhaps there is no book which has been published in the present generation that has done so much for the historical knowledge of Anglo-Saxon literature. Speaking generally, we may say that it represents the preaching of the times before aelfric; that it contains the sort of preaching that aelfric sat under in his youth (when not at Abingdon or Winchester); the sort of preaching, too, that aelfric set himself to correct and to supersede. It is a book whose value turns not so much upon its own direct communications, as on the light it throws all around it, showing up the popular standards of the time, and enabling us to recognise the true setting of many a waif and stray of the old literature. But it is upon the work of aelfric that it sheds the most valuable light. There is in aelfric's Homilies a certain corrective aim, which was but faintly seen before, and when seen could not be distinctly explained; but now we have both the aim and the occasion of it rendered comparatively clear.

These Homilies supply to those of aelfric their true historical introduction. They support the reasons which aelfric a.s.signs for producing homilies. In his preface he speaks of certain English books to which he designs his sermons as an antidote. He had translated his discourses (he says) out of the Latin, not for pride of learning, "but because I had seen much heresy (_gedwild_) in many English books, which unlearned men in their simplicity thought mighty wise." Not only do the Blickling Homilies contain enough of unscriptural and apocryphal material to justify the charge of "_gedwild_" in its vaguer sense of error, but we have also doc.u.mentary grounds for believing that a careful theologian of that time, such as aelfric undoubtedly was, would have brought them under the indictment of heresy.

It used to be thought that the oldest extant list of condemned books proceeded from Pope Gelasius, and was of about A.D. 494; but now that list is a.s.signed to the eighth or even ninth century. In this Index we find sources for much of the literature which we have been considering in this chapter; we find the "Acts of Pilate," "Journeys of the Apostles," "Acts of Peter," "Acts of Andrew the Apostle," "The Contradiction of Solomon," "The Book Physiologus."[122] The material which gives the Blickling collection its peculiar character is largely apocryphal, and, in the light of the above list, heretical.

A new vitality is imparted to aelfric's sermons by their contrast with these older ones. It is plain that there is a common source behind both sets of sermons; the well-established series of topics for each occasion seems clearly to point to some standard collection of Latin homilies now lost.[123] The evident ident.i.ty of the lines on which the discourses run makes comparison the easier and the more satisfactory. In the sermon for Ascension Day, aelfric's treatment is in pointed contrast with the older book. The Blickling is full of the signs and wonders; some, indeed, Scriptural, but far more apocryphal; and it is effusive over these. Whereas aelfric teaches that the visible miracles belonged to the infancy of the Church, and were as artificial watering to a newly-planted tree; but, when the heathen believed, then those miracles ceased. Now (he says) we must look rather for spiritual miracles. The Homily on St. John Baptist is a good example. According to the old book, John is called "angelus," because he lived on earth the angelic life, but aelfric takes it as messenger, and this may hint the difference of treatment. In the same discourse there is a contrast which touches the chronology. The old Homily says that there are only two Nativities kept sacred by the Church--that of the Lord and that of His forerunner.

aelfric takes up this topic with a difference. He says that there are three Nativities, which are celebrated annually, adding that of the Blessed Virgin to the previous two. Now, it was precisely in the tenth century that this third began to be observed in the churches of the West;[124] and the change took place in the interval that separates these two sets of homilies.

On the a.s.sumptio St. Mariae, the elder homily is a jumble of apocryphal legend. Here aelfric presents a contrast, and manifestly an intentional one. In the preamble he recalls certain teaching of Jerome, "through which he quashed the misguided narrative which half-taught men had told about her departure." Then, after an exposition of the Gospel for the day, he returns to the a.s.sumption in a pa.s.sage which, when read in the light of the elder Homily, is very pointed:--"What shall we say to you more particularly about this festival, except that Mary was on this day taken up to heaven from this weary world, to dwell with Him, where she rejoices in eternal life for evermore? If we should say more to you about this day's festival than we read in those holy books which were given by G.o.d's inspiration, we should be like those mountebanks who, from their own imaginations or from dreams, have written many false stories; but the faithful teachers, Augustine, Jerome, Gregory, and other such, have in their wisdom rejected them. But still these absurd books exist, both in Latin and in English, and misguided men read them.

It is enough for believers to read and to relate that which is true; and there are very few men who can completely study all the holy books that were indited by G.o.d's Holy Spirit. Let alone those absurd fictions, which lead the unwary to perdition, and read or listen to Holy Scripture, which directs us to heaven."

The Homilies of aelfric are in two series, of which the first was published in 990, and addressed to Sigeric, Archbishop of Canterbury; the second in 991, after that Danish invasion in which Byrhtnoth fell.

These were long ago published by the aelfric Society. But there is another set, appropriated to the commemoration of saints, after the manner of the Benedictine hagiographies.[125] These have a Latin preface, pointedly agreeing with the prefaces to the previous series. If their miraculous narratives sometimes contain what we should not have expected from aelfric, and if this leads us to doubt the authorship, we may reflect that the contrast is not so great as that between the "Cura Pastoralis" and the "Dialogues" of Gregory.

As a slight specimen of the character of these latter discourses, I will give a few lines from that on St. Swithun:--

Eadgar cyning tha aefter thysum tacnum . wolde thaet se halga wer wurde up gedon . and spraec hit to Athelwolde tham arwurthan bisceope . thaet he hine upp adyde mid arwurthnysse . Tha se bisceop Athelwold mid abbodum and munec.u.m dyde up thone sanct mid sange wurthlice . and baeron into cyrcan sce Petres huse . thaer he stent mid wurthmynte . and wundra gefremath.

King Eadgar then, after these tokens, willed that the holy man should be translated, and spake it to Athelwold, the venerable bishop, that he should translate him with honourable solemnity. Then the bishop Athelwold, with abbots and monks, raised the saint with song solemnly. And they bare him into the church St. Peter's house, where he stands in honoured memory, and worketh wonders.

Seo ealde cyrce waes eall be hangen mid cricc.u.m . and mid creopera sceamelum fram ende oth otherne . on aegtherum wage . the thaer wurdon ge haelede . and man ne mihte swa theah macian hi healfe up.

The old church was all hung round with crutches and with stools from one end to the other, on either wall, of cripples who there had been healed: and yet they had not been able to put half of them up.

aelfric's place in literature consists in this:--That he is the voice of that great Church reform which is the most signal fact in the history of the latter half of the tenth century. Of this reform, the first step was the restoration of the rule of Benedict in the religious houses. The great movement had begun in Gaul early in the ninth century, and its extension to our island could hardly be delayed when peaceful times left room for attention to learning and religion. Both in Frankland and in England the religious revival followed the literary one; only there it followed quickly, and here after a long interval.[126]

The chief author of this revival was Odo (died 961), and the chief conductors of it were aethelwold, Dunstan, Oswald. The leaders of this movement were much in communication with the Frankish monasteries, especially with the famous house at Fleury on the Loire. Various kinds of literature were cherished, but that which is most peculiar to this time is the biographies of Saints. Lanferth, a disciple of aethelwold, wrote Latin hagiographies, and from his Latin was derived the extant homily of the miracles of St. Swithun. Wulstan, a monk of Winchester and a disciple of aethelwold, was a Latin poet, and wrote hagiography in verse; among the rest, he versified the work of Lanferth on St. Swithun.

aelfric was an alumnus of aethelwold at Winchester, and perhaps at Abingdon earlier; from Winchester he was sent to Cernel (Cerne Abbas in Dorsetshire), to be the pastor of aethelweard's house and people, and there he wrought at his homilies. The highest t.i.tle that we find a.s.sociated with his name is that of abbot; and this probably is in relation to Egonesham (Eynsham, Oxon), where aethelweard founded a religious house, and aelfric superintended it. In aethelweard the ealdorman we have our first example of a great lay patron of literature: much of aelfric's work was undertaken at the instance of aethelweard.

It was at his request that he engaged in the translation of the Old Testament, and when he had done the Pentateuch (with frequent omissions), and some parts of Joshua and Judges,[127] he ceased, and declared he would translate no more, having a misgiving lest the narration of many things unlike Christian morality might confuse the judgment of the simple. This is the earliest recorded instance of a devout Christian withholding Scripture from the people for their good.

And, when we take it in conjunction with the authorised diffusion of the Benedictine hagiographies of the time, we see what was approved placed by the side of that which was mistrusted.

The so-called "Canons of aelfric" are a mixed composition, in which some matters of historical and doctrinal instruction are united with directions and regulations and exhortations for correcting the practices of the ignorant priests. They were compiled by aelfric, at the request of Wulfsige, Bishop of Sherborne (A.D. 992-1001), for the benefit of his clergy. The reformation of the monasteries had already made considerable progress, and this seems like an extension of the same movement to embrace the secular clergy. Among the divers matters touched in the Articles are these:--The relative authority of the councils; the first four are to be had in reverence like the four gospels (Tha feower sinothas sind to healdenne swa swa tha feower Cristes bec)--the vestments, the books, and the garb of the priest; the seven orders of the Christian ministry; some points of priestly duty as regards marriages and funerals; of Baptism and the Eucharist, with rebuke of superst.i.tious practices; the priest to speak the sense of the Gospel to the people in English on Sundays and high days, as also of the Lord's Prayer and the Creed; but, withal, the immediate practical aim of the whole seems, above all things, to be the celibacy of the clergy.[128]