LECTURE VI LITERARY WORKS (continued); SUMMARY AND CONCLUSION

Authorship of the Orosius translation undisputed. Recent doubts as to the Bede translation. Ælfric distinctly attributes it to Alfred, which he does not do in the case of the Dialogues.

§ 104. We have seen[779] that in the case of the Orosius, the only direct hint of authorship contained in the book itself is the address of Ohthere to ‘his lord King Alfred’; and the earliest external testimony on the subject is to be found in William of Malmesbury in the early part of the twelfth century. But no one has ever doubted King Alfred’s authorship. Till recently the same might have been said of the Bede; in 1877 Professor Wülker spoke of Alfred’s authorship of the Bede as ‘a fact which no one hitherto has doubted or could doubt[780].’ Since then, however, Mr. Sweet, in his Anglo-Saxon Reader[781], and Dr. Thomas Miller in his edition of the Bede translation, published by the Early English Text Society[782], have tried to overthrow the traditional view; the former, mainly on the ground of that occasional over-literalness of the version already alluded to[783]; the latter, because he thinks that it shows Mercian characteristics incompatible with a West Saxon origin. Now we must admit at once that the book itself contains no direct evidence of authorship, not even such a hint as is dropped in the Orosius. On the other hand the external evidence is very much earlier. Ælfric, the homilist, distinctly quotes the book as Alfred’s. In his homily on St. Gregory he says: ‘Many books tell of his conversation and holy life, as does Historia Anglorum, which King Alfred translated out of English into Latin.… We will however tell you something about him because the fore-said book is not known to all of you, although it is translated into English[784].’ This was written within a hundred years of Alfred’s death. For many books of which the authorship has never been doubted we cannot produce evidence anything like as early. I may note in passing that in speaking of the translation of Gregory’s Dialogues Ælfric makes no assertion as to the Alfredian authorship, merely saying ‘the book has been translated into English, and in it any one who will read it may learn profitably of these matters[785].’ In another place he gives interesting evidence that, till he himself took pen in hand, Alfred’s translations were the only books accessible to those who did not know Latin[786].

Evidence of MSS.

Moreover the Cambridge University MS. of the Anglo-Saxon Bede, which is said to be of the middle of the eleventh century, has at the beginning and end the following distich:—

The same MS. contains, between Bede’s Preface and the History proper, a copy of the West Saxon genealogy in the exact form in which it appears in MS. of the Saxon Chronicle; i.e. it comes down to the accession of Alfred, and no further. This again connects the work with Alfred. The Cambridge MS. is, as far as we can test it, an undoubted copy of one which exists in the library of my own college. This is unfortunately imperfect, both at the beginning and the end. But if, as is likely, it also contained originally the distich and the pedigree, the evidence is thrown yet further back[787].

Curiously enough both Laȝamon[788] and Rudborne[789] speak of the Saxon version as if it were Bede’s own.

The negative arguments inconclusive. The argument from dialect.

§ 105. The question of its authorship must not be regarded as outside the pale of discussion. Only I do not think that the arguments hitherto advanced are sufficient to establish a negative conclusion. As to Dr. Miller’s Mercian theory, I may say at once that I have no pretensions to pose as an expert in early English dialects. I can get up no enthusiasm for the minute distinctions of form and spelling which form their criteria. They have for me only the practical and unpleasant interest that they oblige me often to look up a word in three or four different places in the dictionary before finding it. I may however mention that Professor Schipper, the latest editor of the Anglo-Saxon Bede[790], does not regard the Mercian theory as established[791]. But even if it were established, it does not seem to me incompatible with Alfred’s authorship. It is agreed that all our existing MSS. go back to a single archetype, though they branch off into two groups which form to some extent a twofold recension[792]. The scribe of that archetypal MS. may have been a Mercian, and there may have been other MSS. in which these Mercian peculiarities were wanting. Even if it be assumed (for it certainly could not be proved), that this Mercian archetype was the original MS. of all, it is equally open to us to suppose that the scribe to whom Alfred dictated his translation in the first instance may have been a Mercian. Or again it is quite possible that the Mercian characteristics, if they exist, may be due to the influence of the Mercian scholars who assisted Alfred in his work—Plegmund, Werferth, and the two Mercian chaplains mentioned by Asser[793]. And it is some confirmation of this that there is a certain affinity noticeable between the diction and style of the Bede translation and that of the earlier or unrevised version of the Dialogues, which, as we have seen, there is good reason to attribute to Werferth[794].

Argument from style. Influence of Latin on early prose. The Bede may never have been finally revised.

§ 106. As to the over-literalness of the translation in places, the fact must be admitted, though the extent of it has been, I think, somewhat exaggerated. The cases fall under three heads: (1) where a Latin construction is unidiomatically imitated in the Saxon[795]; this applies especially to constructions with the ablative absolute[796], the accusative and infinitive[797], and the use of the passive voice[798], the range of which is much more restricted in Saxon than in Latin[799]; (2) where a Latin word is translated by a Saxon one which may correspond fairly well with the general meaning of the Latin word, but does not give its sense in the particular passage[800]; (3) where a phrase or sentence is translated, to use Alfred’s own expression, ‘word by word,’ instead of ‘sense by sense[801].’ To all these classes the explanation suggested by Professor Schipper would often apply, viz. that the translator may have embodied in his work interlinear glosses which had been made to assist him; and he cites in illustration the difference between the West Saxon and Northumbrian versions of the Gospels, the former of which is a genuine translation, while the latter is an interlinear gloss made word for word[802]. Some however of the cases where Latin constructions are reproduced, and also one or two of the second class, give me the impression, not that the translator could not have translated more idiomatically if he had pleased, but rather that he was trying experiments with the language. The development of early prose in almost all European languages has been largely influenced by Latin models, and it was only experience which could show how far the process of assimilation might be carried. Similarly for some two centuries after the Renaissance English prose literature is full of experimentally transplanted Latinisms, of which a large proportion failed to make good their footing in the language. Another possibility must also be borne in mind; that the Bede may never have received Alfred’s final revision. We have seen that in the case of the Dialogues an extensive revision was found desirable at a later time, and we seem to have traces of a partial revision of the Bede in the younger group of MSS. mentioned above, in which not only does the translation vary, at times very considerably[803], but a passage is inserted which the earlier recension omits[804], and conversely[805]. When this partial revision was made I cannot say, but probably not by Alfred himself. On the whole, then, I do not regard Mr. Sweet’s or Dr. Miller’s argument as conclusive, either against Alfred’s authorship of the Bede translation, or against the priority of the Orosius.

Omissions made by Alfred in the Bede. The Easter Controversy.

§ 107. I have already said[806] that the principal changes made by Alfred in the Bede are in the way of omission, the additions being comparatively slight. It is worth while to see what considerations guided him in this. First of all he omits almost all documents[807], in two instances he just gives a brief summary of a letter in oratio obliqua[808]. He seems at first to have intended to omit the interrogations and responses of Augustine and Gregory, but afterwards to have changed his mind, as in all the MSS. they occur after the third book instead of in their proper place near the end of the first[809]. He also omits all the metrical compositions, epitaphs, &c.[810], which occur in the course of the work. Then, too, he omits almost everything bearing on the Easter Controversy[811]; partly no doubt because he felt, as modern readers feel, the intolerable tediousness of the whole thing; but partly also, we may well believe, because he disliked the bitterness which even the gentle Bede shows on this question[812], for there are little touches which seem to prove that the piety and self-devotion of the Celtic missionaries had made a deep impression on his heart[813]. The early history prior to the conversion of the Saxons is also a good deal abbreviated[814], no doubt as having less direct interest for his readers. So the description of the sacred places which Bede largely borrowed from Arculfus is omitted, probably for similar reasons[815].

The additions unimportant.

§ 108. It has often formed a subject both of wonder and regret that Alfred should not have enriched the Bede with additions drawn from his own knowledge of the traditions of his people, as he might so easily have done. Reverence for his original may have had something to do with this; but I agree with Professor Wülker[816] that the main reason probably was, because all that Alfred desired in this line had already been done in the compilation of the Saxon Chronicle. It is confirmatory of this that the chronological summary appended to his history by Bede, which had, as I have elsewhere shown[817], such an important influence on the development of annalistic writing in general, and of the Saxon Chronicle in particular, is omitted in the Bede translation.

Smaller additions and expansions there are, but they seldom really add anything to the narrative. They are as a rule merely inserted to make it a little more clear[818], or a little more vivid, or a little more in accordance with the translator’s ideas[819]. Occasionally, though rarely, they show a touch of personal feeling; as where Diocletian is characterised as the bad emperor[820], Constantine as the good emperor[821], and Aidan as the good bishop[822]. Sometimes, as in the other works, they are brief explanations of things which the readers might not know[823]. Occasionally statements of Bede’s are altered[824], or omitted[825], because they were no longer applicable, or they are marked distinctly as being Bede’s and not Alfred’s[826]. But in other cases similar statements are retained, though it would not be safe to argue from this that the state of things indicated still subsisted in Alfred’s day[827].

Mistakes.

Here too there are mistakes[828], though fewer and less serious than in the Orosius. In some cases they may be due to erroneous readings in the MS. which Alfred used[829]. In one or two instances Alfred’s version shows a remarkable divergence of historical fact, which can hardly arise wholly from misunderstanding[830].

Merits of the translation.

But on the whole the translation is a worthy one, preserving, and in one or two instances enhancing[831], the beauty of the original, the most beautiful historical work which the Church had produced since Luke and John wrote their Gospels.

One incidental merit of the translation, as Stubbs has remarked[832], is that it enables us to equate the Saxon technical terms of officers and institutions with the corresponding Latin ones[833].

The translation of Boethius. Fame of the original in the Middle Ages. Causes of this popularity; its form. Sympathy with the author.

§ 109. We come now to what is in many respects the most interesting and important of all Alfred’s literary works, viz. the translation of Boethius on the Consolation of Philosophy. It is here that the additions made by Alfred to his original give us the clearest insight into his own character and modes of thought. And the original is in itself one of the most noteworthy books of the Middle Ages. Just as Orosius was to those ages the accepted manual of universal history[834], and the Cura Pastoralis their accepted manual of Spiritual Counsel, so the Consolatio of Boethius was their accepted manual of practical and speculative philosophy; the one channel through which some tincture of ancient speculation passed into the popular thought of the early Middle Ages. Perhaps no book except the Bible and the Imitatio has been translated into so many languages; and in more than one European country the early translations of the Consolatio have had an important influence on the development of a vernacular literature[835]. For this popularity several reasons may be given. Something was probably due to the form of the work, which is written in that mixture of verse and prose known as the Satura Menippaea[836]. The lyrics of the Consolatio won the enthusiastic admiration of the great Renaissance scholar, F. C. Scaliger[837], and I must confess that to me they seem extremely beautiful, though their beauty is of a somewhat frosty order. But if they have something of the hardness and coldness of marble, they have also its purity and high polish[838]. But the chief reason was, no doubt, sympathy with the author’s misfortunes, whose sudden fall, from being the favourite and chief minister of Theodoric, to prison and to death, made him one of the most signal examples in that ever-lengthening treatise De casibus illustrium uirorum, on which the Middle Ages pondered with intense and morbid interest, feeding that contempt for the world[839] and all things human, which finds such passionate expression in many mediaeval writings:—

Was Boethius a Christian? The Consolatio not distinctively Christian.

To this power of the work as a record of human suffering pathetic testimony is borne by the title of an anonymous French translation of the fifteenth century, which announces itself as the work of ’un pauvre clerc désolé, quérant sa consolation par la traduction de cestui livre[841]’; it is the book to which Dante resorted for comfort after the death of Beatrice[842]; and our own Sir Thomas More while in prison wrote an imitation of Boethius, which he calls ‘Three Books of Comfort in Tribulation[843].’ ‘Dost thou think,’ asks Philosophy of Boethius in Alfred’s translation, ‘that to thee alone such change of state and sorrow have come[844]?’ And, in spite of Tennyson, the fact ‘that loss is common’ does ‘make Our own less bitter[845]’; and the ‘sense of tears in mortal things[846]’ knits mankind together in bonds of sympathy which do make the common burden lighter. And in the case of Boethius this natural feeling was heightened by the erroneous impression, which prevailed in the Middle Ages, that the sufferings of Boethius were due to the rage of an Arian ruler against his Catholic servant[847]. A superficial inspection of dates is sufficient to dispel this illusion[848]; and how little support it derives from the work itself is shown by the fact, that few questions in literary history have been more keenly debated than the question, whether the author was a Christian at all[849]. The question turns largely on the authenticity of certain theological tracts which bear the name of Boethius, and do not concern us here[850]. On the whole it is probable that Boethius was by profession a Christian, though it would seem that his Christianity did not go very deep. Certainly in the hour of trouble, which generally shows the real basis of a man’s thought and character, he turns for consolation, not to the doctrines of Christianity, but to the teachings of Neo-platonic philosophy; and I unhesitatingly affirm that there is far more of the spirit of Christianity in the writings of acknowledged pagans like Seneca and Marcus Aurelius, than in this work of a nominal Christian, who enforces the duty of prayer, not by the authority of Christ and His Apostles, but by that of Plato in the Timaeus[851].

This non-Christian character concealed by glosses and commentaries, from which many of Alfred’s additions are derived.

§ 110. It might have been thought that this absence of any distinctively Christian character would have militated against the popularity of the Consolatio in the Middle Ages. That it did not do so was due partly to causes already enumerated, partly to the fact that the non-Christian character of the work was to some extent concealed by the Christian interpretation given to various passages in the commentaries and glosses on Boethius; which interpretations were in turn embodied in the different translations of the Consolatio, at the head of which stands Alfred’s version.

Yet the additions illustrate Alfred’s thought.

This interesting fact, that many of the additions in Alfred’s Boethius, especially those of a distinctly Christian character, are not really due to Alfred himself but to the glosses and commentaries which were used by him or his learned assistants, was first pointed out by Dr. Schepss in a very suggestive article in the Archiv für’s Studium der neueren Sprachen[852]. It is much to be regretted that Dr. Schepss’ death prevented him from pursuing this line of investigation further. Till this field has been fully explored, we incur the danger of citing as specially characteristic of Alfred something which he only borrowed from others. In some instances I have noticed that the additions made by Alfred are really taken from, or at least suggested by other passages in the text of Boethius[853]. But, when all deductions have been made, there remains enough that we may safely take as evidence of Alfred’s thought and feeling. I have already cited the passage bearing on the needs and instruments of a king[854]. This was to some extent suggested by a commentary, but it is instinct with the mind of Alfred, as is the oft-quoted sentence with which the chapter closes: ‘My will was to live worthily as long as I lived, and after my life to leave to them that should come after my memory in good works[855].’ Very Alfredian too are the thoughts that reward should not be looked for in this world[856], but should be sought from God alone[857]; that a good name is better than any wealth[858]; that true nobility is of the mind, not of the body[859]; that an honest purpose is accepted, even though its accomplishment be frustrated[860]; that a king without free subjects is nothing worth[861]; that no one should be idle[862], or wish to live a soft life[863]. But perhaps the noblest passage is that in which by a splendid metaphor Philosophy is made to say: ‘When I with my servants mount aloft, then do we look down upon the stormy world, even as the eagle when he soars above the clouds in stormy weather, so that the storms cannot hurt him[864]’;—a metaphor which so strikingly expresses Alfred’s own soaring superiority to what he elsewhere calls ‘the wind of stern labours, and the rain of excessive anxiety[865].’

Wealth of similes in the translation.

And this brings me to another point. If any one will look through the additions made by Alfred to the text of Boethius, which are very conveniently distinguished by italic type in Mr. Sedgefield’s handy rendering of Alfred’s version into modern English[866], he can hardly fail to notice how many of them consist in metaphors and similes; none perhaps so fine as that just quoted, but often of great interest and beauty[867]. Even where the simile was suggested by something in the text or commentary which Alfred had before him, it is often developed at much greater length. This is a point of some interest, because it shows that Alfred’s mind was of the class which delights in parable and figure, and makes it not unreasonable to look for deeper meanings in what he wrote and wrought[868].

Discussion on Fate and Freewill.

§ 111. I have said that the subject of fate occupies a prominent place in the Consolatio and in Alfred’s translation of it[869]. The relation of fate to providence, of divine foreknowledge to human freedom, the nature of evil, the existence of chance, these are the high themes round which much of the latter part of the argument circles. They are the themes which occupied the more intellectual spirits among Milton’s fallen angels:—

And fallen man has succeeded as little as fallen angel in solving these high doubts. Alfred realises, as indeed does Boethius, the arduous nature of the inquiry; and his conclusion is, as we should expect, much more than is the case with Boethius, the conclusion of Christian faith and practical Christian piety: ‘I say, as do all Christian men, that it is the divine purpose that rules, and not Fate[871].’ He sees, as all moralists have seen, that morality is only possible on a basis of freedom, that fatalism reduces vice and virtue, punishment and reward to unmeaning terms[872]. ‘To men and to angels God gave the gift of freedom that they might do good or evil, whichever they pleased[873].… But if it be true that the good and the wicked are so made as to be unable to act otherwise than they do, then vain is our labour when we pray, and fast, or give alms, if we have no more thank therefor than those who in all things … run after their fleshly lusts[874]; … and vain too is the commandment which God gave to man that he should eschew evil and do good[875].’ God knows all our works, before we even conceive them in our thought; but this knowledge is not a cause compelling us so to act, any more than the knowledge of the steersman that a storm is coming, is the cause of the storm[876].

Other points characteristic of Alfred.

There are other points which illustrate Alfred’s studies, tastes, and circumstances; the saying that in the golden age no one had heard of a pirate host[877]; the allusion to the wise goldsmith, Weland[878]; the explanations about India and Thule[879].

And there are things in the text itself which evidently come home to Alfred; the beauty of gems[880], the fairness of the country-side—the fairest of all God’s creations[881], the song of the birds in the woods[882], the worth of friends[883]; the stories of kings reduced to poverty[884], of the sword of Damocles[885], the joy of a calm haven after storms[886].

Omissions.

Here too, as in the case of the Orosius, Alfred has modified his original by omissions as well as additions; but it is unnecessary to go minutely into this point, as Mr. Sedgefield has prefixed to his edition of Alfred’s version an elaborate table showing the relation of that version to the original[887].

No doubt as to Alfred’s authorship of the prose translation. Did he also write the alliterative version of the Metra? The negative arguments for the most part purely subjective.

§ 112. In regard to the translation as a whole no doubt has ever been expressed as to the authorship of Alfred[888]; and it is the only one of Alfred’s works which is mentioned by name by Ethelwerd, who wrote towards the end of the tenth century[889]. There is, however, an interesting literary question connected with it, which is this. The translation exists in only two MSS., one in the Cottonian Collection[890], the other in the Bodleian[891]. In the older or Cottonian MS. the metrical parts of Boethius are, with three exceptions[892], rendered into alliterative Saxon verse; in the later or Bodleian MS. they are rendered into prose. It is as to Alfred’s authorship of the alliterative poems that the controversy has raged; and those who deny their authenticity are compelled to deny also the authenticity of the two proems in prose and verse[893], in both of which the poems are distinctly ascribed to Alfred. The question, though interesting as a literary problem, is not intrinsically of great importance. The poems are not of the highest order, though they have been, I think, unduly depreciated. Alfred’s fame will not be much exalted if he wrote them, or much depressed if they should be adjudged to another. I must confess, however, that a great deal of the argument on the negative side seems to me to be of that purely arbitrary and subjective kind which in its ultimate analysis amounts to this: ‘it can’t have been so, because I don’t think that it was[894].’

Logical result of this style of criticism.

§ 113. One thing is agreed on all sides; the verse translation is made from the prose translation, and is not an independent rendering made direct from the Latin; and the main argument of the negative critics is that it is impossible to suppose that a man like Alfred can have occupied himself in turning his own vigorous prose into indifferent verse. On this I would remark: first, does it follow, because Alfred was a great man and a great prose-writer, that he was also necessarily a considerable poet[895]? Secondly, if Alfred wrote the verses, does it necessarily follow that he thought them poor and unworthy of the trouble of making? Great writers are not always gifted with the faculty of self-criticism; otherwise we should not have Wordsworth taking apparently equal pleasure in the composition of Betty Foy and of Laodamia. Indeed, on my conscience, I believe that he liked Betty Foy the better of the two[896]. Thirdly, even if Alfred were conscious of his limitations as a poet, is it not possible that his conscientious spirit may have felt bound to give as true a representation of the original as possible, by reproducing one of its most salient features, the alternation of verse and prose? In truth this style of criticism, if logically carried out, would lead us very far. It would prove, for instance, that at least two hands were concerned in the composition of the third book of Wordsworth’s Prelude. That book contains the glorious and well-known lines:—

But it also contains the no less well-known, but most inglorious line:

It would also prove (to take a closer parallel) that the late Professor Conington never wrote a verse translation of the Aeneid. Unlike Alfred, Mr. Conington was, as we all know, a very considerable Latin scholar; but I must be pardoned for saying that, like Alfred, he was not a very considerable poet. He wrote a prose translation of the Aeneid, of which he thought so little that it was not published till after his death; he wrote a verse translation of the same poem, of which he evidently thought a good deal. Yet can we not imagine a German critic a thousand years hence arguing that the author of the prose translation could never have penned a couplet like the following?—

Probability that the prose version of the Metra was intended merely as a basis for the verse translation. Illustration from the Old High German version. Mutual relations of the two editions. Illustration from two French versions.

§ 114. For my own part, so far from regarding the existence of the prose translation of Boethius’ Metra as inconsistent with Alfred’s authorship of the alliterative version, I am inclined to regard the former as intended from the first to serve as the basis of the latter. I would bring into connexion with this the interesting statement of William of Malmesbury, that Asser, for Alfred’s benefit, unravelled the meaning of the De Consolatione in plainer words; ‘a labour,’ says Malmesbury, with the sniff of the superior person, ‘in those days necessary, in ours ridiculous[898].’ Zimmermann understood this as meaning a preliminary translation made by Asser. ‘Entschieden falsch,’ cries Professor Wülker[899], with the usual brusqueness of a German critic. But the criticism may be retorted on his own explanation that Asser glossed a manuscript for the king’s use. The passage clearly refers to a paraphrase of the original in simpler language, and more natural order, like that which occupies the margin of some of the Delphin Classics, an illustration which had occurred to myself before I knew that Dr. Schepss had also made use of it in his admirable essay referred to above[900]. It is an interesting fact that in the case of early High German we possess just such a paraphrase of this very work. This is how Mr. Stewart, in his excellent monograph on Boethius, describes the translation of the Consolatio made by Notker III of St. Gallen, about a century after Alfred’s time: ‘His method of translation is to give a sentence or group of words of the original, which he arranges for the sake of his pupils in as simple and straightforward a form as possible, followed by the German equivalent. This last is expanded, as the occasion seems to require, by passages of explanation and paraphrase of varying length[901].’ Except as to the ‘German equivalent,’ this illustrates very aptly what I conceive to have been Asser’s procedure. It also illustrates the way in which many of Alfred’s additions may have found their way into his translation. And it would be especially in the poetical portions of the work that such a paraphrase, giving the words of the original in a less intricate order, would be required. So that while Asser paraphrased Boethius’ poetry in prose, Alfred, by a reverse process, first translated Asser’s prose into prose, and then at a later time paraphrased his own prose version in verse. That, in the interval which elapsed between the two versions, the earlier edition should have been copied and circulated, that at a later time scribes should have prefixed to copies of the first edition the prose proem which in strictness is only applicable to the second, is easily intelligible[902]; and it is curious that to this also an almost exact parallel can be produced from the fortunes of the Consolatio in another European country. There exist in French two thirteenth-century translations of the Consolatio. To quote Mr. Stewart once more: ‘The one is in prose, a word-for-word rendering; … the other, a more scholarly performance, follows the scheme of the Latin original’; i.e. in the alternation of verse and prose. Yet to both versions the same prologue is prefixed, in which the translation which follows is in each case attributed to Jehan de Meun[903]. That Alfred intended from the first to give a verse rendering of the Metra, and that he did not see his way at once to carry out his intention, seems to me to be hinted at in a passage near the end of the book, which has very little corresponding to it in the original: ‘It is nigh unto the time when I had purposed to take other work in hand, and I have not yet done with this; … I cannot now so soon sing it, nor have I leisure therefor[904].’

Another point which, as Hartmann showed[905], tells in favour of Alfred’s authorship is the way in which in the poems references are made to the prose portions of the work.

The attack has broken down.

On the whole I regard the attack on Alfred’s authorship of the Metra as having decidedly broken down[906]; and in this opinion I am glad to have the concurrence of a very competent critic in the Times of August 20, 1901. I am breaking no confidence in identifying that critic with my friend and teacher Professor Earle.

Alfred’s last work, the Soliloquies, or ‘Blooms.’

§ 115. The last undoubted work of Alfred’s that has come down to us is one which bears the title ‘Blooms,’ or, as we might say, ‘Anthology[907].’ The first two books are derived mainly from St. Augustine’s two books of Soliloquies. The first book and part of the second follow the original fairly closely, but the remainder of the second book is very free, and is mainly Alfred’s own. The third book is based to some extent on St. Augustine’s Epistle to Paulina on the Vision of God, with additions from the De Ciuitate Dei, St. Gregory’s Dialogues, the Moralia, together with reflexions of Alfred’s own[908]. The use of the De Ciuitate Dei is especially interesting, as it was the favourite book of Charles the Great[909]. It is a noteworthy proof of Alfred’s advance in literary art, that whereas in this third book his materials were not originally in dialogue form, he has very skilfully thrown them into that form in order to make them harmonise with the first two books.

Bad state of the text.

The work has come down to us in a pitiable condition, in a single late and corrupt manuscript, mutilated both at the beginning and end, and with evident lacunae in other places. At the beginning part of the preface is gone; at the end I do not myself think that more is lost than part of the final colophon; the concluding words of the actual text seem to me to mark undoubtedly the close of the work. Professor Wülker indeed thought otherwise; but he was led to his conclusion partly by the wish to give greater probability to his theory which would identify this work with Alfred’s Encheiridion or Commonplace Book; a theory from which, as already stated[910], I strongly dissent, and which Wülker himself has since withdrawn[911]. Still even in its ruin the work reflects clearly the features of its author. The Preface in particular is so characteristic that, as it is comparatively little known, I give it here:—

The Preface.

‘I gathered me then staves, and props, and bars, and helves for each of my tools, and boughs; and for each of the works that I could work, I took the fairest trees, so far as I might carry them away. Nor did I ever bring any burden home without longing to bring home the whole wood, if that might be; for in every tree I saw something of which I had need at home. Wherefore I exhort every one who is strong and has many wains, that he direct his steps to the same wood where I cut the props. Let him there get him others, and load his wains with fair twigs, that he may weave thereof many a goodly wain, and set up many a noble house, and build many a pleasant town, and dwell therein in mirth, and ease, both winter and summer, as I could never do hitherto. But He who taught me to love that wood, He may cause me to dwell more easily, both in this transitory dwelling … while I am in the world, and also in the eternal home which He has promised us through … the holy fathers. And so I believe He will do for their merits, both make this [earthly] way better than it was ere this, or at least enlighten the eyes of my mind, that I may find the right way to the eternal home, and to the eternal country, and to the eternal rest, which is promised to us through the holy fathers. So be it.’

Significance of this Preface. It is the Epilogue to Alfred’s literary works.

§ 116. It is Alfred looking back over the whole of his storm-tossed life, and realising that the calm haven is close at hand[912], and that he must leave it to others to carry on the work which he had begun. Professor Wülker, in the interest of the theory alluded to above, says that this preface refers to a larger collection than any to be found in these three books of ‘Blooms[913].’ True; most true. But the larger collection to which it refers is not this, or any other single work of his, however hypothetically enlarged; but the whole of his literary works. And just as the Preface to the Pastoral Care is in some sense a Prologue to the whole collection, so this is, in a very real sense, the Epilogue. We may not, here in Oxford, claim Alfred as our founder; but surely our hearts may be uplifted at the thought, that in all that we do here in the cause of true learning and of genuine education, we are carrying on the work which Alfred left us to do.

The most mature of Alfred’s works.

The book is in other ways also the most mature of Alfred’s works. It is very closely related to the Boethius both in thought and diction[914]. And just as in the Orosius we had a foretaste of the discussion on fate which holds so prominent a place in the Boethius[915], so the subject of the immortality of the soul, which is only just touched on in the Boethius[916], is here developed at length[917]. And here, as in the Boethius, Alfred’s conclusion is much more distinctly Christian than that of his original. The Soliloquies is one of Augustine’s earliest works, written at a time when a good deal of the gentile rhetorician still hung about him[918]. It must be confessed that his philosophical arguments on this subject are not very convincing, but in Alfred they are strongly reinforced by the authority of Scripture and of the fathers.

Wealth of similes.

Here, too, many of the additions which Alfred makes to his original consist of those similes and parables[919] which he loved so well; the most beautiful perhaps being one in which the soul made fast to God is compared to a ship riding securely on her anchor[920].

Confusion of author and translator.

§ 117. I have said that in the third book Alfred casts into a dialogue form materials which have not that shape in the original. The interlocutors still remain as before, Augustine and Reason. It is a quaint proof of the completeness with which Alfred lost the sense of translation in the consciousness of authorship, that in a passage where the De uidendo Deo is spoken of, the Augustine of the dialogue is made to say: ‘I have not now leisure to go through all that book[921],’ although the historical Augustine was the actual author of it.

Characteristic thoughts.

Of thoughts characteristic of Alfred I will quote but two. The first is this: ‘No man may do aught of good unless God work with him. And yet no one should be idle and not attempt something in proportion to the powers which God gives him[922].’ The other is contained in the last sentence of the book[923]. And I think you will feel with me that we have here ‘the conclusion of the whole matter’; that anything added to this would be of the nature of an anticlimax: ‘Therefore he seems to me a very foolish man, and very wretched, who will not increase his understanding while he is in the world, and ever wish and long to reach that endless life where all shall be made clear.’

Alfred’s last words.

They are the last words not merely of this book; they are the last words of Alfred to us all across the chasm of a thousand years. We have seen some reason for thinking that the earliest of Alfred’s own works, the Pastoral Care, cannot be earlier than 894[924]; and as the years 894-6 were largely occupied with warfare[925], it is probable that Alfred’s literary activity falls mainly into the last four years of his reign, those four silent years for which our authorities fail us almost wholly, but in which Alfred had something of that ‘stillness’ for which he wishes in the Preface to the Pastoral Care.

Alfred and his grandson Athelstan.

One little glimpse we do get of him during his later years. William of Malmesbury, who had special materials for the life of Athelstan[926], tells us how he, a child, like Alfred himself, of singular beauty and attractiveness, was invested by his famous grandsire, who discerned his early promise, with a scarlet cloak, a jewelled belt, and a Saxon sword with golden scabbard[927]. And thus Alfred inherited the twofold blessing of the Psalmist: ‘Thou shalt see thy children’s children, and peace upon Israel.’ Nor was it least among Alfred’s blessings that he left a son like Edward, and a grandson like Athelstan, to carry on his work.

Death and character of Alfred.

§ 118. It was while he was occupied with these high thoughts of Providence and immortality, that he passed away. How the call came to him to quit these shadows for the ‘life where all things are made clear’ we do not know. We only know that it came on October 26, and probably in the year 900[928]. He was only fifty-two. But even if the tradition of his constant illness be rejected, he had been through what might well have worn out even a strong man in a shorter time. Those who witnessed the extinction of so great a light might have exclaimed with Shakespeare’s tawny queen:

Florence’s noble panegyric on Alfred is well known, where he tells how there passed away ‘Alfred the king of the Anglo-Saxons, the son of the most pious king Æthelwulf, the famous, the warlike, the victorious, the careful provider for the widow, the helpless[930], the orphan and the poor; the most skilled of Saxon poets, most dear to his own nation, courteous to all, most liberal; endowed with prudence, fortitude, justice and temperance; most patient in the infirmity from which he continually suffered; the most discerning investigator in executing justice, most watchful and devout in the service of God[931].’ Even the turgid, tasteless Ethelwerd becomes simple and dignified in the face of this great event. ‘There passed from the world,’ he says, ‘the high-souled Alfred, the immovable pillar of the West Saxons; a man full of justice, learned in discourse, imbued especially with the sacred Scriptures, … whose body rests at Winchester in peace. O reader, breathe the prayer “Christ, the Redeemer, save his soul[932].”’ He must be a stern Protestant who would refuse to obey Ethelwerd’s behest.

Lessons of Alfred’s life.

§ 119. Some of us probably know the story of the little boy who, when asked in an examination paper a foolish question as to what Alfred, if he were alive now, would think of certain present-day problems, made the sage reply: ‘If King Alfred were alive now, he would be much too old to take any interest in politics.’ It was an instance, sublime, though unconscious, of answering a fool according to his folly. And yet we should surely be wrong if we thought that, because Alfred died a thousand years ago, his life and work have therefore no lessons for ourselves.

Army. Navy. Learning. Education.

The question may not be of dividing the national militia into two parts, one to be at home and one out; but the problem still confronts us how to provide an army which shall both defend our shores at home, and also be adequate to the needs of the empire abroad. The question may not be whether our ships shall be built on Frisian or on Danish lines; but there are problems of naval construction on the right solution of which the safety of England may very largely depend. The knowledge of Latin is happily not extinct among us now, as it practically was in Alfred’s day; but the necessity still exists, which he felt so strongly, to mediate between the best thoughts of the past and the needs and aspirations of the present; while in education we have hardly perhaps fully realised even Alfred’s modest wish that ‘all the youth of England of free men … be set to learn … until that they are well able to read English writing[933].’

Unity of administration. Faith in God, and in England.

Again, few things are more striking in Alfred, than the way in which he keeps an equal hand on all branches of the national life, army, navy, church, justice, finance, education, learning. It is no doubt a harder task to co-ordinate the administration of an empire with world-wide possessions and world-wide responsibilities, than of a little state like Wessex. But we need something of this unifying guidance from above, if our government is not to fall apart into a chaos of independent, and possibly jealous and hostile departments. But above all we need Alfred’s high faith; a faith first of all, unswerving, unfaltering, in an over-ruling Providence, the guidance of a Higher Hand; but faith also in the destiny of his country and his people. Had he, like Burgred of Mercia, given up the struggle in despair, and gone as a pilgrim to Rome, no one in his own day would have thought the worse of him; and he might have won that pale halo of mediaeval saintship, which, as it was, he did not gain[934]. But England would have been lost to Christianity[935]; and Alfred had faith that it was not in the purposes of God so far to roll back the tide of progress, as to let England become once more a heathen land. Surely Alfred stands high in the muster roll of those ‘Who through faith subdued kingdoms, wrought righteousness, … turned to flight the armies of the aliens[936].’

Personal character.

And we need scarcely less that force of individual character which was the secret, as we have seen, of so much of Alfred’s power. To realise this, we have only to compare him for instance with Henry II, a man who in mere intellectual capacity was possibly his superior, and whose reign conferred incalculable benefits upon England. But his aims were merely selfish, and his life impure; and so the greatness of his achievement is known to few beyond professed students of history[937].

Comparison with other sovereigns; Queen Victoria, Marcus Aurelius, Charles the Great.

§ 120. Of some points in which our late Queen resembled her great ancestor I had the honour of speaking before the University in another place[938]. But when we think of kings and emperors worthy to be compared with our own Alfred, the four names which perhaps most readily occur to us are Marcus Aurelius, the imperial saint of paganism, Louis IX, the royal saint of mediaevalism, Charles the Great, and our own Edward I. But the sad self-suppression of Marcus Aurelius, the melancholy refrain which seems to sigh through the golden book of his thoughts,

is as unlike Alfred’s glad and willing service as anything can be.

Charles the Great is of course one of the most towering figures in the whole of history. Alike in physical and intellectual strength he is head and shoulders above all his predecessors and successors. We have noticed several points of taste and character in which Alfred resembled him[940], and they were alike too in the large and generous activities of their many-sided natures. Charles worked no doubt on a gigantic scale, to which Alfred can make no pretence. But this very fact has given to Alfred’s work a permanence which is wanting to that of Charles. Every succeeding century has but verified more and more Alfred’s vision of a united England, and has led her on gradually to an empire of which neither Charles nor Alfred could have dreamed[941]. Every succeeding century has given the lie to Charles’s system of a united Germany and France:

But, apart from this, there are stains on Charles’s character, from which Alfred is free; the lax morality for which Walafrid Strabo in a curious passage places him in purgatory[943], the occasional outbursts of cruelty which on one occasion led him to execute 4,500 rebel Saxons on a single day[944], have no counterpart in our English hero-king.

Edward I.

Edward I is one of the noblest monarchs who ever sat upon an earthly throne; brave, and dutiful, and true. But we have only to think of his lawyerlike, almost tradesmanlike, way of suing for his pound of flesh on the letter of his bond, and then recall Alfred’s comment on the golden rule: ‘by this one law every one may know how he ought to judge another, he needs no other law book[945],’ in order to feel the difference between them.

St. Louis.

It is only when I think of St. Louis that my heart becomes a little divided. St. Louis is, to my thinking, one of the most beautiful characters in the whole of history. His saintliness is no doubt of the mediaeval type. But this is not surprising, seeing that he lived in the thirteenth century, the central and culminating period of the Middle Ages. Dante, and Joan of Arc, and Thomas à Kempis are mediaeval too. And he went on Crusade, when, according to every utilitarian standard, he would have been better employed in governing his own kingdom. Yet I, at least, cannot love him less, because as a ‘young man’ he ‘saw visions,’ and went on the quest of the Holy Grail. And he was fortunate in his biographer. What would we not give to have, instead of Asser’s stilted and confused Latin, a memoir of Alfred in our native tongue which might rank with Joinville’s picture of his master? And yet in some ways the very saintliness of Louis became a curse to France; for it shed a consecration on an evil despotism, which finally exploded in one of the most hideous convulsions in history:

It seems a hard thing to say, but there is a very real connexion between St. Louis and the French Revolution.

No deductions to be made from Alfred.

Alfred on the other hand is one of the very few rulers whose work in life, and whose memory after death have been, as far as may be said of anything here below, an unmixed blessing to their peoples. Alfred’s aspiration has indeed been abundantly fulfilled: ‘My will was to live worthily as long as I lived; and after my life to leave to them that should come after my memory in good works[947].’ If I have done something in these lectures to place so great a memory in a clearer light, and to sweep away some of the false traditions by which it has been obscured, I shall regard myself as having done a real, if humble, service, not only to historical truth, but also to the national life. We need to keep our historical memories not only fresh but true. For, in the words of the great historian, with the remembrance of whom I began these lectures: ‘The healthy nation has a memory as well as aspirations involved in the consciousness of its identity; it has a past no less living than its future[948].’

Subjection to the Higher Powers

A Sermon

Preached before the University of Oxford on Sunday, January 27, 1901

BEING THE SUNDAY AFTER THE DEATH OF OUR LATE MOST GRACIOUS SOVEREIGN QUEEN VICTORIA

BY THE REV. CHARLES PLUMMER, M.A. FELLOW AND CHAPLAIN OF CORPUS CHRISTI COLLEGE, OXFORD