"Lord, I confess too, when I dine,
The pulse is thine.
* * * * *
'Tis thou that crown'st my glittering hearth
With guiltless mirth,
And giv'st me wassail bowls to drink,
Spiced to the brink."
28 The original _dactylico_ refers to the metre of the Latin of this
poem. For a rendering of ll. 1-65 in the metre of the original see
Glover, _Life and Letters in the Fourth Century_, pp. 267-269.
58 This and the following lines should satisfy the most ardent
vegetarian who seeks to uphold his abstinence from animal food by
the customs of the early Church. In Christian circles, however, the
abstinence was practised on personal and spiritual grounds, _e.g._,
Jerome (_de Regul. Monach._, xi.) says, "The eating of flesh is the
seed-plot of lust" (_seminarium libidinis_): so also Augustine (_de
moribus Ecc. Cath._, i. 33), who supports what doubtless was the
view of Prudentius, namely that the avoidance of animal flesh was a
safe-guard but not a binding Christian duty.
75 _Unwed._ Prudentius thus adopts the view of the ancient world on
the question of the generation of bees. Cf. Virgil, _Geo._ iv. 198,
and Pliny, _Nat. Hist._, xi. 16. Dryden's translation of Virgil
(_l.c._) is as follows:--
"But (what's more strange) their modest appetites,
Averse from Venus, fly the nuptial rights;
No lust enervates their heroic mind,
Nor wastes their strength on wanton womankind,
But in their mouths reside their genial powers,
They gather children from the leaves and flowers."
86 Cf. Ps. liv. 18, 19 (Vulg.): _Vespere et mane et meridie narrabo
et annuntiabo et exaudiet vocem meam._ "In the evening and morning
and at noonday will I pray, and that instantly and he shall hear my
voice" (P. B. Version).
127 This is, strictly speaking, an error: it is the woman's seed
which is to bruise the serpent's head. The error was perpetuated
in the Latin Church by the Vulgate of Gen. iii. 15, _ipsa conteret
caput tuum_, where _ipsa_ refers to the woman (= she herself).
157 The epithet "white-robed" refers to the newly-baptized converts
who received the white robe as a symbol of their new nature. Cf.
_Perist._ i. 67: _Christus illic candidatis praesidet cohortibus_,
and Ambrose (_de Mysteriis_, vii.): "Thou didst receive (that is,
after baptism) white garments as a sign that thou hast doffed the
covering of thy sins and put on the chaste raiment (_velamina_) of
innocence, whereof the prophet spake (Ps. li. 7), 'Thou shalt purge
me with hyssop, and I shall be clean: thou shalt wash me, and I
shall be whiter than snow'" (Vulg.).
199 Phlegethon (rendered "Hell"), one of the rivers of the Virgilian
Hades, is used to express the abode of the lost. Cf. Milton, _P. L._,
ii. 580:--
"... fierce Phlegethon,
Whose waves of torrent fire inflame with rage."
The subject of the _descensus ad inferos_ was evidently a favourite
one with Prudentius and his contemporaries. It has been suggested
that apart from the scriptural basis of this conception Prudentius
was influenced by the so-called _Gospel of Nicodemus_, which embodies
two books, the _Acts of Pilate_ and the _Descent into Hell_. The
latter is assigned by several critics to 400 or thereabouts, and
gives a graphic account of Christ's doings in Hades. Synesius deals
with the subject in one of his hymns (ix.), and Mrs Browning's
translation (see the essay on _The Greek Christian Poets_) of a
passage in that poem may be quoted:--
"Down Thou earnest, low as earth,
Bound to those of mortal birth;
Down Thou earnest, low as hell,
Where Shepherd-Death did tend and keep
A thousand nations like to sheep,
While weak with age old Hades fell
Shivering through his dark to view Thee.
* * * * *
So, redeeming from their pain
Chains of disembodied ones,
Thou didst lead whom thou didst gather
Upward in ascent again,
With a great hymn to the Father,
Upward to the pure white thrones!"
For a modern treatment of the theme see _Christ in Hades_, by
Stephen Phillips.
202 The words suggest the Catacombs, and perhaps refer to the custom
of placing in the tomb a small cup or vase containing spices, of
which myrrh (a symbol of death, according to Gregory of Nyssa, cf.
xii. 71) was most usually employed. Or the allusion may be to the
practice of embalming. (See note on x. 51.) The body was placed
not only in an actual sarcophagus or stone coffin, as expressly
mentioned in the text, but in hollow places cut out of rock or
earth (_loculus_). The _sarcophagus_ method seems to have been the
earlier, but was superseded by that of the _loculus_, except in the
case of the very wealthy.
205 The concluding line is beautifully illustrated by the epitaph
on the martyr Alexander, found over one of the graves in the cemetery
of Callixtus in the Catacombs:--
ALEXANDER MORTVVS NON EST SED VIVIT
SVPER ASTRA ET CORPVS IN HOC TVMVLO
QVIESCIT ...
"Alexander is not dead, but lives above the stars
and his body rests in this tomb."