1 This poem has given four hymns to the Roman Breviary:--
(1) For the Feast of the Transfiguration, Vespers and Matins
consisting of ll. 1-4, 37-40, 41-44, 85-88.
(2) For the Epiphany at Lauds, beginning _O sola magnarum urbium_,
ll. 77-80, 5-8, 61-72.
(3) For the Feast of Holy Innocents at Matins, beginning _Audit
tyrannus anxius_, ll. 93-100, 133-136.
(4) Also the Feast of Holy Innocents at Lauds, beginning _Salvete
flores martyrum_, ll. 125-132.
5 For a curious parallel to these opening lines see Henry Vaughan's
_Pious Thoughts and Ejaculations_ (the Nativity):--
"But stay! what light is that doth stream
And drop here in a gilded beam?
It is Thy star runs Page and brings
Thy tributary Eastern kings.
Lord! grant some light to us that we
May find with them the way to Thee!"
12 Cf. Ignatius, _Ep. ad Ephes. xix._: "All the other stars, together
with the Sun and Moon, became a chorus to the Star, which in its
light excelled them all."
15 Prudentius mentions the constellations of Ursa Major and Ursa
Minor (to which latter the Pole Star belongs) as examples of stars
in constant apparition. All the Little Bear stars are within about
24° from the Pole; hence, if viewed from Saragossa, the birthplace
of Prudentius, the lowest altitude of any of them would be 18°
above the north horizon. The same applies to the majority of the
stars in the Great Bear. Some few would sink below the horizon
for a brief time in each twenty-four hours; but the greater number,
especially the seven principal stars known as the "Plough," would
be sufficiently high up at their lowest northern altitudes to be in
perpetual apparition. [My friend, Rev. R. Killip, F.R.A.S., has
kindly furnished me with these particulars.] Allusions to the Bears
are constantly recurring in the classical poets (cf. _e.g._ Ovid.,
_Met._ xiii. 293, _immunemque aequoris Arcton_, "the Bear that never
touches the sea"). The idea that these stars are mostly hidden by
clouds, though perpetually in view, is a poetic hyperbole intended
to enhance the uniqueness of the Star of Bethlehem.
49 Jerome (_ad Eustoch._ Ep. 22) commenting on the passage in Isa.
xi. 1, "And there shall come forth a rod out of the root of Jesse,
and a flower shall rise up out of his root" (Vulg.), remarks: "The
rod (_virga_) is the mother of the Lord, simple, pure, sincere ...
the flower of the rod is Christ, who saith, 'I am the flower of the
field and the lily of the valleys.'"
69 This symbolism of the gifts of the Magi is also found in Juvencus
(I. 250): "Frankincense, gold and myrrh they bring as gifts to a
King, a Man and a God," and is again alluded to by Prudentius in
_Apoth._ 631 _et seq._ The idea is expressed in the hymn of Jacopone
da Todi, beginning _Verbum caro factum est_ (Mone, _Hymni Latini_,
Vol. 2):
"Gold to the kingly,
Incense to the priestly,
Myrrh to the mortal:"
and it has passed into the Office for Epiphany in the Roman Breviary:
"There are three precious gifts which the Magi offered to their Lord
that day, and they contain in themselves sacred mysteries: in the
gold, that the power of a king may be displayed: in the frankincense,
consider the great high priest: in the myrrh, the burial of the Lord"
_et passim_.
172 The idea that Moses defeated the Amalekites because his arms were
outstretched in the form of a cross is found also in one of the hymns
(lxi.) of Gregory Nazianzen. The symbol of the Christian religion,
the cross, "was fancifully traced by the Fathers throughout the
universe: the four points of the compass, the 'height, breadth,
length and depth' of the Apostle expressed, or were expressed by,
the cross.... The cross explained everything" (Maitland, _Church in
the Catacombs_, p. 202).
193 The discomfiture of the heathen gods wrought by the Incarnation
is elaborated by Milton, whose lines recall this and similar passages
in Prudentius:--
"Peor, and Baälim
Forsake their temples dim
* * * * *
And sullen Moloch fled,
Hath left in shadows dread,
His burning idol all of blackest hue.
Our Babe, to show his Godhead true,
Can in his swaddling bands control the damned crew."