acting pictorially, is where Hobbes compares the Papacy to the ghost
of the Roman Empire sitting upon its tomb. This implies a foregone
personification, but the pleasure it gives springs chiefly from our
sense of its historic and intellectual truth. And this subordinate form
of imagination uses typically and metaphorically those forms in which
ecstasy had formerly visibly clothed itself, flesh-and-blooded itself,
so to speak; as where Lord Bacon says that Persecution in the name of
Religion is “to bring down the Holy Ghost, not in the likeness of a
dove, but in the shape of a vulture or a raven.”
After reading more extracts from the poem, Mr. Lowell concluded his
lecture in these words:
Truly it seems to me that I can feel a heart beat all through this
old poem, a manly, trustful, and tender one. There are some men who
have what may be called a vindictive love of Truth--whose love of it,
indeed, seems to be only another form of hatred to their neighbor. They
put crooked pins on the stool of repentance before they invite the
erring to sit down on it. Our brother Langland is plainly not one of
these.
What I especially find to our purpose in Piers Ploughman, as I said
before, is that it defines with tolerable exactness those impulses
which our poetry has received from the Anglo-Saxon as distinguished
from the Anglo-Norman element of our race. It is a common Yankee
proverb that there is a great deal of human nature in man. I think
it especially true of the Anglo-Saxon man. We find in this poem
common sense, tenderness, a love of spiritual goodness without much
sensibility to the merely beautiful, a kind of _domestic_ feeling of
nature and a respect for what is established. But what is still more
noticeable is that man is recognized as man, and that the conservatism
of Langland is predicated upon the well-being of the people.
It is impossible to revive a dead poem, but it is pleasant, at least,
to throw a memorial flower upon its grave.
LECTURE III
THE METRICAL ROMANCES
(_Tuesday Evening, January 16, 1855_)
III
Where is the Golden Age? It is fifty years ago to every man and woman
of three-score and ten. I do not doubt that aged Adam babbled of the
superiority of the good old times, and, forgetful in his enthusiasm of
that fatal bite which set the teeth of all his descendants on edge,
told, with a regretful sigh, how much larger and finer the apples of
his youth were than that to which the great-grandson on his knee was
giving a preliminary polish. Meanwhile the great-grandson sees the good
times far in front, a galaxy of golden pippins whereof he shall pluck
and eat as many as he likes without question. Thus it is that none of
us knows when Time is with him, but the old man sees only his shoulders
and that inexorable wallet in which youth and beauty and strength are
borne away as alms for Oblivion; and the boy beholds but the glowing
face and the hands stretched out full of gifts like those of a St.
Nicholas. Thus there is never any present good; but the juggler, Life,
smilingly baffles us all, making us believe that the vanished ring is
under his left hand or his right, the past or the future, and shows us
at last that it was in our own pocket all the while.
So we may always listen with composure when we hear of Golden Ages
passed away. Burke pronounced the funeral oration of one--of the age
of Chivalry--the period of Metrical Romances--of which I propose to
speak to-night. Mr. Ruskin--himself as true a knight-errant as ever
sat in a demipique saddle, ready to break a lance with all comers, and
resolved that even the windmills and the drovers shall not go about
their business till they have done homage to his Dulcinea--for the time
being joins in the lament. Nay, what do we learn from the old romances
themselves, but that all the heroes were already dead and buried? Their
song also is a threnody, if we listen rightly. For when did Oliver
and Roland live? When Arthur and Tristem and Lancelot and Caradoc
Break-arm? In that Golden Age of Chivalry which is always past.
Undoubtedly there was a great deal in the institution of Chivalry that
was picturesque; but it is noticeable in countries where society is
still picturesque that dirt and ignorance and tyranny have the chief
hand in making them so. Mr. Fenimore Cooper thought the American savage
picturesque, but if he had lived in a time when it was necessary that
one should take out a policy of insurance on his scalp or wig before
going to bed, he might have seen them in a different light. The tourist
looks up with delight at the eagle sliding in smooth-winged circles
on the icy mountain air, and sparkling back the low morning sun like
a belated star. But what does the lamb think of him? Let us look at
Chivalry a moment from the lamb’s point of view.
It is true that the investiture of the Knight was a religious ceremony,
but this was due to the Church, which in an age of brute force always
maintained the traditions at least of the intellect and conscience.
The vows which the Knights took had as little force as those of
god-parents, who fulfil their spiritual relation by sending a piece of
plate to the god-child. They stood by each other when it was for their
interest to do so, but the only virtue they had any respect for was an
arm stronger than their own. It is hard to say which they preferred to
break--a head, or one of the Ten Commandments. They looked upon the
rich Jew with thirty-two sound teeth in his head as a providential
contrivance, and practised upon him a comprehensive kind of dental
surgery, at once for profit and amusement, and then put into some
chapel a painted window with a Jewish prophet in it for piety--as
if _they_ were the Jewish profits they cared about. They outraged
and robbed their vassals in every conceivable manner, and, if _very_
religious, made restitution on their death-beds by giving a part of the
plunder (when they could keep it no longer) to have masses sung for the
health of their souls--thus contriving, as they thought, to be their
own heirs in the other world. Individual examples of heroism are not
wanting to show that man is always paramount to the institutions of
his own contriving, so that any institution will yield itself to the
compelling charms of a noble nature. But even were this not so, yet Sir
Philip Sidney, the standard type of the chivalrous, grew up under other
influences. So did Lord Herbert of Cherbury, so did the incomparable
Bayard; and the single fact that is related as a wonderful thing of
Bayard, that, after the storming of Brescia, he respected the honor of
the daughter of a lady in whose house he was quartered, notwithstanding
she was beautiful and in his power, is of more weight than all the
romances in Don Quixote’s library.
But what form is that which rises before us, with features in which
the gentle and forgiving reproach of the woman is lost in the aspiring
power of the martyr?
_We_ know her as she was,
The whitest lily in the shield of France,
With heart of virgin gold,
that bravest and most loyal heart over whose beatings knightly armor
was ever buckled, that saintly shape in which even battle looks lovely,
that life so pure, so inspired, so humble, which stands there forever
to show us how near womanhood ever is to heroism, and that the human
heart is true to an eternal instinct when it paints Faith and Hope and
Charity and Religion with the countenances of women.
We are told that the sentiment of respect for woman, a sentiment always
remarkable in the Teutonic race, is an inheritance from the Institution
of Chivalry. But womanhood must be dressed in silk and miniver that
chivalry may recognize it. That priceless pearl hidden in the coarse
kirtle of the peasant-girl of Domremy it trampled under its knightly
feet--shall I say?--or swinish hoofs. Poor Joan! The chivalry of France
sold her; the chivalry of England subjected her to outrages whose
burning shame cooled the martyr-fire, and the King whom she had saved,
the very top of French Knighthood, was toying with Agnes Sorel while
the fagots were crackling around the savior of himself and his kingdom
in the square of Rouen! Thank God, that our unchivalric generation
can hack the golden spurs from such recreant heels! A statue stands
now where her ashes were gathered to be cast into the Seine, but her
fittest monument is the little fountain beneath it, the emblem of her
innocence, of her inspiration, drawn not from court, or castle, or
cloister, but from the inscrutable depths of that old human nature and
that heaven common to us all--an emblem, no less, that the memory of
a devoted life is a spring where all coming times may drink the holy
waters of gratitude and aspiration. I confess that I cannot see clearly
that later scaffold in the Place de la Révolution, through the smoke
of this martyr-fire at Rouen, but it seems to me that, compared with
this _woman_, the Marie Antoinette, for whose sake Burke lamented the
downfall of chivalry, is only the daughter of a king.
But those old days, whether good or bad, have left behind them a great
body of literature, of which even yet a large part remains unprinted.
To this literature belong the Metrical Romances. Astonished by the
fancy and invention so abundantly displayed by the writers of these
poems, those who have written upon the subject have set themselves
gravely to work to find out what country they could have got them from.
Mr. Warton, following Dr. Warburton, inclines to assign them to an
Oriental origin. Dr. Percy, on the other hand, asserts a Scandinavian
origin; while Ritson, who would have found it reason enough to think
that the sun rose in the West if Warton or Percy had taken the other
side, is positive that they were wholly French. Perhaps the truth lies
somewhere between the positions of Percy and Ritson. The Norman race,
neither French nor Scandinavian, was a product of the mingled blood of
both, and in its mental characteristics we find the gaiety and lively
fancy of the one tempering what is wild in the energy and gloomy in the
imagination of the other.
We know the exact date of the arrival of the first Metrical Romance in
England. Taillefer, a Norman minstrel, brought it over in his head, and
rode in the front at the battle of Hastings singing the song of Roland.
Taillefer answers precisely the description of a Danish skald, but he
sang in French, and the hero he celebrated was one of the peers of
Charlemagne, who was himself a German.
Taillefer, who well could sing a strain,
Upon a swift horse rode amain
Before the Duke and chanted loud
Of Charlemagne and Roland good,
Of Oliver and vassals brave
Who found at Roncesvalles their grave.
What this song of Roland was it is impossible to say, as the only copy
of it seems to have perished with Taillefer at the battle of Hastings;
but it was probably of the same kind with many of those which have
survived and brought down to us the exploits of Arthur and his knights.
With regard to a large part of the romances of the Round Table, and
those which grew out of them, it is tolerably certain that, although
written in French, they were made in England.
One of the great charms of the Metrical Romances is the innocent
simplicity with which they commit anachronisms. Perhaps it would be
more exact to call them synchronisms, for, with the most undoubting
faith, they compel all other times to adopt the dress, manners, and
conventionalities of their own. To them there was no one world, nor
ever had been any, except that of Romance. They conferred retrospective
knighthood upon the patriarchs; upon Job, David, and Solomon. Joseph
of Arimathea became Sir Joseph of that ilk. Even the soldier who
pierced the side of Jesus upon the cross was made into Sir Longinus
and represented as running a tilt with our Lord. All the heroes of
the Grecian legend were treated in the same way. They translated the
old time and the old faith into new, and thus completed the outfit of
their own imaginary world, supplying it at a very cheap rate with a
Past and with mythology. And as they believed the gods and genii of
the Pagan ancients to have been evil spirits who, though undeified,
were imperishable in their essence, they were allowed to emigrate in
a body from the old religion into the new, where they continued to
exercise their functions, sometimes under their former names, but
oftener in some disguise. These unfortunate aliens seem to have lived
very much from hand to mouth, and after the invention of holy water
(more terrible to them than Greek-fire) they must have had rather an
uncomfortable time of it. The giants were received with enthusiasm,
and admitted to rights of citizenship in the land of Romance, where
they were allowed to hold fiefs and castles in consideration of their
eminent usefulness in abducting damsels, and their serving as anvils
to the knights, who sometimes belabored them for three days at a time,
the fight ending at last, not from failure of breath on the part of the
combatants but of the minstrel. As soon as _he_ has enough, or sees
that his hearers have, the head of the unhappy giant becomes loose on
his shoulders.
Another charm of the romances is their entire inconsequentiality.
As soon as we enter this wonderful country the old fetters of cause
and effect drop from our limbs, and we are no longer bound to give
a reason for anything. All things come to pass in that most charming
of ways which children explain by the comprehensive metaphysical
formula--“_’cause_.” Nothing seems to be premeditated, but a knight
falls in love, or out of it, fights, goes on board enchanted vessels
that carry him to countries laid down on no chart, and all without
asking a question. In truth, it is a delightful kind of impromptu life,
such as we all should like to lead if we could, with nothing set down
in the bills beforehand.
But the most singular peculiarity of Romance-land remains to be
noticed--there are no _people_ in it, that is, no common people. The
lowest rank in life is that of a dwarf. It is true that if a knight
loses his way there will always be a clown or two to set him right. But
they disappear at once, and seem to be wholly phantasmagoric, or, at
best, an expedient rendered necessary by the absence of guide-posts,
and the inability of the cavaliers to read them if there had been any.
There are plenty of Saracens no doubt, but they are more like cucumbers
than men, and are introduced merely that the knight may have the
pleasure of slicing them.
We cannot claim any condensed poetical merit for the Metrical Romances.
They have very few quotable passages and fewer vigorous single lines.
Their merit consists in a diffuse picturesqueness, and reading them is
like turning over illuminated missals in a traveler’s half-hour, which
leave a vague impression on the mind of something vivid and fanciful,
without one’s being able to recall any particular beauty. Some of them
have great narrative merit, being straightforward and to the purpose,
never entangling themselves in reflection or subordinating the story to
the expression. In this respect they are refreshing after reading many
poems of the modern school, which, under the pretense of sensuousness,
are truly sensual, and deal quite as much with the upholstery as with
the soul of poetry. The thought has nowadays become of less importance
than the vehicle of it, and amid the pomp of words we are too often
reminded of an Egyptian procession, in which all the painful musical
instruments then invented, priests, soldiers, and royalty itself,
accompany the triumphal chariot containing perhaps, after all, only an
embalmed monkey or a pickled ibis.
There is none of this nonsense in the Old Romances, though sometimes
they are tediously sentimental, and we wonder as much at the capacity
of our ancestors in bearing dry verses as dry blows. Generally,
however, they show an unaffected piety and love of nature. The
delight of the old minstrels in the return of Spring is particularly
agreeable, and another argument in favor of the Northern origin of
this class of poems. Many of them open with passages like this:
Merry it is in the month of May,
When the small fowls sing their lay,
Then flowers the apple-tree and perry,
And the little birds sing merry;
Then the ladies strew their bowers
With red roses and lily flowers,
The damisels lead down the dance,
And the knights play with shield and lance.
Some of the comparisons, also, drawn from Nature, are as fresh as dew.
For example, when a lady sees her lover:
She is as glad at that sight
As the birds are of the light.
Or,
As glad as grass is of the rain.
A knight is said to be
As weary as water in a weir,
a simile full of imagination.
The most airy glimpses of the picturesque occur sometimes; as
describing a troop of knights:
They rode away full serriedly,
Their gilded pennons of silk of Ind
Merrily rattled with the wind;
The steeds so noble and so wight
Leaped and neighed beneath each knight.
After quoting various specimens of these poems, Mr. Lowell gave the
following sketch of the manners and customs of Romance-land, “condensed
from the best authorities.”
If you are born in this remarkable country and destined for a hero,
the chances are that by the time you are seven years old your father
will have gone off to fight the infidels, and a neighboring earl will
have taken possession of his estates and his too-hastily-supposed
widow. You resent this in various ways, especially by calling your
step-father all the proper names you can think of that are improper.
He, for some unexplained reason, is unable to get rid of you, though
he tries a variety of plots level with the meanest capacity. You,
being of uncommon sagacity, are saved by the aid of three or four
superfluous miracles. Meanwhile you contrive to pick up a good knightly
education, and by the time you are seventeen are bigger and stronger
and handsomer than anybody else, except, of course, the giants. So, one
day you buckle on your armor, mount your horse, who is as remarkable
in his way as yourself, and go adventuring. Presently you come to a
castle where you are most courteously received. Maidens as white as
whale’s bone and fair as flowers (they are all so in Romance-land) help
you off with your armor, and dress you in richest silks. You then go
to dine with the Lord of the Castle, who is a knight of very affable
manners and agreeable conversation, but with an aversion to religious
topics. His daughter, the fairest lady on the ground, assists at the
meal. You are conducted to your chamber, and after a refreshing sleep
meet your host and hostess at breakfast. At a suitable time you return
thanks for your kind treatment and ask for your horse. The knight,
however, in the blandest manner tells you that a little custom of his
will interfere with your departure. He is in the habit of fighting with
all his guests, and has hitherto been successful in killing them all
to the number of several hundred. This is precisely the account which
you are fond of settling, and after a few allusions to Mahomed and
Termagant and Alcoban, you accept the challenge and, of course, come
off victor. This seems to settle the matter for the young lady whom
your lance has just promoted to her inheritance, and she immediately
offers herself and her estates to you, telling you, at the same time,
that she had long been secretly a Christian. Though madly in love with
her, and interested in her religious views, which she details to you
at some length, you mount your steed and ride away, but without being
expected to give any reasons. You have a particular mission nowhere,
and on your way to that interesting country you kill a _megalosaurus_
(for whose skeleton Professor Owen would have given his ears), and
two or three incidental giants. Riding on, you come to a Paynim-land,
ruled over by a liberally-minded Soldan, who receives you into favor
after you have slain some thousands of his subjects to get an appetite
for dinner. The Soldan, of course, has a daughter, who is converted by
you, and, of course, offers you her hand. This makes you think of the
other lady, and you diplomatize. But there is another Paynim-land, and
another Soldan, who sends word that he intends to marry your beautiful
convert.
The embassy of the proud Paynim somehow results in your being
imprisoned for seven years, when it suddenly occurs to you that you
might as well step out. So you pick up a magic sword that has been
shut up with you, knock down the jailers, mount your horse which is
waiting at the door, and ride off. Now, or at some other convenient
time, you take occasion to go mad for a year or two on account of
ladye-love number one. But hearing that ladye-love number two is about
to yield to the addresses of her royal suitor, who has killed her
father, burned his capital, and put all his subjects to the sword,
you make some appropriate theological disquisitions and start to the
rescue. On your way you meet a strange knight, join combat with him
without any questions on either side, and after a doubtful fight of a
day or two, are mutually overcome with amazement at finding anybody who
cannot be beaten. Of course it turns out that the strange knight is
your father; you join forces, make short work with the amorous Soldan
and his giants, and find yourself encumbered with a young lady, a
princess too, all of whose relatives and vassals have been slaughtered
on your account, and who naturally expects you to share her throne.
In a moment of abstraction you consent to the arrangement, and are
married by an archbishop _in partibus_ who happens to be on the spot.
As your late royal rival has slain all your late father-in-law’s
lieges, and you have done the same service for him in turn, there
are no adventures left in this part of the world. Luckily, before
the wedding-ring is warm on your finger, a _plesiosaurus_ turns up.
This saves many disagreeable explanations with the bride, whom you
are resolved to have nothing to do with while the other young lady is
alive. You settle her comfortably on the throne of her depopulated
kingdom, slay the monster, and start for home with your revered parent.
There you overcome the usurping Earl, reinstate your father, and assist
cheerfully at the burning of your mother for bigamy; your filial piety
being less strong than your reverence for the laws of your country.
A fairy who has a particular interest in you (and who, it seems, is
your real mother, after all--a fact which relieves your mind of any
regrets on the score of the late melancholy bonfire), lets you into the
secret that ladye-love the first is your own sister. This revives your
affection for your wife, and you go back to the kingdom of Gombraunt,
find her reduced to extremities by another matrimonial Soldan, whom
you incontinently massacre with all _his_ giants, and now at last a
prospect of quiet domestic life seems to open. Dull, peaceful days
follow, and you begin to take desponding views of life, when your
_ennui_ is pleasantly broken in upon by a monster who combines in
himself all the monstrosities of heraldic zoölogy. You decapitate him
and incautiously put one of his teeth in your boot as a keepsake. A
scratch ensues, physicians are in vain, and you die with an edifying
piety, deeply regretted by your subjects, if there are any left with
their heads on.
On the whole, we may think ourselves happy that we live under somewhat
different institutions.
LECTURE IV
THE BALLADS
(_Friday Evening, January 19, 1855_)
IV
One of the laws of the historical Macbeth declares that “Fools,
minstrels, bards, and all other such idle people, unless they be
specially licensed by the King, shall be compelled to seek some craft
to win their living,” and the old chronicler adds approvingly, “These
and such-like laws were used by King Macbeth, through which he governed
the realm ten years in good justice.”
I do not quote this in order to blacken the memory of that unhappy
monarch. The poets commonly contrive to be even with their enemies in
the end, and Shakspeare has taken an ample revenge. I cite it only
for the phrase _unless they be specially licensed by the King_, which
points to a fact on which I propose to dwell for a few moments before
entering upon my more immediate object.