[Sidenote: 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].
[Sidenote: 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:—
‘Historicus quondam fecit me Beda Latinum,
Alfred, rex Saxo, transtulit ille pius.’
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. A 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.
[Sidenote: 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].
[Sidenote: 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.
[Sidenote: 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].
[Sidenote: 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].
[Sidenote: 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].
[Sidenote: 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].
[Sidenote: 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:—
‘O esca uermium, o massa pulueris,
O ros, o uanitas, cur sic extolleris?[840]’
[Sidenote: 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].
[Sidenote: 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.
[Sidenote: 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].’
[Sidenote: 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].
[Sidenote: 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:—
‘Others apart sat on a hill retired
In thoughts more elevate, and reason’d high
Of providence, foreknowledge, will, and fate,
Fix’d fate, freewill, foreknowledge absolute,
And found no end, in wand’ring mazes lost[870].’
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].
[Sidenote: 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].
[Sidenote: 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].
[Sidenote: 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].’
[Sidenote: 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:—
‘And from my pillow, looking forth by light
Of Moon or favouring Stars, I could behold
The antechapel where the statue stood
Of Newton with his prism and silent face,
The marble index of a mind for ever
Voyaging through strange seas of thought, alone.’
But it also contains the no less well-known, but most inglorious line:
And at the _Hoop_ alighted, famous Inn.
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?—
‘Three calves to Eryx next he kills,
A lambkin’s blood to Tempest spills[897].’
[Sidenote: 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.
[Sidenote: 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.
[Sidenote: 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.
[Sidenote: 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:—
[Sidenote: 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.’
[Sidenote: 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.
[Sidenote: 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.
[Sidenote: 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].
[Sidenote: 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.
[Sidenote: 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.’
[Sidenote: 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.
[Sidenote: 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.
[Sidenote: 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:
‘And there is nothing left remarkable
Beneath the visiting moon[929].’
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.
[Sidenote: 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.
[Sidenote: 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].’
[Sidenote: 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].’
[Sidenote: 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].
[Sidenote: 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,
‘Entbehren sollst du, sollst entbehren[939],’
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:
μέγα ἔργον, ὃ οὐ δύο γ’ ἄνδρε φέροειν,
οἶοι νῦν βροτοί εἰσ’, ὁ δέ μιν ῥέα πάλλε καὶ οἶος[942].
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.
[Sidenote: 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.
[Sidenote: 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:
‘Sword and fire,
Red ruin, and the breaking up of laws[946].’
It seems a hard thing to say, but there is a very real connexion between
St. Louis and the French Revolution.
[Sidenote: 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_