[Text: Bright's _Anglo-Saxon Reader_, pp. 26 ff.]
King Alfred sends greetings to Waerferth in loving and friendly words. I
let thee know that it has often come to my mind what wise men there were
formerly throughout England among both the clergy and the _5_ laity, and
what happy times there were then throughout England, and how the kings
who held sway over the people in those days obeyed God and his ministers;
and how they preserved not only their peace but their morality also and
good order at home and extended _10_ their possessions abroad; and how
prosperous they were both with war and with wisdom; and how zealous the
clergy were both in teaching and in learning, and in all the services
they owed to God; and how foreigners came to the land in search of wisdom
and learning, and _15_ how we should now have to secure them from abroad
if we were to have them. So complete was this decay in England that there
were very few on this side of the Humber who could understand their
rituals in English or translate a Latin letter into English; and I feel
sure _20_ that there were not many beyond Humber. So few there were that
I can not remember a single one south of the Thames when I began to
reign. Almighty God be thanked that we have any teachers among us now....
Then I considered all this, and brought to mind _25_ also how, before it
had all been laid waste and burned, the churches throughout all England
stood filled with treasures and books; and there was a great multitude of
God's servants, but they knew very little about the books, for they could
not understand anything in them, _30_ since they were not written in
their own language--as if they spoke thus: "Our fathers who held these
places of old loved wisdom and through it acquired wealth and bequeathed
it to us. Here we may still see their tracks, but we can not follow them,
and hence we have _35_ now lost both the wealth and the wisdom, since we
would not incline our hearts after their example."
When I called all this to mind, I wondered very much, considering all the
good and wise men who were formerly throughout England and all the books
that they _40_ had perfectly learned, that they had translated no part of
them into their own language. But soon I answered myself and said: "They
did not expect that men should ever become as careless and that learning
should decay as it has; they neglected it through the desire that the
_45_ greater increase of wisdom there should be in the land the more
should men learn of foreign languages."
I then considered that the law was first found in the Hebrew tongue, and
again when the Greeks learned it, they translated it all into their own
language. And the _50_ Romans likewise when they had learned it, they
translated it all through learned scholars into their own language. And
all other Christian people have turned some part into their own language.
Wherefore it seems to me best, if it seems so to you, that we should
translate _55_ some books that are most needful for all men to know into
the language which we can all understand and that we should bring about
what we may very easily do with God's help if we have tranquillity;
namely, that all youths that are now in England of _60_ free birth, who
are rich enough to devote themselves to it, be put to learning as long as
they are not fitted for any other occupation, until the time that they
shall be able to read English writing with ease: and let those that would
pursue their studies further be taught more _65_ in Latin and be promoted
to a higher rank. When I brought to mind how the knowledge of Latin had
formerly decayed throughout England, and yet many knew how to read
English writing, I began among other various and manifold troubles of
this kingdom to turn _70_ into English the book that is called in Latin
_Pastoralis_ and in English _The Shepherd's Book_, sometimes word for
word, sometimes thought by thought, as I had learned it from Plegmund my
archbishop, and Asser my bishop, and Grimbald my priest, and John my
priest. _75_ After I had learned it so that I understood it and so that I
could interpret it clearly, I translated it into English. I shall send
one copy to every bishopric in my kingdom; and in each is a book-mark
worth fifty mancuses. And I command in God's name that no man _80_ take
the book-mark from the monastery. It is not certain that there will be
such learned bishops as, thanks be to God, we now have nearly everywhere.
Hence I wish the books to remain always in their places, unless the
bishop wishes to take them with him, or they be lent _85_ out anywhere,
or any one be copying them.