In a paper published under the head of "Chaucer's Night Spell" in the
Folk-lore Record (part i. p. 145), Mr Thoms drew attention to four
lines spoken by the carpenter in Chaucer's _Miller's Tale_:
Lord Jhesu Crist, and seynte Benedyht
Blesse this hous from every wikked wight,
Fro nyghtes verray, the White Paternostre
When wonestow now, seynte Petres soster.
("Verray" is commonly supposed to mean night-mare, but Mr Thoms
referred it to "Werra," a Sclavonic deity.)
Mention of the White Paternoster occurs again in White's _Way to the
True Church_ (1624):
White Paternoster, Saint Peter's brother,
What hast i' th t'one hand? white booke leaves,
What hast i' th t'other hand? heaven gate keyes.
Open heaven gates, and streike (shut) hell gates:
And let every crysome child creepe to its own mother.
White Paternoster, Amen.
A reading of the formula is preserved in the _Enchiridion Papae
Leonis_, a book translated into French soon after its first appearance
in Latin at Rome in 1502:
Au soir, m'allant coucher, je trouvis trois anges a mon lit
couches, un aux pieds, deux au chevet, la bonne Vierge Marie
du milieu, qui me dit que je me couchis, que rien ne doutis.
Le bon Dieu est mon Pere, la bonne Vierge est ma mere, les
trois vierges sont mes s[oe]urs. La chemise ou Dieu fut ne,
mon corps en est enveloppe; la croix Sainte Marguerite a ma
poitrine est ecrite; madame d'en va sur les champs a Dieu
pleurant, rencontrit Monsieur Saint Jean. Monsieur Saint Jean,
d'ou venez vous? Je viens d' _Ave Salus_. Vous n'avez pas vu
le bon Dieu; si est, il est dans l'arbre de la croix, les
pieds pendans, les mains clouans, un petit chapeau d'epine
blanche sur la tete.
Qui la dira trois fois au soir, trois fois au matin, gagnera
le Paradis a la fin.
Curious as are the above citations, they only go a little way towards
filling up the blanks in the history of this waif from the fabric
of early Christian popular lore. A search of some years has yielded
evidence that the White Paternoster is still a part of the living
traditional matter of at least five European countries. Most persons
are familiar with the English version which runs thus:
Four corners to my bed,
Four angels round my head,
One to watch, one to pray,
And two to bear my soul away.
A second English variant was set on record by Aubrey, and may also be
read in Ady's "Candle in the Dark" (1655):
Matthew, Mark, Luke, John,
Bless the bed that I lye on;
And blessed guardian angel keep
Me safe from danger while I sleep.
Halliwell suggests that the two last lines were imitated from the
following in Bishop Ken's Evening Hymn:
Let my blest guardian, while I sleep,
His watchful station near me keep.
But if there was any imitation in the case, it was the bishop who
copied from the folk-rhymer, not the folk-rhymer from the bishop.
The thought of the coming of death in sleep, is expressed in a prayer
that may be sometimes seen inscribed at the head and foot of the bed
in Norwegian homesteads: