Part 1 (1/2)
Our Catholic Heritage in English Literature of Pre-Conquest Days.
by Emily Hickey.
FOREWORDS
This little book makes no claim to be a history of pre-Conquest Literature. It is an attempt to increase the interest which Catholics may well feel in this part of the great 'inheritance of their fathers.'
It is not meant to be a formal course of reading, but a sort of talk, as it were, about beautiful things said and sung in old days: things which to have learned to love is to have incurred a great and living debt. I have tried to clothe some of these in the nearest approach I could find to the native garb in which their makers had sent them forth, with the humblest acknowledgement that nothing comes up to that native garb itself. In writing the book I have naturally incurred debt in various directions; debt of which the source would be difficult always to trace.
I may mention my obligations to the work of Professor Morley, Professor Earle, Professor Ten Brink, and Professor Albert S. Cook: also to the writers of Chapters I-VII of ”The Cambridge History of English Literature,” vol. i.
If this little book in any way fulfils the wishes of those Catholic teachers who have asked me to print some thoughts of mine about English Literature, I shall be glad indeed.
EMILY HICKEY.
CHAPTER I
The beginnings of Literature in England. Two poets of the best period of our old poetry, Caedmon and Cynewulf. The language they wrote in.
The monastery at Whitby. The story of Caedmon's gift of song.
How many of us I wonder, realise in anything like its full extent the beauty and the glory of our Catholic heritage. Do we think how the Great Mother, the keeper of truth, the guardian of beauty, the muse of learning, the fosterer of progress, has given us gifts in munificent generosity, gifts that sprang from her holy bosom, to enlighten, to cheer, to guide and to help; gifts that she, large, liberal, glorious, could not but give, for she, like her Lord, is giver and bestower; and to be of her children is to be of the givers and bestowers. The Catholic Church is the source of fine literature, of true art, as of n.o.ble speech and n.o.ble deed.
We are going to look at a small portion of that part of our Catholic heritage which consists of our early literature; we are going to think about the beginning of Christian work of this kind in the form of poetry and prose in England. When I say Christian poetry and prose, I am using the word Christian as opposed to pagan, and inclusive of secular as well as religious verse, though the amount of secular verse is, in the earliest time, comparatively very small. Some of the pagan work was retouched by Christians who cared for the truth and strength and beauty of it. The ideal of the English heathen poet was, in many respects, a fine one. He loved valour and generosity and loyalty, and all these things are found, for instance, in the poem ”Beowulf,” a poem full of interest of various kinds; full, too, as Professor Harrison says, ”of evidences of having been fumigated here and there by a Christian incense-bearer.” But ”the poem is a heathen poem, just 'fumigated' here and there by its editor.” There is a vast difference between ”fumigating” a heathen work and adapting it to blessedly changed belief, seeing in old story the potential vessel of Christian thought and Christian teaching. To fumigate with incense is one thing--to use that incense in the work of dedication and consecration is another. For instance, the old story of the ”Quest of the Graal,” best known to modern readers through Tennyson's ”Idylls of the King,” has been Christianised and consecrated. And so it was with some fine old English (or Anglo-Saxon) poetry. But, just now, we are going to listen to Catholic poets and teachers only.
We begin with the work of poets. Out of all those who wrote in what was the best period of our old poetry, a period that lasted some hundred and fifty or seventy-five years, we know the names of two only, Caedmon and Cynewulf.
And here may I say that scholars agree that the names are to be p.r.o.nounced _Kadmon_ and _Kun-e-wolf_; in the second name we sound the _y_ like a French _u_, make a syllable of the _e_, not sounding it as _ee_, but short, and make the last syllable just what we now p.r.o.nounce as _wolf_.
Both of these poets deserve our love and our praise, as singers and inspirers of other singers, but we know much more about Caedmon's life than we know about his share in the poetry that has been attributed to him; that is the poetry which has gone under his name. That he did write much fine verse we know. On the other hand, we know a good deal as to the authenticity of Cynewulf's poetry, and nothing about his life.
Both of these poets wrote in the language spoken in England before the period of French influence. That influence upon English at first seemed to be disastrous; the language became broken up and spoilt: but this was only for a time; and by and by, out of roughness and chaotic grammar there grew up a beautiful and stately speech meet for great poets to sing in, and great men and women to use. So it is that what for a time seems to be disastrous may one day be realised as benign and beautiful.
This pre-Conquest language has to be learned as we learn a foreign tongue. It is much easier to learn than Latin or German, but still it has to be learned; so we shall have to listen to the thought of these poets in the language of our own day, allowing ourselves now and then the use of words or expressions which it is fair to employ in rendering old poetry or prose, though we do not use them in ordinary speech or writing.
We shall sometimes use translations, and sometimes I will tell you about the poetry, giving the gist of it as best I can.
[Ill.u.s.tration: WHITBY ABBEY]
At Whitby you may see the ruins of what must have been a very beautiful monastery, built high on a hill, swept by brisk and health-giving winds with the strength and freshness of moorland and sea. This monastery, part of which was for monks, and part for nuns, was ruled by Abbess Hild.[A] This seems strange to us, but it was because the Celtic usage prevailed in the government of the Abbey.
[Footnote A: Hilda is the Latinised form, which it is a pity to use instead of the English one.]
We must never forget the work of the Celtic missionaries who brought Christianity from the Western Islands to the North of England: and, of course, their ”ways” as well as their message were impressed on the converts. Later on, as we know, the Roman usage was established all over the country.
Among the monks of Streoneshalh, as Whitby was then called, the Danes having given it its present name, there was, as St Bede the Venerable tells us, ”a brother specially renowned and honoured by Divine grace, because it was his wont to make fitting songs appertaining to piety and virtue; so that whatever he learned from scholars about the Divine Writings, that did he, in a short time, with the greatest sweetness and fervour, adorn with the language of poetry, and bring forth in the English speech. And because of his poems the hearts of many men were brought to despise the world, and were inspired with desire for the fellows.h.i.+p of the heavenly life.... He was a layman until he was far advanced in years, and he had never learnt any songs. It was then the custom that, when there was a feast on some occasion of rejoicing, all present should sing to the harp in turn. And when Caedmon saw the harp coming near him, he would get up, feeling ashamed, and go home to his house. Now once upon a time he had done this and had left the house where they were feasting, and gone to the stall where the cattle were, which it was his duty that night to attend to. There, when his work was done, he lay down and slept, and in a dream he saw a man standing by him, who hailed him and greeted him and called him by his name, saying: 'Caedmon, sing me something.' And Caedmon answered and said, 'I can sing nothing, and therefore did I go from this feast, and depart hither, because I could not.' And again he that was speaking with him, said: 'Nevertheless, thou must sing for me.'”
Then Caedmon understood, and he said in the same spirit that prompted Our Lady's ”Be it done unto me according to thy word,” ”What shall I sing?” And the guest of his dream said, ”Sing the Creation for me.”
As soon as Caedmon had received this answer, he at once began to sing to the praise of G.o.d the Creator verses and words which he had never heard.