Part 2 (1/2)

And laid in a manger because He had no room in the inn.

Glory to G.o.d in the highest: and on earth peace to men of good will.”{11}

[Ill.u.s.tration:

JACOPONE IN ECSTASY BEFORE THE VIRGIN.

From ”Laude di Frate Jacopone da Todi”

(Florence, 1490).]

It is in the poetry of Jacopone da Todi, born shortly after the death of St. Francis, that the Franciscan Christmas spirit finds its most intense expression. A wild, wandering ascetic, an impa.s.sioned poet, and a soaring mystic, Jacopone is one of the greatest of Christian singers, unpolished as his verses are. n.o.ble by birth, he made himself utterly as the common people for whom he piped his rustic notes. ”Dio fatto piccino” (”G.o.d made a little thing”) is the keynote of his music; the Christ Child is for him ”our sweet little brother”; with tender affection he rejoices in endearing diminutives--”Bambolino,” ”Piccolino,” ”Jesulino.” He sings of the Nativity with extraordinary realism.[13] Here, in words, is a picture of the Madonna and her Child that might well have inspired an early Tuscan artist:--

”Veggiamo il s...o...b..mbino Gammettare nel fieno, E le braccia scoperte Porgere ad ella in seno,

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Ed essa lo ricopre El meglio che pu almeno, Mettendoli la poppa Entro la sua bocchina.

A la sua man manca, Cullava lo Bambino, E con sante carole Nenciava il suo amor fino....

Gli Angioletti d' intorno Se ne gian danzando, Facendo dolci versi E d' amor favellando.”[14]{12}

But there is an intense sense of the divine, as well as the human, in the Holy Babe; no one has felt more vividly the paradox of the Incarnation:--

”Ne la degna stalla del dolce Bambino Gli Angeli cantano d' intorno al piccolino; Cantano e gridano gli Angeli diletti, Tutti riverenti timidi e subietti,

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Al Bambolino principe de gli eletti, Che nudo giace nel pungente spino.

Il Verbo divino, che e sommo sapiente, In questo d par che non sappia niente, Guardal su' l fieno, che gambetta piangente, Como elli non fusse huomo divino.”[15]{13}

Here, again, are some sweet and homely lines about preparation for the Infant Saviour:--

”Andiamo a lavare La casa a nettare, Che non trovi bruttura.

Poi el menaremo, Et gli daremo Ben da ber' e mangiare.

Un cibo espiato, Et d' or li sia dato Senza alcuna dimura.

Lo cor adempito Dagiamoli fornito Senza odio ne rancura.”[16]{14}

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There have been few more rapturous poets than Jacopone; men deemed him mad; but, ”if he is mad,” says a modern Italian writer, ”he is mad as the lark”--”Nessun poeta canta a tutta gola come questo frate minore. S'

e pazzo, e pazzo come l' allodola.”

To him is attributed that most poignant of Latin hymns, the ”Stabat Mater dolorosa”; he wrote also a joyous Christmas pendant to it:--

”Stabat Mater speciosa, Juxta foenum gaudiosa, Dum jacebat parvulus.

Cujus animam gaudentem, Laetabundam ac ferventem, Pertransivit jubilus.”[17]{15}

In the fourteenth century we find a blossoming forth of Christmas poetry in another land, Germany.{16} There are indeed Christmas and Epiphany pa.s.sages in a poetical Life of Christ by Otfrid of Weissenburg in the ninth century, and a twelfth-century poem by Spervogel, ”Er ist gewaltic unde starc,” opens with a mention of Christmas, but these are of little importance for us. The fourteenth century shows the first real outburst, and that is traceable, in part at least, to the mystical movement in the Rhineland caused by the preaching of the great Dominican, Eckhart of Strasburg, and his followers. It was a movement towards inward piety as distinguished from, though not excluding, external observances, which made its way largely by sermons listened to by great congregations in the towns. Its impulse came not from the monasteries proper, but from the convents of Dominican friars, and it was for Germany in the fourteenth century something like what Franciscanism had been for Italy in the thirteenth. One of the central doctrines of the school

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was that of the Divine Birth in the soul of the believer; according to Eckhart the soul comes into immediate union with G.o.d by ”bringing forth the Son”

within itself; the historic Christ is the symbol of the divine humanity to which the soul should rise: ”when the soul bringeth forth the Son,” he says, ”it is happier than Mary.”{17} Several Christmas sermons by Eckhart have been preserved; one of them ends with the prayer, ”To this Birth may that G.o.d, who to-day is new born as man, bring us, that we, poor children of earth, may be born in Him as G.o.d; to this may He bring us eternally! Amen.”{18} With this profound doctrine of the Divine Birth, it was natural that the German mystics should enter deeply into the festival of Christmas, and one of the earliest of German Christmas carols, ”Es komt ein schif geladen,” is the work of Eckhart's disciple, John Tauler (d. 1361). It is perhaps an adaptation of a secular song:--

”A s.h.i.+p comes sailing onwards With a precious freight on board; It bears the only Son of G.o.d, It bears the Eternal Word.”

The doctrine of the mystics, ”Die in order to live,” fills the last verses:--

”Whoe'er would hope in gladness To kiss this Holy Child, Must suffer many a pain and woe, Patient like Him and mild;

Must die with Him to evil And rise to righteousness, That so with Christ he too may share Eternal life and bliss.”{19}

To the fourteenth century may perhaps belong an allegorical carol still sung in both Catholic and Protestant Germany:--