Chapter XXXVIII: Conclusion: IV (13)

This is a very interesting and, in some respects, a learned work; but we are fain to confess that we have been disappointed in it. If the author, instead of attempting to show that the worship of the one true God was the early religion of Rome, had contented himself with proving it to have been professed by the primitive Gentile nations in general, we should agree with him, and thank him for unfolding in our English language the incontrovertible truth that polytheism and idolatry are but corruptions of great primeval traditions collected, preserved, and handed down by Noe, and that heathen mythology can be made to bear witness to the original idea of the unity and spirituality of God. This view of the religious errors of the ancients has been held up by several eminent writers, and particularly by two who deserve to be rescued from an unjust oblivion—by Monsignor Bianchini (1697) in _La Storia Universale provata con Monumenti e figurata con Simboli Antichi_; and by Abbé Bergier (1773) in his _Origine des Dieux du Paganisme_. While we do not accuse our reverend author of a want of modesty precisely in stating his prime opinion about the monotheism of the second king of Rome, we do think that he writes a little too dogmatically and as though he had discovered some historical treasure-trove wherewith to enrich his arguments; whereas no new documents or monuments whatever have been brought to light to throw a different or brighter ray upon the character of Numa Pompilius, in connection with whom, moreover, he seems to us to confound idolatry and polytheism. We confidently believe that the _Cœleste Numen_ of Numa, on which so great stress is laid, like the _Deus Optimus Maximus_ of Tully, or the _Divûm pater atque hominum rex_ of Virgil, was nothing more than another form of man’s continual, almost involuntary, protest against the falling away of the human race from the worship of the Creator, but practically did not betoken more than a recognition of one among many greater than his fellow-gods. While Numa forbade the worship of _idols_ in Rome, and consequently professed a less corrupt error than did many contemporary rulers, he never asserted the unity or, we prefer to say, the _oneness_ of God. He was a prolific polytheist, multiplying divinities and introducing new superstitions among his people. Father Formby has brought up nothing in his favor unknown to Arnobius, Orosius, St. Augustine, and Tertullian. This last writer, although he absolves Numa from the crime of idolatry, distinctly charges upon him a many-parted god: “Nam a Numa concepta est curiositas superstitiosa” (_Apol._ xxv.)

Our author’s present work is an amplification of a smaller one published in pamphlet form two years ago, in which he shows the “city of ancient Rome” to have been “the divinely-sent pioneer of the way for the Catholic Church.” On this subject we cannot too closely agree with him, or sufficiently thank him for turning towards our students and illustrating for them a side of Roman history which is so important. Our own studies have always pointed in the same direction, and we cannot better conclude this notice of Father Formby’s work and show our sympathy with him than by a brief extract from our commonplace book, made up many years ago in Rome itself:

“The celebrated Gallo-Roman poet and statesman, Rutilius Numatianus, was much attached to the false ancient divinities of Rome and no small help to the political party of Symmachus, which so stubbornly fought St. Ambrose and the Christians. The following lines from his _Itinerarium_ (i. 62 _et seq._) are truly beautiful and express a grand idea, but one that is still grander in another sense than his; for if a heathen understood it to be a blessing in disguise upon the conquered peoples of the earth to be brought under the domination of Rome on account of the prosperity and civilization that accompanied her rule, how shall not a Christian admire the action of divine Providence, preparing the world for the New Law, and applaud those triumphs that brought so many countries through the Roman Empire into the Church of Christ. Of Christian less than of pagan Rome we shall interpret the poet’s sentiment:

“‘Fecisti patriam diversis gentibus unam;
Profuit invitis, te dominante, capi;
Dumque offers victis patrii consortia juris
Urbem fecisti quod prius orbis erat.’”

THE ILLUSTRATED CATHOLIC FAMILY ALMANAC for 1878. New York: The
Catholic Publication Society Co.

This annual, neat, compact, and perfect in all its mechanical arrangements—the labor of many busy and well-stored minds condensed into a portable form—has just been issued. To say that it equals its predecessors, which have found so much favor with the public, would be doing it great injustice. In every respect it is far superior, and shows palpable evidence that its conductors, appreciating the growth in public taste as well as the increasing desire for reliable information on important Catholic subjects, have left no effort untried to satisfy the wishes of their readers. This is particularly noticeable in the illustrations, which we consider to be not only good pictures but genuine works of art. The portraits of Archbishop Bayley, Bishops Von Ketteler and De St. Palais, and the venerable Jesuit Father McElroy are not only excellent likenesses of those deceased prelates, but the best specimens of wood-cut portraiture we have yet seen on this side of the Atlantic. The other engravings, of which there are about a dozen, are alike creditable to the artist and suitable for the pages of such a publication. The reading matter, however, will probably most attract the attention of the majority of purchasers, many of whom will doubtless wonder where a great portion of it could possibly have been discovered. Thus, in addition to the lives of the ecclesiastics above mentioned, and biographical sketches of the venerable Sister Mary Margaret Bourgeois, Frederic Ozanam, Columbus, and others, we have an elaborate History of Printing, a description (with fac-similes) of “The Earliest Irish Madonna,” accounts of the Libraries of the Bollandists and of the Eremites of York; an archæological sketch of the oldest churches of the world, an explanation of the antique Cross of St. Zachary, a _résumé_ of the labors of the Franciscans in California, and a well-digested mass of astronomical, chronological, and statistical information which cannot help proving of incalculable value as matters of reference.

EVIDENCES OF RELIGION. By Louis Jouin, S.J. New York: P. O’Shea. 1877.

There is nothing more gratifying to Catholics who watch the progress of their religion in this country than to find that the church in the United States is beginning to supply her own literature, and more especially her polemical literature, which she needs most of all. Within the last few years several controversial works and books of instruction have been written in this country which are far better adapted to our people than the standard works of foreign authors; and the time, we trust, is not far distant when we shall be fully supplied with a well-adapted course of polemics of our own, and be no longer dependent on the writings of men in lands which are often more or less out of harmony with the American mind. _The Evidences of Religion_ is one of the books of which we stood most in need, and the wonder is that it was not written long before. Perhaps, however, it is as well that no one attempted it before Father Jouin; for we doubt if any other attempt could have been so entirely successful.

The book is a marvel of condensed matter and thought and argument. In its 380 octavo pages are summed up the philosophical treatise _De Certitudine_ and theological tract _De Locis Theologicis_; and it contains in addition a refutation, short, sharp, and decisive, of the latest errors in philosophy, politics, and religion.

Christianity rests on facts, not on mere theories. The science of the day pretends to deal with facts, and in every case to accept them, so that in our controversies with the pseudo-science of the times there is nothing more important than to bring out clearly and strongly the facts on which the certainty of the Christian faith rests. This Father Jouin has done, and in his book we have the whole groundwork on which Christianity is based spread out before us in perspective; the outline is complete, though of course, in the limited space which he allowed himself, he has not been able to bring out each detail in full. Yet he assures us in his preface that nothing essential has been left out, and we have verified his assertion. Altogether this is just the sort of book, in our opinion, that is needed to combat the errors of the age, and to serve as an antidote to the poison of rank infidelity and materialism with which the very atmosphere around us is charged.

The author tells us that he designs the work more especially as a text-book for students in the higher classes of our Catholic colleges, and we sincerely hope that it may be adopted in every Catholic college throughout the country. Our Catholic instructors fully realize the importance of giving their students a thorough grounding in the evidences of their religion, and Father Jouin’s book in the hands of a good professor can be made the basis of a thorough course of such instruction.

Not alone to students in colleges do we recommend the study of this work, but to every intelligent educated Catholic, who should investigate the reasons on which his religion is founded, and be able to answer for the faith that is in him. Let our Catholic lawyers and doctors and business men take it up, and they will find in it sufficient to convince them of the reasonableness of their creed. It will furnish them, moreover, with conclusive arguments against the absurd theories and false views of religion which are being advanced every day in their hearing.

The greatest enemy that the Catholic Church has to contend with, both without and within, at the present day, is ignorance of her true position and teaching, and we eagerly invite and encourage every study and investigation that may in any way help to dispel it.

It is to be regretted that so valuable a work has not been brought out in a worthy manner. It is neither well printed nor well put together.

THE NEW VESPER HYMN-BOOK: A companion to _The New Vesper Psalter_;
containing a collection of all the hymns sung at Vespers throughout
the year (classified according to metre), set to music, either for
unison or four voices, with accompaniment, and including the best of
the plain chant melodies, together with the words in full, and the
versicles and responses proper to each hymn. The whole compiled and
edited by Charles Lewis, Director of the Cathedral Choir, Boston,
Mass. Boston: Thos. B. Noonan & Co.

At the present stage of the revival of Gregorian Chant, the true song of the church, we can commend this little work as one which will doubtless be found useful in many churches whose organists are unable to harmonize the chant or the singers to read its proper notation. We wish, however, that the editor had given all the hymns as found in the _Vesperale_, as the musical airs which are substituted are not worthy to supplant the original melodies. The style of notation is that usually adopted in translations from the old form of four lines and square notes. Could not the editor have done better, so as to give to those unaccustomed to plain chant some idea of its movement and expression? There is no mark given to designate accented from unaccented notes, and, lacking this, we defy any one who is not familiar with the traditional movement of a phrase to give its true expression.

We think the spacing of notes and phrases as given in the old style should be preserved—that is, the notes upon each syllable should be printed close together, and a wider and distinct space left between syllables and words. An intelligent system of writing plain chant upon the modern musical staff is yet to be invented. We have been told that in some places the Tonic Sol-Fa system is being attempted, with what success we have not learned.

LOTOS FLOWERS, GATHERED IN SUN AND SHADOW. By Mrs. Chambers-Ketchum.
New York: D. Appleton & Co. 1877.

Mrs. Chambers-Ketchum is already known to the readers of THE CATHOLIC WORLD through her poems, “Advent” and “A Birthday Wish” (appearing under the name of “Twenty-one” in the present collection), published in its pages during the present year. Her verse is pure in thought and written out of a woman’s heart full of love and enthusiasm. With true Southern fervor she revels in the luxuriant flora of her home, and in the landscape of all her pictures she takes a dear delight. Even so unsightly an object as a Mississippi steamboat-landing grows picturesque under her hand, and do we not feel soft Italian air as we read?—

“Peaceful stand
The sentinel poplars in their gold-green plumes
Beside the Enzo bridge. Where late the hoofs
Of flying squadrons scared th’affrighted land
The soft cloud-shadows chase each other now
O’er violet gardens.”

As with many another poet, the ease with which Mrs. Chambers-Ketchum writes is at times a snare, leading her to accept too readily a hackneyed term or word, surrendering after too slight a struggle to the tyranny of rhyme. In her verse, also, there is sometimes a lack of smoothness that would set despair in the heart of the faithful scanner.

Was it because our ears were sick with a certain slang of “culture” that, when we stumbled over Krishna in the “Christian Legend,” we felt a strong desire to banish these Indian immortals to that Hades where languished the gods of Greece until Schiller called them forth to run riot in the field of religion as well as of art? And is not the term “legend” a strange misnomer, for the New Testament narrative of the raising of Lazarus? For Mrs. Chambers-Ketchum’s verse is essentially Christian and womanly, and even so short a notice of it would scarcely be complete without a mention of “Benny,” who, with his kitten and his “baby’s sense of right,” is already dear and familiar to the mothers and children of our whole country, whose kindly hearts will surely give to Benny’s mother their sympathy in his loss.

SURLY TIM, AND OTHER STORIES. By Francis Hodgson Burnett. New York:
Scribner, Armstrong & Co. 1877.

Unfortunately for our first impression of the merit of the little volume of which “Surly Tim” is the initial story, we began our reading with “Lodusky,” attracted to it by the locality of the tale, its hill people and dialect being a loadstone to us, but lately returned from similar surroundings. But as even in our mountain Edens we find the trail of the serpent, so in “Lodusky” we seemed to be treading the familiar path of moral irresponsibility and the tyranny of personal magnetism, and we craved the flaming sword of the archangel to put the evil to flight.

Nor did our impression grow fairer on turning to “Le Monsieur de la Petite Dame.” But in “One Day at Arle” and in “Seth” we welcomed truly the author’s strong and exquisite pathos. In these pictures of the sorrow of the laboring classes the author draws with a pencil full of feeling, working under a sky whose hue is the leaden monotone of modern French landscape painting; a break of sunshine here and there, but the light seems to fall, after all, on earthly stubble and the dumb, almost soulless faces of patient cattle that know nothing beyond their daily furrow and the mute, faithful service they bear a kindly hand at the plough.

We are reminded of the pathos of Robert Buchanan’s North-Coast verse, and we close the little volume sadly, almost as if all human sorrow wherein is no Christian joy stood at our threshold, asking from us an alms we had no power to give.

REPERTORIUM ORATORIS SACRI: Containing Outlines of Six Hundred Sermons
for all the Sundays and Holidays of the Ecclesiastical Year; also
for other solemn occasions. Compiled from the works of eminent
preachers of various ages and nations by a secular priest. With an
introduction by the Rt. Rev. Joseph Dwenger, D.D., Bishop of Fort
Wayne. New York and Cincinnati: Fr. Pustet, Typographus Sedis
Apostolicæ. 1877.

This publication is to be continued in monthly parts, each part containing the outlines of two sermons for each Sunday and holiday for one quarter of the year. There will be four volumes of four parts each, so that when the work is completed there will be eight sermons for each occasion.

It will, if it fulfils the promise of this first number, be the best and most complete collection of the kind ever published so far as we are aware. It hardly needs to be said that plans of sermons such as are here given are very much more valuable to a preacher than the actual sermons themselves; for there are few who can give with much effect the words of another, to say nothing of the trouble involved in committing them to memory. The sermons of great pulpit orators are indeed extremely useful and deserving of study as models of style; but a few will answer that purpose as well as a thousand.

The work is in English, being designed principally for use in this country. It is most earnestly to be hoped that it will receive the liberal support which it certainly deserves.

NICHOLAS MINTURN. A Study in a Story. By J. G. Holland. 1 vol. 12mo.
New York: Scribner, Armstrong & Co. 1877.

We prefer Dr. Holland’s stories to his essays. He possesses fine descriptive powers; his genial humor captivates the reader; his power of analysis is searching. No one can read _Nicholas Minturn_ without recognizing the author’s ability to lay bare the vices and follies of the various classes with whom his hero is brought in contact. In doing this, however, Dr. Holland is apt to forget their redeeming virtues. This is his great fault as a novelist. He lacks the power to vitalize the subtle traits that appeal to our humanity. There is no bond of union between his people and us. He is unable to centralize our interest. When disaster overtakes the ocean steamer there is not a single figure to start out from the group and wring a groan of compassion from us. We listen to the wailing of despair and the shriek of terror with as much apathy as if it arose from a distant battle-field. In all other respects the story is far superior to the great mass of light literature.

THE ETERNAL YEARS. By the Hon. Mrs. A. Montgomery, author of _The
Divine Sequence_, also _The Bucklyn Shaig_, _Mine Own Familiar
Friend_, _The Wrong Man_, _On the Wing_, etc. With an introduction
by the Rev. S. Porter, S.J. London: Burns & Oates. 1877.

_The Eternal Years_ is a republication of a series of articles from THE CATHOLIC WORLD. A number of thoughtful readers of our magazine have expressed the great interest with which they have read those articles and their desire to know the name of the author. They will be pleased to see that they are now published in a volume under their author’s name. _On the Wing_ will be remembered as having been one of the most popular of the series of sketches taken from scenes in European life and incidents of travel which we have from time to time published. Mrs. Montgomery possesses a very versatile talent as a writer, and passes with facility “from grave to gay, from lively to severe.” Whatever she writes is always both instructive and pleasing.

THE SUNDAY-SCHOOL TEACHER’S MANUAL; or, The Art of Teaching Catechism.
For the use of teachers and parents. By the Rev. A. A. Lambing,
author of _The Orphan’s Friend_. New York: Benziger Brothers. 1877.

Father Lambing has done for Sunday-school teachers what M. Amond, the curé of St. Sulpice, and Father Porter have done for those engaged in the sacred ministry of the pulpit.

This manual, written in a clear and popular style, supplies a need that should have been more felt than it was. It gives those in charge of Sunday-schools a true idea of their very important mission, a deep sense of the responsibility that rests upon them, points out the various qualifications necessary for the faithful discharge of their duties, and contains many useful instructions which will aid them in becoming effective catechisers.

IZA: A STORY OF LIFE IN RUSSIAN POLAND. By Kathleen O’Meara. London:
Burns & Oates. 1877. (New York: The Catholic Publication Society
Co.)

This book, by a lady who since its first appearance has become distinguished in the higher walks of literature, has been republished at a very seasonable time, when the Eastern war, and the novel pretensions of Russia to be considered the friend and protector of oppressed nationalities, have once more called public attention to her barbarous treatment of the gallant Poles. The scenes are laid in Poland; the characters, which are few and clearly drawn, are Polish or Muscovite, and the plot, though simple and natural, is well and artistically wrought out. The theme of the whole story is the oppression of the Polish nobility by the shrewd, keen, and unscrupulous agents of the czar, wherein the generous, high-spirited and confiding patriotism of the one class is strongly contrasted with the accomplished villainy of the other. Though the superstructure is, of course, a work of pure fiction, it is based on well known historical facts. The entire work is written with great care and accuracy as to names, places, costumes, and local customs, the situations are highly dramatic, and the moral effect produced on the reader is healthful and salutary.

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THE CATHOLIC WORLD.

The attention of readers will be directed to the advertisement of complete sets of THE CATHOLIC WORLD and THE YOUNG CATHOLIC as suitable and valuable Christmas presents. Bound volumes of THE YOUNG CATHOLIC make the very best present that could be offered to children. The reading matter is interesting, the illustrations are really excellent, and the puzzles and charades afford unfailing amusement for the long winter evenings.

THE CATHOLIC WORLD is now in its twenty-sixth volume. It constitutes a library, and a most valuable and varied library, in itself. In it is everything that could be desired. Theology and philosophy have their departments, filled by men of known and recognized competence, master minds indeed in those higher sciences. The literary articles and reviews are acknowledged by the secular press to be unsurpassed in power, grace, and strength. The polemics of the day find their true solution in THE CATHOLIC WORLD, which has told upon the non-Catholic mind in this country as no other magazine or publication has been able to tell. There is an abundance of fiction and light literature in its pages, a fiction that has known how to be interesting without being dangerous, and good without being dull. Many stories that have already made their mark in the literary world and won deserved fame for their authors began by passing through the columns of this magazine. All the leading and absorbing questions of the day are taken up and discussed in it by men thoroughly equipped and fitted for so important a task. Indeed THE CATHOLIC WORLD may fairly claim to be a channel through which the very best Catholic literature of the day, in all its forms, passes, a guide to and in all the questions of the day, and a compendium from year to year of all that is best and most worthy of attention in the higher sciences, in physical science, in politics, in literature, and in art. His Eminence the Cardinal has recently kindly taken occasion to “congratulate the Catholics in America on possessing a magazine of which they may be justly proud,” and trusts “that they will contribute their share to make THE CATHOLIC WORLD still more useful to themselves and to the Church at large.” No words could add strength to this commendation and appeal; and it is to be hoped that Catholics will take both to heart. No intelligent Catholic in this country should be without a magazine that is peculiarly and designedly his own. Yet are there thousands of intelligent persons who are without it, who probably do not know of its existence. It is for those who do know it and appreciate it to make it known among their friends. Taken in the very lowest sense, no man has yet complained that in THE CATHOLIC WORLD he did not receive the full, and more than the full, value of his money.

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THE

CATHOLIC WORLD.

VOL. XXVI., No. 155.—FEBRUARY, 1878.

CEADMON THE COW-HERD, ENGLAND’S FIRST POET.

BY AUBREY DE VERE.

The Venerable Bede’s _Ecclesiastical History of the English Nation_ contains nothing more touching than its record of Ceadmon, the earliest English poet, whose gift came to him in a manner so extraordinary. It occurs in the 24th chapter: “By his verses the minds of many were often excited to despise the world, and to aspire to heaven. Others after him attempted in the English nation to compose religious poems, but none could ever compare with him; for he did not learn the art of poetry from man, but from God, for which reason he never would compose any vain or trivial poem.” ... “Being sometimes at entertainments, when it was agreed, for the sake of mirth, that all present should sing in their turns, when he saw the instrument come towards him he rose from the table and retired home. Having done so on a certain occasion, ... a Person appeared to him in his sleep, and, saluting him by his name, said, ‘Ceadmon, sing some song for me.’ He answered, ‘I cannot sing.’” Ceadmon’s song is next described: “How he, being the Eternal God, became the author of all miracles, Who first, as Almighty Preserver of the human race, created heaven for the sons of men, _as the roof of the house_, and _next_ the earth.” ... “He sang the Creation of the world, the origin of man, and all the history of Genesis, ... the Incarnation, Passion, Resurrection of our Lord, and His Ascension.”[158] Ceadmon’s poetry is referred to also in Sharon Turner’s _History of the Anglo-Saxons_; and Sir Francis Palgrave points out the singular resemblance of passages in _Paradise Lost_ to corresponding passages in its surviving fragments. To the history of Ceadmon Montalembert has devoted some of the most eloquent paragraphs in his admirable work, _Les Moines d’Occident_—see chapter ii., vol. iv., page 68.

Sole stood upon the pleasant bank of Esk
Ceadmon the Cow-herd, while the sinking sun
Reddened the bay, and fired the river-bank
With pomp beside of golden Iris lit,
And flamed upon the ruddy herds that strayed
Along the marge, clear-imaged. None was nigh:—
For that cause spake the Cow-herd, “Praise to God!
He made the worlds; and now, by Hilda’s hand
He plants a fair crown upon Whitby’s height:
Daily her convent towers more high aspire;
Daily ascend her Vespers. Hark that strain!”
He stood and listened. Soon the flame-touched herds
Sent forth their lowings, and the cliffs replied,
And Ceadmon thus resumed: “The music note
Rings through their lowings dull, though heard by few!
Poor kine, ye do your best! Ye know not God,
Yet man, his likeness, unto you is God,
And him ye worship with obedience sage,
A grateful, sober, much-enduring race
That o’er the vernal clover sigh for joy,
With winter snows contend not. Patient kine,
What thought is yours, deep-musing? Haply this—
‘God’s help! how narrow are our thoughts, and few!
Not so the thoughts of that slight human child
Who daily drives us with her blossomed rod
From lowland valleys to the pails long-ranged!’
Take comfort, kine! God also made your race!
If praise from man surceased, from your broad chests
That God would perfect praise, and, when ye died,
Resound it from yon rocks that gird the bay:
God knoweth all things. Let that thought suffice!”

Thus spake the ruler of the deep-mouthed kine:
They were not his; the man and they alike
A neighbor’s wealth. He was contented thus:
Humble he was in station, meek of soul,
Unlettered, yet heart-wise. His face was pale;
Stately his frame, though slightly bent by age:
Slow were his eyes, and slow his speech, and slow
His musing step; and slow his hand to wrath,
A massive hand, but soft, that many a time
Had succored man and woman, child and beast;
Ay, yet could fiercely grasp the sword! At times
As mightily it clutched his ashen goad
When like an eagle on him swooped some thought:
Then stood he as in dream, his pallid front
Brightening like eastern sea-cliffs when a moon
Unrisen is near its rising.

Round the bay Meantime with deepening eve full many a fire Up-sprung, and horns were heard. Around the steep With bannered pomp and many a dancing plume Ere long a cavalcade made way. Whence came it? Oswy, Northumbria’s king, the foremost rode, Oswy triumphant o’er the Mercian host, To sue for blessing on his sceptre new; With him an Anglian prince, student long time In Bangor of the Irish, and a monk Of Gallic race far wandering from the Marne: They came to look on Hilda, hear her words Of far-famed wisdom on the Interior Life: For Hilda thus discoursed: “True life of man Is life within: inward immeasurably The being winds of all who walk the earth; But he whom sense hath blinded nothing knows Of that wide greatness: like a boy is he That clambers round some castle’s wall extern In search of nests—the outward wall of seven— Yet nothing knows of those great courts within, The hall where princes banquet, or the bower Where royal maidens touch the lyre and lute, Much less its central church, and sacred shrine Wherein God dwells alone.”[159] Thus Hilda spake; And they that gazed upon her widening eyes Low whispered, each to each, “She speaks of things Which she hath seen and known.”

On Whitby’s crest The royal feast was holden: far below, A noisier revel dinned the shore; therein The humbler guests partook. Full many a tent Glimmered upon the white sands, ripple-kissed; Full many a savory dish sent up its steam; The farmer from the field had driven his calf; The fisher brought the harvest of the sea; And Jock, the woodsman, from his oaken glades The tall stag, arrow-pierced. In gay attire Now green, now crimson, matron sat and maid: Each had her due: the elder, reverence most, The lovelier that and love. Beside the board The beggar lacked not place.

When hunger’s rage, Sharpened by fresh sea-air, was quelled, the jest Succeeded, and the tale of foreign lands; But, boast who might of distant chief renowned, His battle-axe, or fist that felled an ox, The Anglian’s answer was “our Hilda” still: “Is not her prayer puissant as sworded hosts? Her insight more than wisdom of the seers? What birth like hers illustrious? Edwin’s self, Dëira’s exile, next Northumbria’s king, Her kinsman was. Together bowed they not When he of holy hand, missioned from Rome, Paulinus, poured o’er both the absolving wave And knit to Christ? Kingliest was she, that maid Who spurned earth-crowns!” The night advanced, he rose That ruled the feast, the miller old, yet blithe, And cried, “A song!” So song succeeded song, For each man knew that time to chant his stave, But no man yet sang nobly. Last the harp Made way to Ceadmon, lowest at the board: He pushed it back, answering, “I cannot sing:” Around him many gathered clamoring, “Sing!” And one among them, voluble and small, Shot out a splenetic speech: “This lord of kine, Our herdsman, grows to ox! Behold, his eyes Move slow, like eyes of oxen!”

Sudden rose
Ceadmon, and spake: “I note full oft young men
Quick-eyed, but small-eyed, darting glances round
Now here, now there, like glance of some poor bird,
That light on all things and can rest on none:
As ready are they with their tongues as eyes;
But all their songs are chirpings backward blown
On winds that sing God’s song, by them unheard:
My oxen wait my service: I depart.”
Then strode he to his cow-house in the mead,
Displeased though meek, and muttered, “Slow of eye!
My kine are slow: if I were swift my hand
Might tend them worse.” Hearing his steps the kine
Turned round their hornèd foreheads: angry thoughts
Went from him as a vapor. Straw he brought,
And strewed their beds; and they, contented well,
Down laid ere long their great bulks, breathing deep
Amid the glimmering moonlight. He, with head
Propped on the white flank of a heifer mild,
Rested, his deer-skin o’er him drawn. Hard days
Bring slumber soon. His latest thought was this:
“Though witless things we are, my kine and I,
Yet God it was who made us.”

As he slept,
Beside him stood a Man Divine and spake;
“Ceadmon, arise, and sing.” Ceadmon replied,
“My Lord, I cannot sing, and for that cause
Forth from the revel came I. Once, in youth,
I willed to sing the bright face of a maid,
And failed, and once a gold-faced harvest-field,
And failed, and once the flame-eyed face of war,
And failed once more.” To him the Man Divine,
“Those themes were earthly. Sing!” And Ceadmon said,
“What shall I sing, my Lord?” Then answer came,
“Ceadmon, stand up, and sing thy song of God.”

At once obedient, Ceadmon rose, and sang,
And help was with him from great thoughts of old
Within his silent nature yearly stored,
That swelled, collecting like a flood that bursts
In spring its icy bar. The Lord of all
He sang; that God beneath whose hand eterne,
Then when he willed forth-stretched athwart the abyss,
Creation like a fiery chariot ran,
Inwoven wheels of ever-living stars.
Him first he sang. The builder, here below,
From fair foundations rears at last the roof,
But Song, a child of heaven, begins with heaven,
The archetype divine, and end of all,
More late descends to earth. He sang that hymn,
“Let there be light, and there was light”; and lo!
On the void deep came down the seal of God
And stamped immortal form. Clear laughed the skies,
While from crystalline seas the strong earth brake,
Both continent and isle; and downward rolled
The sea-surge summoned to his home remote.
Then came a second vision to the man
There standing ‘mid his oxen. Darkness sweet,
He sang, of pleasant frondage clothed the vales,
Ambrosial bowers rich-fruited which the sun,
A glory new-created in his place,
All day made golden, and the moon by night
Silvered with virgin beam, while sang the bird
Her first of love-songs on the branch first-flower’d—
Not yet the lion stalked. And Ceadmon sang
O’er-awed, the Father of all humankind
Standing in garden planted by God’s hand,
And girt by murmurs of the rivers four,
Between the trees of Knowledge and of Life,
With eastward face. In worship mute of God,
Eden’s Contemplative he stood that hour,
Not her Ascetic, since, where sin is none,
No need for spirit severe.

And Ceadmon sang
God’s Daughter, Adam’s Sister, Child, and Bride,
Our Mother Eve. Lit by the matin star,
That nearer drew to earth, and brighter flashed
To meet her gaze, that snowy Innocence
Stood up with queenly port. She turned: she saw
Earth’s King, mankind’s great Father. Taught by God,
Immaculate, unastonished, undismayed,
In love and reverence to her Lord she drew,
And, kneeling, kissed his hand: and Adam laid
That hand, made holier, on that kneeler’s head,
And spake; “For this shall man his parents leave,
And to his wife cleave fast.”

When Ceadmon ceased
Thus spake the Man Divine: “At break of day
Seek thou some prudent man, and say that God
Hath loosed thy tongue; nor hide henceforth thy gift.”
Then Ceadmon turned, and slept among his kine
Dreamless. Ere dawn he stood upon the shore
In doubt: but when at last o’er eastern seas
The sun, long wished for, like a god upsprang,
Once more he found God’s song upon his mouth
Murmuring high joy; and sought a prudent man,
And told him all the vision. At the word
He to the Abbess with the tidings fled,
And she made answer, “Bring me Ceadmon here.”

Then clomb the pair that sea-beat mount of God
Fanned by sea-gale, nor trod, as others used,
The curving way, but faced the abrupt ascent,
And halted not, so worked in both her will,
Till now between the unfinished towers they stood
Panting and spent. The portals open stood:
Ceadmon passed in alone. Nor ivory decked,
Nor gold, the walls. That convent was a keep
Strong ’gainst invading storm or demon hosts,
And naked as the rock whereon it stood,
Yet, as a church, august. Dark, high-arched roofs
Slowly let go the distant hymn. Each cell
Cinctured its statued saint, the peace of God
On every stony face. Like caverned grot
Far off the western window frowned: beyond,
Close by, there shook an autumn-blazoned tree:
No need for gems beside of storied glass.

He entered last that hall where Hilda sat
Begirt with a great company, the chiefs
Down either side far ranged. Three stalls, cross-crowned,
Stood side by side, the midmost hers. The years
Had laid upon her brows a hand serene,
And left alone their blessing. Levelled eyes
Sable, and keen, with meditative strength
Conjoined the instinct and the claim to rule;
Firm were her lips and rigid. At her right
Sat Finan, Aidan’s successor, with head
Snow-white, and beard that rolled adown a breast
Never by mortal passion heaved in storm,
A cloister of majestic thoughts that walked,
Humbly with God. High in the left-hand stall
Oswy was throned, a man in prime, with brow
Less youthful than his years. Exile long past,
Or deepening thought of one disastrous deed,
Had left a shadow in his eyes. The strength
Of passion held in check looked lordly forth
From head and hand: tawny his beard; his hair
Thick-curled and dense. Alert the monarch sat
Half turned, like one on horseback set that hears,
And he alone, the advancing trump of war.
Down the long gallery strangers thronged in mass,
Dane or Norwegian, huge of arm through weight
Of billows oar-subdued, with stormy looks
Wild as their waves and crags; Southerns keen-browed;
Pure Saxon youths, fair-fronted, with mild eyes
(These less than others strove for nobler place),
And Pilgrim travel-worn. Behind the rest,
And higher-ranged in marble-arched arcade,
Sat Hilda’s sisterhood. Clustering they shone,
White-veiled, and pale of face, and still and meek,
An inly-bending curve, like some young moon
Whose crescent glitters o’er a dusky strait.
In front were monks dark-stoled: for Hilda ruled,
Though feminine, two houses, one of men:
Upon two chasm-divided rocks they stood,
To various service vowed, though single. Faith;
Nor ever, save at rarest festival,
Their holy inmates met.

“Is this the man
Favored, though late, with gift of song?” Thus spake
Hilda with placid smile. Severer then
She added: “Son, the commonest gifts of God
He counts his best, and oft temptation blends
With powers more rare. Yet sing! That God who lifts
The violet from the grass as well could draw
Music from stones hard by. That song thou sang’st,
Sing it once more.”

Then Ceadmon from his knees
Arose and stood. With princely instinct first
The strong man to the abbess bowed, and next
To that great twain, the bishop and the king,
Last to that stately concourse ranged each side
Down the long hall; and, dubious, answered thus:
“Great Mother, if that God who sent the song
Vouchsafe me to recall it, I will sing;
But I misdoubt it lost.” Slowly his face
Down-drooped, and all his body forward bent
As brooding memory, step by step, retracked
Its backward way. Vainly long time it sought
The starting-point. Then Ceadmon’s large, soft hands
Opening and closing worked; for wont were they,
In musings when he stood, to clasp his goad,
And plant its point far from him, thereupon
Propping his stalwart weight. Customed support
Now finding not, unwittingly those hands
Reached forth, and on Saint Finan’s crosier-staff
Settling, withdrew it from the old bishop’s grasp;
And Ceadmon leant thereon, while passed a smile
Down the long hall to see earth’s meekest man
The spiritual sceptre claim of Lindisfarne.
They smiled; he triumphed: soon the Cow-herd found
That first fair corner-stone of all his song;
Then rose the fabric heavenward. Lifting hands,
Once more his lordly music he rehearsed,
The void abyss at God’s command forth-flinging
Creation like a Thought:—where night had reigned,
The universe of God.

The singing stars
Which with the Angels sang when earth was made
Sang in his song. From highest shrill of lark
To ocean’s deepest under cliffs low-browed,
And pine-woods’ vastest on the topmost hills,
No tone was wanting; while to them that heard
Strange images looked forth of worlds new-born,
Fair, phantom mountains, and, with forests plumed,
The marvelling headlands, for the first time glassed
In waters ever calm. O’er sapphire seas
Green islands laughed. Fairer, the wide earth’s flower,
Eden, on airs unshaken yet by sighs
From bosom still inviolate forth poured
Immortal sweets. With sense to spirit turned
Who heard the song inhaled those sweets. Their eyes
Flashing, their passionate hands and heaving breasts,
Tumult self-stilled, and mute, expectant trance,
’Twas these that gave their bard his twofold might,
That might denied to poets later born
Who, singing to soft brains and hearts ice-hard,
Applauded or contemned, alike roll round
A vainly-seeking eye, and, famished, drop
A hand clay-cold upon the unechoing shell,
Missing their inspiration’s human half.

Thus Ceadmon sang, and ceased. Silent awhile
The concourse stood (for all had risen), as though
Waiting from heaven its echo. Each on each
Gazed hard and caught his hands. Fiercely ere long
Their gratulating shout aloft had leaped
But Hilda laid her finger on her lip,
Or provident lest praise might stain the pure,
Or deeming song a gift too high for praise.
She spake: “Through help of God thy song is sound:
Now hear His Holy Word, and shape therefrom
A second hymn, and worthier than the first.”

Then Finan stood, and bent his hoary head
Above the Scripture tome in reverence stayed
Upon his kneeling deacon’s hands and brow,
And sweetly sang five verses, thus beginning,
“_Cum esset desponsata_,” and was still;
And next rehearsed them in the Anglian tongue:
Then Ceadmon took God’s Word into his heart,
And ruminating stood, as when the kine,
Their flowery pasture ended, ruminate;
And was a man in thought. At last the light
Shone from his dubious countenance, and he spake:
“Great Mother, lo! I saw a second Song!
T’wards me it came; but with averted face,
And borne on shifting winds. A man am I
Sluggish and slow, that needs must muse and brood;
Therefore that Scripture till the sun goes down
Will I revolve. If song from God be mine
Expect me here at morn.”

The morrow morn
In that high presence Ceadmon stood and sang
A second song, and manlier than his first;
And Hilda said, “From God it came, not man;
Thou therefore live a monk among my monks,
And sing to God.” Doubtful he stood—“From youth
My place hath been with kine; their ways I know,
And how to cure their griefs.” Smiling she answered,
“Our convent hath its meads, and kine; with these
Consort each morning: night and day be ours.”
Then Ceadmon knelt, and bowed, and said, “So be it”:
And aged Finan, and Northumbria’s king
Oswy, approved; and all that host had joy.

Thus in that convent Ceadmon lived, a monk,
Humblest of all the monks, save him that slept
In the next cell, who once had been a prince.
Seven times a day he sang God’s praises, first
When earliest dawn drew back night’s sable veil
With trembling hand, revisiting the earth
Like some pale maid that through the curtain peers
Round her sick mother’s bed, misdoubting half
If sleep lie there, or death; latest when eve
Through nave and chancel stole from arch to arch,
And laid upon the snowy altar-step
At last a brow of gold. From time to time,
By ancient yearnings driven, through wood and vale
He tracked Dëirean or Bernician glades
To holy Ripon, or late-sceptred York,
Not yet great Wilfred’s seat, or Beverley:—
The children gathered round him, crying, “Sing!”
They gave him inspiration with their eyes,
And with his conquering music he returned it.
Oftener he roamed that strenuous eastern coast
To Yarrow and to Wearmouth, sacred sites,
The well-beloved of Bede, or northward more,
To Bamborough, Oswald’s keep. At Coldingham
His feet had rest—there where St. Ebba’s Cape
That ends the lonely range of Lammermoor,
Sustained for centuries o’er the wild sea-surge
In region of dim mist and flying bird,
Fronting the Forth, those convent piles far-kenned,
The worn-out sailor’s hope.

Fair English shores,
Despite the buffeting storms of north and east,
Despite rough ages blind with stormier strife,
Or froz’n by doubt, or sad with sensual care,
A fragrance as of Carmel haunts you still
Bequeathed by feet of that forgotten saint
Who trod you once, sowing the seed divine!
Fierce tribes that kenned him distant round him flocked;
On sobbing sands the fisher left his net,
His lamb the shepherd on the hills of March,
Suing for song. With wrinkled face all smiles,
Like that blind Scian upon Grecian shores,
If God the song accorded, Ceadmon sang;
If God denied it, after musings deep
He answered, “I am of the kine and dumb”;—
The man revered his art, and fraudful song
Esteemed as fraudful coin.

Music denied,
He solaced them with tales wherein, so seemed it,
Nature and Grace, inwoven, like children played,
Or like two sisters o’er one sampler bent,
One pattern worked. Ever the sorrowful chance
Ending in joy, the human craving still,
Like creeper circling up the Tree of Life,
Lifted by hand unseen, witnessed that He,
Man’s Maker, is the Healer too of man,
And life his school, expectant. Parables—
Thus Ceadmon named his legends. They who heard
Made answer, “Nay, not parables, but truths;”
Endured no change of phrase; to years remote
Transmitted them as facts.

Better than tale
They loved their minstrel’s harp. The songs he sang
Were songs to brighten gentle hearts, to fire
Strong hearts with holier courage, hope to breathe
Through spirits despondent, o’er the childless floor
Or widowed bed, flashing from highest heaven
A beam half faith, half vision. Many a tear,
His own, and tears of those that listened, fell
Oft as he sang that hand, lovely as light,
Forth stretched, and gathering from forbidden boughs
That fruit fatal to man. He sang the Flood,
Sin’s doom that quelled the impure, yet raised to height
Else inaccessible, the just. He sang
That patriarch facing at Divine command
The illimitable desert—harder proof,
Lifting his knife o’er him, the seed foretold:
He sang of Israel loosed, the twelve black seals
Down pressed on Egypt’s testament of woe,
Covenant of pride with penance; sang the face
Of Moses glittering from red Sinai’s rocks,
The Tables twain, and Mandements of God.
On Christian nights he sang that jubilant star
Which led the Magians to the Bethlehem crib
By Joseph watched, and Mary. Pale, in Lent,
Tremulous and pale, he told of Calvary,
Nor added word, but, as in trance, rehearsed
That Passion fourfold of the Evangelists,
Which, terrible and swift—not like a tale—
With speed of things which must be done, not said,
A river of bale, from guilty age to age,
Along the lamentable shore of things
Annual makes way, the history of the world,
Not of one race, one day. Up to its fount
That stream he tracked, that primal mystery sang
Which, chanted later by a thousand years,
Music celestial, though with note that jarred
(Some wandering orb troubling its starry chime),
Amazed the nations—“There was war in heaven:
Michael and they, his angels, warfare waged
With Satan and his angels.” Brief that war,
That ruin total. Brief was Ceadmon’s song:
Therein the Eternal Face was undivulged:
Therein the Apostate’s form no grandeur wore:
The grandeur was elsewhere. Who hate their God
Change not alone to vanquished but to vile.
On Easter morns he sang the Saviour Risen,
Eden regained. Since then on England’s shores
Though many sang, yet no man sang like him.

O holy House of Whitby! on thy steep
Rejoice, howe’er the tempest, night or day,
Afflict thee, or the craftier hand of Time,
Drag back thine airy arches in mid spring;
Rejoice, for Ceadmon in thy cloisters knelt,
And singing paced beside thy sounding sea!
Long years he lived; and with the whitening hair
More youthful grew in spirit, and more meek;
And they that saw him said he sang within
Then when the golden mouth but seldom breathed
Sonorous strain, and when—that fulgent eye
No longer bright—still on his forehead shone
Not flame but purer light, like that last beam
Which, when the sunset woods no longer burn,
Maintains its place on Alpine throne remote,
Or utmost beak of promontoried cloud,
And heavenward dies in smiles. Esteem of men
Daily he less esteemed, through single heart
More knit with God. To please a sickly child
He sang his latest song, and, ending, said,
“Song is but body, though ’tis body winged:
The soul of song is love: the body dead,
The soul should thrive the more.” That Patmian Sage
Whose head had lain upon the Saviour’s breast,
Who in high vision saw the First and Last,
Who heard the harpings of the Elders crowned,
Who o’er the ruins of the Imperial House
And ashes of the twelve great Cæsars dead
Witnessed the endless triumph of the just,
To earthly life restored, and, weak through age,
But seldom spake, and gave but one command,
The great “_Mandatum Novum_” of his Lord,
“My children, love each other!” Like to his
Was Ceadmon’s age. Weakness with happy stealth
Increased upon him: he was cheerful still:
He still could pace, though slowly, in the sun,
Still gladsomely converse with friends who wept,
Still lay a broad hand on his well-loved kine.

The legend of the last of Ceadmon’s days:—
That hospital wherein the old monks died
Stood but a stone’s throw from the monastery:
“Make there my couch to-night,” he said, and smiled:
They marvelled, yet obeyed. There, hour by hour,
The man, low-seated on his pallet-bed,
In silence watched the courses of the stars,
Or casual spake at times of common things,
And three times played with childhood’s days, and twice
His father named. At last, like one that, long
Begirt with good, is smit by sudden thought
Of greater good, thus spake he: “Have ye, sons,
Here in this house the Blessed Sacrament?”
They answered, wrathful, “Father, thou art strong;
Shake not thy children! Thou hast many days!”
“Yet bring me here the Blessed Sacrament,”
Once more he said. The brethren issued forth
Save four that silent sat waiting the close.
Ere long in grave procession they returned,
Two deacons first, gold-vested; after these
That priest who bare the Blessed Sacrament,
And acolytes behind him, lifting lights.
Then from his pallet Ceadmon slowly rose
And worshipped Christ, his God, and reaching forth
His right hand, cradled in his left, behold!
Therein was laid God’s Mystery. He spake:
“Stand ye in flawless charity of God
T’wards me, my sons, or lives there in your hearts
Memory the least of wrong or wrath?” They answered:
“Father, within us lives nor wrong, nor wrath,
But love, and love alone.” And he: “Not less
Am I in charity with you, my sons,
And all my sins of pride, and other sins,
Humbly I mourn.” Then, bending the old head
Above the old hand, Ceadmon received his Lord
To be his soul’s viaticum, in might
Leading from life that seems to life that is,
And long, unpropped by any, kneeling hung
And made thanksgiving prayer. Thanksgiving made,
He sat upon his bed, and spake: “How long
Ere yet the monks begin their matin psalms?”
“That hour is nigh,” they answered; he replied,
“Then let us wait that hour,” and laid him down
With those kine-tending and harp-mastering hands
Crossed on his breast, and slept.