The Medieval Mind. Henry Osborn Taylor
Hippo. Of whom the first-named in nine books, the second following his footprints in six books, the third in twelve books and also in two others directed against the Manichaeans, shed floods of salutary doctrine for their readers; and in them the promise of the Truth was fulfilled: ‘Whoso believeth in me, as the Scripture saith, out of his belly shall flow rivers of living water. …’ But since these works are so great that only the rich may own them, and so profound that they may be fathomed only by the learned, your holiness has seen fit to lay on us the task of plucking from them all, as from the sweetest wide-flowering fields of paradise, what might seem to meet the needs of weaklings.”[218]
Bede was also a lovely story-teller. His literary charm and power appear in his Life of St. Cuthbert, and still more in his ever-famous Ecclesiastical History of the English People, so warm with love of mankind, and presenting so wonderful a series of dramatic stories animate with vital motive and the colour of incident and circumstance. Midway between the spontaneous genius of this work and the copied Scripture Commentary, stand Bede’s grammatical, metrical, and scientific compositions, compiled with studious zeal. They evince a broad interest in scholarship and in nature. Still, neither material nor method was original. For instance, his De rerum natura took its plan and much of its substance from Isidore’s work of the same name. Bede has, however, put in further matter and made his work less of a mere shell of words than Isidore’s. For he is interested in connecting natural occurrences with their causes, stating, for example, that the tides depend on the moon.[219] In this work as in his other opera didascalica, like the De temporum ratione and his learned De arte metrica,[220] he shows himself a more intelligent student than his Spanish predecessor. Yet he drew everything from some written source.
One need not wonder at the voluminousness of Bede’s literary productions.[221] Many of the writings emanating from monasteries are transcriptions rather than compositions. The circumstance that books, i.e. manuscripts, were rare and costly was an impelling motive. Isidore and Bede made systematic compilations for general use. They and their congeners would also make extracts from manuscripts, of which they might have but the loan, or from unique codices in order to preserve the contents. Such notes or excerpts might have the value of a treatise, and might be preserved and in turn transcribed as a distinct work. Yet whether made by a Bede or by a lesser man, they represent mainly the labour of a copyist.
Bede’s writings were all in Latin, and were intended for the instruction of monks. They played a most important rôle in the transmission of learning, sacred and profane, in Latin form. For its still more popular diffusion, translations into the vernacular might be demanded. Such at all events were made of Scripture; and perhaps a century and a half after Bede’s death, the translation of edifying Latin books was undertaken by the best of Saxon kings. King Alfred was born in 849 and closed his eyes in 901. In the midst of other royal labours he set himself the task of placing before his people, or at least his clergy, Anglo-Saxon versions of some of the then most highly regarded volumes of instruction. The wise Pastoral Care of Gregory the Great; his Dialogues, less wise according to our views; the Histories of Orosius[222] and Bede; and that philosophic vade-mecum of the Middle Ages, the De consolatione philosophiae of Boëthius. Of these, Alfred translated the Pastoral Care and the De consolatione, also Orosius; the other works appear to have been translated at his direction.[223] Alfred’s translations contain his own reflections and other matter not in the originals. In rendering Orosius, he rewrote the geographical introduction, inserted a description of Germany and accounts of northern Europe given by two of his Norse liegemen, Ohthere and Wulfstan. The alertness of his mind is shown by this insertion of the latest geographical knowledge. Other and more personal passages will disclose his purpose, and illustrate the manner in which his Christianized intelligence worked upon trains of thought suggested perhaps by the Latin writing before him.
Alfred’s often-quoted preface to Gregory’s Pastoral Care tells his reasons for undertaking its translation, and sets forth the condition of England. He speaks of the “wise men there formerly were throughout England, both of sacred and secular orders,” and of their zeal in learning and teaching and serving God; and how foreigners came to the land in search of wisdom and instruction. But “when I came to the throne,” so general was the decay of learning in England “that there were very few on this side of the Humber who could understand their rituals in English, or translate a letter from Latin into English; and I believe there were not many beyond the Humber. … Thanks be to God Almighty that we have any teachers among us now.” Alfred therefore commands the bishop, to whom he is now sending the copy, to disengage himself as often as possible from worldly matters, and apply the Christian wisdom God has given him. “I remembered also how I saw, before it had been all ravaged and burnt, how the churches throughout the whole of England stood filled with treasures and books, and there was also a great multitude of God’s servants, but they had very little knowledge of books, for they could not understand anything of them because they were not written in their own language.” It therefore seemed wise to me “to translate some books which are most needful for all men to know, into the language which we can all understand, and … that all the youth now in England of free men, who are rich enough to be able to devote themselves to it, be set to learn so long as they are not fit for any other occupation, until that they are well able to read English writing: and let those be afterwards taught more in the Latin language who are to continue learning and be promoted to a higher rank.”
In the De consolatione of Boëthius, the antique pagan thought, softened with human sympathy, and in need of such comfort and assurance as was offered by the Faith, is found occupied with questions (like that of free-will) prominent in Christianity. The book presented meditations which were so consonant with Christian views that its Christian readers from Alfred to Dante mistook them for Christian sentiments, and added further meanings naturally occurring to the Christian soul. Alfred’s reflections in his version of the De consolatione are very personal to Saxon Alfred and show how he took his life and kingly office:
“O Philosophy, thou knowest that I never greatly delighted in covetousness and the possession of earthly power, nor longed for this authority”—so far Boëthius,[224] and now Alfred himself: “but I desired instruments and materials to carry out the work I was set to do, which was that I should virtuously and fittingly administer the authority committed unto me. Now no man, as thou knowest, can get full play for his natural gifts, nor conduct and administer government, unless he hath fit tools, and the raw material to work upon. By material I mean that which is necessary to the exercise of natural powers; thus a king’s raw material and instruments of rule are a well-peopled land, and he must have men of prayer, men of war, and men of work. As thou knowest, without these tools no king may display his special talent. Further, for his materials he must have means of support for the three classes above spoken of, which are his instruments; and these means are land to dwell in, gifts, weapons, meat, ale, clothing, and what else soever the three classes need. Without these means he cannot keep his tools in order, and without these tools he cannot perform any of the tasks entrusted to him. [I have desired material for the exercise of government that my talents and my power might not be forgotten and hidden away[225]] for every good gift and every power soon groweth old and is no more heard of, if Wisdom be not in them. Without Wisdom no faculty can be fully brought out, for whatsoever is done unwisely can never be accounted as skill. To be brief, I may say that it has ever been my desire to live honourably while I was alive, and after my death to leave to them that should come after me my memory in good works.”
The last sentence needs no comment. But those preceding it will be illuminated by another passage inserted by Alfred:
“Therefore it is that a man never by his authority attains to virtue and excellence, but by reason of his virtue and excellence he attains to authority and power. No man is better for his power, but for his skill he is good, if he is good, and for his skill he is worthy of power, if he is worthy of it. Study Wisdom then, and, when ye have learned it, contemn it not, for I tell you that by its means ye may without fail attain to power, yea, even though not desiring it.”
Perhaps from the teaching of his own life Alfred knew, as well as Boëthius, the toil and sadness of power: “Though their false hope and imagination lead fools to believe that power and wealth are the highest good, yet it is quite otherwise.” And again, speaking