Cynewulf's "Christ," of which the original opening is lost, begins for us with praise of Christ as the corner-stone that the builders rejected, and with looking to Christ from the prison of this world. The poet then dwells on the mystery of the pure birth of the Saviour, and passes to a hymning of praise of the Virgin, "the delight of women among all the hosts of heaven." The theme of the Nativity is approached with an imagined dialogue between Joseph and Mary, and passes again into a strain of joyous hymning. In the one measure common to all FirstEnglish poetry, which I put into another form without change of his thoughts, Cynewulf sings his

CALL FOR CHRIST.

Come now, thou Lord of Victory, Creator of Mankind,
Make manifest Thy tenderness in mercy to us here!
Need is there for us all in Thee thy Mother's kin to find,
Though to thy Father's mystery we cannot yet come near.

Christ, Saviour, by Thy coming bless this earth of ours with love;

The golden gates, so long fast barred, do Thou, O Heavenly King,

Bid now unclose, that humbly Thou, descending from above, Seek us on earth, for we have need of blessing Thou canst bring.

With fangs of death the accursed wolf hath scattered, Lord, the flock

That with Thy blood, in time of old, O Master, thou hast bought;

He has us in fierce clutch; we are his prey, his mock, He scorns our soul's desire; wherefore, to Thee is all our thought.

2 Though written without break, the original is here defective, through some oversight of the copyist.

Thee, our Preserver, earnestly we pray that Thou devise
For sad exiles a speedy help; let the dark spirit fall
To depths of hell; but let thy work, Creator, let man rise
Justly to that high realm whence the Accursed drew us all.

Through love of sin he drew us that, bereft of heaven's light,

We suffer endless miseries, betrayed for evermore, Unless Thou come to save us from the slayer, Lord of Might! Shelter of Man! O Living God! come soon, our need is sore!

Cynewulf then continuing the theme of the Nativity with renewed praise of the Virgin, passes to the resurrection, the ascension, the descent into hell, and liberation of the souls who there awaited the Lord's coming; and he closes his poem with hymns of praise and thanksgiving to God who gives us food and all blessings of this life, the sun and moon, the dew and rain, the increase of the earth, and the salvation of the soul through Christ.

Outside the Exeter and Vercelli Books, the most important First-English religious poem is a fragment on the story of Judith, which, although a fragment, includes the part to which the poet gave his highest energy, the slaying of Holofernes, and the welcoming of Judith by the city she had saved. This poem is in the same MS. which contains the great poem of Beowulf, not religious, but a record of the Northern

1 Miltsa, Be merciful. "Milts," mercy; "milts-ian," to pity, to be gracious. Allied to the word " 'mild."-Mihtig, mighty; the h having been strongly aspirated is now represented by gh, the softened g by y.-Drihten, Lord; "driht," a household; "drihten," lord, as the supreme father and ruler. On móde, in mind (mood).Gebletsa nu, bless now. -Beorhte, brightly; e, a case-ending, passed into adverbial sign.-Leóhte, make shine.-Thinne andwlitan, thy face "andwlita" = German" antlitz." It is a masculine noun ending in a, and therefore of the first declension, which consists only of nouns ending in the vowels a or e, and is thus inflected

THE PSALMIST.

From a Psalter of the Tenth Century, Cotton MS. Tiberius, C. vi.

life of our forefathers before they had received Christianity. The place for some representation of Beowulf will be in the section of this Library that describes our larger works in verse and prose. There are also First-English hymns and prayers in various MSS., and a version of the Psalms, partly in prose, partly in verse, which from Psalm li. to cl. belongs

Wearth, become; weorthan," to become, be. The word is used in such a phrase as "woe worth the day."-Thuruh thine mycelnesse, through thy (mickleness) greatness.-Thes (adverb), for this.-Andgyt, understanding.-We habbath, we have, or shall have. There was no future tense in First English; the present represented it. -ath was the plural sign in the present indicative of verbs where the pronoun preceded the verb, e if the pronoun followed. The present

of "habban," to have, in which the v is formed by soft pronunciation of the b, shows the original softening of the b into an f, which has since been softened out of existence altogether. Ic habbe or hæbbe = have; thu hæfst-ha(f)st; he hæfth-ha(f)th; we, ge or hi habbath, or habbe we, ge or hi. So in the past "hæfde" becomes "ha(f)d."-Ure wegas, our ways. "Weg," way, a masculine noun ending in a consonant, is of the second declension, which contains

The as in "wegas is, it will be seen, the form of the nominative or accusative plural only in masculines of this declension. It is the sole source of the modern English plural in s, though coincidence with the Norman-French plural in s favoured its extension in modern English to nouns of all classes.-Wide, widely. The common use of e as an adverbial ending in First English, and the subsequent dropping of the final e, causes many of the homely adverbs from the Teutonic side of the language to be now alike in spelling with the adjectives from which they were made, as "hit him hard," &c.Geond thas wertheóde, among this people. "Geond" = "yond," the g being softened before the vowels. A g so modified was afterwards represented by a modified letter, like a 3, and this is the origin of the mistaken use of in printing MS. so written. Nobody ever intended to write "ze or "zour." The modified letter represented a g, softened sometimes to the sound of y, sometimes to a sound now represented by gh. "Thas wertheode;' "wer" (= Latin "vir"), man, is used in combination with "-theod," a people; "theod" ending in a consonant is of the second declension, and it is feminine, therefore (see the table given after the word " wegas"), it has an accusative singular in e; "thas," agreeing with its noun, is the accusative singular feminine of "this," a pronoun which was thus inflected (the second s in "thisse" and "thissa" being a modified r).

a dedication to Queen Elizabeth. There was another edition of them by Dr. Marshall, rector of Lincoln College, Oxford, published in 1665, with the Gothic version given by Francis Junius; and in 1842 they were produced in a handy edition, carefully re-edited from the original manuscripts by Benjamin Thorpe, who was in his day our most helpful worker at First English. Here is from the sixth chapter of Matthew

THE LORD'S PRAYER IN FIRST ENGLISH:

Fæder úre, thú the eart on heofenum, si thin nama gehalgod. To-becume thin rice. Geweorthe thin willa on eorthan, swa swa on heofenum. Urne dæghwamlican hlaf syle us to-dæg. And forgyf ús úre gyltas, swa swa we forgifath úrum gyltendum. And ne gelæde thu us on costnunge, ac alys us of yfle: Sothlice.

Alcuin died in the year 804, and between the years 800 and 815, or about the time of the death of Alcuin, John Scotus Erigena was born. Whether born in Ireland, as is probable, or in Ayrshire as some say, he seems to have had in his veins some of that mixture of Celtic blood which gave audacity to thought. He found his way to the court of Charles the Bald, one of the sons of Alcuin's friend Charlemagne, and was there held in high esteem for wit, wisdom, and learning. He translated from Greek into Latin a book on the "Hierarchies of Heaven,"

inflexion re. (See the form already given to explain "thinne.")— Healdan móton, may be able to hold firm, or abide. "Healdan," to hold, fasten, &c.; "mót," meaning must, ought, can, was inflected thus in the present: "ic mót, thú móst, he mot; we móton." In the past, "ic móste, ... we moston."-Fole the andette, let the people (the folk = German "Volk ") acknowledge thee. "Andetan," to confess; "andetnes," a confession, a creed; "andettan," to confess, acknowledge, thank. - Fæl, true, pure. - Gefea, joy, gladness. - Æghwyle, every one. Eg- as a prefix means "ever, always." (It is the word in the phrase "ever and aye"). hwylc (Scottish "whilk") means which or what.-Folca, of the peoples (see form of the second declension, given to explain "wegas").-Blissian, to rejoice, be glad.—Beald and báld, bold, high-spirited.-Theod being feminine, its nominative plural is in a.-Thas the, for this that; thú, hi, thou, them; "the". here is indeclinable. "He, she, it was declined

On thinre holo, in thy health.

"Hælo," or "hælu," is indeclinable.

Being feminine the pronoun-inflected like an adjective-takes the

67-VOL. II.

Syllan, to give; athel, noble; westm, fruit; egesa, awe; gemæru, boundaries.-As to verbs, it may be added that -ian or -an is the sign of the infinitive present. That the three conjugations are marked by the way of making the past tense, the first by addition of -ode, -de, or -te, with or without change of the root-vowel, the second and third by change of the root-vowel always without addition of -de or -te.

ascribed to Dionysius the Areopagite, who was supposed to have been converted by St. Paul, and afterwards to have become first bishop of the Christians at Athens. Erigena had already incurred suspicion of heresy when he produced his Latin work, in five parts, on "The Division of Nature," a dialogue between pupil and master, which was the startingpoint of a new school of philosophy. In this book he gave mystical interpretations of Scripture, and otherwise excited a very warm antagonism. After the death of Charles the Bald, John Scotus Erigena is said to have come to England, allured by the munificence of King Alfred, and at Malmesbury to have been stabbed to death by the styles of his pupils, about the year 875.

King Alfred had succeeded Ethelred in the year 871, being then twenty-two years old. There was confusion in the land from inroads of the Danes; many monasteries and their schools were broken up, and learning had decayed. When Alfred had cleared the way for labour towards the re-establishment of knowledge and religion, he produced or caused to be produced English versions of books suitable for his purpose. The History of Orosius, which had been the Latin text-book for a history of the world in the monastery schools, he restored to the schools in English, with much abridgment of its theological element, and addition of fresh knowledge. There was added an original detail of the geography of Germany in Alfred's time, and the record of two coasting voyages in the north of Europe. Alfred provided also a translation into English of Bede's History of England. For the instruction of the clergy, he issued an English version of the Pastoral Care of Pope Gregory the Great.

The opening sentences of King Alfred's translation of this book have an interest that has caused them to be often quoted.1

There is a single change of the root-vowel in the second declension, and there is a double change in the third. The past tenses are formed in the first conjugation (a) by adding -ode, (b) by adding -de or -te simply, (c) by adding -de or -te with a change also of the root-vowel. In the second conjugation the root-vowel is changed-as in "eat" to "ate"="æt"-in one of three ways: to (a) œ', (b) e, (c) 6. In the third conjugation it is changed (a) to a with a second change to u, (b) to á with a second change to i, (c) to ea with a second change to u. The second change occurs in the second person singular and whole plural of the indicative and throughout the subjunctive. It is the origin of such double forms as "sang " and "sung." In reading First English aloud pronounce a like the a in "path or "father; "a like the a in "pat" or pate" (this mark over a vowel indicates longer and broader sound); pronounce, therefore, Cadmon not Seedman, but Cadmon, and the vowels and letters generally more after the manner of northern than of southern English as now spoken; slightly roughen the aspiration of the h, and sound the r.

1 The standard edition of this work of King Alfred's has been produced by one of the best living First-English scholars, Mr. Henry Sweet, for "the Early English Text Society:"-" King Alfred's WestSaxon Version of Gregory's Pastoral Care. With an English Translation, the Latin Text, Notes, and an Introduction." The passage above quoted is given from the Translation added by Mr. Sweet to his text. A word may here be said of "the Early English Text Society," to which English students are indebted for this and much other valuable work. We owe its existence to the enthusiastic energy of Mr. F. J. Furnivall, who set it up in the year 1864, and has himself edited many interesting texts for it. The self-denial of the editors, and fellowship of many in the work, has enabled this society to secure an unusually large return of valuable publications for the annual guinea of each of its members. In the first ten years of its life the society produced more than 16,000 pages of edited texts. Some of

KING ALFRED'S INTRODUCTION TO HIS TRANSLATION OF POPE GREGORY'S "REGULA PASTORALIS." King Alfred bids greet bishop Wærferth with his words lovingly and with friendship; and I let it be known to thee that it has very often come into my mind, what wise men there formerly were throughout England, both of sacred and secular orders; and how happy times there were then throughout England; and how the kings who had power over the nation in those days obeyed God and his ministers; and they preserved peace, morality, and order at home, and at the same time enlarged their territory abroad; and how they prospered both with war and with wisdom; and also the sacred orders how zealous they were both in teaching and learning, and in all the services they owed God; and how foreigners came to this land in search of wisdom and instruction, and how we should now have to get them from abroad if we were to have them. So general was its decay 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 that there were not many beyond the Humber. There were so few of them that I cannot remember a single one south of the Thames when I came to the throne. Thanks be to God And Almighty that we have any teachers among us now. therefore I command thee to do as I believe thou art willing, to disengage thyself from worldly matters as often as thou canst, that thou mayest apply the wisdom which God has given thee wherever thou canst. Consider what punishments would come upon us on account of this world, if we neither loved it (wisdom) ourselves nor suffered other men to obtain it we should love the name only of Christian, and very few of the virtues. When I considered all this 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 the books, for they could not understand anything of them, because they were not written in their own language. As if they had said: Our forefathers, who formerly held these places, loved wisdom, and through it they obtained wealth and bequeathed it to us. In this we

can still see their tracks, but we cannot follow them, and therefore we have lost both the wealth and the wisdom, because we would not incline our hearts after their example."

the publications, not in themselves works of genius, are included in the series for help they may give to philological research, some for their lively illustration of manners and customs, or of phases of opinion, but not a few are the only printed editions of texts of the highest literary interest. It is for this society that Mr. Skeat has produced such an edition of several texts of "The Vision of Piers Plowman as we should have had otherwise no hope of possessing, a study that no German could surpass in thoroughness, and very fruitful indeed in its results. Among other works edited by him are Barbour's "Bruce" and "Havelok" and "William of Palerne." Dr. Richard Morris has not only edited for the Early English Text Society such important works as the thirteenth century poem on the Story of Genesis and Exodus, the "Cursor Mundi," "The Ayenbite of Inwit," &c, but he has been the first to develop in the introductions to such works that more critical study of old English Dialects which now has the attention of all students. Mr. Furnivall has worked indefatigably, and has been particularly happy in his lively illustration of old social conditions, by help of "The Book of Curtasye," ," "The Book of Demeanour," Andrew Boorde's "Introduction and Dyetary," &c., besides contributing to a series of editions of the old Arthurian Romances. There is an edition of the Works of Sir David Lindsay, by Mr. J. A. H. Murray, who edits also an interesting poem of the year 1549, "The Complaynt of Scotland." But a chronicle of good work done by "The Early English Text Society" is more than can be here set down in a note. Its publishers are Messrs. Trübuer and Co., 57 and 59, Ludgate Hill.