his own head, and carrying it to a stream, and there carefully washing it, and afterwards performing the same sacred office for each of his companions, giving each body its own head, he dug graves for them and buried them, and last of all buried himself." With the appetite for the fabulous and superhuman is coupled as if the heart were searching for its dead kindred-the love of antiquity. Hence history, in its first efforts, usually begins at a very remote period, and traces events in an unbroken series, even from the moment when Adam passed the gates of Paradise. Add to this, that the historians were essentially theological,priests, who lived remote from public affairs, considered the civil transactions as entirely subordinate to the ecclesiastical, were strongly infected with the love of wonder, and conceived it their business to enforce belief rather than to encourage inquiry. Thus Matthew Paris, the most eminent historian of the thirteenth century, to explain why the Mahometans abominate pork, informs us that Mahomet, having on one occasion gorged himself with food and drink till he was in an insensible condition, fell asleep on a dunghill, and in this disgraceful state was attacked and suffocated by a litter of pigs; for which reason his followers have ever since refused to partake of their flesh. This celebrated writer tells us further, to account for the origin of the Mahometan sect, that Mahomet was originally a cardinal, and became a heretic only because he failed in his design of being elected pope. Perhaps the most reliable standard of the knowledge and opinions of these Ages of Faith is Geoffrey's History of the Britons (1147). This Welsh monk ascertains that after the capture of Troy, Ascanius fled from the city, and begat a son, who became father to Brutus; that Brutus, having extirpated the race of giants, founded London, settled the affairs of the island, and called it, after himself, by the name of Britain. A long line of kings is then led from oblivion into day, most of whom are famous for their abilities, and some for the prodigies which occur in their time. Thus during the reign of Rivallo 'it rained blood three days together, and there fell vast swarms of flies.' When Morvidus, 'a most cruel tyrant,' was on the throne,— There came from the coasts of the Irish sea, a most cruel monster, that was continnally devouring the people upon the sea-coasts. As soon as he heard of it, he ventured to go and encounter it alone; when he had in vain spent all his darts upon it, the monster rushed upon him, and with open jaws swallowed him up like a small fish.' The dauntless Arthur kills a giant from the shores of Spain, against whom armies were able to do nothing,— For whether they attacked him by sea or land, he either overturned their ships with vast rocks, or killed them with several sorts of darts, besides many of them that he took and devoured half alive.' Pausing, in the historical account, to relate the prophecy of Merlin, he tells us how, by the prophet's advice, a pond was drained, at whose bottom were two hollow stones, and in them two dragons asleep, which hindered the building of Vortigern's tower; then, 'As Vortigern, king of the Britons, was sitting upon the bank of the drained pond, the two dragons, one of which was white, the other red, came forth, and, approaching one another, began a terrible fight, and cast forth fire with their breath. But the white dragon had the advantage, and made the other fly to the end of the lake. And he, for grief at his flight, renewed the assault upon his pursuer, and forced him to retire. After this battle of the dragons, the king commanded Ambrose Merlin to tell him what it portended. Upon which he, bursting into tears, delivered what his prophetical spirit suggested to him, as follows: "Woe to the red dragon, for his banishment hasteneth on. His lurking holes shall be seized by the white dragon, which signifies the Saxons whom you invited over; but the red denotes the British nation, which shall be oppressed by the white. Therefore shall its mountains be levelled as the valleys, and the rivers of the valleys shall run with blood. The exercise of religion shall be destroyed, and churches be laid open to ruin." The history is brought down to the close of the seventh century, when the Britons, sunk in barbarism and no longer worthy of their name, were known only as 'Welshmen': 'But as for the kings that have succeeded among them in Wales, since that time, I leave the history of them to Caradoc of Lancarvan, my contemporary; as I do also the kings of the Saxons to William of Malmesbury, and Henry of Huntington. But I advise them to be silent concerning the kings of the Britons, since they have not that book written in the British tongue, which Walter, archdeacon of Oxford, brought out of Brittany, and which being a true history, published in honour of those princes, I have thus taken care to translate.' It is here that we first read of Gorboduc, whose story will be the theme of the earliest English tragedy; of Lear and his daughters; and, above all, of King Arthur as the recognized hero of national story. A hundred years after its first publication, this book was generally adopted by writers on English history; and, for its repudiation in the sixteenth century, Vergil was considered as a man almost deprived of reason. A book thus stamped with every mark of approbation is surely no bad measure of the ages in which it was accredited and admired. Mere annalists abounded, who set down minutely, in chrono logical order, what their eyes have seen and their ears have heard, till the reader is overpowered with weariness; only the dross of history; facts, in particles, in mass, without the abstract truth which interpenetrates them, and lies latent among them, like gold in the ore; dreams, portents, warnings, and the whole progeny of superstition. Here is the style of the chronicler in the tenth century: 538. When he had reigned four years, the sun was eclipsed from the first hour of the day to the third. 540. Again, two years after, the sun was eclipsed for half an hour after the third hour, so that the stars were everywhere visible in the sky. 661. After three years, Kenwalk again fought a battle near the town of Pontesbury, and took prisoner Wulfhere, son of Penda, at Ashdown, when he had defeated his army. 671. After one year more, there was a great pestilence among the birds, so that there was an intolerable stench by sea and land, arising from the carcasses of birds, both small and great. 674. After one year, Wulfhere, son of Penda, and Kenwalk fought a battle among themselves in a place called Bedwin. 677. After three years a comet was seen. 729. At the end of one year a comet appeared, and the holy bishop Egbert died. 733. Two years after these things, king Ethelbald received under his dominion the royal vill which is called Somerton. The same year the sun was eclipsed. 734. After the lapse of one year, the moon appeared as if stained with spots of blood, and by the same omen Tatwine and Bede departed this life.' That monument of English prose which is at once most venerable and most valuable is the Saxon Chronicle, compiled from the monastic annals by the Archbishop of Canterbury in 891, and carried forward in the monasteries by various hands until the accession of Henry II, in the year 1154. Of value as a statistic epitome of English history during that long period, its chief value, perhaps, consists in the bird's-eye view which it gives of linguistic changes from year to year, from century to century, until, as the last records are by contemporary writers, old English almost melts into modern. At distant intervals, when inspired by the transitory, the sombre, and the mysterious, it rises to a pathos like this on William the Conqueror: 'Sharp death, that passes neither by rich men nor poor, seized him also. Alas, how false and how uncertain is this world's weal! He, that was before a rich king and lord of many lands, had not then of all his land more than a space of seven feet; and he, that was whilom enshrouded in gold and gems, lay there covered with mould.' But, in general, it is vapid, empty, and uncritical, noting in the same lifeless tone the important and the trivial, without the slightest tinge of dramatic color or of discrimination. Blood gushes out of the earth in Berkshire near the birthplace of Alfred. In Peterborough, under a Norman abbot, horns are heard at dead of night, and spectral huntsmen are seen to ride through the woods. The following extracts are fair specimens: '449. In this year Martian and Valentinian succeeded to the empire and reigned seven winters. And in their days Hengest and Horsa, invited by Wyrtgeorn, king of the Britons, sought Britain, on the shore which is named Ypwines fleot; first in support of the Britons, but afterwards they fought against them. 463. In this year Hengest and Esc fought against the Welsh and took countless booty; and the Welsh fled from the Angles as fire. 509. In this year St. Benedict the abbot, father of all monks, went to heaven. 792. Here Offa, king of Mercia, commanded that King Ethelbert should be beheaded; and Osred, who had been king of the Northumbrians, returning home after his exile, was apprehended and slain on the 18th day before the Calends of October. His body is deposited at Tinemouth. Ethelred this year, on the 3d day before the Calends of October, took unto himself a new wife whose name was Elfreda. 793. In this year dire forwarnings came over the land of the Northumbrians, and miserably terrified the people: there were excessive whirlwinds and lightnings, and fiery dragons were seen flying in the air. A great famine soon followed these tokens; and a little after that, in the same year, on the 6th of the Ides of January, the havoc of heathen men miserably destroyed God's church at Lindisfarne, through rapine and slaughter. And Sicga died on the 8th of the Cal. of March.' Centuries will pass before history, which thus begins in romance and babble, will end in essay; before this enfeebled intellect will be able to rise from particular facts to discover the laws by which those facts are governed, exhibiting by judicious selection, rejection, and arrangement, the orderly progress of society and the nature of man. Theology. It was a favorite saying among the ancients, that death is 'a law and not a punishment.' It was a rootdoctrine of the early Christians that disobedience—the fruit of the forbidden tree-brought death into the world and all our woe.' The first represented man as pure and innocent till his will has sinned; the second, as under sentence of condemnation at the moment of birth. Plutarch had said that no funeral sacrifices were offered for infants, 'because it is irreligious to lament for those pure souls who have passed into a better life and a happier dwelling-place.' 'Be assured,' writes a saint of the sixth century, 'that not only men who have obtained the use of their reason, but children who have begun to live in their mother's womb and have there died, or who, just born, have passed away without the sacrament of holy baptism administered in the name of the Father, Son, and Holy Ghost, must be punished by eternal tor ture. The opinion so graphically expressed by a theologian who said 'he doubted not that there were infants less than a span long crawling about the floor of hell,' was held with great confidence in the early Church. Some, indeed, imagined that a special place was assigned to them, where there was neither suffering nor enjoyment. This was emphatically denied by St. Augustine, who declared that they descended into 'everlasting fire.' According to a popular legend, the redbreast was commissioned by the Deity to carry a drop of water to them to relieve their consuming thirst, and its breast was singed in piercing the flames. Belief in a personal devil, as we have seen, was profound and universal. Sometimes he is encountered as a grotesque and hideous animal, sometimes as a black man, sometimes as a fair woman, sometimes as a priest haranguing in the pulpit, sometimes as an angel of light. He hovers forever about the Christian; but the sign of the cross, a few drops of holy water, or the name of Mary, can put him to immediate and ignominious flight. Doubt was branded as a sin. To cherish prejudice was better than to analyze it. Those who diverged from the orthodox belief were doomed. Avenues of inquiry were painted with images of appalling suffering and malicious demons. An age which believes that a man is intensely guilty who holds certain opinions, and will cause the damnation of his fellows if he propagates them, has no moral difficulty in concluding that the heretic should be damned. A law of the Saxons condemned to death any one who ate meat in Lent, unless the priest was satisfied that it was a matter of absolute necessity. Gregory of Tours, recording 'the virtues of saints and the disasters of nations,' draws the moral of the history thus: 'Arius, the impious founder of the impious sect, his entrails having fallen out, passed into the flames of hell; but Hilary, the blessed defender of the undivided Trinity, though exiled on that account, found his country in Paradise. King Clovis, who confessed the Trinity, and by its assistance crushed the heretics, extended his dominions through all Gaul. Alaric, who denied the Trinity, was deprived of his kingdom and his subjects, and, what was far worse, was punished in the future world.' At the close of the twelfth century, among the measures devised to suppress heresy, the principal was the Inquisition. The function of the civil government was to execute its sentence. Placed in the hands of Dominicans and Franciscans, it was centralized I am persecuted, Arius plaintively said, 'because I have taught that the Son had a beginning and the Father had not.' |