And now the poet enters into himself and expresses his great confidence in obtaining salvation through the Cross. This confidence is all the greater inasmuch as he hath sung its glories so frequently. 66 'Soul-longings many in my day I've had, My life's hope now is that the Tree of Triumph Must seek I. Than all others oftener Did I alone extol its glories; Thereto my will is bent, and when I need A claim for shelter, to the Rood I'll go. Of mightiest friends, from me are many now When the Saviour's Rood that here I contemplate, The bliss of Heaven's wards: the Lord's folk there And He shall set me there in glory, And with the saints their pleasures I shall share." The poem breathes throughout charity, sweetness, piety. It is a dream, an allegory, the forerunner of the numerous dreams that subsequently figure in English literature: of Langland's and Chaucer's and Lydgate's and Dunbar's and Lindsay's and John Bunyan's. But this wail of Cedmon's for the friends of other days, with which the poem closes; this longing hope soon to join them; this living by anticipation in the celestial mansions, is the last glimpse we get of the man till the hour when his desires are to be fulfilled and his poetic soul passes from the beauties of earth to the bliss of heaven. Living in so elevated a sphere of thought, Cedmon could find it in himself to write nothing but what tended to elevate and spiritualize the aspirations and emotions of human nature. The Venerable Bede bears testimony to this effect: "He never could compose frivolous and useless poems, but those alone pertaining to religion became his religious tongue." But withal, wide was the range of his themes. He did not confine himself to the mere paraphrasing of Scripture, or allegorizing upon the Rood. He also sang of the Divine attributes; of the judgments and the mercy of God to men; of the beauty of virtue and the hideousness of vice; but he sang with such fervor and persuasion that he led many from 1 The Ruthwell cross. That Cedmon wrote this poem is stated on the stone: Cadmon me fauætho 2 Nihil unquam frivoli et supervacui poematis facere potuit; sed ea tantummodo quæ ad religionem pertinent, religiosam ejus linguam decebant. Hist. Eccl. lib. iv. cap. χχίν. their evil ways to the practice of good deeds. This is no fictional assertion. The historian takes the pains to inform us of it. "By his verses," says the Venerable Bede, "many were often excited to despise the world, and to aspire to heaven." What unction there must have been in them, thus to stir up the normally obtuse feelings of his English brethren! And with what loving admiration those verses must have been read and recited. "A new poem by Cedmon!"— with joy did these words ring in the ears of the people; eagerly did they flock around the good monk who brought them the tidings and came to read the poem for them. Soon their singers and harpers knew it by heart and went about reciting it. Warmly were they received and well were they repaid for their services. No doubt some jealous ones there were among them, who still clung to the old pagan songs, and who attempted to belittle the productions of the heaven-inspired bard. But they daily lost ground with the people and soon found that in order to make a living they must know the poems of Cedmon. Parents taught them to their children, and in every household in Northumbria were they sung. And as they became part of the people's thinking the recollections of paganism faded out into the dim mists of the past, occasionally to be remembered in order to weave a legend about some Christian great one, such as that they applied to Cedmon himself. Only Shakspeare, King James's version of the Bible, and Bunyan's Pilgrim's Progress, ever took such hold on the popular English mind as did Cedmon's poems. The secret of his success was twofold. It lay in his great genius and in his holy life. Of the first it is not easy, at this distance of time, to form an adequate idea. Conceive a people with the ignorance and mental inaction of centuries weighing them down and making them of the earth, earthy; knowing only the use of the instruments of war and the chase; brutal in their habits; material in their thoughts; their uncouth natures slightly glossed with a varnish of Christianity; Christian indeed in name and in creed, but pagan in many of their customs and manners;-conceive all this, and then remember that this people is daily witnessing scenes of war and bloodshed. The old English chroniclers record them with an admirable coolness. “A. 658. This year Kenwalh fought against the Welsh at Peonna. A. 661. This year, during Easter, Kenwalh fought at Pontesbury, and Wulfhere, the son of Penda, laid the country waste as far as Ashdown. . . . . And Wulfhere, the son of Penda, laid waste Wight, and gave the people of Wight to Ethelwalde, king of the South Saxons, because Wulfhere had been his sponsor at baptism. . . . . A. 675. This year, Wulfhere, the son of Penda, and Escwin, the son of Cenfus, fought at Beaden-head. . . . . A. 676. And Ethelred, king of the Mer cians, laid waste Kent. . . . . A. 679. This year, Elfwin was slain near the Trent, where Egfrid and Ethelred fought, and St. Etheldrida died." The death of a saint, a battle, the slaying of a man, are all told in the same breath; they are all of them events of almost daily occurrence. These are the scenes in which Cedmon lived and moved. In the midst of all this din, he raised his voice and was heard. He sang the substance of which all the ancient myths were but the shadow. He led men to forget more and more the pagan past; to exchange the dirges on the death of Baldr for the doleful strains on the Saviour's passion; to let the glories of Valhalla become dimmed by the more spiritual and real splendors of the heavenly kingdom. This was a great work; it was a noble task; it was moulding the popular mind into new shape; it was helping to spiritualize their natures; it was preparing the soil for the seeds of grace. None but the greatest genius could have achieved it all. He brought the Oriental imagery of the Bible within the comprehension of the humblest English mind; he draped it in the English fashion of thinking; he made its purely spiritual language palpable to the English imagination. He did it in language musical and flowing. His verses have been the admiration of all those who gave them attention. "His accent," says Guest," always falls in the right place, and the emphatic syllable is ever supported by a strong one. His rhythm changes with the thought-now marching slowly with a stately theme, and now running off with all the joyousness of triumph, when his subject teems with gladness and exultation." But the holiness of his life no less than the strength of his genius added weight to his words, and made them strike with such force. The Venerable Bede bears testimony to his virtues. He was an eminently religious man, fond of prayer, devoted to the reception of the sacraments of the Church, attentive and punctual in the performance of his various duties. He was a cheerful worker in God's service, submissive in all things to the will of his superiors, happy when he saw others the same; but he was the terror of those whom he found disorderly and lagging in their duties towards their Creator. Having entered religion late in life, he was prepared to appreciate its quiet, peaceful, undisturbed ways, as he contrasted them with the fickleness and boisterousness of the world he had abandoned, and he thought that others should in this respect feel as he felt. His happy, cheerful disposition—always prepared with a kind word or a pleasant saying-tended to make the religious life attractive to others. There was nothing gloomy in his piety. He was no friend of moroseness. This last he re 1 Rhythms, II. p. 50, VOL. IV.-3 garded in its true light, rather as a hindrance than a help to genuine religious feeling. Leading such a life, how else could his death be than happy also? And such the Venerable Bede tells us it was. Let us linger over his last days, and watch the going out of that brilliant meteor of English song. To be able to stand by the death-bed of England's first great poet is a rare privilege. For some time a disease, the nature of which is not mentioned, had been undermining his constitution; during two weeks he felt it weakening him beyond recovery; and now he feels that the day of his dissolution is at hand. Nothing daunted, he moves about among his brethren; his cheery soul sheds sunshine into their hearts; in whatever mood he finds them, he leaves them with a laughing face and a pleasant thought. The evening of this last day he walks over to the infirmary, and asks those in attendance to prepare a bed for him, which they do with no small share of surprise. He stays up till after midnight, keeping everybody enlivened with his pleasant conversation. Midnight passed, he asked to communicate in the reception of the holy Eucharist. And they answered: "What need of the Eucharist? for you are not likely to die, since you talk so merrily with us, as if you were in perfect health." But he insisted on receiving it, and according to the custom of that day it was placed in his hands. He then asked those around him whether they were all in charity with him and free from rancor. There was only one answer—a unanimous "Yes." How else could they be with such a genial companion, holy religious, and great poet? He was full of life and humor; he had frequently made them laugh, but it was not at the expense of charity, it was not by giving pain to others. So, when the same question was put to him immediately after, well might he say: "I am in charity, my children, with all the servants of God." But the ruling passion asserted itself even in death. Cedmon desires to hear once more the praises of God sung, before he goes to sing them in heaven in union with the angelic choirs and the friends who passed before him. He would have his soul wafted upon the song of prayer and benediction ascending from the chapel near by. So he asks how soon the time was when the brothers were to sing the nocturnal praises of the Lord; and when told that it was not far off, he said: "Let us await that hour;" and signing himself with the sign of the cross, he laid his head on the pillow, and falling into a slumber, his soul passed away. A death befitting his life. Let us now address ourselves to that which still lives of him,— his spirit as embodied in his poetry. 1 Bede, loc. cit. III. Cedmon's genius, in its first flight, disdains all midway courses, and soars into the celestial empyrean. With the deeds of human heroes he is familiar; but he will none of them. In praise of his holy Creator alone-Heaven's Ward-will he attune his harp. The gods of his English ancestors have been extolled; right proper is it then that the true God-the Glory-King of hosts-have a lay dedicated to him. And so the poet bursts forth into a most eloquent prelude; every word is brimful of meaning; every line bends beneath the weight of his theme, and word and line show each alike how he labored to grapple with his subject in a manner adequate to its dignity. "Mickle right it is that we, heaven's guard, Glory-King of hosts! with words should praise, With hearts should love. He is of powers the efficacy; Lord Almighty! In him beginning never Or origin hath been; but he is aye supreme Never, in the history of old English thought, was such a poetic beginning heard. It is the song of a soul strong in its convictions of the greatness and majesty of Him it extols. This is the passage said to have been composed by the poet that memorable night he . watched in the stable. Then follows a brief account of the rebellion and fall of the angels, which, in all probability, was the theme given him by the learned men of the community as a test; for he afterwards reverts at length to the same subject. The description is vividly English. God is a stern Overlord who treats his adversaries with an iron hand. "Stern of mood he was; he gript them in his wrath; with hostile hands he gript them, and crushed them in his grasp." This was succeeded by peace. On earth, it was a rare thing in his day; so he lives to sing of it in heaven. "Then as before was peace in heaven Fair peaceful ways; the Lord beloved of all- a Tha waes sóth swa ær, sibb on heofnum— -Thorpe's Cedmon, p. 5. 1 Guest's Translation in "English Rhythms," vol. ii. |