of Eratosthenes, and of Pythagoras on some astronomical topics; he also cites Martianus Capella. His knowledge of Greek appears almost in every

page.

The Divisione Naturæ certainly indicates great curiosity and research of mind, though it rather exercises ingenuity than conveys information. In a future age, when such disquisitions were offensive to that anti-christian despotism which was spreading its clouds over the European hemisphere, a pope, Honorius III. issued a bull to declare, that it " abounded with the worms of heretical depravity." He complains, that it was received into monasteries, and that "scholastic men, more fond of novelty than was expedient, occupied themselves studiously in reading it." He therefore commands, that they "solicitously seek for it everywhere; and, if they safely could, that they send it to him to be burnt, or to burn it themselves. He excommunicates all such as should keep a copy fifteen days after notice of this order." As all inquiries of the human mind must be accompanied by many errors, it is a lamentable abuse of power to pursue the speculative to death or infamy for efforts of thinking, which, if wrong, the next critic or literary opponent is best fitted to detect and overthrow. No error, if left to itself, will be a perennial plant. No power can prevent, though it may retard, the growth of truth.

Erigena was in great favour with Charles. The king, one day when they were feasting opposite to each other, took occasion to give him a gentle rebuke for some irregularity, by asking him, "What separates a Scot from a sot?" The philosopher, with ready wit, retorted, "The table." The king had the good sense and friendship to smile at the turn.

At another time, when he was at table, the servants brought in a dish containing two large fishes, and a very small one. John was a thin little man, and was sitting near two ecclesiastics of

* De Divisione Naturæ, p. 146, 147, 149.

1 Ibid. p. 145-149.

Ibid. p. 147, 148. This ancient author, whose era is not ascertained, (though he must have preceded Gregory of Tours, who mentions him), left nine books, two de Nuptiis Philologia, the other seven on the seven liberal arts. His work was twice printed with innumerable mistakes. Grotius, in his fourteenth year, astonished the world, by correcting justly almost all the errors. The recollection of this induced Vossius to say, "Quo Batavo-nihil nunc undique eruditius, vel sol videt, vel solum sustinet." Hist. Lat. 713. How highly Capella was once esteemed, may be inferred from the panegyric of Gregory of Tours, lib. x. c. 31, p. 243. Barthius, one of those great scholars whose race is now extinct, says of him, "Jam ante ipsos mille annos tanta Capellæ hujus auctoritas, ut qui eum teneret, videretur omnium artium arcana nosse." Adversaria, c. 23, p. 409. Barthius describes his work thus: "Tota fere ibi Cyclopædia novem chartis absoluta est, cum innumeris interioris sapientiæ mysteriis versu atque prosa oratione indicatis et propositis," ib. p. 960. For what is known of Capella, see Fab. Bib. Lat. iii. p. 213–224.

See this bull at length in Fab. Bib. Med. lib. ix. 402. It is dated 10 Kal. Feb. 1225.

• Matt. West. 336. Malmsb. 3 Gale, 360. The Latin words which John so readily converted into a pun that retorted the king's sarcasm on himself, are, “Quid distat inter soltum et Scottum ?"

vast size. The king bade him divide the dish with them. John, whose cheerful mind was always alive to pleasantry, conveyed the two large fishes into his own plate, and divided the little one between the ecclesiastics. The king accused him of an unfair partition. "Not so," says John. "Here are two large fishes," pointing to his plate, "with a small one," alluding to himself." There are also two large ones," looking at the divines, "and a little one," pointing to their plates.P

After Charles's death, he was invited to England by Alfred, whose munificence rewarded his talents; he placed him at Malmsbury, and also at Ethelingey.

The life of John ended unfortunately; he was stabbed by the boys he taught. That he died violently, will not be questioned; but a controversy accompanies the catastrophe.s

The proficiency and examples of Bede and Alcuin, and their pupils and friends, seemed to promise an age of literary cultivation; and the prosperity of Egbert's reign, which immediately followed, was favourable to the realization of this hope. But the fierce invasions of the Northmen now began. Their desolating bands spread fire and sword over the most cultivated parts of the country. Monasteries and their libraries were burnt. The stu

P Malmsb. 3 Gale, 361. That John was an inmate in Charles's palace, we also learn from his contemporary, Pardulus, who says, "Scotum illum qui est in palatio regis Johanem nomine." Testim. prefixed.

Venitque ad regem Elfredum cujus munificentia illectus et magisterio ejus, ut ex scriptis regis intellexi, sublimis Melduni rescdit. Malmsb. 361.

So Malmsb. 361. The same words are in Matt. West. 334; and Hoveden, 419; and Fordun, 670.

The question is, whether Erigena, whom William kills at Malmsbury, is the same of whom Asser says, that he was placed by Alfred over his new monastery at Ethelingey, and that some malicious monks hired two lads to kill him at midnight, when he came to pray alone at the altar, p. 61. My own opinion is, that they are not two persons; 1st. Asser, in page 47, talks of a John, who by the traits he gives, was Erigena. He there styles him merely "Johannem presbyterum et monachum," and he has the same phrases of the John killed at Ethelingey, in p. 61. 2d. Ingulf expressly places Erigena at Ethelingey, p. 27. 3d. Asser says the John of Ethelingey was stabbed by two French lads, "duos servulos," 62; and it is rather improbable that another John should at the same time be killed in the same place by lads. 4th. The ancient epitaph quoted by Malmsbury says he was martyred, which is an expression very suitable to Asser's account of his being stabbed at the altar when praying, and of the assassins intending to drag his body to a prostitute's door. 5th. Asser's account agrees with Malmsbury's, as to his assassins being lads, whom he taught; for Asser says, that Alfred placed in that monastery French children to be taught. 6th. The mode of the assassination is the same in both. Malmsbury says, 361, "Animam exuit tormento gravi et acerbo ut dum iniquitas valida et manus infirma sæpe frustaretur et sæpe impeteret, amaram mortem obiret." I understand this to imply many wounds, and not immediate death. Asser says, "Et crudelibus afficiunt vulneribus," p. 63, and that the monks found him not dead, and brought him home so," semivivum colligentis cum gemitu et merore domum reportaverunt,” p. 64. I think it is improbable that two persons of the same name and station should at the same time have experienced the same singular catastrophe. I would rather suppose that Erigena had been abbot of both places, and therefore the memory of the crime was preserved at both. Asser had the property of two monasteries given to him by Alfred, p. 50.

dious were dispersed or destroyed. The nation was plundered and impoverished; and warfare, avenging or defensive, became the habit of the better conditioned. One man, our Alfred, made the efforts already noticed to revive literature in the island, in the midst of these destructive storms; but even he could not obtain a sufficient interval of peace for its diffusion. The attack of Hastings in the latter part of his life, when he could have done most for letters, again renewed through his kingdom, the necessity of great martial exertions; and his earls, thanes, and knights, as well as their dependents, were, for their own preservation, compelled to make warlike education and exercises the great business of life. The occupation of one-third of England by the Northmen colonizers of Northumbria and East Anglia; their hostile movements, and the attempts of similar adventurers, kept the country in the same state of martial efficiency and employment, which precluded that enjoyment of peaceful leisure in which letters flourish, and they accordingly declined. The monastic friends of Edgar endeavoured to revive them; but scarcely had Edgar acquired and transmitted a full and prosperous sovereignty, in which the Anglo-Danes and Anglo-Saxons had become melted into one nation; and Dunstan, and his friends Ethelwald and Oswald, were exerting themselves to revive literature, and to multiply its best asylums, the monastic establishments, when, under his second son, the calamities of desolating invasions of Danes and Norwegians again overspread the country, and ended in the establishment of a Danish dynasty on the throne of Alfred. This event spread a race of Danish lords over the English soil, and the mutual jealousy and bickerings between them and the old Saxon proprietary body kept all the country in an armed state, which made warlike accomplishment and exercises still the first necessity and occupation of all. The reign of Edward the Confessor began a new era of peace and harmony, and literature would have again raised her head among the Anglo-Saxons; but, in the next succession, their dynasty was destroyed. Thus, though important political benefits resulted from the invading fanaticism of the North, yet their continued attacks, and the consequences that attended them, intercepted and diverted, for above a century and a half, the intellectual cultivation of the Anglo-Saxon nation.

Hence the historian has no progressive developement to display in the farther contemplation of the Anglo-Saxon mind. The sufferings of the nation carried the thinking students of the day strongly towards religious literature: and little else than sermons and homilies, penitentiaries and confessions," lives of saints, and

t The Anglo-Saxon MSS. of these are enumerated by Wanley in his Catalogue, pp. 1-48, 52-63, 69, 72, 81, 86-88, 90, 92, 97, 111, 116, 122, 131-144, 154-176, 186211, &c. &c. &c. Their number exceeds by far all the other topics.

As p. 50, 112, 145, and the Rule of Benedict, 91, 122.

▾ Wanley's MSS. p. 79. Martyrologics, &c, 106, 185.

translations and expositions of the Scriptures," with some authentic but plain and meagre chronicles, formularies of superstitions, and medicinal tracts, were produced in the century preceding the Norman conquest. The only individuals who are entitled to be selected from the general inferiority and uniformity are the two Elfrics; Elfric Bata, and his scholar Elfric, the abbot and bishop, of whom the latter only deserves notice here; for whose works, chiefly grammars, translations from the Scriptures, homilies, and lives of saints, we refer the reader to Wanley's Catalogue of the Anglo-Saxon MSS. But his exhortations to his fellowclergymen to study and to diligence in their duties, ought to be remembered to his honour. To the archbishop Wulstan he writes:

"It becomes us bishops that we should unclose that book-learning which our canons teach, and also the book of Christ to you, priests! in English speech, because all of you do not understand Latin.”

To bishop Wulfsin he wrote:

"You ought often to address your clergy, and reprove their negligence, because by their perversity the statutes of the canons and the religious knowledge of the holy church is almost destroyed.”

His translations from the Heptateuch into Anglo-Saxon he addressed to the ealdorman Ethelwerd. His letter, with other religious treatises, to Wulfget, and another to Sigwerd, show that the Anglo-Saxon language had acquired the name of ENGLISH in his time:

"I, Elfric, abbot, by this English writing, friendlily greet Wulfget, at Ylmandune, in this, that we now here speak of those English writings which I lend thee. The meaning of those writings pleased thee well, and I said that I would yet send thee more."d

"Elfric, abbot, greets friendlily Sigwerd at East Heolon. I say to thee truly that he is very wise who speaketh in works: and I turned these into English, and advise you, if you will, to read them yourself."

I, Elfric, would turn this little book (his grammar) to the English phrase from that rcæf-cɲæfte (art of letters) which is called grammatica, because stæf-cræfte is the key that unlocks the meaning of books."

As MSS. of the Gospels, p. 64, 76, 211; the Heptateuch, 67; Psalter, 76, 152; Paraphrases of the Lord's Prayer, Creed, Gloria Patri, p. 48, 51, 81, 147, 148; Prayers, 64, 147, 202; Jubilate, 76, 168, 182, 183; Hymns, 98, 99, 243; Judith, 98; and the Pseudo-Gospel of Nicodemus, 96.

As the MS. Chronicles mentioned, p. 64, 84, 95, 130, &c.

Their expositions of dreams, prognostications, charms, exorcisms, and predic. tions on the moon, thunder, birth, health, &c. abound. See p. 40, 44, 88, 89, 90, 98, 110, 114, 194, &c.

As the MS. in p. 72-75, and 176-180. See also Apuleius de Herbis, p. 92. This latter is very valuable from the English or Saxon names of the plants which are given to the Latin ones of the original.

* Elfric MSS. Wanley, p. 22.

This was printed by Thwaite.

e lbid.

d Elfric MSS. Wanley, p. 69.

b Ibid. p. 58.

f1bid. p. 84.

His anxiety for the good and correct writing of his books is thus expressed:

"Look! you who write this book; write it by this example; and for God's love make it that it be less to the writer's credit for beauty than for reproach

to me."

"I pray now if any one will write this book, that he make it well from this example, because I would not yet bring into it any error through false writers. It will be then his fault, not mine. The un-writer doth much evil if he will not rectify his mistake."

h

Among the Anglo-Saxon MSS. that remain may be remarked the History, or rather Romance of Apollonius, King of Tyre, which yet exists in our ancient language.i

CHAPTER VII.

The Sciences of the Anglo-Saxons.

THE most enlightened nations of antiquity had not made much progress in any of the sciences but the mathematical. During the Anglo-Saxon period, the general mind of Europe turned from their cultivation, to other pursuits more necessary and congenial to their new political situation. Happily for mankind, they were attended to during this period more efficiently in the Mahomedan kingdoms. The Arabian mind being completely settled in fertile countries and mild climates, enjoyed all the leisure that was wanted for the cultivation of natural knowledge; its acuteness and activity took this direction, and began preparing that intel

Elfric MSS. Wanley, p. 69.

Elfric MSS. Wanley, p. 85. He begins his letter prefixed to his translation of Genesis, thus: "Elfric monk humbly greets Ethelwærd ealdorman. You bade me, dear, that I should turn from Latin into English the book Genesis. I thought it would be a heavy thing to grant this, and you said that I need not translate more of the book than to Isaac, the son of Abraham, because some other man had translated this book from Isaac to the end," &c. Of his translations from the first seven books of the Old Testament, he says, "Moses wrote five books by wonderful appointment. We have turned them truly into English. The book that Joshua made I turned also into English some time since, for Ethelwerd ealdorman. The book of Judges men may read in the English writing, into which I translated it." He adds of Job, "I turned formerly some sayings from this into English." Elfric de Vet. Testam. MS. and cited by Thwaites.

It is among the MSS. at Cambridge. It is mentioned by Wanley, p. 147, and is there said to have been first written in Greek, and then turned into Latin during the time of the emperors. A Greek MS. of it is said to be at Vienna, with a version in modern Greek.