But by far the most important prose work that has come down to us is the Saxon Chronicle, which gives a connected history of Britain in the form of annals, from the Christian era to the year 1154. The oldest MS. in existence dates from about the year 891, and is thought, with much probability, to have been partly composed, partly transcribed from earlier annals, by or under the direction of Archbishop Plegmund. From this time the Chronicle seems to have been continued under succeeding Archbishops of Canterbury to the time of the Conquest, when the task was transferred, under what circumstances we do not know, to the monks of Peterborough. Considered as a whole, the literature of the AngloSaxons conveys the impression that they were a prosaic and practical race, solid but slow thinkers, without much imagination or mental fire. What they might have made of it, had they been allowed to develop their literature uninterruptedly, it is, of course, impossible to say. But it seems reasonable to suppose that, for ulterior ends of higher good, it was ordered that the Saxon commonwealth should not repose in unmolested prosperity. A vein of sluggishness, of Boeotian enjoyment, of coarse indulgence, with forgetfulness of the higher aims of life, ran through the Saxon character. Their transference from the sandy barrens and marshes of Holstein, from the peaty plains and stunted forests of Hanover, to the rich soil and milder climate of England, tended to develop this weak side-this proneness to ease. In their old dwelling-place they were at least stimulated by the necessity of contending with the unfruitfulness of nature and the encroachments of the sea; in comparison with it, England must have been a terrestrial paradise-a very land of Cockaigne. This tendency to relapse into habits of indolent ease, which Sir Walter Scott has pourtrayed in the character of Athelstan in Ivanhoe, extended to the learned class, and to the churchmen no less than the laity. The influence of such a man as Bede should have been enough to inaugurate a long era of literary energy; yet William of Malmesbury assures us that, with the exception of the brief Saxon annals and the barbarous epitome of Ethelwerd, he had not been able to discover any historical work composed by an Anglo-Saxon upon the affairs of Britain, from the death of Bede to his own time. To form the future English character, it was necessary that the harder and sterner elements which belonged to the Scandinavian races, should be mingled and gradually fused with the softer Teutonic type. The Danish invasions and immigrations, which commenced in 832, and terminated with the establishment of the Danish dynasty in 1017, effected this. But in the process, the existing literary culture, and nearly all the establishments which had been founded to promote it, were swept away. In a country reduced to the dismal condition described by Bishop Lupus in a sermon preached to his flock* about the year 1012, it was impossible that men's thoughts should be efficaciously turned to any subjects save such as bore upon their personal security. Canute, indeed, after he had restored internal peace and order, showed a desire to patronise literary men, and, by rebuilding the monasteries, to open asylums for learning. But the glory and greatness of his reign gave an impulse rather to the Scandinavian than to the Saxon genius. No English poet sang of his victories; that task was left to the scalds, whom he brought with him from Denmark. By this time large advances had been made towards the amalgamation of the races. Writing of the year 1036, Malmesbury † says that the citizens of London, "from long intercourse with these barbarians" (the Danes), "had almost entirely adopted their customs.” The Danes adopted with facility *Turner, Ang.-Sax. Book vi. ch. xiv. the Anglo-Saxon tongue, though importing into it many Danish words, and probably breaking down to a great degree its grammatical structure. The secular laws of Canute, addressed to both races equally, are written in Anglo-Saxon. All that the cold North could supply, the English nationality had now received. The stubborn hardihood and perseverance which were illustrated in the Drakes, the Cooks, the Stephensons, of later days, were, by this large infusion of Danish blood, rooted in the English nature. The intellectual activity and literary culture of the South, together with the great Roman tradition of political order and vigorous administration, were still wanting; and these were supplied by means of the Norman Conquest. PRELIMINARY CHAPTER. SECTION II. THE NORMAN PERIOD. 1066-1350. IN the age at which we are arrived, two classes of men only cultivated literature, the clergy and the minstrels. The local centres at which learning was to be obtained were of two kinds, the universities and the monasteries. Poetry and light literature were comparatively independent of such aids; yet the form and development even of these could not but be largely dependent on the social and moral condition of the classes among whom they were circulated. The intellectual achievements, therefore, of the clergy, both Saxon and Norman-the means of selfculture which they had at their disposal, and the degree of success with which they availed themselves of those means, the different classes of poets, their nationality, the traditional or other materials upon which they worked, and the furtherance or obstruction which they met with in the temper and habits of the time,-all these matters must now be successively touched upon. What we have named the Norman period embraces more than two centuries and a half, and includes the long conflict between two opposing elements, which terminated, on the whole, in favour of what was English, yet so that the national language, literature, and prevailing opinions, were all deeply coloured by French words and French thoughts. For many years after the Conquest the Saxon clergy were in no mood or condition to betake themselves to the tranquil pursuits of learning. Before that catastrophe, religious fervour and rigour of discipline had long been on the wane amongst them. We read of much laxity of manners, of bishops holding two or more sees at once, of priests so ignorant of Latin as to be unable to say mass without innumerable blunders. The Conqueror, who, with all his cruelty and pride, hated hypocrisy and empty profession with all his heart, would not tolerate these relaxed ecclesiastics, and by the nomination of Lanfranc (a native of Italy, but for many years prior of Bec, in Normandy) to the see of Canterbury, inaugurated a great reformation in Church matters. Some few of the Saxon bishops, as the noble St. Wulstan of Worcester, Agelric of Chichester, and one or two others, were left in possession of their sees; the rest had to make way for Normans. Nor was this all. Had the unworthy only been deposed, and the worthy still allowed to look forward to advancement to be obtained through desert, the Saxon clergy might still have held together, and with renewed strictness of life a revival of learning might have taken place among them. But the repeated insurrections of the English exasperated the fiery temper of the Conqueror; and after having quelled them, and thus "overturned the power of the laity, he made an ordinance that no monk or clergyman of that nation should be suffered to aspire to any dignity whatever." Thus cut off from the hope of due recognition for merit the Saxon clergy were deprived of one of the chief incentives to study. One may be sure that from that time the more ambitious among them would make haste to learn French, and would rather disguise their nationality than avow it. Yet there was at least one monastery, in which a literary work, begun in happier times two centuries before, was carried on by Saxon * Malmesbury, p. 287. |