Part 8

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_Pellite corde metum, mea membra, et credite vosmet Cum Christo reditura Deo; nam vos gerit ille Et secum revocat: morbos ridete minaces: Inflictos casus contemnite; tetra sepulcra Despuite; exsurgens quo Christus provocat, ite._"

_Translation._

"I know in Christ my body shall arise; Why bid me, then, despair? for I shall go By that same path whereby my Lord returned, Death trodden 'neath His feet: this is my creed. Banish, my limbs, all terror; and believe That ye with Christ our God shall yet return; He beareth you and with Himself recalls. Laugh at the threats of sickness; scorn the blows Of fate; despise the horrors of the tomb; And fare ye where the risen Christ doth call."

61 The poet expresses as a duty owed to Christ Himself the heathen obligation of casting three handfuls of earth upon a body discovered dead.

69 For the incident referred to in these lines, see the Apocryphal book of Tobias, cc. ii. and xi. Tobit, a pious Israelite captive in Nineveh, was reduced to beggary as the result of his zeal in burying those of his countrymen who had been killed and exposed by royal command. He also lost his sight, which was eventually restored by the application of the gall of a fish which attacked his son Tobias, and was killed by him. The "fish" of the legend is probably the crocodile, whose gall was credited with medicinal properties by various Greek and Latin writers. Cf. Pliny, _N. H._ xxviii. 8: "They say that nothing avails more against cataract than to anoint the eyes with its gall mixed with honey."

113 Cf. Cyprian (_De Mortal._ 20): "We must not lament our brethren whom the Lord's summons has freed from the world, for we know that they are not lost, but gone before. We may not wear the black robes of mourning while they have put on the white raiment of joy. Nor may we grieve for those as lost whom we know to be living with God."

171 Cf. _Perist._ vii.:--

"_Nos pio fletu, date, perluamus Marmorum sulcos._"

The early Christian epitaphs, of which many thousands exist, are instinct with a faith which is in striking contrast to the unrelieved gloom or sullen resignation of paganism. We may compare with the common

AVE ATQVE VALE

"Hail and farewell"

or inscriptions like

INFANTI DVLCISSIMO QVEM DI IRATI AETERNO SOMNO DEDERUNT

"To a very sweet babe, whom the angry gods gave to unending sleep."

the Christian

DVLCIS ET INNOCENS HIC DORMIT SEVERIANVS SOMNO PACIS CVIVS SPIRITVS IN LVCE DOMINI SVSCEPTVS EST (A.D. 393)

"Here slumbers in the sleep of peace the sweet and innocent Severianus, whose spirit is received in the light of the Lord"

or

NATVS EST LAVRENTIVS IN ETERNVM ANN. XX. DORMIT IN PACE (A.D. 329)

"Laurentius was born into eternity in his twentieth year. He sleeps in peace."

See also note on iii. 205.

XI

1 Virgil's Fourth Eclogue known as the "Pollio" has undoubtedly influenced the thought and style of this poem: the more noticeable parallels will be pointed out as they occur. In Milton's ode _On the Morning of Christ's Nativity_ there are several passages which recall Prudentius' treatment of the theme in this and the succeeding hymn; but curiously enough, the Puritan poet in alluding to the season of the Nativity takes an opposite line of thought, and regards the diminished sunshine of winter as a veiling of an inferior flame before the light of "a greater Sun." Prudentius proclaims the increase of the sun's light, which begins after the winter solstice, as symbolic of the ever-widening influence of the True Light. The idea is given in a terse form by St. Peter Chrysologus, _Serm._ 159: _Crescere dies coepit, quia verus dies illuxit_. "The day begins to lengthen out, inasmuch as the true Day hath shone forth."

18 For the somewhat obscure phrase _verbo editus_, see note on iii. 2.

20 For "Sophia" or the Divine Creative Wisdom, see Prov. iii. 19, 20, and especially viii. 27-31, where the language "has been of signal importance in the history of thought, helping, as it does, to make a bridge between Eastern and Greek ideas, and to prepare the way for the Incarnation" (Davison, _Wisdom-Literature of the O. T._, pp. 5, 6). In Alexandrian theology the conception of God's transcendence gave rise to the doctrine of an intermediate power or _logos_, by which creation was effected. In the Prologue of the fourth Gospel the idea was set forth in its purely Christian form. See 1, 3, where the Logos or the pre-incarnate Christ is described as the maker of all things--an idea which is also illustrated by the language of St. Paul in such passages as Col. i. 6.

59 Cf. for the conception of a golden age, Virg., _Ecl._, iv. 5 _et seq._: _Magnus ab integro saeclorum nascitur ordo_, etc.

65 Reminiscences of ancient prophecy appear to be embodied in this and following lines. Cf. Joel iii. 18: "And it shall come to pass in that day that the mountains shall drop down sweet wine and the hills shall flow with milk." Amos ix. 13: "The mountains shall drop sweet wine and all the hills shall melt." But cf. especially Virg., _Ecl._, iv. 18-30: _At tibi prima, puer, nullo munuscula cultu_, etc.

"Unbidden earth shall wreathing ivy bring, And fragrant herbs (the promises of spring) As her first off'rings to her infant king.

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Unlaboured harvest shall the fields adorn, And clustered grapes shall blush on every thorn; The knotted oaks shall showers of honey weep, And through the matted grass the liquid gold shall creep." (Dryden's Trans.)

81 The legend of the ox and ass adoring our Lord arose from an allegorical interpretation of Isa. i. 3: "The ox knoweth his owner, the ass his master's crib." Origen (_Homilies on St. Luke_ xiii.) is the first to allegorise on the passage in Isaiah, where the word for "crib" in the Greek translation of the O. T. is identical with St. Luke's word for "manger" (_phatnê_). After referring to the circumstances of the Nativity, Origen proceeds to say: "That was what the prophet foretold, saying, 'The ox knoweth,' etc. The Ox is a clean animal: the Ass an unclean one. The Ass knew his master's crib (_praesepe domini sui_): not the people of Israel, but the unclean animal out of pagan nations knew its master's crib. 'But Israel hath not known me: and my people hath not understood.' Let us understand this and press forward to the crib, recognise the Master and be made worthy of his knowledge." The thought that the Ox = the Jews and the Ass = Pagans, reappears in Gregory Nazianzen, Ambrose and Jerome. See an interesting article by Mr. Austin West (_Ox and Ass Legend of the Nativity_. _Cont. Review_, Dec. 1903), who notes the further impetus given to the legend by the Latin rendering of Habb. iii. 2 (LXX.) which in the _Vetus Itala_ version appears as "in medio duorum animalium in notesceris," "in the midst of two animals shalt thou be known" (R.V., _in the midst of the years make it known_). The legend does not appear in apocryphal Christian literature earlier than in the _Pseudo-Matthew Gospel_, which belongs to the later fifth century. It is interesting to note that with St. Francis and the Franciscans the ox and the ass are merely animals: the allegorical interpretation of Origen had vanished from Christendom: and in its place we find St. Francis (see _Life of St. Francis_ by St. Bonaventura, "Temple Classics" edition, p. 111) making a _presepio_ at Greccio, to which a living ox and ass are brought, in order that a visible representation of the manger-scene might kindle the devotion of the Brethren and the assembled townsfolk. This act of St. Francis inaugurated the custom, still observed in the Roman Church, of representing by means of waxen images the whole of the Nativity manger-scene, Mother and Child together with the adoring animals.

97 For the _obstetrix_, cf. _Proto-Evangelium of the Pseudo-James_ (a Greek romance of the fourth century), § 18 _et seq._, where Joseph is represented as seeking and finding a Hebrew midwife.

100 Cf. Milton's _Ode on the Nativity_, ll. 157-164:--

"With such a horrid clang As on Mount Sinai rang While the red fire and smould'ring clouds outbrake: The aged earth aghast With terror of that blast, Shall from the surface to the centre shake; When at the world's last session The dreadful Judge in middle air shall spread his throne."

XII

1 This poem has given four hymns to the Roman Breviary:-- (1) For the Feast of the Transfiguration, Vespers and Matins consisting of ll. 1-4, 37-40, 41-44, 85-88. (2) For the Epiphany at Lauds, beginning _O sola magnarum urbium_, ll. 77-80, 5-8, 61-72. (3) For the Feast of Holy Innocents at Matins, beginning _Audit tyrannus anxius_, ll. 93-100, 133-136. (4) Also the Feast of Holy Innocents at Lauds, beginning _Salvete flores martyrum_, ll. 125-132.

5 For a curious parallel to these opening lines see Henry Vaughan's _Pious Thoughts and Ejaculations_ (the Nativity):--

"But stay! what light is that doth stream And drop here in a gilded beam? It is Thy star runs Page and brings Thy tributary Eastern kings. Lord! grant some light to us that we May find with them the way to Thee!"

12 Cf. Ignatius, _Ep. ad Ephes. xix._: "All the other stars, together with the Sun and Moon, became a chorus to the Star, which in its light excelled them all."

15 Prudentius mentions the constellations of Ursa Major and Ursa Minor (to which latter the Pole Star belongs) as examples of stars in constant apparition. All the Little Bear stars are within about 24° from the Pole; hence, if viewed from Saragossa, the birthplace of Prudentius, the lowest altitude of any of them would be 18° above the north horizon. The same applies to the majority of the stars in the Great Bear. Some few would sink below the horizon for a brief time in each twenty-four hours; but the greater number, especially the seven principal stars known as the "Plough," would be sufficiently high up at their lowest northern altitudes to be in perpetual apparition. [My friend, Rev. R. Killip, F.R.A.S., has kindly furnished me with these particulars.] Allusions to the Bears are constantly recurring in the classical poets (cf. _e.g._ Ovid., _Met._ xiii. 293, _immunemque aequoris Arcton_, "the Bear that never touches the sea"). The idea that these stars are mostly hidden by clouds, though perpetually in view, is a poetic hyperbole intended to enhance the uniqueness of the Star of Bethlehem.

49 Jerome (_ad Eustoch._ Ep. 22) commenting on the passage in Isa. xi. 1, "And there shall come forth a rod out of the root of Jesse, and a flower shall rise up out of his root" (Vulg.), remarks: "The rod (_virga_) is the mother of the Lord, simple, pure, sincere ... the flower of the rod is Christ, who saith, 'I am the flower of the field and the lily of the valleys.'"

69 This symbolism of the gifts of the Magi is also found in Juvencus (I. 250): "Frankincense, gold and myrrh they bring as gifts to a King, a Man and a God," and is again alluded to by Prudentius in _Apoth._ 631 _et seq._ The idea is expressed in the hymn of Jacopone da Todi, beginning _Verbum caro factum est_ (Mone, _Hymni Latini_, Vol. 2):

"Gold to the kingly, Incense to the priestly, Myrrh to the mortal:"

and it has passed into the Office for Epiphany in the Roman Breviary: "There are three precious gifts which the Magi offered to their Lord that day, and they contain in themselves sacred mysteries: in the gold, that the power of a king may be displayed: in the frankincense, consider the great high priest: in the myrrh, the burial of the Lord" _et passim_.

172 The idea that Moses defeated the Amalekites because his arms were outstretched in the form of a cross is found also in one of the hymns (lxi.) of Gregory Nazianzen. The symbol of the Christian religion, the cross, "was fancifully traced by the Fathers throughout the universe: the four points of the compass, the 'height, breadth, length and depth' of the Apostle expressed, or were expressed by, the cross.... The cross explained everything" (Maitland, _Church in the Catacombs_, p. 202).

193 The discomfiture of the heathen gods wrought by the Incarnation is elaborated by Milton, whose lines recall this and similar passages in Prudentius:--

"Peor, and Baälim Forsake their temples dim

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And sullen Moloch fled, Hath left in shadows dread, His burning idol all of blackest hue.

Our Babe, to show his Godhead true, Can in his swaddling bands control the damned crew."

FINIS