CHAPTER XXV UNSIGNED POEMS EITHER BY CYNEWULF OR BY MEN OF HIS SCHOOL THE poems which still remain for appreciation have all of them been attributed by divers critics to Cynewulf. No positive proof, however, can be given of his authorship of them. Five of them are important poems-the Guthlac, the Descent into Hell, the Phoenix, the Dream of the Rood, and the Andreas. The order in which I have here enumerated them is probably the chronological order of their composition, but no evidence really worth having can be given for this order. I may then classify them as I please, and I take first the Guthlac and the Andreas, both of which are saint-legends, then the Descent into Hell, then the Phoenix, and lastly, the Dream of the Rood, because, as I have said, it closes in my opinion the life and work of Cynewulf. The Guthlac is the story of that anchorite on whose island refuge in the fens the Abbey of Crowland was built. The poem is in the Exeter Book, and its conclusion is missing. There is scarcely any critic of importance who does not say that Cynewulf had a hand in it, and the second part at least is almost unanimously allotted to him. It is more than probable that we should find in its lost ending, had we but the luck to discover it, Cynewulf's signature in runes. The poem has been divided into two parts, and then into three, by various writers. Many attribute only the second part to Cynewulf; and those who think that he wrote the whole, think also, for the most part, that there was a long interval between the composition of the first and second portions,1 between Guthlac A 1 Rieger divides it into two, written at different times by Cynewulf. Charitius adopts the division, but only the second part is Cynewulf's. Lefevre divides it into three parts, with a long interval between the second and third parts. Dietrich and Morley say it is one poem by one hand. Wülker thinks that the second part is Cynewulf's and his earliest work! These differing doctors show at least that no clear conclusion has been arrived at. and Guthlac B. The style and poetic power of the first are very inferior to the second. Moreover, the first part differs considerably from the Life of Guthlac by Felix, who may have been a monk of Crowland, while the second part follows that life closely. On the whole, then, it is most probable that Cynewulf, at the beginning of his Christian life, while his imagination was yet hampered by his natural avoidance of all profane poetry, wrote the first part of Guthlac from oral tradition, and then, much later in life, when his imagination was delivered by the peace in his soul, took up his old work again, after the production of the Life of Guthlac, and added to it an end, with a special account of the anchorite's death. The free and noble manner of this part is a great contrast to the barren and limping movement of the first part. Could we but be certain that Cynewulf wrote both parts at different times, the comparison of the poet in the one to the poet in the other would be a fascinating bit of criticism. One thing remains to be said. Mr. Gollancz tells me he has transferred to the beginning of Guthlac (which follows the Christ in the Exeter manuscript) a number of lines which have been usually printed at the end of the Christ. These form, he says, the true introduction to Guthlac, and he supports his opinion by the fact that there is a blank space in the manuscript before these lines begin. The Christ certainly ends. better where he makes it now end, at line 1663. It is not so clear that the Guthlac begins better where he makes it begin -Se bid gefeana faegrast. It is a better beginning, as a matter of form, but the difficulty lies in this, that the quality of this new introduction, as poetry, is of a much higher value than the rest of the first part of the poem.. It is, in fact, of the same poetic value as the Christ itself, with which it has been so long connected, or as the second part of Guthlac. It is not possible, I think, to hold that this introduction could have been written by the poet of Guthlac A at the time when A was written. It is not only a difference in artistic work which divides them, but it is a difference in thoughtfulness, in experience of life, such as, to compare small things with great, divides the outlook over life taken by Milton in the Samson Agonistes from that taken in the Comus. It is more than probable that Mr. Gollancz is right in tagging on these twentynine lines to the Guthlac, but I think he will have to say that 749. 1 If so, this partly dates the poem, for that life was written between 747 and they were placed there many years after the first part was written, when Guthlac B was added-about the time, that is, when Cynewulf wrote the Christ. Indeed, I think that the whole preface has been remodelled if not entirely written at this time. It is done with something of an artist's hand. The picture with which it begins is tenderly conceived, and tenderness is one of the qualities of Cynewulf's genius. The mournful note in it, the patriot's sorrow, belongs also to Cynewulf, and has some historical interest if we identify his life with the evil days of Northumbria. There is also a contemplative element in it as of one who had retired from the stormy world and was inclined, in the conventionality of conversion, to classify the different kinds of saints. In such a classification he easily slips into his subject. The life of Guthlac belonged to the highest class. He is one of the anchorites whom Northumbria's old traditions, derived from the Celtic monks, considered to live nearest to God. "Fairest of joys it is," so the poem begins, when at first they meet the angel and the "happy soul who has forsaken the frail delights of earth.” And sweet and tender is the greeting that the angel gives whither fondly thou didst yearn Now mayst fare thy way Glory's gleaming light. Way-goer art thou now harbour from afflictions, Chr. 1671 (Guth. 6). From this, the introduction passes on through the classification I have mentioned to those chosen champions of God who dwell in wildernesses; and glides at once into the life of Guthlac in lines which seem to confirm the inference that this first part of the poem followed an oral tradition rather than the book of Felix. "Now we may declare what men of holy estate made known to us, how Guthlac directed his mind to the will of God." The first part has but little poetic power of any kind, and the few lines in it which describe the hermit's life with nature have been already quoted. The second part reveals at once a more experienced and more imaginative hand. It takes up, after an homiletic account of the Fall, the story of the death of Guthlac, and his death is told in heroic terms. It is the last fight of a Christian warrior. His death-song is sung; he is received into the Burg of triumph. The scenery is well set and the Sun plays his part in the battle. Night too appears with her shadow-helm to darken the battle-field. Night follows after night, each striding like a phantom over the sky. The Fiend and Guthlac meet one another like two heroes, armed for battle. Guthlac stands alone. Satan comes on him with many troops-"smiths of sin; roaring and raging, like wild beasts"; but the hill where this Holm-gang is set is Guthlac's field of victory. "His heart, his bones, were tortured," but his soul, full of joy, was ready for the Forth-going. The praise of God burnt in his breast; fiery hot was love in his heart, as the days stepped on and the cloud-helmings of the nights." When sickness came heavier on him, "the deadly drink that Eve had poured for Adam," death entered the lists -the warrior greedy of corpses; the stealthy bowman drew near to Guthlac in the shadow of the night. But he was not alone. His disciple asked him, "How is thine heart, my lord and father, shelter of thy friends, so sore oppressed! Knowst thou how this sickness will have an end?" "Death is near," answers Guthlac,-"the warrior who is not weary in the fight. Long do I tarry here"- and the whole passage is replete with the anchorite's tenderness and rapture. "Then the heavens grew dim over the children of men, dark strode the roll of nights above the clouds," and the day dawned on which Christ arose. Death was closer now; "stark, with thievish steps, he sought the house of the soul. Hot and near to Guthlac's heart the whirring arrow-storm, with showers of war, drove into his body. The cunning keys unlocked the treasure of his life." Then Guthlac gives his last message to his sister, and all the lines are steeped in that pathetic humanity which belongs in its fulness only to Cynewulf among Anglo-Saxon poets. I would the passage were not too long to translate. After this he reveals to his disciple the secret of his converse with an angel who visits him between "the rushing of the dawn and the darkening of the night." "My soul," cries Guthlac, "is struggling forth to reach true joy." Then sank his head, but still, "high-minded, he drew his breath," and it was fragrant "as the blowing herbs in summer time, whicheach in its own stead-winsome o'er the meadows, dropping honey, sweetly smell." With this lovely verse the poet, thrilled by the note that he has struck, is so uplifted that the impulse bears him onwards for a long time in a fuller flight, and the next sixty lines are some of the finest and the most sustained in the whole of Anglo-Saxon poetry. The sunset, the darkening of the night, the upleaping over the body of the saint of the heavenly pillar of light by which the shadows of the darkness are quenched, the dawn, the death, the rapturous welcome of the saint in heaven, the voyage of the ship over the sea- are all touched with true fire, and burn with a steady light. They are, just because they are good, difficult to translate, but here they are 1252. When the glorious gleam swart the North-sky grew, Sought its setting-path, Shrouded the land's lovelinesses ! Then of Lights the greatest, Holy, from the Heavens, came, shining high, serenely, He abode his end-day; as it should befit him; Blessed in his boldness, Noble round the noble one, And the dazzling of that glory, till from Eastward came, Then arose the glorious man, Blessed, mindful to be brave! as I erst did bid thee, for my spirit now To his true companion spoke he, "Time is, that thou farest sighing for the joys of God." On the up-way! Angels bore it on 4 but his lych grew cold Then out-streamed a Light, Brightest that of beaming 1 Night urged its way over the sky. sheenier than the sun, 2 This is the Pillar of Light afterwards more fully described. 8 To-lysanto dissolve. "Loosed and lost" expresses the process as well as the end of the dissolution, and this is the full meaning, I think, of the word. 4 As the word lich for corpse is used in Piers Plowman, and in our lych-gate, I use it here for alliteration's sake. |