Easter Hymns From Old Cloisters

FROM the soil of the monastic life, which might seem, for many reasons, to have been unfavorable to such a development, there sprang and bloomed some of the rarest flowers of Christian poetry. There could be little, one might think, in the stern and rigorous existence behind the gray walls of the monasteries, with its fastings and castigations, its penances and prayers, and its isolation from the light and beauty of the world, to stimulate the imagination, or to call into exercise the poetic faculty. But the monk had ready to his hand the Old Testament imagery, rich in a symbolism in which, by a poetry touched with divine inspiration, there were shadowed forth the mystery and glory of the later dispensation. In the life and sufferings of Christ, with the attendant associations, he had an exhaustless theme, which he used by turns to interpret ancient types and symbols, or to quicken a flagging faith in a blessedness yet to be revealed. If ever he lacked themes, his own heart, with its victories and defeats, its revolt against the impurities of the world, and its aspirations toward the heavenly existence, supplied them: and he had for the vehicle of his devotion a language marvelously sonorous and flexible, and capable of becoming stately, or rugged, or tender, in harmony with his thought.

It is true that the mediæval poetry was restricted in scope, and that its conceits often surprise us by their grotesque realism, or shock us by their boldness; but the intense feeling which the poems convey is a quality which helps us to forget such defects. Holding himself aloof from the domestic associations, which call out the natural affections, the monk poured forth all the fervor of his soul in his hymns. No lover ever sang to his mistress with a more passionate intensity than that with which Fortunatus and Bernard addressed their Lord. This feeling is as far removed from our own time in spirit as it is in distance; and there is nothing in the sacred poetry of the modern tongues to equal the grandeur of the “ Dies iræ, dies illa ” of Thomas of Celano, or the tenderness of the “ Stabat mater dolorosa ” of Jacobus de Benedictis, or the rapture of Bernard’s

The mediæval poetry is particularly rich in hymns and lyrics of the Resurrection. Our own conditions are such as to place us, perhaps, a little out of sympathy with the feeling which these poems convey. Our present existence has so much that is desirable that we are in danger of finding it both engrossing and satisfying; and it is only after we are taught, by some sharp affliction, the uncertainty of this life that we begin to fix our aspirations upon the life to come. But the monk found little to content him, either in the gloom and discipline of the monastery, or in the wild unrest of the world outside. In the solitude of his cell he dreamed and sang of Paradise, and of the resurrection of Christ as the assurance of an abundant entrance thereinto.

The earliest Easter hymn of which we have knowledge carries us back fifteen centuries. Its author, St. Ambrose, Bishop of Milan, was born not many years after the recognition of Christianity by the decree of Constantine, probably about the year 340. Treves was probably his birthplace. The story of his life is like a romance, although the leading facts in it are clearly established. He came of a noble family, and by his great abilities and known integrity he rose to high rank in the state. In the year 374, Auxentius, Bishop of Milan, died. The people were permitted to choose his successor. In the assembly met for this purpose a tumult arose, and Ambrose, who was then governor of Liguria, went in to quiet it. Just as he was commanding order, a child suddenly cried out, “Ambrose Bishop!” The people took up the cry with wild enthusiasm, believing that it indicated the special intervention of Providence for their guidance. It was in vain that Ambrose protested that he had not been baptized, and adopted various expedients to weaken the regard of the people. He even took flight, but was apprehended by the authorities, and was baptized on the last day of November, 374. Seven days later he was consecrated to the bishop’s office. The ecclesiastical career which had such an extraordinary beginning was varied and eventful. Ambrose brought to the sacred office the dauntless courage and the purity of purpose which had characterized his civil administration. He took an active part in the stormy controversies of his time, with expiring paganism on one hand, and with Arianism on the other. He resisted, vehemently and successfully, the repeated efforts of the pagan nobles of Rome to reinstate the altar of Victory in the senate-house. When the Empress Justina demanded the Portian church in Milan for the Ariaus, Ambrose and his priests remained in the edifice five days and nights to keep it from falling into their hands. The people gathered to his support, and filled the church. Soldiers surrounded the building and prevented egress, but they could not tire out the patience of the congregation, whose enthusiasm was sustained by the singing of hymns which Ambrose had written. The bishop carried the day, and the soldiers were withdrawn. When the Emperor Theodosius ordered a cruel massacre at Thessalonica, Ambrose met him at the church door, and would not suffer him to enter. For eight months the emperor remained excommunicate, and then was admitted to the sacraments only alter making public penance. On the 4th of April, 397, the stout-hearted bishop, who had done so much to vindicate the authority of the church against the state, died at Milan, and was buried in the basilica of San Ambrogio. His hymns are terse, simple, and vigorous, and are written in a stanza which lacks the charm of rhyme.

The Easter hymn beginning “ Hic est die verus Dei” is one of the very few poems of his writing, the authenticity of which is unquestioned. Most of the hymns classed as Ambrosian belong to a later period. Of this hymn, Mrs. Charles, in her Voice of Christian Life in Song, supplies the following translation : —

“ This is the very day of God, —
Serene with holy light it came, —
In which the stream of sacred blood
Swept over the world’s crime and shame.

“ The angels ponder, wondering:
They see the body’s pain and strife;
They see to Christ the guilty cling,
And reap at once the blessed life. “ O admirable Mystery!
The sins of all are laid on Thee;
And Thou, to cleanse the world’s deep stain,
As man dost bear the sins of men.

There is another ancient Easter poem which is often classed among the Ambrosian hymns, though its place is probably in the sixth century. It begins “ Ad cœnam Agni providi,” and appears in (lie Roman Breviary in an altered version, “ Ad regias Agni dapes.” According to Daniel (see vol. i. of the Thesaurus), it was probably sung in the early church by the newly-baptized catechumens when, clad in white, they first partook of the sacraments.

There are numerous translations by Mrs. Charles, Dr. Neale, Dr. Thompson, Edward Caswall, Bishop Williams, and others. The following rendering is by Mrs. Charles: —

Two centuries intervene between Ambrose and the next poet who sang of Easter, Venantius Fortunatus. Among the singers of the early church there is no greater contrast of temperament and character than that which exists between these poets. Ambrose was stern, simple, fearless, profoundly earnest; Fortunatus was gay, light-hearted, often trifling, and as skilled in turning society verses as in the making of hymns. lie was born in Venetia about the year 530, and studied at Ravenna. He won high praise among his contemporaries for his learning, and he is mentioned as one of the last poets to whom Latin was a mother-tongue. His early life was spent in wandering gayly from castle to castle, very much after the manner of the troubadours of a later day, and he found ready entrance everywhere by the wit and sweetness of his verses. He crossed over into France, where he became intimate with Gregory of Tours and Queen Radegnnda. Partly in consequence of a pilgrimage to the tomb of the holy Martin at Tours, and rather more because of his friendship with the queen, he adopted a graver habit of life, and, entering the priesthood, connected himself with a monastic institution, which the queen had established at Poitiers. His life here seems to have been nearly as light and careless as before, and if we may judge by his verses he was little given to the rigors of asceticism. Some biographers and critics have found it so difficult to reconcile the contradictory qualities of his poems that they have been inclined to regard his hymns as artificial, if not insincere; but Mrs. Charles comes to his defense with the ingenious suggestion that if there had been left of Cowper’s works only John Gilpin, Lines on the Receipt of a Hamper, and some playful letters to Lady Austin on the one hand, and the hymn “ God moves in a mysterious way ” on the other, it might have been equally difficult to reconcile the fragments. It is at least certain that Fortunatus’s splendid hymns, " Vexilla regis prodeunt ” (“ The royal banners forward go ”), “Pange lingua gloriosi” (“ Sing, my tongue, the glorious story”), and “ Salve festa dies ” (“ ITail, festal day ”) are among the most valued treasures of sacred song. Fortunatus was made Bishop of Poitiers in 599, and died about ten years later. Ilis Easter hymn, the last of the three mentioned above, is extracted from a poem of fifty-six verses. There are translations by Mrs. Charles and others, one of the best being this, by YV. J. C., in Shipley’s Lyra Messianica: —

Ambrose and Fortunatus wrote in unrhymed verse. It was left, for the poets of a later day, and for those chiefly of the twelfth century, to play upon the sonorous Latin tongue as upon the keys of a mighty organ. Not that rhyme was an invention of the Christian poets, nor an importation from without. Archbishop Trench cites abundant evidence to show that it was not a discovery of something new, but a recovery of something which had been lost. He shows that it

had its origin, or at least its very clear anticipation, in the early national poetry of Rome; that even after the introduction of the Greek metres, it continually appeared; and that verses with middle and with final rhymes are found in every one of the Latin poets. The first Christian poet in whose hymns distinct rhymes occur is Hilary, in the fourth century; and from this point rhyme may be traced, in the words of Trench, " step by step, from its rude, timid, and uncertain beginnings, till in the later hymnologists of the twelfth and thirteenth centuries, an Aquinas or an Adam of St. Victor, it displayed all its latent capabilities, and attained its final glory and perfection, satiating the ear with a richness of melody scarcely anywhere to be surpassed.” Among the many hymns which might be cited as illustrations of the sweet melodies of this period is a jubilant Eastor piece of uncertain authorship. It is so musical and so rapturous as to appeal even to the dullest ear: —

This charming piece is faithfully reproduced in spirit, and, so far as our less flexible language will permit, in melody, in a translation contributed by Rev. E. A. Washburn to Dr. Schaff’s Christ in Song: —

Of the sacred singers of the twelfth century there are none whose lives afford more interesting or ampler materials for study than Bernard of Clairvaux. There was in his nature a combination of gentleness and fierceness, of humility and ambition, of fervor and severity, which constitutes him the representative monk of his time. He was born of a knightly family in Burgundy, in 1091, and at the age of twenty-two entered the monastery at Citeaux, the home of the severest asceticism anywhere practiced at that time. Three years later, at the head of twelve monks, he was sent out to found a new establishment. The site selected was stony and desolate, and was fitly known as the Valley of Wormwood. The monks suffered great privation. The rude building which they erected had the bare earth for a floor, and they slept upon planks, with logs for pillows. Their supplies failed them, and only the charity of their neighbors kept them alive through the first winter. Gradually, however, the barren ground yielded to their industry, and the Valley of Wormwood was transformed into the fair Valley of Clairvaux. Bernard’s five brothers and his aged father sought refuge in the same retreat, so that the family ties were preserved in these new associations. Bernard’s influence and fame extended rapidly. When Innocent II. and Anacletus II. were contending for the chair of St. Peter in 1130, it was Bernard who was selected by the king and the bishops of France to decide upon the claims of the rival Popes, and his choice of Innocent was sustained. It was Bernard who engaged in the great theological controversy with Abelard, which ended in the excommunication of the latter. It was Bernard who, in 1146, went over France and Germany preaching the second crusade; and by his fiery eloquence he kindled the religious enthusiasm of the people to fever heat. The terrible disasters which overtook this enterprise, and the popular indignation against him as the author of the movement, may have hastened his death, which occurred on the 20th of August, 1153. His last words to the weeping monks who stood around his bed were those of Paul: “ I am in a strait betwixt two, having a desire to depart and to be with Christ, which is far better.”

The opposing elements in Bernard’s character may be indicated briefly by two incidents. When his brother Gerard, whom he loved tenderly, died, he shed no tears, and the monks wondered at his firmness. He ascended the pulpit, and began his discourse as usual, but suddenly his emotions overpowered him, and his voice was lost in sobs. Unable longer to control himself, all the pent-up grief and tenderness of his heart found utterance. ” Who,” he cried with tearful vehemence, “ could ever have loved me as he did! Thou art in the eternal presence of Ihe Lord Jesus, and hast angels for thy companions; but what have I to fill up the void thou hast left? Fain would I know thy feelings toward me, my brother, my beloved, if indeed it is permitted to one bathing in the floods of divine radiance to call to mind our misery, to be occupied with our grief.’’ Yet the same Bernard, “ the dove-like,” as his friends were wont to call him, could be harsh and unjust when his plans were thwarted. When William was elected to the archbishopric of York, Bernard, who had desired the position for a Clairvaux monk, wrote bitterly against the new incumbent, charging him with ambition and simony, and condemning him to everlasting perdition. There was no real foundation for the charges, but nevertheless Bernard continued the persecution, until he had driven the archbishop from his place and secured the coveted position for his monk.

Among the hymns of exquisite beauty which we owe to this rarely-gifted spirit is one which deserves a place among Easter pieces. The original contains about two hundred lines, and is a jubilation on the name of Jesus. There are many variations of arrangement and combination in the original text, and there are numerous translations, the best being that by Rev. Edward Caswall, an English Catholic, which is given below. Dr. Sehaff, with pardonable enthusiasm, describes it as the sweetest and most evangelical hymn of the Middle Ages:

The first four stanzas of the above are contained in many collections. It is worth noticing, as an illustration of the freaks of hymn-menders, that in the last line of the fourth stanza “ lovers ” is almost invariably given “ loved ones;” a change from the active to the passive which alters and weakens the meaning.

While Bernard was defending the interests of the monks of Clairvaux with so much zeal, Peter the Venerable was at the head of the rival monastery at Cluny. He was born in Auvergne a year later than Bernard, and entered upon the government of the abbey of Cluny in 1122. He was a man of great gentleness and beauty of character, and libs rule over the Cluniac monks was so mild as to draw down upon him a severe reproof from Bernard. He was charged with having a great variety of dishes at the table of the monastery, with providing the best of material for the habits of the monks, and with allowing those who were sick a staff to support their steps. His answer to these accusations was a gentle plea for charitable judgment. When Bernard attacked with great bitterness a Cluniac monk who had been made Bishop of Langres, Peter wrote to him, deprecating his harshness and defending the monk. When Abelard, old and worn with persecution, was overtaken with severe illness on his way to Rome, Peter opened to him the hospitable doors of Cluny, and extended to him the tenderest care. He pleaded for him with the Pope, and brought about a reconciliation between him and Bernard, and when Abelard died, with the gentle kindness which characterized all his acts, Peter communicated the tidings to the faithful Heloisa. Peter died in 1156. Not many poems of his writing have come down to us, but his Easter hymn “ Mortis portis fractis, fortis ” is a marvel of ingenious and musical rhyme. Let us listen to a few lines: —

Such a measure as this defies translation, and after reading the Latin, Mrs. Charles’s rendering of it seems inadequate enough:—

Abelard represented the scholastic, Bernard the mystic, type of monkish character. In Adam of St. “Victor we have a representative of a school of theology which sought to reconcile these often conflicting tendencies, and to fuse into the glowing eloquence of its prose and the passionate fervor of its poetry all that was best in both. In the twelfth and thirteenth centuries the monks of France led the sacred choir, and the religious establishment of St. Victor in the suburbs of Paris was one of the most famous for its poets and scholars. Of the external life of Adam all that is known is that he was born early in the twelfth century, either in Brittany or in Great Britain; that he studied in Paris, and entered the hermitage of St. Victor about 1130; and that he continued there until his death, which occurred, probably, in 1192. But there was no other of the mediæval poets who left to the church so rich a legacy of song. More than a hundred hymns of his writing remain to us, and of these at least half are of the first quality. It was his great delight to play upon the Old Testament types and symbols, and quite often in his hymns the theology overmasters the poetry. But he had such supreme command over form and rhyme that his poems are marvels of melody. Hear him, as at the close of a hymn on the Resurrection, full of Old Testament allusions, he bursts forth in such strains as these:

After making all allowance for his defects, Trench says that “ his profound acquaintance with the whole circle of the theology of his time, and eminently with its exposition of Scripture; the abundant and admirable use which he makes of it, the exquisite art and variety with which for the most part his verse is managed and his rhymes disposed, their rich melody multiplying and ever deepening at the close; the strength which often he concentrates into a single line; his skill in conducting a story; and most of all the evident nearness of the things which he celebrates to his own heart of hearts, — these and other excellences render him, as far as my judgment goes, the foremost among the sacred Latin poets of the Middle Ages.” Even this cordial praise Dr. Neale considered scarcely sufficient.

Among the best of Adam’s Easter pieces is that the first two stanzas of which are given below. It is unincumbered with Old Testament allusions, and it dwells, in language of rare beauty, upon the coincidence of the opening spring-time and the Resurrection feast:

Philip S. Worslcy is the author of this exquisite translation: —

Either in this century or the next, there arose, in some unknown cloister, from the lips of a singer whose name has not come down to us, the triumphant Easter hymn “ Finita jam sunt prœlia,” which Dr. Neale translates thus: —

MARY MAGDALEN.

JESUS

MARY MAGDALEN.

JESUS.

MARY MAGDALEN.

JESUS.

Let us listen to one strain more before we leave the cloisters and their songs. This is from some unknown poet of the fourteenth or possibly of the sixteenth century. Hark, how jubilantly he calls upon everything in nature — sky and air, the awakening spring, lilies and violets, hills, valleys, anti fountains — to join in the exultation over the risen Lord!

Mrs. Charles gives us the following admirable version, in which comparatively little of the meaning or the music of the original is lost : —