be done in the way of change. The Creed may be compared with the one of 1250, printed in page 145 of my work:

'I bileve in god, fadir almygti, makere of hevene and of erthe: and in iesu crist the sone of him, oure lord, oon alone: which is conceyved of the hooli gost; born of marie maiden: suffride passioun undir pounce pilat: crucified, deed, and biried: he went doun to hellis: the thridde day he roos agen fro deede: he steig to hevenes: he sittith on the right syde of god the fadir almygti: thenns he is to come for to deme the quyke and deede. I beleve in the hooli goost: feith of hooli chirche communynge of seyntis: forgyveness of synnes : agenrisyng of fleish, and everlastynge lyf. So be it.'

PREIE WE. FOR THE PEES.

'God of whom ben hooli desiris, rigt councels and iust werkis: gyve to thi servantis pees that the world may not geve, that in our hertis govun to thi commandementis, and the drede of enemys putt awei, oure tymes be pesible thurgh thi defendyng. Bi oure lord iesu crist, thi sone, that with thee lyveth and regneth in the unitie of the hooli goost god, bi all worldis of worldis. So be it.'

God, that taughtist the hertis of thi feithful servantis bi the lightnynge of the hooli goost: graunte us to savore rightful thingis in the same goost, and to be ioiful evermore of his counfort. Bi crist our lorde. So be it.'

Almyghti god, everlastynge, that aloone doost many wondres, schewe the spirit of heelful grace upon bisschopes thi servantis, and upon alle the congregacion

betake to hem: and gheete in the dewe of thi blessynge that thei plese evermore to the in trouthe. Bi crist oure lord. So be it.'

HOLY MATRIMONY.

(From a Manual of 1408.)

'Lo breyren and sustren her we beon comyn to gedre in ye worsschip of god and his holy seintes in ye face of holy chirche to joynen to gedre yuse tweyne bodies yat heynforward yei be on body in ye beleve and in ye lawe of god for te deserven everlastynge lyf wat so yei han don here byfore. Wherfore i charge you on holy chirche byhalf all yat here bes yat gif eni mon or womman knowen eny obstacle prevei or apert why yat yey lawefully mowe nogt come to gedre in ye sacrament of holy churche sey ye now or never more.'

(From another Manual, rather older, of the Fourteenth

Century.)

'Also I charge you both, and eyther be your selfe, as ye wyll answer before God at the day of dome, that yf there be any thynge done pryvely or openly, betwene your selfe or that ye knowe any lawfull lettyng why that ye may not be wedded togyther at thys time: say it nowe, or we do any more to this mater.'

'N.-Wylt thou have this man to thy husbande, and to be buxum to him, serve him and kepe him in

Here we see the Southern sustren, the Midland beon, and the Northern bes.

sykenes and in helthe: And in all other degrese be unto hym as a wyfe should be to hir husbande, and all other to forsake for hym: and holde thee only to hym to thy lyves end? Respondeat mulier hoc modo: I wyll.

'I N. take the N. to my weddyd husbonde to have and to holde fro thys day for bether, for wurs, for richer, for porer, in sykenesse and in helthe, to be bonour and buxum in bed and at bort: tyll deth us departe yf holy chyrche wol it ordeyne: and ther to I plycht the my trouth.

'With this rynge I wedde the, and with this gold and silver I honoure the, and with this gyft I honoure the. In nomine Patris: et Filii: et Spiritus Sancti. Amen.'

The middle of the Fourteenth Century was the time when English, as it were, made a fresh start, and was prized by high and low alike. I take what follows from an old Lollard work, put forth about 1450 and printed eighty years later, when the term Lollard was being swallowed up by the term Lutheran: Sir William Thorisby archebishop of Yorke1 did do draw a treatyse in englishe by a worshipfull clercke whose name was Gatryke, in the whiche were conteyned the articles of beleve, the seven dedly synnes, the seven workes of mercy, the X commaundmentes. And sent them in small pagines to the commyn people to learne it and to knowe it, of which yet many a copye be in england. . . . Also it is knowen to many men in ye tyme of King Richerd ye II. yat into a parlement was put a bible

This Prelate, in 1361, began the choir of York Minster.

(bill) by the assent of II archbisshops and of the clergy to adnulle the bible that tyme translated into Englishe with other Englishe bookes of the exposicion off the gospells; whiche when it was harde and seyn of lordes and of the comones, the duke of Lancaster Jhon answered thereto ryght sharpely, sayenge this sentence: We will not be refuse of all other nacions; for sythen they have Goddes law whiche is the lawe of oure belefe in there owne langage, we will have oures in Englishe whosoever say naye. And this he affermyd with a great othe. Also Thomas Arundell Archebishoppe of Canterbury sayde in a sermon at Westmester at the buryenge of Quene Anne, that it was more joye of here than of any woman that ever he knewe. For she an alien borne hadde in englishe all the IIII gospels with the doctours upon them. And he said that she had sent them to him to examen and he saide that they were good and trewe.' 1 Here we see that English had kept its ground in the Palace; an intrusion which would have seemed strange, I suspect, to Edward the Second, the grandfather of stout Duke John. Not long after the Duke's death, an inscription in English was graven upon the brass set up in Higham Ferrars church to the memory of Archbishop Chicheley's brother.

We have seen what was the language of the Church in the days of Richard II.; we now turn to the speech of the Court. England had the honour of giving birth to one of the two great poets of the Middle Ages, of the

1 Arber's Reprint of Rede me and be nott wrothe, page 176. In page 157 will be found a Fifteenth Century pun: the endowing of the clergy should be called all amiss,' rather than 'almes.'

T

two bright stars that enlighten the darksome gap of fourteen hundred years between Juvenal and Ariosto. Dante had been at work upon the loftiest part of his Divina Commedia at the precise time that Manning was compiling his Handlyng Synne, the first thoroughlyformed pattern of the New English; the great Italian was now to be followed by a Northern admirer, of a somewhat lower order of genius indeed, but still a bard who ranks very high among poets of the second class. Chaucer was born at London, a city that boasts a more tuneful brood than any single spot in the world; for this early bard was to have for his fellow-townsmen Spenser, Milton, Pope, and Byron. Never has English life been painted in more glowing hues than by Chaucer; his lines will be more long-lived than the frescoes of Orcagna, which are dropping off the Pisan cloister ; though poet and painter belong to the same date.

Chaucer has many new forms; such as gossib (as well as godsib), harwed instead of the old heregede, arowe (sagitta) instead of arwe. He led the fashion of doubling the vowel o, for he has both the old stôl and the new stool. He turns the old tôh into tough, akern into acorn. Indeed there are whole sentences in his writings, especially in the Parson's prose sermon, that need but the change of a few letters to be good modern English, spelling and all. He follows Manning's way of writing syn, or rather sin, for quoniam. In one of the earliest sentences of the Parson's attack on Pride, we find the words, 'those bountees ... that he hath not;' but this corruption as yet comes very seldom,

We see many new phrases like, what ails him? now