for what purpose it was written, or to point out any parallel case; but it is still more difficult to imagine why (if Asser the biographer and Asser bishop of Sherborne be the same) its author, who lived nine years after Alfred's death, did not complete it. When we examine the book itself, we see at once that it does not support its own character; it has the appearance of an unskilful compilation of history and legend. Asser's life of Alfred consists of two very distinct parts; first, a chronicle of events, strictly historical, from 851 to 887; and, secondly, a few personal anecdotes of Alfred, which are engrafted upon the chronicle at the years 866 and 884, without any particular reference to those years, and at the conclusion. No person can compare the first, or strictly historical part of the work, with the Saxon Chronicle, without being convinced that it is a mere translation from the corresponding part of that document, which was most probably not in existence till long after Alfred's death.

If the suspicions of the authenticity of this biography be well founded, its historical value is considerably diminished, although it is not entirely destroyed. It contains interesting traditions relating to Alfred's life and character, many of which were without doubt true in substance; while our opinion of Alfred will be rather elevated, than lowered, by the right which is thus given us to separate the legendary matter from the truth. There is nothing remarkable in the style of the book attributed to Asser.-WRIGHT, THOMAS, 1842, Biographia Britannica Literaria, vol 1, pp. 408-412.

Though most of the public events recorded in this book are to be found in the Saxon Chronicle, yet for many interesting circumstances in the life of our great Saxon king we are indebted to this biography alone. But, as if no part of history is ever to be free from suspicion, or from difficulty, a doubt has been raised concerning the authenticity of this work.

As the work has been edited by Petrie, so has it been here translated, and the reader, taking it upon its own merits, will find therein much of interest about our glorious king, concerning whom he will lament with me that all we know is so little, so unsatisfying.-GILES, J. A., 1848, ed. Six Old English Chronicles, Preface, p. vi.

Although Alfred lived at a time when our perception of his individuality is not obscured by the shadowy clouds of tradition, and in a country where the sober prose of reality had early taken the place of all the poetry of more southern lands, yet he was never fortunate enough to find a Cassiodorus or an Eginhard amongst those by whom he was surrounded. At the first glance, indeed, Asser might be compared with the latter; but, if the Gesta Alfredi is somewhat more closely observed, one doubt after another will arise, whether, in the form which is preserved to us, this can really be the work of that bishop who was so trusted by his king. Criticism has been frequently employed on this little book, but it has never decided the important question. For my own part, I shall not undertake to solve such a problem in its full extent; and I doubt much whether it is possible to determine the point with absolute certainty. I find, so far, that, with the single exception of Thomas Wright, in the "Biographia Literaria Britannica, I., 405413," no one has thought of denying the authenticity of the book; the best English and German authors rather maintain that it was really written by Asser, and is our best authority for the life of this great king.-PAULI, GEORG REINHOLD, 1851-3, Life of Alfred the Great, p. 3.

Matthew of Westminster; Ingulphus, the author of the "Life of St. Neots;" Simon Dunel; William of Malmesbury; Roger of Wendover; Roger de Hoveden; Henry of Huntingdon; John Harding, or Capgrave, who wrote in the 14th or 15th century; Grafton; Fabian, or Rastul, who wrote 1529; and indeed numbers of those upon whom we are bound to depend for our notions of history, all are equally silent as to Asser and his history. It has even been questioned seriously whether there ever was an Asser, Bishop of Sherborne; but that is going too far. If we can credit any fact of that period, we can believe in the bishop; and we know just enough about him to make it probable that any forger knowing as much would. deem him a proper person upon whose reputation to pin the history.-YEATMAN, JOHN PYM, 1874, An Introduction to the Study of Early English History, p. 306.

We pass over an interval of nearly two hundred years before we come to another

historian of real graphic power. have we even then a great historian, much less a man of anything like Bede's comprehensiveness and universality of

mind.

He is, in fact, not an historian at all, but only a biographer; his work is little more than a fragment, of which a very small portion is original, and the interest of it is mainly due to the genuine greatness of the man whom he describes to us. Nevertheless, Asser's "Life of Alfred" is by no means contemptible, even as a literary composition; and if it is seldom studied in the original, some part of its contents is known to all and related in other language to children. in the nursery at this day.-GAIRDNER, JAMES, 1879, Early Chroniclers of Europe, England, p. 30.

In 1574 appeared Parker's edition of Asser's Life of Alfred, and we read in Strype that "of this edition of Asserius there had been great expectation among the learned." We can add, that of this edition the interest is not yet extinct.

I venture to think that the internal evidence corresponds to the author's name, that it was written at the time of, and by such a person as, Alfred's Welsh bishop. The evident acquaintance with people and with localities, the bits of Welsh, the calling of the English uniformly "Saxons," all mark the Welshman who was at home in England. In the course of this biography, which seems to have been left in an unfinished state, there is a considerable extract from the Winchester Chronicles translated into Latin. EARLE, JOHN, 1884, Anglo-Saxon Literature, pp. 43, 183.

We have little reason to doubt that the bulk of the book is by the man whose name it bears. Additions have probably been made to it, legends inserted, events coloured and heightened to glorify the King, but on the whole its record is historical, and contemporary with Ælfred. -BROOKE, STOPFORD A., 1898, English Literature from the Beginning to the Norman Conquest, p. 237, note.

A strenuous bishop, zealous without dread of person, and for aught appears, the best of many ages, if he busied not himself too much in secular affairs. MILTON, JOHN, 1670, History of Britain, bk. vi

Relatively to the times then, when the smallest ascent above the common level of gross ignorance, excited wonder, we may readily allow, that the archbishop. was an accomplished man; and the marvellous tales, with which the histories of his life abound, are not necessary to convince us that, in other respects, he was great and good; however much certain parts of his public conduct, when he came

into power, may by some have been deemed deserving of censure. -BERINGTON, JOSEPH, 1814, A Literary History of the Middle Ages, p. 200.

Urged by Ambition, who with subtlest skill
Changes her means, the Enthusiast as a dupe
Shall soar, and as a hypocrite can stoop,
And turn the instruments of good to ill,
Moulding the credulous people to his will.
Such DUNSTAN:-from its Benedictine coop
Issues the master Mind, at whose fell swoop
The chaste affections tremble to fulfil
Their purposes. Behold, pre-signified,
The Might of spiritual sway! his thoughts,
his dreams,

Do in the supernatural world abide:

So vaunt a throng of Followers, filled with pride

In what they see of virtues pushed to extremes,

And sorceries of talent misapplied. -WORDSWORTH, WILLIAM, 1821-22, Ecclesiastical Sonnets, pt. i, xxviii.

The spirit lives on in spite of selfdestructive falsehood, and of metamorphoses supplanting one another, and the mind and works of Dunstan have outlived the Anglo-Saxon language and dynasty, and even catholicism itself in England; nor can their influence at the present day be denied by the Anglican church, nor by dissenters, even quakers, who, like Dunstan, are earnestly desirous for what to them appears the truest and the best. LAPPENBERG, JOHANN MARTIN, 1834-37, A History of England under the AngloSaxon Kings, tr. Thorpe, vol. II, p. 148.

The whole tenour of Dunstan's life shows that his mind was distinguished more by its extraordinary activity, than by a tendency to solitude and contemplation; his leisure employments were chiefly works of the hand, the mechanical sciences and the fine arts. Yet he appears to have been a man of considerable learning, and not devoid of literary taste. Although he regarded the Scriptures, and the writings of the theologians, as the grand object of study to Christians, yet he taught that the writings of the poets and other ancient authors were not to be neglected, because they tended to polish the minds, and improve the style of those who read them.

His favourite studies were arithmetic, with geometry, astronomy, and music, the quadrivium of the schools, the highest and most difficult class of scholastic accomplishments. He is said to have imbibed his taste from the Irish monks, who cultivated science with more zeal than literature. He also employed much time in his youth in writing and illuminating books, and in making ornaments of different kinds, for he excelled in drawing and sculpture. He appears to have possessed little taste for literary compositions, for we hear nothing of his skill in poetry, he attained no reputation for eloquence, and the writings which have been attributed to him, of little importance in their character, are such as would have originated in the necessity of the moment. But his influence on the literature of his country was great; the innumerable monasteries which grew up

To put the glorious charge to try with fire,
To winnow and to purge. I hear you call!
A radiance and a resonance from heaven
Surrounds me, and my soul is breaking forth
In strength, as did the new-created sun
When earth beheld it first on the fourth day.
God spake not then more plainly to that orb
Than to my spirit now. I hear the call

TAYLOR, SIR HENRY, 1842, Edwin the Fair.

Since the Reformation, it has been a favourite occupation with many writers to tear from his grave the laurels planted upon it by the gratitude of his contemporaries. There is, however, something very suspicious in that sagacity which, at the distance of several hundred years, pretends to see more deeply and more clearly into the character of a man than was seen by those who lived at the same time, and who profited by his services; and that sagacity becomes still more suspicious, when the only proof which wer have of its existence, is a determination to attribute to selfish or odious motives, actions of themselves the most harmless, often the most praisworthy. - LINGARD, JOHN, 1844, The History and Antiquities of the Anglo-Saxon Church, vol. II, p. 244.

We may fully admit Dunstan's sincerity. Riches he utterly despised--when in his cell, he bestowed the whole of his ample patrimony, as well as the other great property which he acquired by bequests, upon the monastery. He had mortified

his flesh, subdued his appetites and passions; and, from a deep sense of duty, however mistaken, he had abandoned that which was dearest to him in the world. But this painful process had left terrible effects behind; his heart was now seared against all those affections and feelings of humanity, which connect us with our fellow creatures, and afford the best means of testifying our love toward our common father. His mind was narrowed to the compass of his order; and the single object of his existence was, the establishment of the Benedictine rule and the extension of the Papal power.-PALGRAVE, FRANCIS, 1850, A History of the AngloSaxons, p. 200.

But in the year 988, when his lifework was finished, and the worn-out, weary servant was awaiting his summons, he was at Canterbury, a fine noble-looking old man, to be seen haunting the cathedral aisles, muttering his prayers as he passed, or musing dreamily of by-gone times at the tomb of his friend and predecessor, Odo the Good. His career had been a glorious one; he had been the companion and even the maker of kings; his life had been spent in the whirl of courts; in his hands he had held the reins of government; he had purged the Church of what he honestly thought a scandalous vice; he had quelled internal dissensions, had kept foreign depredators at bay, and now he had crept back to his church like a weary pilgrim, to lay down his bones at the altar of his Master, whom he had so long served, the fires of ambition all burnt

On

out of him, and the soul longing to be free. The unseen messenger came. the day of Ascension he preached his last sermon, and gave the people his last public blessing; his subject was the Incarnation; he told his auditors they would. never hear him again; and as he was returning through the church, indicated the spot where he should be buried. The greatest man of his age, greatest churchman, and greatest statesman. He stands out boldly on the page of history even now, though nearly a thousand years. have crowded that page with a multitude of names and figures; still towering above the mass he is prominent as the earliest of a long list of great ecclesiastical statesmen, numbering such spirits as Hildebrand, Mazarin, Wolsey, and Richelieu, men who have impressed their characters upon their age, who with one hand upheld the Church, and with the other guided the State. HILL, O'DELL TRAVERS, 1867, English Monasticism, pp. 168, 169.

St. Dunstan, patron saint of goldsmiths and jewellers. He was a smith, and worked up all sorts of metals in his cell near Glastonbury Church. It was in this cell that, according to legend, Satan had a gossip with the saint, and Dunstan caught his sable majesty by the nose with a pair of red-hot forceps.-BREWER, E. COBHAM, 1880, The Reader's Handbook, p. 280.

There are not many men who can boast on laying down their work that so much of it has been good.-WAKEMAN, HENRY OFFLEY, 1896, An Introduction to the History of the Church of England, p. 72.

name.

I, Elfric, monk and mass-priest, although more weakly than for such orders is fitting, was sent in King Ethelred's days to a certain minster which is called Cernel, at the request of Ethelmaer, the thegn, whose borth and goodness are everywhere known. Then it occurred to my mind, I trust through God's grace, that I would turn this book from Latin speech into English. ELFRIC, 990, Homilies, Preface.

This Alfric was a very wise man, so that there was no sager man in England. THE ANGLO-SAXON CHRONICLE, 995 ed., Giles, p. 391.

The learned energy of his earlier years has, indeed, rarely been surpassed; and although, like other Anglo-Saxons, he wrote but little quite original, yet, considering the time of his appearance, he has fully earned a foremost rank in the literature of England. SOAMES, HENRY, 1835, The Anglo-Saxon Church, p. 189.

After the name of Alfred, that of Alfric stands first among the Anglo-Saxon vernacular writers, both for the number and the importance of his works. WRIGHT, THOMAS, 1842, Biographia Britannica Literaria, vol. I, p. 61.

equally exhibit

His sermons what were the doctrines of the AngloSaxon church at the period in which they were compiled or translated, and are for the most part valuable in matter, and expressed in language which may be pronounced a pure specimen of our noble, old, Germanic mother tongue. THORPE, BENJAMIN, 1844, ed., The Homilies of the Anglo-Saxon Church, vol. 1, Preface.

So far as we can follow the busy career of Elfric, he was always the same in his aims, his ideas, and the manner of bringing them into practice. His knowledge might increase, his arguments might gain depth and stringency, but the essence of his nature, as of his writings, remained the same. He appears to us from the beginning a finished, completely developed personality. Even his style is as lucid, fluent, and upon occasion as forcible, in

the first collection of homilies as in his latest writings, although his command of language and of alliteration increased as time went on. In regard to his art, it was perhaps unfortunate that Ælfric yielded so early to the allurement of alliteration, which never lost its hold upon him. The writings of the second period, almost without exception, even including the rule of St. Basil and the introduction to the Old and New Testaments, appear with this adornment. The prose expression certainly did not gain precision by this. TEN BRINK, BERNHARD, 1877-83, History of English Literature (To Wiclif), tr. Kennedy, p. 110.

Equally clear in his prose with Alfred and even more poetic and finished, he had to a less degree that masculine vigor that marked the king. Most of his prose is so alliterative as to mar its character and, yet, what he lacks in solidity he supplies in a more modern, lucid and facile expression. HUNT, THEODORE W., 1887, Representative English Prose and Prose Writers, p. 18.

Elfric is altogether the most important writer of the late West-Saxon period.

Elfric's career is conspicuous in its relation to the reform of Dunstan and Æthelwold, and his writings mark a cul

mination in prose style. His language is always clear, and when not forced into an artificial alliterative mould, it is flexible. and forcible.-BRIGHT, JAMES W., 1891, An Anglo-Saxon Reader, pp. 212, 213,

notes.

The best of Elfric's homilies are as good as the best of their kind anywhere. -KER, W. P., 1893, English Prose, ed. Craik, Introduction, vol. 1, p. 6.

Ælfric's style exhibits decided advance over his predecessors in power of graceful transition. One paragraph leads to another, and there are varied devices of explicit reference. LEWIS, EDWIN HERBERT, 1894, The History of the English Paragraph, p. 70.

What Bæda was to England in the eighth, Elfric was to the eleventh century.