PERSONAL

Me, Bede, the servant of God, and priest of the monastery of the blessed apostles, Peter and Paul, which is at Wearmouth and Jarrow, who being born in the territory of that same monastery, was given, at seven years of age, to be educated by the most reverend Abbot Benedict, and afterwards by Ceolfrid; and spending all the remaining time of my life in that monastery, I wholly applied myself to the study of Scripture, and amidst the observance of regular discipline, and the daily care of singing in the church, I always took delight in learning, teaching, and writing. In the nineteenth year of my age, I received deacon's orders; in the thirtieth, those of the priesthood, both of them by the ministry of the most reverend Bishop John, and by order of the Abbot Ceolfrid. From which time, till the fifty-ninth year of my age, I have made it my business, for the use of me and mine, to compile out of the works of the venerable Fathers, and to interpret and explain according to their meaning. BEDE, 731, Ecclesiastical History, bk. v, ch. xxiv, (A. D. 731), ed. Giles, p. 297.

One of the last things he did was the translating of the Gospel of St. John into English. When death seized on him, one of his devout scholars, whom he used for his secretary or amanuensis, complained, "My beloved master, there remains yet one sentence unwritten." "Write it, then, quickly," replied Bede, and, summoning all his spirits together, like the last blaze of a candle going out, he indited it, and expired. . . . Nor have I aught else to observe of Bede, save only this: A foreign ambassador, some two hundred years since, coming to Durham, addressed himself first to the high and sumptuous shrine of St. Cuthbert, "If thou beest a saint, pray for me;" then, coming to the plain, low, and little tomb of Bede, "Because," said he, "thou art a saint, good Bede, pray for me."-FULLER, THOMAS, 1655, The Church History of Britain, ed. Nichols, bk. ii, sec. iii, par. 18.

Never, perhaps, was name more appropriately conferred than was that of the child Bede. In Anglo-Saxon it means "prayer," and was thoroughly indicative of the spirit which guided its possessor.-DOUGHERTY, J. J., 1882, A True Monk-The Venerable Bede, Catholic World vol. 34, p. 559.

Of the well-known line inscribed to Bede's memory in Durham Cathedral, where his bones lay till, in the days of Henry VIII., their rich shrine was broken, and the bones themselves were scattered by the mob, there is a legend that might well be true if angels took part in the affairs of men. A pupil who had been chosen to write his master's epitaph laboured in vain to complete the hexameter line in which he was to record that "In this grave are the bones of Bede." He fell asleep over his toil at the unfinished line

Ossa."

"Hac sunt in fossa, Bedæ But an angel bent over the sleeping youth, and with a pencil of light supplied the missing word. The student awoke and read, "Hac sunt in fossa, Bedæ Venerabilis ossa." England has ratified the title, and to the end of time his countrymen will look back with affectionate honour to the sinless student-life of Venerable Bede.-MORLEY, HENRY, 1888, English Writers, vol. II, p. 157.

Such a man would not, of course, be a Chrysostom or an Ambrose, dealing with sinners in corrupt cities. His was rather the oratory which corresponds to that of an Oxford or Cambridge universitypreacher, dealing with theological themes for the defence and confirmation of the faith. Forty-seven of his sermons are on the course of the ecclesiastical year, setting forth objective truths in the order of the calendar, in a scholarly and practical way. Twenty-two belong to the Lenten season, and forty-eight were delivered on days commemorating the saintly characters who have been eminent enough to be canonized in the good opinion of succeeding ages. Twenty more of a different character are manifestly intended for country congregations. It was in the darkest period of letters that this man became the embodiment of what learning survived the decay of Roman literature. And if as an orator he cannot be ranked with the great preachers of the fourth century, he certainly kept alive the spark of eloquence until better conditions for it appeared.--SEARS, LORENZO, 1895, The History of Oratory, p. 178.

Bede died on May 25, A. D. 735, on Wednesday evening before Ascension Day, "after the first Vespers of our LORD'S Ascension," whence he is said to have

died on the Feast of Ascension, because our Saxon ancestors reckoned Festivals from the first Vespers. His remains were first deposited in the south Porch of the Church. Thence they were removed to a more honourable situation within the Church. Elfrid, a priest of Durham, who had been accustomed to offer up his prayers at Bede's tomb annually on the anniversary of his death, stole his remains, and carried them off to Durham. There he secreted them in the coffin of S. Cuthbert. Here they remained, the theft not being discovered, till A. D. 1104, when they were separated from S. Cuthbert's relics; and fifty years later Hugh Pudsey erected a most beautiful shrine of gold and silver, adorned with jewels, in which he enclosed them. This shrine was pillaged and demolished in King Henry VIII. time. A long inscription now alone remains in Durham Cathedral, concluding with the well-known rhyme,

"Hac sunt in fossâ,

Bede venerabilis Ossa." -ADAMS, D. C. O., 1897, The Saints and Missionaries of the Anglo-Saxon Era, First Series, p. 456.

ECCLESIASTICAL HISTORY

The profoundest scholar in his age, for Latin, Greek, philosophy, history, divinity, mathematics, music, and what not? Homilies of his making were read in his lifetime, in the Christian churches; a dignity afforded to him alone. We are much beholding to his "Ecclesiastical History,' written by him, and dedicated to Ceolwolfus, king of Northumberland. A worthy work, indeed; though, in some respect, we could heartily wish that his faith had been less, and his charity more. -FULLER, THOMAS, 1655, The Church History of Britain, ed. Nichols, bk. ii, sec. iii, par. 15.

Is his only work which is now read. He candidly cites the authorities, on which his narrative rests, and as these were sometimes oral, they might be fallacious; but no better could be found. The credulity of Bede is seen in the admission of idle tales into a history, which, in other respects, merits the highest praise. For my part, I should lament, had the historian of those times been guided, in the selection of his materials, by a more discriminating scepticism; for we should have wanted a just transcript of the age in which he

lived; and might even have doubted the authenticity of the composition. As it is, we see what was at that period the superstitious character of our ancestors; and in the historian we behold a man, endowed with great talents, and possessed of extraordinary erudition, but in those habits of his mind-in which virtue was not concerned-not less weak nor credulous than his contemporaries. . . . The style of Bede is sufficiently perspicuous and flowing, but not always pure, and seldom elegant.-BERINGTON, JOSEPH, 1814, A Literary History of the Middle Ages, p. 144.

The author received secondary evidence with caution, for he distinguishes between the statements which he received from

eye-witnesses, and those which reached him through a succession of informants. In the last of these instances, the channel of information is always pointed out with scrupulous exactness, whatever opinion we may entertain, as in the case of some visions and miracles, of the credibility. of the facts themselves. STEVENSON, JOSEPH, 1838, ed. Beda Historia Ecclesiastica Gentis Anglorum, etc., Preface.

The style of Bede, if not elegant Latin, is yet correct, sufficiently classical. It is a written style, such as was learnt in the cloister schools by the help of Donatus. and the Rhetorica of Cicero, and matured by reading the Latin fathers, St. Augustine, and St. Ambrose. Bede viewed the world only from the retirement of his cell. He knew events chiefly as they appeared in books. Even the history of his own time is drawn from what was communicated to him. So that, however correct it may be, it wants that truth of delineation which can only be given by one who has been himself an agent in the scenes he describes.-PATTISON, MARK, 1845, Gregory of Tours, Christian Remembrancer; also Essays, vol. I, p. 13.

Thus was the time of that excellent man employed in doing good to mankind, seldom or never moving beyond the limits of his own monastery, and yet in the dark cloister of it surveying the whole world, and dispensing to it the gifts entrusted to him; it seems not a little surprising, that one who had scarcely moved away from the place of his nativity, should so accurately describe those at a distance; and this quality in his writings, when considered

with reference to the age in which he lived, is the more remarkable, as there is but one other recorded in history who possessed it in equal perfection,—the immortal Homer.-GILES, J. A., 1847, ed. The Venerable Bede's Ecclesiastical History of England, Preface, p. xv.

Pre-eminently a teacher, not a thinker. He had high powers of arrangement and exposition. His style is nervous and good, with scarcely any admixture of barbarisms; and his patience and love of truth leading him to collect knowledge from all quarters, have made his "Ecclesiastical History" of inestimable value. -PEARSON, CHARLES H., 1867, History of England During the Early and Middle Ages, vol. 1, p. 302.

From the first the "Ecclesiastical History" of Bede has always been regarded as a work of the highest interest. After the lapse of several centuries it was still looked upon as the model of what a history ought to be, and after which other histories ought to be written. It was translated by the great king Alfred into the vernacular English of his own day, and it has been frequently translated since. No one, indeed, can be indifferent to such a remarkable record of the dawn of Christian civilization in this country, written so near the time itself by one of the most vigorous and many-sided intellects that England ever produced.-GAIRDNER, JAMES, 1879, Early Chroniclers of Europe, England, p. 28.

He lacks art, but not straightforwardness.―JUSSERAND, J. J., 1895, A Literary History of the English People, p. 67.

Of the "Ecclesiastical History," it is difficult to over-estimate the value. Perhaps those alone can fully appreciate its worth whose business it has been to investigate the original sources from which our knowledge of the early Church, and, it may be added, of the mediæval Church in England, is derived. A feeling of utter blank comes over them when Bede's "History" ends, and they are forced to have recourse to less trustworthy sources of information. It is not criticism, but sheer philistinism, to cavil at the simplicity-call it credulity, if you will with which he records in perfect good faith the countless miracles attributed to his heroes; or at the prejudices which he shows against the British, and

to a less extent against the Irish or Celtic, Church; or at the artless way in which he connects natural phenomena, such as comets and eclipses, with coming evil. It is quite easy, by the exercise of a little acumen, to disentangle the historical from the legendary, and to make due allowance for the natural prepossessions of a writer brought up in the school of Benedict Biscop. And when this is done, you. have not only a most vivid and fascinating narrator, but a most honest and trustworthy guide.-OVERTON, JOHN HENRY, 1897, The Church in England, vol. I, p. 101.

GENERAL

This venerable man divided the lifegiving bread of the Old and New Testament among the children of Christ, by his lucid commentaries, explaining in his works more than sixty mysterious subjects, and thus gained lasting honour, both in his own and foreign countries.ORDERICUS VITALIS, 1141, The Ecclesiastical History of England and Normandy, tr. Forester, vol. II, p. 38.

A man whom it is easier to admire than worthily to extol: who, though born in a remote corner of the world, was able to dazzle the whole earth with the brilliancy of his learning. . . . Here my abilities fail, here my eloquence falls short: ignorant which to praise most, the number of his writings, or the gravity of his style. No doubt he had imbibed a large portion of heavenly wisdom, to be able to compose so many volumes within the limits of so short a life. With this man was buried almost all knowledge of history down to our times, inasmuch as there has been no Englishman either emulous of his pursuits, or a follower of his graces, who could continue the thread of his discourse. WILLIAM OF MALMESBURY, C. 1142, Chronicle of the Kings of England, bk. i, ch. iii, tr. Sharpe, pp. 54, 57, 60.

An account of his writings is an account of the English learning in that age, taken in its most advantageous view. On the whole, though this father of the English learning seems to have been but a genius of the middle class, neither elevated nor subtile, and one who wrote in a low style, simple, but not elegant, yet, when we reflect upon the time in which he lived, the place in which he spent his whole life, within the walls of a monastery,

in so remote and wild a country, it is impossible to refuse him the praise of an incredible industry and a generous thirst of knowledge.-BURKE, EDMUND, 1769?, An Abridgment of English History, Works, vol. VII, pp. 250, 253.

The style of Bede in all his works is plain and unaffected. Attentive only to his matter, he had little solicitude for the phrase in which he dressed it. But though seldom eloquent, and often homely, it is clear, precise, and useful.-TURNER, SHARON, 1799-1836, The History of the Anglo-Saxons, vol. III, bk. ix, ch. vi.

Shone like a single star, serene in a night of darkness.-SOUTHEY, ROBERT, 1821, A Vision of Judgment, ix.

The Venerable Bede, as he was afterwards styled, early in the eighth century, surpasses every other name of our ancient literary annals; and, though little more than a diligent compiler from older writers, may perhaps be reckoned superior to any man whom the world (so low had the East sunk like the West) then possessed. HALLAM, HENRY, 1837-39, Introduction to the Literature of Europe, pt. i, ch. i, par. 7.

That primeval gossiper.-DISRAELI, ISAAC, 1841, Cadmon and Milton, Amenities of Literature.

The reputation of Beda survived and grew after his death. The Saxons were proud that their nation had produced so eminent a writer; the monks of Wearmouth and Jarrow were harassed with solicitations for copies of his works; and, at the distance of a hundred years, the prelates of the Franks, in the council of Aix-la-Chapelle, numbered him among the Fathers of the church, and styled him the venerable and admirable doctor. If the improvements of modern times have diminished the value of his writings, this circumstance ought no more to detract from his merit than it does from that of the philosophers of Greece and Rome. Beda was a great man for the age in which he lived; he would have been so had he lived in any other age.-LINGARD, JOHN, 1844, The History and Antiquities of the Anglo-Saxon Church, vol. II., p. 183.

Bede was the parent of theology in England. The theology of Bede flowed directly from the fountain of Christian doctrine, the sacred writings.

It consists in commentaries on the whole Bible. But his interpretation is that which now prevailed universally in the Church. By this the whole volume is represented as a great allegory. Bede probably did little more than select from the more popular Fathers, what appeared to him the most subtle and ingenious, and therefore most true and edifying exposition. Even the New Testament, the Gospels, and Acts, have their hidden and mysterious, as well as their historical signification. No word but enshrines a religious and typical sense.--MILMAN, HENRY HART, 1854, History of Latin Christianity, vol. II, p. 92.

Born at the end of the Christian world, and of a race which half a century before his birth was still plunged in the darkness of idolatry, at once reveals himself clothed in the fulness of all enlightenment known to his time. He was for Eng

land what Cassiodorus was for Italy and St. Isidore for Spain. But he had, in addition, an influence and echo beyond his own country which has been surpassed by none: his influence upon Christendom was as rapid as it was extensive, and his works, which soon found a place in all the monastic libraries of the West, brought down his fame to the period of the Renaissance. He wrote at his pleasure in prose or verse, in Anglo-Saxon and in Latin; and many of his writings prove that he was acquainted with Greek. The greater part of his works were devoted to theology and its cognate studies. Far from con

fining himself to theology, he wrote with success upon astronomy and meteorology, physics and music, philosophy and geography, arithmetic and rhetoric, grammar and versification, without omitting medicine, and without disdaining to descend even to orthography and numeration. Hist treatises have almost always the form of abridgments or catechisms adapted to the education of his monastic disciples. He thus penetrated, with a bold and unwearying step, into all the paths then open. to the human intelligence, with a clearness and extent of vision truly surprising for the age and circumstances under which he lived. He thus won the name of Father of English learning, given to him by the greatest of modern Englishmen. -MONTALEMBERT, CHARLES FORBES, 1860-68, The Monks of the West, vol. v, pp. 58,59,60.