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addressed not only to the clergy but also to the laity, "who ought to know the history of their own land." takes pains, as if it were of national interest, to give in full the story of the origin of English poetry. In 891 he began to work the Chronicle up into a national history. The new book Elfred now took in hand, probably in 891-3, was The History of the World, by Orosius, a book originally written in 418 at the suggestion of Augustine, to prove that the wars of the world and decay of the Roman Empire were not due, as the heathen declared, to Christianity.

This was the work of about five years, 888 to 893, years of "stillness" that Elfred loved, years when he nourished the arts of peace and literature, as he had done in wars and government; that "desire I have to leave to men who should live after me a memory of good deeds." He collected poetry Northumbrian poetry - Boda's account of Cædmon would have set him to it. "I should," says Stopford Brooke, "like to have seen Elfred reading Beowulf for the first time, or Asser and Ælfred reading together the Christ of Cynewulf." This was not all; he sang and listened to English song, but cared also for men and things beyond England. He kept open house for all who brought outlandish tales; he received pagan Danes, Britons from Wales, Scots, Armoricans, voyagers from Gaul, Germany, Rome, and messengers from Jerusalem and the far East, and we learn that he sent messengers to visit the Christian churches of India! Christian churches of India! Does not this seem like the foreshadowing of a great and then far-distant future? A foreshadowing of the reunion and commingling of the earliest and latest branches of the Aryan or noble races of humanity? The great Ælfred, full of earnest endeavour for the good of his fellow-men, often wearied out with mental and bodily

suffering, yet spares no pains in the strife with brutality and ignorance; and, in his sorrow, is full of sympathy and love that reach out to the ends of the earth. This seed of love which he sowed in the long-distant past, has it not now grown into a mighty union of nations? India, under her sufferings, loyal to her younger sister-younger at least in civilization and culture-but in her thousand years of vigorous life still old enough to be the little mother of many nations. These children of the East and children of the West, long before the dawn of dated history, had one common origin. Their language still contains words of similar sounds and meaning, showing they are of one family; and many hundreds of years before Elfred, had not India a cultured literature, with poetry and science, aye, even long before the glorious outburst of Greek art, literature, and philosophy?

Pardon this digression.

Elfred neglected not the arts, he developed the art of shipbuilding. He had architects from the continent, was himself an architect. He re-built fortresses; re-built London. He made and repaired roads; built with fair stone royal country-houses. In his reign, enamel work, gold-weaving, and gold-smithery flourished; and certain mechanical inventions were his amusement. Through all this lighter work he pursued the heavier of ruling his kingdom and preparing for wars.

These were his happiest days, but he lived, as he said, "with a naked sword always hanging over his head by a single thread," and his quiet was destroyed when the sword fell in 893. "Hardship and sorrow a king would. wish to be without, but it is not a king's doom," the sorrow came with the pirates from Boulogne, with 250 vessels; they seized on the forest of Andred; and Hastings, with 80 vessels, passed up the Thames. In 894, Hastings got into

Hampshire, and the whole of the Danelaw soon rose and joined the invaders. It was their dying effort. Elfred was well prepared, and the war, though carried to Chester and the North, and to Exeter and the South, was victoriously finished by the capture of the Danish fleet in 897. From that date till his death Ælfred had peace.

The book he now undertook was Boëthius' De Consolatione Philosophia. He had now become an expert in translation, and boldly entered into the soul of the author. Boëthius wrote it in prison where Theodoric, king of the East Goths, had thrown him on a charge of conspiracy. Composed as a comfort in his trouble, it is a dialogue between himself and philosophy, who consoles him for his evil fortune by showing that the only lasting happiness is in the soul. Inward virtue is all, everything else is indifferent. The book is the last effort of heathen philosophy, and so near to a part of Christianity that it may be called the bridge between dying paganism and living Christianity. Many in the middle ages believed Boëthius to be a Christian, and his work was translated into most of the European languages.

We will give a few excerpts from Wise's translation of Ælfred's works in connection with his version by Boëthius.

On Wisdom.-Wisdom is the highest virtue, and he hath in him four other virtues. One is prudence; another moderation; the third is courage; the fourth is righteousness. Wisdom maketh those that love it wise, and worthy, and constant, and patient, and righteous, and with every good habit fitteth him that loveth it. They cannot do this who have the power of this world; nor can they give any virtue from their wealth to those who love them, if they have it not in their nature. From this it is very evident that the powerful in this world's wealth have no appropriate virtue in it; but their wealth comes to them from without, and they can have nothing from without which is their own.

On Glory.-Oh glory of the world! Why do foolish men, with a

G

false voice call thee glory? Thou art not so; far more men have much pomp, much glory, and much worship from the opinion of foolish people than they have from their own works.

On Friends.-True friends !—I say then, that this is the most precious of all the riches of the world. They are not even to be reckoned among the goods of the world, but divine ones, because false fortune can neither bring them nor take them away.

Greed.-Dost mean to be covetous for money? Now thou mayest nohow else get it except thou steal it, or find it hidden, or there increase thyself with it where thou lessen it to others.

Ambition.-Would'st thou now be foremost in dignities? But if thou wilt have them, thou must flatter very miserably and very humbly those that may assist thee to them. If thou wilt make thyself better and worthier than many, then shalt thou let thyself be worse than some. How! is this not then some part of unhappiness that a man so brave should cringe to those that can give it? Desirest thou power? But thou shalt never obtain it free from sorrows from foreign nations, and yet more from thine own men and kindred. Yearnest thou for glory? But thou canst never have it without vexations; for thou wilt always have something contrary and unpleasing.

Lust.-Dost wish to enjoy thy desires unrestrained? But thou wilt despise God's commandments, and thy wearied flesh will rule thee and not thou it. How can a man become more wretched than by being subject to his wearying flesh and not to his reasoning soul? His thoughts on God are entirely his own.

We should with all our power seek after God that we may know Him. Though it should not be our lot to know what He is, yet we should, from the dignity of the understanding which He has given us, try to find out. Every creature discovers that God is eternal! Then, said I, “What is Eternity?" Thou hast asked me a great and difficult thing to comprehend. If thou wilt understand it thou must first have the eyes of thy mind clean and lucid. I may not conceal from thee what I know of this: Know thou that there are three things in this world; one is temporary; to this there is both a beginning and an end; and I know not any creature that is temporary, but hath his beginning and his end. Another thing is eternal which hath a beginning, but hath no end; I know not when it began, but I know that it will never end; such are angels and the souls of men. The third thing is eternal without end, as without beginning:

this is God! Between these three there is very great discrimination. If we were to investigate all this subject, we should come late to the end of this book, or never.

But one thing thou must first know of this-Why is God called the highest Eternity? Because we know very little of that which was before us, except by memory and by asking; and yet we know less of that which will be after us. That alone exists rationally to us which is present, but to Him all is present-which was before, which now is, that which after us will be-all of it is present to Him! His riches increase not, nor do they diminish ever. He never remembers anything, because He never forgets ought. He seeks nothing, nor enquires, because He knows it all. He searches for nothing, because He loses nothing; He pursues no creature, because none can fly from Him; He dreads nothing, because He knows no one more powerful than Himself, nor even like Him. He is always giving, and never wants. He is always Almighty, because He is always good and never evil. To Him there is no need of anything. He is always seeing; He never sleeps; He is always mild and kind; He will always be eternal. Hence there never was a time that He was not, nor ever will be. He is always free. He is not necessitated to do any work. From divine power He is everywhere present. His greatness no man can measure. He is not to be conceived bodily but spiritually, so as now wisdom is and reason. But He is wisdom,

He is reason itself.

One can scarcely believe that we are perusing the written thoughts of an Anglo-Saxon of the ninth century, who could not even read till he was twelve years old!

With this hasty view of King Ælfred's literary and other works, I would conclude this essay with the eulogium on Ælfred in J. R. Green's Conquest of England.

Hardly four years in fact had passed since the triumphs over Hastings when the "stillness" he had sighed for came to him. Ælfred died on the 28th October, 901 (some give 900). "So long as

I have lived," he wrote, as life was closing on him, "I have striven to live worthily." It is this height and singleness of purpose, this concentration of every faculty on the noblest aim, that lifts Elfred out of the narrow bounds of Wessex; for if the sphere of his action seems too small to justify a comparison of him with the few whom