PART I.

SUBJECT-MATTER.

CHAPTER I. THE EPIC.

EVERYONE knows that two of the most important factors in human affairs are Church and State. Again, every student of history is aware that the further back we go, the more intimate are the relations between these two great powers. Looking towards the beginnings of civilization, we see the lines of statecraft and priestcraft steadily converging. Where a Gladstone stands to-day, stood, some three centuries ago, a Cardinal Wolsey. In the remote past, in the dawn of history (a relative term, differing with different nations), we find law and religion to be convertible terms. Even in highly-civilized Greece, the Laws cf. Sophocles, Oed. Tyr. 864 sqq.—were sacred. So it was with our own ancestors, the Germanic tribes, whose nature and customs fell under the keen eyes of Tacitus, and are noted down in his Germania. Let us take his description of the Germanic custom of casting lots, a ceremony at once legal and religious. He says (c. 10) that "a branch is cut from a fruit-bearing tree and divided into little blocks, which are distinguished by certain marks, and scattered at random

over a white cloth. Then the state-priest if it is a public occasion, the father of the family if it is domestic, after a prayer to the gods, looking toward heaven, thrice picks up a block. These he now interprets according to the marks previously made." What renders the ceremony of importance to us is the fact that the "interpretation" Tacitus mentions was poetical, and that the "marks" were runes, i.e., the rude alphabet employed by the Germanic tribes. According as these mystic symbols fell, the priest made alliterating verses declaring the result of the ceremony. The letters gave the key to the rimes. Since the beech-tree (Anglo-Sax. bôc, "book," but also "beech," like German Buch and Buche) was a favorite wood for the purpose, and the signs were cut in (A.-S. wrîtan, "cut into," then "write"), we win a new meaning for the phrase "to write a book." Further, to read, really means to interpret, as in the common "rede the riddle." So in the original, literal sense, the priest read the writing of the book. Since he read it poetically, and as a decree of the gods, and as something legally bind. ing on the people, we may assume (bearing in mind the antiquity of priestcraft) that poetry, the earliest form of literature, begins among the priesthood in the service of law and religion. [Cf. p. 3 of the Introduction.]

a

But this unit of sacred law had two sides. On the one hand were such ceremonies as the above, practical use, which concerned the people. Late "survivals" of these rites may still be found in the peasant's hut and in the modern nursery, e.g., the time-honored custom of saying a rime to see who shall be “it” for a game. But on the other hand was formal

- at

worship, the purely religious side. The tribe boasted its origin from a god, and at stated seasons joined in solemn worship of its divine ruler and progenitor. To this god the assembled multitude sang a hymn, first merely chorus, exclamation and incoherent chant, full of repetitions. As they sang, they kept time with the foot in a solemn dance, which was inseparable from the chant itself and governed the words (cf. our metrical term "foot"). As order and matter penetrated this wild ceremony, there resulted a rude hymn, with intelligible words and a connecting idea. Naturally this connecting idea would concern the deeds of the god,— his birth and bringing up and his mighty acts. Thus a thread of legend would be woven into the hymn,

a thread fastened at one end to the human associations of the tribe, but losing itself in the uncertainty of a miraculous and superhuman past.

But a third element comes in. Besides the legendary thread, we have the mythological. In order to explain the natural processes about him, early man peopled the universe with a multitude of gods. Or, to speak more clearly, he attributed will and passion to the acts of nature. Something dimly personal stood behind the flash of lightning, the roaring of the wind. The ways and doings of these nature-gods were set in order, and, of course, were in many cases brought in direct connection with the tribal or legendary god. Hence a second sort of thread woven into the hymn, mythology. But both legend and mythology are narrative. The hymn thus treated ceased to be a mere hymn. The chorus and the strophe were dropped; instead of sets of verses (strophe) the verses ran on in

unbroken row. Single persons (minstrels) took the place of the dancing multitude, and chanted in a sort of "recitative," some song full of myth and legend, but centred in the person of the tribal god. Now what is such a song? It is The Epic. [Epic, from Greek Epos, a "word," then a "narration": cf. Sagâ something said.]

=

It is important to remember that the Epic was not the result of that individual effort to which we now give the name of poetical composition.

To use Mr. Tylor's words (Primitive Culture, I. 273), epic poetry goes back "to that actual experience of nature and life which is the ultimate source of human fancy." Perhaps "source" is not quite accurate; we should prefer to say that it is experience of nature and experience of life (¿.e., mythology and legend), which awaken and stimulate the inborn human fancy, that is, the creative power of poetry. This creative power, in early times, when the great epics were forming, when their materials were gradually drawing together, lay rather in the national life itself than in any individual. There were no poets, only singers. The race or nation was the poet. For the final shape in which these epics come down to us, we must assume the genius of a singer-poet.

We note further that the personages of the Epic must be humanized, — ¿.e., partake of our passions and other characteristics. Otherwise they could not awaken human interest. But the background across which these huge beings move must be the twilight of legend and myth. Instead of taking the Homeric poems as illustration, we prefer to give a brief outline of our own. national epic, — Beowulf.

[Beowulf, the only complete epic preserved from Anglo-Saxon heathen poetry, is based on legends and myths that arose among the northern Germanic tribes before the conquest of Britain in the Fifth Century. The poem in its present shape was probably composed at one of the Northumbrian courts before the Eighth Century. The Ms. is a West Saxon copy of the Tenth Century. There are besides a few fragments preserved. Probably many other AngloSaxon epics were lost in the wholesale and wanton destruction of Mss. when the monasteries were broken up under Henry VIII.]

The story of Beowulf is now becoming familiar to all readers; we give a bare outline. A powerful king of the Danes (Hrôthgâr) builds a banquet-hall. But he does not enjoy it long. A dreaded monster (Grendel) lives in the neighboring fen, and hears with envious heart the sounds of revelry. So he comes at dead of night, enters the hall, seizes thirty of the sleeping vassals, and bears them off to be devoured in his home. Nothing can withstand him. The banquet-hall lies empty and useless. Over the sea lives a hero who is moved to help Hrôthgâr. The hero's name is Beowulf. He bids his men make ready a boat, and with fourteen vassals puts to sea. He arrives at Hrôthgâr's court, and a grand banquet is held in the hall; but at night the Danes retire, leaving Beowulf and his warriors to guard the post of danger. Grendel comes, and a terrific combat follows between him and Beowulf, which ends in victory for the latter. He tears out Grendel's giant arm from its socket; with "shrill death-song" the monster reels away to die amid his fen. That day the Danes and their deliverers rejoice, and there is another feast. The Danes now remain in the hall; Beowulf goes elsewhere. With night comes the mother of Grendel, a huge and terrible monster, to avenge her