No More Learning

"But in the night, which was with wind
And burning dust, again I creep
Down, having fever, for a drink.
"Now meanwhile had my brethren found
The water-pitcher, where it stood
Behind the door upon the ground,
And called my mother; and they all,
As they were thirsty, and the night
Most sultry, drained the pitcher there;
That they sate with it, in my sight,
Their lips still wet, when I came down.
"Now mark! I, being fevered, sick
(Most unblest also), at that sight
Brake forth, and cursed them-dost thou hear? —
One was my mother- Now, do right! "
But my lord mused a space, and said:-
:-
"Send him away, sirs, and make on!
It is some madman! ” the King said.
As the King bade, so was it done.
The morrow, at the self-same hour,
In the King's path, behold, the man,
Not kneeling, sternly fixed! he stood
Right opposite, and thus began,
Frowning grim down:-"Thou wicked King,
Most deaf where thou shouldst most give ear!
What, must I howl in the next world,
Because thou wilt not listen here?
"What, wilt thou pray, and get thee grace,
And all grace shall to me be grudged?
Nay, but I swear, from this thy path
I will not stir till I be judged! "


## p. 876 (#298) ############################################

876
MATTHEW ARNOLD
Then they who stood about the King
Drew close together and conferred;
Till that the King stood forth and said,
"Before the priests thou shalt be heard. "
But when the Ulemas were met,
And the thing heard, they doubted not;
But sentenced him, as the law is,
To die by stoning on the spot.
Now the King charged us secretly:-
"Stoned must he be, the law stands so.
Yet, if he seek to fly, give way;
Hinder him not, but let him go. "
So saying, the King took a stone,
And cast it softly;- but the man,
With a great joy upon his face,
Kneeled down, and cried not, neither ran.
-
So they, whose lot it was, cast stones,
That they flew thick and bruised him sore,
But he praised Allah with loud voice,
And remained kneeling as before.
My lord had covered up his face;
But when one told him, "He is dead,"
Turning him quickly to go in,-
་་ Bring thou to me his corpse," he said.
-
THE VIZIER
And truly while I speak, O King,
I hear the bearers on the stair;
Wilt thou they straightway bring him in?
-Ho! enter ye who tarry there!
O King, in this I praise thee not.
Now must I call thy grief not wise,
Is he thy friend, or of thy blood,
To find such favor in thine eyes?
Nay, were he thine own mother's son,
Still, thou art king, and the law stands.
It were not meet the balance swerved,
The sword were broken in thy hands.
But being nothing, as he is,
Why for no cause make sad thy face? —


## p. 877 (#299) ############################################

MATTHEW ARNOLD
877
Lo, I am old! Three kings, ere thee,
Have I seen reigning in this place.
But who, through all this length of time,
Could bear the burden of his years,
If he for strangers pained his heart
Not less than those who merit tears?
Fathers we must have, wife and child,
And grievous is the grief for these;
This pain alone, which must be borne,
Makes the head white, and bows the knees.
But other loads than this his own
One man is not well made to bear.
Besides, to each are his own friends,
To mourn with him, and show him care.
Look, this is but one single place,
Though it be great; all the earth round,
If a man bear to have it so,
Things which might vex him shall be found.
All these have sorrow, and keep still,
Whilst other men make cheer, and sing,
Wilt thou have pity on all these?
No, nor on this dead dog, O King!
THE KING
O Vizier, thou art old, I young!
Clear in these things I cannot see.
My head is burning, and a heat
Is in my skin which angers me.
But hear ye this, ye sons of men!
They that bear rule, and are obeyed,
Unto a rule more strong than theirs
Are in their turn obedient made.
In vain therefore, with wistful eyes
Gazing up hither, the poor man
Who loiters by the high-heaped booths,
Below there in the Registàn,
Says: "Happy he, who lodges there!
With silken raiment, store of rice,


## p. 878 (#300) ############################################


878
MATTHEW ARNOLD
And for this drought, all kinds of fruits,
Grape-syrup, squares of colored ice,
With cherries served in drifts of snow. "
In vain hath a king power to build
Houses, arcades, enameled mosques;
And to make orchard-closes, filled
With curious fruit-trees brought from far;
With cisterns for the winter rain;
And in the desert, spacious inns
In divers places-if that pain
Is not more lightened, which he feels,
If his will be not satisfied;
And that it be not, from all time
The law is planted, to abide.
Thou wast a sinner, thou poor man!
Thou wast athirst, and didst not see
That, though we take what we desire,
We must not snatch it eagerly.
And I have meat and drink at will,
And rooms of treasures, not a few,
But I am sick, nor heed I these;
And what I would, I cannot do.
Even the great honor which I have,
When I am dead, will soon grow still;
So have I neither joy nor fame-
But what I can do, that I will.
I have a fretted brickwork tomb
Upon a hill on the right hand,
Hard by a close of apricots,
Upon the road of Samarcand;
Thither, O Vizier, will I bear
This man my pity could not save,
And plucking up the marble flags,
There lay his body in my grave.
Bring water, nard, and linen rolls!
Wash off all blood, set smooth each limb!
Then say: "He was not wholly vile,
Because a king shall bury him. "


## p. 879 (#301) ############################################

MATTHEW ARNOLD
879
THE
DOVER BEACH
HE sea is calm to-night.
The tide is full, the moon lies fair
Upon the straits; -on the French coast the light
Gleams and is gone; the cliffs of England stand,
Glimmering and vast, out in the tranquil bay.
Come to the window, sweet is the night-air!
Only, from the long line of spray
Where the sea meets the moon-blanched sand,
Listen! you hear the grating roar
Of pebbles which the waves draw back, and fling,
At their return, up the high strand,
Begin and cease, and then again begin,
With tremulous cadence slow, and bring
The eternal note of sadness in.
Sophocles long ago
Heard it on the Egean, and it brought
Into his mind the turbid ebb and flow
Of human misery; we
Find also in the sound a thought,
Hearing it by this distant northern sea.
The sea of faith
Was once, too, at the full, and round earth's shore
Lay like the folds of a bright girdle furled.
But now I only hear
Its melancholy, long, withdrawing roar,
Retreating, to the breath
Of the night-wind, down the vast edges drear
And naked shingles of the world.
Ah, love, let us be true
To one another! for the world, which seems
To lie before us like a land of dreams,
So various, so beautiful, so new,
Hath really neither joy, nor love, nor light,
Nor certitude, nor peace, nor help for pain;
And we are here as on a darkling plain
Swept with confused alarms of struggle and flight,
Where ignorant armies clash by night.


## p. 880 (#302) ############################################


880
MATTHEW ARNOLD
WEARY
SELF-DEPENDENCE
EARY of myself, and sick of asking
What I am, and what I ought to be,
At this vessel's prow I stand, which bears me
Forwards, forwards, o'er the starlit sea.
And a look of passionate desire
O'er the sea and to the stars I send:
"Ye who from my childhood up have calmed me,
Calm me, ah, compose me to the end!
Ah, once more," I cried, "ye stars, ye waters,
On my heart your mighty charm renew;
Still, still let me, as I gaze upon you,
Feel my soul becoming vast like you. "
From the intense, clear, star-sown vault of heaven,
Over the lit sea's unquiet way,
In the rustling night-air came the answer:-
"Wouldst thou be as these are? Live as they.
"Unaffrighted by the silence round them,
Undistracted by the sights they see,
These demand not that the things without them
Yield them love, amusement, sympathy.
"And with joy the stars perform their shining,
And the sea its long moon-silvered roll;
For self-poised they live, nor pine with noting
All the fever of some differing soul.
"Bounded by themselves, and unregardful
In what state God's other works may be,
In their own tasks all their powers pouring,
These attain the mighty life you see. "
O air-born voice! long since, severely clear,
:-
A cry like thine in mine own heart I hear:
"Resolve to be thyself; and know that he
Who finds himself, loses his misery! "


## p. 881 (#303) ############################################

MATTHEW ARNOLD
881
I
STANZAS FROM THE GRANDE CHARTREUSE
H, HIDE me in your gloom profound,
Ο" Ye solemn seats of holy pain!
Take me, cowled forms, and fence me round,
Till I possess my soul again;
Till free my thoughts before me roll,
Not chafed by hourly false control!
For the world cries your faith is now
But a dead time's exploded dream;
My melancholy, sciolists say,
Is a passed mood, and outworn theme —
As if the world had ever had
A faith, or sciolists been sad!
Ah, if it be passed, take away
At least the restlessness, the pain!
Be man henceforth no more a prey
To these out-dated stings again!
The nobleness of grief is gone-
Ah, leave us not the fret alone!
But if you cannot give us ease
Last of the race of them who grieve,
Here leave us to die out with these
Last of the people who believe!
Silent, while years engrave the brow;
Silent the best are silent now.
―
Achilles ponders in his tent,
The kings of modern thought are dumb;
Silent they are, though not content,
And wait to see the future come.
They have the grief men had of yore,
But they contend and cry no more.
Our fathers watered with their tears
This sea of time whereon we sail;
Their voices were in all men's ears
Who passed within their puissant hail.
Still the same ocean round us raves,
But we stand mute and watch the waves.
II-56


## p. 882 (#304) ############################################

882
MATTHEW ARNOLD
For what availed it, all the noise
And outcry of the former men? -
Say, have their sons achieved more joys,
Say, is life lighter now than then?
The sufferers died, they left their pain-
The pangs which tortured them remain.
What helps it now that Byron bore,
With haughty scorn which mocked the smart,
Through Europe to the Etolian shore
The pageant of his bleeding heart?
That thousands counted every groan,
And Europe made his woe her own?
What boots it, Shelley! that the breeze
Carried thy lovely wail away,
Musical through Italian trees
Which fringe thy soft blue Spezzian bay?
Inheritors of thy distress,
Have restless hearts one throb the less?
Or are we easier to have read,
O Obermann! the sad, stern page,
Which tells us how thou hidd'st thy head
From the fierce tempest of thine age
In the lone brakes of Fontainebleau,
Or châlets near the Alpine snow?
Ye slumber in your silent grave!
The world, which for an idle day
Grace to your mood of sadness gave,
Long since hath flung her weeds away.
The eternal trifler breaks your spell;
But we -we learnt your lore too well!
Years hence, perhaps, may dawn an age,
More fortunate, alas! than we,
Which without hardness will be sage,
And gay without frivolity.
Sons of the world, oh, speed those years;
But while we wait, allow our tears!


## p. 883 (#305) ############################################

MATTHEW ARNOLD
883
A SUMMER NIGHT
IN
IN THE deserted, moon-blanched street,
How lonely rings the echo of my feet!
Those windows, which I gaze at, frown,
Silent and white, unopening down,
Repellent as the world, but see,
A break between the housetops shows
The moon! and lost behind her, fading dim
Into the dewy dark obscurity
Down at the far horizon's rim,
Doth a whole tract of heaven disclose!
And to my mind the thought
Is on a sudden brought
Of a past night, and a far different scene:
Headlands stood out into the moonlit deep
As clearly as at noon;
The spring-tide's brimming flow
Heaved dazzlingly between;
Houses, with long wide sweep,
Girdled the glistening bay;
Behind, through the soft air,
The blue haze-cradled mountains spread away.
That night was far more fair-
But the same restless pacings to and fro,
And the same vainly throbbing heart was there,
And the same bright, calm moon.
And the calm moonlight seems to say:-
Hast thou then still the old unquiet breast,
Which neither deadens into rest,
Nor ever feels the fiery glow
That whirls the spirit from itself away,
But fluctuates to and fro,
--
Never by passion quite possessed
And never quite benumbed by the world's sway? —
And I, I know not if to pray
Still to be what I am, or yield, and be
Like all the other men I see.
For most men in a brazen prison live,
Where, in the sun's hot eye,
With heads bent o'er their toil, they languidly
Their lives to some unmeaning taskwork give,
Dreaming of naught beyond their prison wall.
And as, year after year,


## p. 884 (#306) ############################################

884
MATTHEW ARNOLD
Fresh products of their barren labor fall
From their tired hands, and rest
Never yet comes more near,
Gloom settles slowly down over their breast.
And while they try to stem
The waves of mournful thought by which they are prest,
Death in their prison reaches them,
Unfreed, having seen nothing, still unblest.
And the rest, a few,
Escape their prison and depart
On the wide ocean of life anew.
There the freed prisoner, where'er his heart
Listeth will sail;
Nor doth he know how there prevail,
Despotic on that sea,
Trade-winds which cross it from eternity:
Awhile he holds some false way, undebarred
By thwarting signs, and braves
The freshening wind and blackening waves.
And then the tempest strikes him; and between
The lightning bursts is seen
Only a driving wreck,
And the pale master on his spar-strewn deck
With anguished face and flying hair
Grasping the rudder hard,
Still bent to make some port he knows not where,
Still standing for some false, impossible shore.
And sterner comes the roar
Of sea and wind, and through the deepening gloom
Fainter and fainter wreck and helmsman loom,
And he too disappears, and comes no more.
Is there no life, but these alone?
Madman or slave, must man be one?
Plainness and clearness without shadow of stain!
Clearness divine!
Ye heavens, whose pure dark regions have no sign
Of languor, though so calm, and though so great
Are yet untroubled and unpassionate;
Who, though so noble, share in the world's toil,
And, though so tasked, keep free from dust and soil!
I will not say that your mild deeps retain
A tinge, it may be, of their silent pain
Who have longed deeply once, and longed in vain
But I will rather say that you remain


## p. 885 (#307) ############################################

MATTHEW ARNOLD
885
A world above man's head, to let him see
How boundless might his soul's horizons be,
How vast, yet of what clear transparency!
How it were good to live there, and breathe free;
How fair a lot to fill
Is left to each man still!
THE BETTER PART
L
ONG fed on boundless hopes, O race of man,
How angrily thou spurn'st all simpler fare!
"Christ," some one says, "was human as we are;
No judge eyes us from Heaven, our sin to scan;
We live no more when we have done our span. "—
"Well, then, for Christ," thou answerest, "who can care?
From sin, which Heaven records not, why forbear?
Live we like brutes our life without a plan ! »
So answerest thou; but why not rather say,
"Hath man no second life? - Pitch this one high!
Sits there no judge in Heaven our sin to see? —
More strictly, then, the inward judge obey!
Was Christ a man like us? -Ah! let us try
If we then, too, can be such men as he! "
THE LAST WORD
REEP into thy narrow bed,
Creep, and let no more be said!
Vain thy onset! all stands fast.
Thou thyself must break at last.
C
Let the long contention cease!
Geese are swans, and swans are geese.
Let them have it how they will!
Thou art tired; best be still.
They out-talked thee, hissed thee, tore thee?
Better men fared thus before thee;
Fired their ringing shot and passed,
Hotly charged - and sank at last.
Charge once more, then, and be dumb!
Let the victors, when they come,
When the forts of folly fall,
Find thy body by the wall!


## p. 886 (#308) ############################################

886
THE ARTHURIAN LEGENDS
(Eighth to Twelfth Centuries)
BY RICHARD JONES
OR nearly a thousand years, the Arthurian legends, which lie
at the basis of Tennyson's 'Idylls of the King,' have fur-
nished unlimited literary material, not to English poets
alone, but to the poets of all Christendom. These Celtic romances,
having their birthplace in Brittany or in Wales, had been growing
and changing for some centuries, before the fanciful Historia Bri-
tonum' of Geoffrey of Monmouth flushed them with color and filled
them with new life. Through the version of the good Benedictine
they soon became a vehicle for the dissemination of Christian doc-
trine. By the year 1200 they were the common property of Europe,
influencing profoundly the literature of the Middle Ages, and becom-
ing the source of a great stream of poetry that has flowed without
interruption down to our own day.
Sixty years after the Historia Britonum' appeared, and when the
English poet Layamon wrote his 'Brut' (A. D. 1205), which was a
translation of Wace, as Wace was a translation of Geoffrey, the theme
was engrossing the imagination of Europe. It had absorbed into itself
the elements of other cycles of legend, which had grown up inde-
pendently; some of these, in fact, having been at one time of much
greater prominence. Finally, so vast and so complicated did the body
of Arthurian legend become, that summaries of the essential features
were attempted. Such a summary was made in French about 1270,
by the Italian Rustighello of Pisa; in German, about two centuries
later, by Ulrich Füterer; and in English by Sir Thomas Malory in
his 'Morte d'Arthur,' finished "the ix. yere of the reygne of kyng
Edward the Fourth," and one of the first books published in England
by Caxton, "emprynted and fynysshed in th'abbey Westmestre the last
day of July, the yere of our Lord MCCCCLXXXV. " It is of interest
to note, as an indication of the popularity of the Arthurian legends,
that Caxton printed the Morte d'Arthur' eight years before he
printed any portion of the English Bible, and fifty-three years before
the complete English Bible was in print. He printed the 'Morte
d'Arthur' in response to a general "demaund"; for "many noble
and dyvers gentylmen of thys royame of England camen and de-
maunded me many and oftymes wherefore that I have not do make
and enprynte the noble hystorye of the saynt greal, and of the moost


## p. 887 (#309) ############################################

THE ARTHURIAN LEGENDS
887
renomed crysten kyng, fyrst and chyef of the thre best crysten and
worthy, kyng Arthur, whyche ought moost to be remembred emonge
us Englysshe men tofore al other crysten kynges. "
Nor did poetic treatment of the theme then cease. Dante, in the
'Divine Comedy,' speaks by name of Arthur, Guinevere, Tristan, and
Launcelot. In that touching interview in the second cycle of the
Inferno between the poet and Francesca da Rimini, which Carlyle
has called "a thing woven out of rainbows on a ground of eternal
black," Francesca replies to Dante, who was bent to know the primal
root whence her love for Paolo gat being:—
"One day
For our delight, we read of Launcelot,
How him love thralled. Alone we were, and no
Suspicion near us. Oft-times by that reading
Our eyes were drawn together, and the hue
Fled from our altered cheek. But at one point
Alone we fell. When of that smile we read,
The wished smile, rapturously kissed
By one so deep in love, then he, who ne'er
From me shall separate, at once my lips
All trembling kissed. The book and writer both
Were love's purveyors. In its leaves that day
We read no more. "
This poetic material was appropriated also by the countrymen of
Dante, Boiardo, Ariosto, and Tasso, by Hans Sachs in Germany, by
Spenser, Shakespeare, and Milton in England. As Sir Walter Scott
has sung:-
"The mightiest chiefs of British song
Scorned not such legends to prolong. "
Roger Ascham, it is true, has, in his 'Scholemaster' (1570 A. D. ),
broken a lance against this body of fiction. "In our forefathers'
tyme," wrote he. "whan Papistrie, as a standyng poole, couered and
ouerflowed all England, fewe bookes were read in our tong, sauyng
certaine bookes of Cheualrie, as they sayd, for pastime and pleasure,
which, as some say, were made in Monasteries, by idle Monkes, or
wanton Chanons; as one for example, Morte Arthure': the whole
pleasure of which booke standeth in two special poyntes, in open
mans slaughter. and bold bawdrye in which booke those be counted
the noblest Knights, that do kill most men without any quarrell,
and commit foulest aduoulteries by sutlest shiftes. "
But Roger's characterization of "the whole pleasure of which
booke" was not just, nor did it destroy interest in the theme. "The
generall end of all the booke. " said Spenser of the 'Faerie Queene,'


## p. 888 (#310) ############################################

888
THE ARTHURIAN LEGENDS
"is to fashion a gentleman or noble person in vertuous and gentle
discipline;" and for this purpose he therefore "chose the historye of
King Arthure, as most fitte for the excellency of his person, being
made famous by many men's former workes, and also furthest from
the daunger of envie, and suspition of present tyme. "
The plots for Shakespeare's 'King Lear' and 'Cymbeline' came
from Geoffrey's 'Historia Britonum,' as did also the story of 'Gorbo-
duc,' the first tragedy in the English language. Milton intended at
one time that the subject of the great poem for which he was "plum-
ing his wings" should be King Arthur, as may be seen, in his 'Man-
sus' and 'Epitaphium Damonis. ' Indeed, he did touch the lyre upon
this theme,-lightly, it is true, but firmly enough to justify Swin-
burne's lines:-
"Yet Milton's sacred feet have lingered there,
His lips have made august the fabulous air,
His hands have touched and left the wild weeds fair. »
But his duties as Latin Secretary to the Commonwealth diverted him
from poetry for many years, and when the Restoration gave him
leisure once more to court the Muse, he had come to doubt the exist-
ence of the Celtic hero-king; for in 'Paradise Lost' (Book i. , line
579) he refers to
"what resounds
In fable or romance of Uther's son;"
and in his 'History of Britain' (1670 A. D. ) he says explicitly:- "For
who Arthur was, and whether ever any such reign'd in Britan, hath
bin doubted heertofore, and may again with good reason.
"
Dryden, who composed the words of an opera on King Arthur,
meditated, according to Sir Walter Scott, a larger treatment of the
theme:-
:-
"And Dryden in immortal strain
Had raised the Table Round again,
But that a ribald King and Court
Bade him toil on to make them sport. »
Sir Walter himself edited the old metrical romance of 'Sir Tristram,·
and where the manuscript was defective, composed a portion after
the manner of the original, the portion in which occur the lines,
"Mi schip do thou take,
With godes that bethe new;
Two seyles do thou make,
Beth different in hewe:


## p. 889 (#311) ############################################

THE ARTHURIAN LEGENDS
889
«Ysoude of Britanye,
With the white honde,
The schip she can se,
Seyling to londe;
The white seyl tho marked sche.
"Fairer ladye ere
Did Britannye never spye,
Swiche murning chere,
Making on heighe;
On Tristremes bere,
Doun con she lye;
Rise ogayn did sche nere,
But thare con sche dye
For woe:
Swiche lovers als thei
Never schal be moe. "
Of the poets of the present generation, Tennyson has treated the
Arthurian poetic heritage as a whole. Phases of the Arthurian
theme have been presented also by his contemporaries and suc-
cessors at home and abroad,- by William Wordsworth, Lord Lytton,
Robert Stephen Hawker, Matthew Arnold, William Morris, Algernon
Charles Swinburne, in England; Edgar Quinet in France; Wilhelm
Hertz, L. Schneegans, F. Roeber, in Germany; Richard Hovey in
America. There have been many other approved variations on
Arthurian themes, such as James Russell Lowell's 'Vision of Sir
Launfal,' and Richard Wagner's operas, Lohengrin,' Tristan and
Isolde,' and 'Parsifal. ' Of still later versions, we may mention the
'King Arthur' of J. Comyns Carr, which has been presented on the
stage by Sir Henry Irving; and Under King Constantine,' by Katrina
Trask, whose hero is the king whom tradition names as the successor
of the heroic Arthur, "Imperator, Dux Bellorum. "
This poetic material is manifestly a living force in the literature
of the present day. And we may well remind ourselves of the rule
which should govern our verdict in regard to the new treatments
of the theme as they appear. This century-old Dichterstoff,' this
poetic treasure-store through which speaks the voice of the race, this
great body of accumulated poetic material, is a heritage; and it is
evident that whoever attempts any phase of this theme may not
treat such subject-matter capriciously, nor otherwise than in har-
mony with its inherent nature and spirit. It is recognized that the
stuff whereof great poetry is made is not the arbitrary creation of
the poet, and cannot be manufactured to order. "Genuine poetic
material," it has been said, "is handed down in the imagination of
man from generation to generation, changing its spirit according to


## p. 890 (#312) ############################################

890
THE ARTHURIAN LEGENDS
the spirit of each age, and reaching its full development only when
in the course of time the favorable conditions coincide. " Inasmuch
as the subject-matter of the Arthurian legends is not the creation of
a single poet, nor even of many poets, but is in fact the creation of
the people. -indeed, of many peoples widely separated in time and
space, and is thus in a sense the voice of the race, it resembles
in this respect the Faust legends, which are the basis of Goethe's
world-poem; or the medieval visions of a future state, which found
their supreme and final expression in Dante's 'Divina Commedia,'
which sums up within itself the art, the religion, the politics, the
philosophy, and the view of life of the Middle Ages.
Whether the Arthurian legends as a whole have found their final
and adequate expression in Tennyson's 'Idylls of the King,' or
whether it was alread, too late, when the Laureate wrote, to create
from primitive ideas so simple a poem of the first rank, is not
within the province of this essay to discuss. But manifestly, any
final judgment in regard to the treatment of this theme as a whole,
or any phase of the theme, is inadequate which leaves out of con-
sideration the history of the subject-matter, and its treatment by
other poets; which, in short, ignores its possibilities and its signifi-
cance. With respect to the origin and the early history of the
Arthurian legend, much remains to be established. Whether its
original home was in Wales, or among the neighboring Celts across
the sea in Brittany, whither many of the Celts of Britain fled after
the Anglo-Saxon invasion of their island home, no one knows. But
to some extent, at least, the legend was common to both sides of
the Channel when Geoffrey wrote his book, about 1145. As a matter
of course, this King Arthur, the ideal hero of later ages, was a less
commanding personage in the early forms of the legend than when
it had acquired its splendid distinction by borrowing and assimilating
other mythical tales.
It appears that five great cycles of legend, —(1) the Arthur, Gui-
nevere, and Merlin cycle, (2) the Round Table cycle, (3) the Holy
Grail cycle, (4) the Launcelot cycle, (5) the Tristan cycle, - which at
first developed independently, were, in the latter half of the twelfth
century, merged together into a body of legend whose bond of unity
was the idealized Celtic hero, King Arthur.
This blameless knight, whose transfigured memory has been thus
transmitted to us, was probably a leader of the Celtic tribes of
England in their struggles with the Saxon invaders. His victory at
Mount Badon, described by Sir Launcelot to the household at
Astolat,
"Dull days were those, till our good Arthur broke
The pagan yet once more on Badon Hill,» —


## p. 891 (#313) ############################################

THE ARTHURIAN LEGENDS
891
this victory is mentioned by Gildas, who wrote in the sixth century.
Gildas, however, though he mentions the occasion, does not give the
name of the leader. But Nennius, who wrote in the latter part of the
eighth century, or early in the ninth, makes Arthur the chieftain,
and adds an account of his great personal prowess. Thus the Arthur
legend has already begun to grow. For the desperate struggle with
the Saxons was vain. As the highly gifted, imaginative Celt saw
his people overwhelmed by the kinsmen of the conquerors of Rome,
he found solace in song for the hard facts of life. In the fields of
imagination he won the victories denied him on the field of battle,
and he clustered these triumphs against the enemies of his race
about the name and the person of the magnanimous Arthur. When
the descendants of the Saxons were in their turn overcome by Nor-
man conquerors, the heart of the Celtic world was profoundly stirred.
Ancient memories awoke, and, yearning for the restoration of British
greatness, men rehearsed the deeds of him who had been king, and
of whom it was prophesied that he should be king hereafter.
this moment of newly awakened hope, Geoffrey's Historia' appeared.
His book was not in reality a history. Possibly it was not even
very largely founded on existing legends. But in any case the
chronicle of Geoffrey was a work of genius and of imagination.
"The figure of Arthur," says Ten Brink, "now stood forth in brill-
iant light, a chivalrous king and hero, endowed and guarded by
supernatural powers, surrounded by brave warriors and a splendid
court, a man of marvelous life and a tragic death. "
At
Geoffrey's book was immediately translated into French by Robert
Wace, who incorporated with the legend of Arthur the Round Table
legend. In his 'Brut,' the English poet-priest Layamon reproduced
this feature of the legend with additional details. His chronicle is
largely a free translation of the 'Brut d'Engleterre' of Wace, earlier
known as 'Geste des Bretons. ' Thus as Wace had reproduced Geof-
frey with additions and modifications, Layamon reproduced Wace. So
the story grew.
In the mean time, other poets in other lands had
taken up the theme, connecting with it other cycles of legend already
in existence. In 1205, when Layamon wrote his 'Brut,' unnumbered
versions of the history of King Arthur, with which had been woven
the legend of the Holy Grail, had already appeared among the
principal nations of Europe. Of the early Arthurian poets, two of
the more illustrious and important are Chrestien de Troyes, in France,
of highest poetic repute, who opened the way for Tennyson, and
Wolfram von Eschenbach, in Germany, with his 'Parzival,' later the
theme of Wagner's greatest opera. The names of Robert de Borron
in France, Walter Map in England, and Heinrich von dem Türlin in
Germany, may also be mentioned.


## p. 892 (#314) ############################################

892
THE ARTHURIAN LEGENDS
In divers lands, innumerable poets with diverse tastes set them-
selves to make new versions of the legend. Characteristics of the
Arthurian tale were grafted upon an entirely different stock, as was
done by Boiardo in Italy, making confusion worse confounded to the
modern Arthurian scholar. Boiardo expressly says in the 'Orlando
Innamorato' that his intention is to graft the characteristics of the
Arthurian cycle upon the Carlovingian French national epic stock.
He wished to please the courts, whose ideal was not the paladins,
but Arthur's knights. The "peers" of the Charlemagne legend are
thus transformed into knights-errant, who fight for ladies and for
honor. The result of this interpenetration of the two cycles is a
splendid world of love and cortesia, whose constituent elements it
defies the Arthurian scholar to trace. Truly, as Dr. Sommer has
said in his erudite edition of Malory's 'La Morte d'Arthur,' "The
origin and relationship to one another of these branches of romance,
whether in prose or in verse, are involved in great obscurity. " He
adds that it would almost seem as though several generations of
scholars were required for the gigantic task of finding a sure path-
way through this intricate maze. And M. Gaston Paris, one of the
foremost of living Arthurian scholars, has written in his 'Romania':
"Some time ago I undertook a methodical exploration in the grand
poetical domain which is called the cycle of the Round Table, the
cycle of Arthur, or the Breton cycle. I advance, groping along, and
very often retracing my steps twenty times over, I become aware
that I am lost in a pathless maze. »
There is a question, moreover, whether Geoffrey's book is based
mainly upon inherited poetical material, or is largely the product of
Geoffrey's individual imagination. The elder Paris, M. Paulin Paris
inclined to the view that Nennius, with hints from local tales, sup-
plied all the bases that Geoffrey had. But his son, Professor Gaston
Paris, in his 'Littérature Française au Moyen Age,' emphasizes the
importance of the "Celtic" contribution, as does also Mr. Alfred
Nutt in his 'Studies in the Arthurian Legend. ' The former view
emphasizes the individual importance of Geoffrey; the latter view
places the emphasis on the legendary heritage. Referring to this
so-called national poetry, Ten Brink says:—
"But herein lies the essential difference between that age and our own:
the result of poetical activity was not the property and not the production of
a single person, but of the community. . The work of the individual singer
endured only as long as its delivery lasted. He gained personal distinction
only as a virtuoso. The permanent elements of what he presented, the
material, the ideas, even the style and metre, already existed. The work of
the singer was only a ripple in the stream of national poetry. Who can say
how much the individual contributed to it, or where in his poetical recitation


## p. 893 (#315) ############################################

THE ARTHURIAN LEGENDS
893
memory ceased and creative impulse began! In any case the work of the
individual lived on only as the ideal possession of the aggregate body of the
people, and it soon lost the stamp of originality. "
When Geoffrey wrote, this period of national poetry was drawing
to a close; but was not yet closed. Alfred Nutt, in his 'Studies in
the Legend of the Holy Grail,' speaking of Wolfram von Eschenbach,
who wrote his 'Parzival' about the time that the 'Nibelungenlied'
was given its present form (i. e. , about a half-century after Geoffrey),
says:-"Compared with the unknown poets who gave their present
shape to the Nibelungenlied' or to the 'Chanson de Roland,' he is
an individual writer; but he is far from deserving this epithet even
in the sense that Chaucer deserves it. " Professor Rhys says, in his
'Studies in the Arthurian Legend':- "Leaving aside for a while the
man Arthur, and assuming the existence of a god of that name, let
us see what could be made of him. Mythologically speaking, he
would probably have to be regarded as a Culture Hero," etc.
To summarize this discussion of the difficulties of the theme, there
are now existing, scattered throughout the libraries and the monas-
teries of Europe, unnumbered versions of the Arthurian legends.
Some of these are early versions, some are late, and some are inter-
mediate. What is the relation of all these versions to one another?
Which are the oldest, and which are copies, and of what versions
are they copies? What is the land of their origin, and what is the
significance of their symbolism? These problems, weighty in tracing
the growth of mediæval ideals,-i. e. , in tracing the development of
the realities of the present from the ideals of the past, — are still
under investigation by the specialists. The study of the Arthurian
legends is in itself a distinct branch of learning, which demands the
lifelong labors of scholarly devotees.
-
There now remains to consider the extraordinary spread of the
legend in the closing decades of the twelfth century and in the
century following. Though Tennyson has worthily celebrated as the
morning star of English song —
"Dan Chaucer, the first warbler, whose sweet breath
Preluded those melodious bursts that fill
The spacious times of great Elizabeth
With sounds that echo still,"
yet the centuries before Chaucer, far from being barren of literature,
were periods of rich poetical activity both in England and on the
Continent. Eleanor of Aquitaine, formerly Queen of France,-who
had herself gone on a crusade to the Holy Land, and who, on return-
ing, married in 1152 Henry of Anjou, who became in 1155 Henry II.


## p. 894 (#316) ############################################

894
THE ARTHURIAN LEGENDS
of England,—was an ardent patroness of the art of poetry, and per-
sonally aroused the zeal of poets. The famous troubadour Bernard de
Ventadorn-"with whom," says Ten Brink, "the Provençal art-poesy
entered upon the period of its florescence"- followed her to England,
and addressed to her his impassioned verse. Wace, the Norman-
French trouvere, dedicated to her his 'Brut. ' The ruling classes of
England at this time were truly cosmopolitan, familiar with the
poetic material of many lands. Jusserand, in his English Novel in
the Time of Shakespeare,' discussing a poem of the following cen-
tury written in French by a Norman monk of Westminster and dedi-
cated to Eleanor of Provence, wife of Henry III. , says:-"Rarely
was the like seen in any literature: here is a poem dedicated to a
Frenchwoman by a Norman of England, which begins with the praise
of a Briton, a Saxon, and a Dane. "
But the ruling classes of England were not the only cosmopoli-
tans, nor the only possessors of fresh poetic material. Throughout
Europe in general, the conditions were favorable for poetic produc-
tion. The Crusades had brought home a larger knowledge of the
world, and the stimulus of new experiences. Western princes re-
turned with princesses of the East as their brides, and these were
accompanied by splendid trains, including minstrels and poets. Thus
Europe gathered in new poetic material, which stimulated and devel-
oped the poetical activity of the age. Furthermore, the Crusades
had aroused an intense idealism, which, as always, demanded and
found poetic expression. The dominant idea pervading the earlier
forms of the Charlemagne stories, the unswerving loyalty due from a
vassal to his lord,- that is, the feudal view of life, no longer found
an echo in the hearts of men. The time was therefore propitious for
the development of a new cycle of legend.
Though by the middle of the twelfth century the Arthurian
legend had been long in existence, and King Arthur had of late
been glorified by Geoffrey's book, the legend was not yet supreme in
popular interest. It became so through its association, a few years
later, with the legend of the Holy Grail,- the San Graal, the holy
vessel which received at the Cross the blood of Christ, which was
now become a symbol of the Divine Presence. This holy vessel had
been brought by Joseph of Arimathea from Palestine to Britain, but
was now, alas, vanished quite from the sight of man. It was the
holy quest for this sacred vessel, to which the knights of the Round
Table now bound themselves,- this "search for the supernatural,»
this "struggle for the spiritual," this blending of the spirit of Christ-
ianity with that of chivalry,- which immediately transformed the
Arthurian legend, and gave to its heroes immortality. At once a
new spirit breathes in the old legend. In a few years it is become


## p. 895 (#317) ############################################

THE ARTHURIAN LEGENDS
895
a mystical, symbolical, anagogical tale, inculcating one of the pro-
foundest dogmas of the Holy Catholic Church, a bearer of a Christian
doctrine engrossing the thought of the Christian world. And inas-
much as the transformed Arthurian legend now taught by implication
the doctrine of the Divine Presence, its spread was in every way
furthered by the great power of the Church, whose spiritual rulers
made the minstrel doubly welcome when celebrating this theme.
For there was heresy to be combated; viz. , the heresy of the
scholastic theologian Berengar of Tours, who had attacked the doc-
trine of the transubstantiation of the bread and the wine of the
Eucharist into the body and blood of Christ. Lanfranc, Archbishop
of Canterbury, one of the most brilliant of the Middle Age theologi-
ans, felt impelled to reply to Berengar, who had been his personal
friend; and he did so in the 'Liber Scintillarum,' which was a vigor-
ous, indeed a violent, defense of the doctrine denied by Berenga. .
Berengar died in 1088; but he left a considerable body of followers.
The heretics were anathematized by the Second Lateran Ecumenical
Council held in Rome in 1139. Again, in 1215, the Fourth Lateran
Council declared transubstantiation to be an article of faith, and in
1264 a special holy day, Corpus Christi,-viz. , the first Thursday after
Trinity Sunday,- was set apart to give an annual public manifesta-
tion of the belief of the Church in the doctrine of the Eucharist.
―――――――
But when the Fourth Lateran Ecumenical Council met in 1215,
the transformation of the Arthurian legend by means of its associa-
tion with the legend of the Holy Grail was already complete, and
the transformed legend, now become a defender of the faith, was
engrossing the imagination of Europe. The subsequent influence of
the legend was doubtless to some extent associated with the discus-
sions which continually came up anew respecting the meaning of the
doctrine of the Eucharist; for it was not until the Council of Trent
(1545-63) that the doctrine was finally and authoritatively defined.
In the mean time there was interminable discussion respecting the
nature of this "real presence," respecting transubstantiation and con-
substantiation and impanation, respecting the actual presence of the
body and blood of Christ under the appearance of the bread and
wine, or the presence of the body and blood together with the bread
and wine. · The professor of philosophy in the University of Oxford,
who passes daily through Logic Lane, has said that there the follow-
ers of Duns Scotus and Thomas Aquinas were wont to come to
blows in the eagerness of their discussion respecting the proper defi-
nition of the doctrine. Nor was the doctrine without interest to the
Reformers. Luther and Zwingli held opposing views, and Calvin was
involved in a long dispute concerning the doctrine, which resulted in
the division of the evangelical body into the two parties of the


## p. 896 (#318) ############################################

896
THE ARTHURIAN LEGENDS
Lutherans and the Reformed.
Doubtless the connection between the
Arthurian legend and the doctrine of the Divine Presence was not
without influence on the unparalleled spread of the legend in the
closing decades of the twelfth century, and on its prominence in the
centuries following.
A suggestion has already been given of the vast development of
the Arthurian legends during the thirteenth, fourteenth, and fifteenth
centuries, and of the importance of the labors of the specialists, who
are endeavoring to fix a date for these versions in order to infer
therefrom the spiritual ideals of the people among whom they arose.
To perceive clearly to what extent ideals do change, it is but neces-
sary to compare various versions of the same incident as given in
various periods of time. To go no farther back than Malory, for
example, we observe a signal difference between his treatment of
the sin of Guinevere and Launcelot, and the treatment of the theme
by Tennyson. Malory's Arthur is not so much wounded by the
treachery of Launcelot, of whose relations to Guinevere he had long
been aware, as he is angered at Sir Modred for making public those
disclosures which made it necessary for him and Sir Launcelot to
"bee at debate. " "Ah! Agravaine, Agravaine," cries the King, “Jesu
forgive it thy soule! for thine evil will that thou and thy brother
Sir Modred had unto Sir Launcelot hath caused all this sorrow.
Wit you well my heart was never so heavie as it is now,
and much more I am sorrier for my good knights losse than for the
losse of my queene, for queenes might I have enough, but such a
fellowship of good knightes shall never bee together in no com-
pany. "
But to the great Poet Laureate, who voices the modern
ideal, a true marriage is the crown of life. To love one maiden
only, to cleave to her and worship her by years of noblest deeds, to
be joined with her and to live together as one life, and, reigning
with one will in all things, to have power on this dead world to
make it live, this was the high ideal of the blameless King,
"Too wholly true to dream untruth in thee. »
―――
And his farewell from her who had not made his life so sweet that
he should greatly care to live,
---
"Lo! I forgive thee, as Eternal God
Forgives:
And so thou lean on our fair father Christ,
Hereafter in that world where all are pure
We two may meet before high God, and thou
Wilt spring to me, and claim me thine,»-
this is altogether one of the noblest passages in modern verse.


## p. 897 (#319) ############################################

THE ARTHURIAN LEGENDS
897
A comparison of the various modern treatments of the Tristram
theme, as given by Tennyson, Richard Wagner, F. Roeber, L.
Schneegans, Matthew Arnold, Algernon Charles Swinburne, F. Mil-
lard, touching also on the Tristan of Hans Sachs, and the Tristram
who, because he is true to love, is the darling of the old romances,
and is there—notwithstanding that his love is the wedded wife of
another always represented as the strong and beautiful knight, the
flower of courtesy, a model to youth,-such a comparison would
reveal striking differences between mediæval and modern ideals.
In making the comparison, however, care must be exercised to
select the modern treatment of the theme which represents correctly
the modern ideal. The Middle Age romances, sung by wandering
minstrels, before the invention of the printing press, doubtless ex-
pressed the ideals of the age in which they were produced more
infallibly than does the possibly individualistic conception of the
modern poet; for, of the earlier forms of the romance, only those
which found general favor were likely to be preserved and handed
down. This inference may be safely made because of the method of
the dissemination of the poems before the art of printing was known.
It is true that copies of them were carried in manuscript from
country to country; but the more important means of dissemination
were the minstrels, who passed from court to court and land to land,
singing the songs which they had made or heard. In that age there
was little thought of literary proprietorship. The poem belonged to
him who could recall it. And as each minstrel felt free to adopt
whatever poem he found or heard that pleased him, so he felt free
also to modify the incidents thereof, guided only by his experience
as to what pleased his hearers. Hence the countless variations in
the treatment of the theme, and the value of the conclusions that
may be drawn as to the moral sentiment of an age, the quality of
whose moral judgments is indicated by the prevailing tone of the
songs which persisted because they pleased. Unconformable varia-
tions, which express the view of an individual rather than the view
of a people, may have come down to us in an accidentally preserved
manuscript; but the songs which were sung by the poets of all lands
give expression to the view of life of the age, and reveal the morals
and the ideals of nations, whose history in this respect may other-
wise be lost to us. What some of these ideals were, as revealed by
this rich store of poetic material which grew up about the chivalrous
and spiritual ideals of the Middle Ages, and what the corresponding
modern ideals are,- what, in brief, some of the hitherto dimly dis-
cerned ethical movements of the past seven hundred years have in
reality been, and whither they seem to be tending,- surely, clear
knowledge on these themes is an end worthy the supreme endeavor
11-57


## p. 898 (#320) ############################################

898
THE ARTHURIAN LEGENDS
of finished scholars, whose training has made them expert in inter-
preting the aspirations of each age, and in tracing the evolution of
the ideals of the past into the realities of the present. And though,
as M. Gaston Paris has said, the path of the Arthurian scholar
seems at times to be an inextricable maze, yet the value of the
results already achieved, and the possibility of still greater results,
will doubtless prove a sufficient encouragement to the several gener-
ations of scholars which, as Dr. Sommer suggests, are needed for
the gigantic task.
Richard Jones
FROM GEOFFREY OF MONMOUTH'S HISTORIA BRITONUM ›
ARTHUR SUCCEEDS UTHER, HIS FATHER, IN THE KINGDOM OF BRITAIN,
AND BESIEGES COLGRIN
U
THER Pendragon being dead, the nobility from several prov
inces assembled together at Silchester, and proposed to
Dubricius, Archbishop of Legions, that he should consecrate
Arthur, Uther's son, to be their king. For they were now in
great straits, because, upon hearing of the king's death, the Sax-
ons had invited over their countrymen from Germany, and were
attempting, under the command of Colgrin, to exterminate the
whole British race.
Dubricius, therefore, grieving for
the calamities of his country, in conjunction with the other bish-
ops set the crown upon Arthur's head. Arthur was then only
fifteen years old, but a youth of such unparalleled courage and
generosity, joined with that sweetness of temper and innate good-
ness, as gained for him universal love. When his coronation
was over, he, according to usual custom, showed his bounty
and munificence to the people. And such a number of soldiers
flocked to him upon it that his treasury was not able to answer
that vast expense. But such a spirit of generosity, joined with
valor, can never long want means to support itself. Arthur,
therefore, the better to keep up his munificence, resolved to make
use of his courage, and to fall upon the Saxons, that he might
enrich his followers with their wealth. To this he was also
moved by the justice of the cause, since the entire monarchy of
Britain belonged to him by hereditary right. Hereupon assem-
bling the youth under his command, he marched to York, of


## p. 899 (#321) ############################################

THE ARTHURIAN LEGENDS
899
which, when Colgrin had intelligence, he met with a very great
army, composed of Saxons, Scots, and Picts, by the river Dug-
las, where a battle happened, with the loss of the greater part
of both armies. Notwithstanding, the victory fell to Arthur, who
pursued Colgrin to York, and there besieged him.
DUBRICIUS'S SPEECH AGAINST THE TREACHEROUS SAXONS, OF WHOM
ARTHUR SLAYS MANY IN BATTLE
WHEN he had done speaking, St. Dubricius, Archbishop of
Legions, going to the top of a hill, cried out with a loud voice,
"You that have the honor to profess the Christian faith, keep
fixed in your minds the love which you owe to your country and
fellow subjects, whose sufferings by the treachery of the Pagans
will be an everlasting reproach to you if you do not courageously
defend them. It is your country which you fight for, and for
which you should, when required, voluntarily suffer death; for
that itself is victory and the cure of the soul. For he that shall
die for his brethren, offers himself a living sacrifice to God, and
has Christ for his example, who condescended to lay down his
life for his brethren. If, therefore, any of you shall be killed in
this war, that death itself, which is suffered in so glorious a
cause, shall be to him for penance and absolution of all his sins. "
At these words, all of them, encouraged with the benediction of
the holy prelate, instantly armed themselves.
Upon
[Arthur's shield] the picture of the blessed Mary, Mother of
God, was painted, in order to put him frequently in mind of
her.
In this manner was a great part of that day also
spent; whereupon Arthur, provoked to see the little advantage he
had yet gained, and that victory still continued in suspense, drew
out his Caliburn [Excalibur, Tennyson], and calling upon the
name of the blessed Virgin, rushed forward with great fury into
the thickest of the enemy's ranks; of whom (such was the merit
of his prayers) not one escaped alive that felt the fury of his
sword; neither did he give over the fury of his assault until he
had, with his Caliburn alone, killed four hundred and seventy
men. The Britons, seeing this, followed their leader in great
multitudes, and made slaughter on all sides; so that Colgrin and
Baldulph, his brother, and many thousands more, fell before them.
But Cheldric, in his imminent danger of his men, betook himself
to flight.
.
·
.


## p. 900 (#322) ############################################

THE ARTHURIAN LEGENDS
900
ARTHUR INCREASES HIS DOMINIONS
AFTER this, having invited over to him all persons whatsoever
that were famous for valor in foreign nations, he began to aug-
ment the number of his domestics, and introduced such politeness
into his court as people of the remotest countries thought worthy
of their imitation. So that there was not a nobleman who
thought himself of any consideration unless his clothes and arms
were made in the same fashion as those of Arthur's knights. At
length the fame of his munificence and valor spreading over the
whole world, he became a terror to the kings of other countries,
who grievously feared the loss of their dominions if he should
make any attempt upon them.
Arthur formed a design
for the conquest of all Europe.
At the end of nine
years, in which time all the parts of Gaul were entirely reduced,
Arthur returned back to Paris, where he kept his court, and call-
ing an assembly of the clergy and people, established peace and
the just administration of the laws in that kingdom. Then he
bestowed Neustria, now called Normandy, upon Bedoer, his but-
ler; the province of Andegavia upon Caius, his sewer; and sev-
eral other provinces upon his great men that attended him.
Thus, having settled the peace of the cities and the countries.
there, he returned back in the beginning of spring to Britain.
ARTHUR HOLDS A SOLEMN FESTIVAL
UPON the approach of the feast of Pentecost, Arthur, the better
to demonstrate his joy after such triumphant success, and for the
more solemn observation of that festival, and reconciling the
minds of the princes that were now subject to him, resolved,
during that season, to hold a magnificent court, to place the
crown upon his head, and to invite all the kings and dukes under
his subjection to the solemnity.