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reason to be inadequate to subdue them; and he CHAP. therefore had recourse to the aids of religion. His honoured friend assures us, that to protect himself from vice, he rose alone at the first dawn of day, and privately visited churches and their shrines, for the sake of prayer. There, long prostrate, he besought the great moral Legislator to strengthen his good intentions. So sincere was his virtuous determination, that he even implored the dispensation of some affliction which he could support, and which would not, like blindness or leprosy, make him useless and contemptible in society, as an assistant to his virtue. With frequent and earnest devotion, he preferred this request; and when at no long interval the disorder of the ficus came upon him, he welcomed its occurrence, and converted it to a moral utility, though it attacked him severely. However variously with their present habits, some may appreciate the remedy with which Alfred chose to combat his too ardent passions, we cannot refuse our applause to his magnanimity. His abhorrence of vice, his zeal for practical virtue, would do honour to any private man of the most regular habits: but in a prince who lives in that sphere of society where every object and every associate tempt the passions, and seduce the reason, it was one of those noble exertions of soul which humanity rarely yet displays, and which words cannot adequately applaud.

21

ASSER repeatedly describes his sovereign's religious disposition : "He was accustomed to hear divine service, especially the mass, every day, and to repeat psalms and prayers, and the devotions for

21 Asser, 41, 42.

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the hours of the day and for night; and he often frequented churches alone, without his state, in the night-time, for the sake of praying."2

ASSER also adds: "It was his habit, attentively and solicitously, to hear the sacred Scriptures read by his own subjects, or by foreigners, when any came to him from abroad, and also prayers.

"HE lamented continually, with sorrow and sighing, to all who were admitted into his intimacy, that the Deity had made him void of Divine wisdom and the liberal arts. But He who beholds the internal mind, and promotes every virtuous meditation and good inclination, increased this inward impulse, till the king had acquired, from every quarter within his reach, coadjutors of this pious disposition who were able to assist him in the wisdom he desired, and to conduct him to the proficiency he coveted." 23

In another place Asser informs us that Alfred carefully carried in his bosom a little book, in which were written the daily offices of prayer, and some psalms and pious supplications which he had read in his youth. 24

ASSER intimates that one of the king's first uses of his knowlege of Latin, and his mode of learning it, was to translate passages of the sacred Scriptures, and to insert them in the book which he called his manual, because he had it always at his hand, and from which, he then said, he derived no small comfort. 25

NEARLY a thousand years have elapsed since Alfred's reign, and yet no plan of acquiring moral and philosophical wisdom has been suggested which

22 Asser, p. 44.

24 Asser, p. 55.

23 These are Asser's words, p. 45. 25 Ibid. p. 57.

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will be found to be more efficacious than this inva- CHAP. luable habit of our Anglo-Saxon king. They who have profited from it can attest its efficacy.

BUT, independently of Asser's account, we have two written records still remaining of the pious feelings of this admirable king, from his own heart and pen, in his Anglo-Saxon selections and translations from St. Austin's meditations, and in his additions to his version of Boetius. As the truth is every day becoming more apparent, and will be ere long admitted by the most philosophical, that enlightened religion is the best guide to wisdom, virtue, and social order, and their surest basis, we will make no apology for adding a few extracts on this subject.

ALFRED'S imitation of the fourth metrum of Boetius consists chiefly of the additions of his own piety:

"He that would firmly build his house; he should not set it upon the highest hill; and he that would seek heavenly wisdom must not be arrogant. And again,

"As he that would firmly build his house will not place it upon sand-hills, so, if thou wouldest build wisdom, set it not up on covetousness; for as the drinking sand swalloweth the rain, so covetousness absorbs the frail happiness of this world, because it will be always thirsty.

"Nor can a house stand long on an high mountain if a full raging wind presses on it. Nor hath it on the drinking sand that which will continue against violent rain.

"So also the mind of man is undermined and agitated from its place, when the wind of strong troubles or the rain of immeasurable anxiety shake it.

"But he that will have the eternal riches, he will fly from the dangerous beauty of this middle earth, and build the house of his mind on the fast stone of lowliness; for Christ dwelt in the valley of humility and in the meditation of wisdom.

"Hence the wise man will lead all his life to the joy that his unchangeable, endless, and without care. Then he will despise both earthly good, and evil also; and hope for the future, which

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will be eternal. Because God, who for ever abides, will preserve him every where in the riches of his mind, though the wind of this world's difficulties, and the perpetual cares of its prosperities should blow on him." 26

FROM the diffuse meditations of St. Austin 27, Alfred selected the parts which most pleased him, and has translated these into Saxon, with that freedom, and with those additions which make his versions so often breathe his own feelings. As the king's heart is laid open before us in these chosen effusions, it may not be uninteresting to insert some extracts from them, as a further delineation of his real character:

"Lord! Thou who art the maker of all creation, grant me first that I may rightly know thee and rationally address thee; then may I earn that I shall become worthy that thou, from thy mild-heartedness, shouldest redeem and free me.

"I call to Thee, Lord! Thou that abandonest none of thy creatures to become nought. To thee I call; Thou that lovest all that can love Thee; both those which know what they should love and those which do not.

"O Thou! that didst make all creatures very good without any evil! Thou! who wilt not openly show thyself to any others but to those who are cleansed in their mind! To Thee, O Lord! I call, because Thou art the father of sincerity and wisdom, and true life, and of the supreme life and the supreme felicity, and of the highest good and the supreme brightness, and of intellectual light.

"O Thou who art the Father of that Son which has awakened us, and yet urgeth us out of the sleep of our sins, and exhorteth us, that we become thine: to Thee, Lord! I pray, who art the supreme truth, for all the truth that is, is truth from Thee.

"Thee, I implore, O Lord! who art the highest wisdom. Through Thee are wise all those that are so. Thou art the true life, and through Thee all that live subsist. Thou art the supreme felicity, and from Thee all have become happy that are

26 Alfred's Boet. p. 22. The two last paragraphs, and some phrases of the others, are Alfred's own composition.

27 MSS. Brit. Mus. Vitell. A. 15.

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Thou art the highest good, and from Thee all beauty CHAP. springs. Thou art the intellectual light, and from Thee man derives his understanding!

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"He that loveth Thee, seeketh Thee: he that followeth Thee, he will obtain Thee."

AFTER indulging in these lofty feelings awhile, he proceeds more earnestly :

"Come now to help me, O Thou, who art the only Eternal; the true God of glory: Father and Son, and so art now; and Holy Spirit, without any separation or mutability, and without any necessity or diminution of power, and who never diest. Thou art always dwelling in the highest brightness, and in highest happiness; in perfect unanimity, and in the fullest abundance. With Thee there is no deficiency of good, but Thou art ever abiding, replete with every felicity, through endless time.

"To Thee, O God! I call and speak. Hear, O hear me! Lord! for thou art my God and my Lord; my father and my creator; my ruler and my hope; my wealth and my honour; my house; my country; my salvation, and my life! Hear, hear me, O Lord! Few of thy servants comprehend thee. But Thee alone I love, indeed, above all other things; Thee I seek; Thee I will follow; Thee I am ready to serve. Under Thy power I desire to abide, for Thou alone art the Sovereign of all. I pray Thee to command me as Thou wilt."

ONE extract more, breathing the same warmth of feeling, may be added:

"Now I have sought Thee: unlock thy door and teach me how I may come to Thee. I have nothing to bring to Thee but my good will; but I myself have nothing else. I know nothing that is better than to love Thee, the heavenly and the spiritual One, above all earthly things. Thus I also do, Good Father! because I know of nothing better than thyself.

"But I know not how I can come to Thee unless Thou permittest me. Teach it to me, and help me. If those through

Thee find the Truth who find Thee, give me that truth. If they through Thee obtain any virtue who obtain Thee, impart that virtue to me. If wisdom, grant me that wisdom. Add to me the hope of the everlasting life, and pour thy love upon me.

"Oh! how Thy goodness is to be admired, for it is unlike all other goods. I wish to come to thee, and the more ear