^gmns of ll)f €a0t£i:tt Clmrtl) 
 
 i.M.n 
 
FROM THE LIBRARY OF 
 
 P ^ 
 ^ 
 
 REV. LOUIS FITZGERALD BENSON. D. D. 
 
 BEQUEATHED BY HIM TO 
 
 THE LIBRARY OF 
 
 PRINCETON THEOLOGICAL SEMINARY 
 
 
 Sfctloa 
 
li Y M N S 
 
 OF 
 
 Ci)e eastern C1)urc>). 
 
PRINTEU HY 
 
 SPOTTISWOODE AND CO., NEW-STREET SQUARE 
 
 LONDON 
 
^ 
 
 ^1 OF PR/^ 
 
 V 
 
 HYMN 
 
 OCT 24 1932 
 
 OF 
 
 TRANSLATED. 
 WITH NOTES AND AN INTRODUCTION, 
 
 BY 
 
 ^V 
 
 THE REV. J. M. NEALE, D.D., 
 
 Warden of Sacknj'tlle College. 
 
 FIFTH EDITION. 
 
 LONDON : 
 J. T" HAYES, 17 HENRIETTA STREET, COVENT GARDEN 
 
 .-\ 
 
Sion's lyre, thou best content 
 That e'er Heav'n to mortals lent, 
 Though they as a trifle leave thee, 
 Whose dull thoughts cannot conceive thee, 
 Though to them thou be a scorn 
 Who to nought but earth are born, 
 May my life no longer be 
 Than 1 am in love with thee ! 
 
 Wither. 
 

 TO 
 
 
 THE SUPERIOR 
 
 
 AND 
 
 
 THE OTHER SISTERS 
 
 
 OF 
 
 mt 
 
 ^ou$t of jHerct at Cletcer. 
 
 
 WITH THANKFULNESS FOR THEIR PAST, AND 
 
 
 PRAYERS FOR THEIR FUTURE SUCCESS, 
 
 
 THESE HYMNS 
 
 
 ARE DEDICATED. 
 
CONTENTS. 
 
 - 
 
 
 PAGE 
 
 Preface to First Edition 
 
 '3 
 
 Preface to Second Edition . . 
 
 19 
 
 Preface to Third Edition 
 
 21 
 
 Introduction 
 
 25 
 
 S. Anatolius — (d. 458) 
 
 • 55 
 
 Stichera for a Sunday of the First Tone . 
 
 57 
 
 Evening Hymn . , . , , 
 
 59 
 
 Stichera at Vespers, S. Stephen's Day 
 
 62 
 
 Stichera for Christmas-tide . , , . 
 
 64 
 
 S. Andrew of Crete — (a.d. 660 — 732) 
 
 71 
 
 Stichera for Great Thursday .... 
 
 73 
 
 Troparia for Palm Sunday .... 
 
 76 
 
 The Great Canon . . . . ... 
 
 78 
 
 Stichera for the Second Week of the Great Fast 
 
 82 
 
 S. Germanus — (a.d. 634 — 734) .... 
 
 H 
 
 A Sunday in the Week of the First Tone 
 
 87 
 
 S. John Damascene — (circ. a.d. 780) . 
 
 90 
 
 Canon for Easter Day, called the " Queen of Canons" — 
 
 - r~ 
 
 Ode I.—" 'Tis the Day of Resurrection " 
 
 95 
 
8 CONTENTS. 
 
 
 PAGE 
 
 S, John Damascene — Continued. 
 
 
 Ode III. — " Come and let us drink of that New- 
 
 
 River" 
 
 97 
 
 Ode IV. — " Stand on thy watch-tower, Habak- 
 
 
 kuk the Seer" 
 
 98 
 
 Ode V. — " Let us rise in early morning" 
 
 100 
 
 Ode VI. — " Into the dim earth's lowest parts 
 
 
 descending" .... 
 
 IC2 
 
 Ode VII. — " Who from the fiery furnace saved 
 
 
 the Three" .... 
 
 lej 
 
 Ode VIII. — "Thou hallowed chosen morn of 
 
 
 praise " . 
 
 105 
 
 Ode IX. — " Thou New Jerusalem, arise and 
 
 
 shine" ..... 
 
 107 
 
 The Stichera of the Last Kiss 
 
 108 
 
 Idiomela for All Saints 
 
 "S 
 
 Canon for S. Thomas' Sunday : — 
 
 
 Ode I. — "Come, ye faithful, raise the strain " , 
 
 118 
 
 Ode III.—" On the rock of Thy Command- 
 
 
 ments " 
 
 121 
 
 Ode IV. — " CyRisT, we turn our eyes to Thee" 
 
 "3 
 
 Ode V.—" Thee, O Christ, we, very early 
 
 
 rising" 
 
 125 
 
CONTENTS. 
 
 9 
 
 
 PAGE 
 
 S. CosMAS, surnamed T^he Melodist — (a.d. 760) . 
 
 127 
 
 Canon for Christmas Day : — 
 
 
 Ode I.—" Christ is born ! Tell forth His fame ' 
 
 130 
 
 Ode III. — " Him, of the Father's very Essence ' 
 
 133 
 
 Ode IV.—" Rod of the Root of Jesse " . 
 
 i36 
 
 Ode V.—" Father of Peace, and God of Conso- 
 
 
 lation " .... 
 
 139 
 
 Ode VI. — " As Jonah, issuing from his three 
 
 
 days' tomb " . . . 
 
 . 141 
 
 Ode VII.—" The Holy Children boldly stand " 
 
 . 143 
 
 Ode VIII.—" The dewy freshness that the fur- 
 
 
 nace flings" 
 
 145 
 
 Ode IX. — *' wond'rous mystery, full of passing 
 
 
 grace!" .... 
 
 148 
 
 Cento on the Transfiguration .... 
 
 150 
 
 S. Tarasius — (a.d. 806) 
 
 154 
 
 S. Theophanes— (a.d. 759— 818) .... 
 
 156 
 
 Idiomela on Friday of Tyrophagus 
 
 160 
 
 Stichera at the First Vespers of Cheese Sunday (Quin- 
 
 
 quagesima) : — " Adams Complaint " 
 
 164 
 
10 CONTENTS. 
 
 PAGE 
 
 S. Theodore of the Studium — (a.d. 826) , • . 168 
 
 Canon for Apocreos (Sexagesima) 
 
 Ode I. — " That fearful day, that day of speech 
 
 less dread "... 
 Ode III. — "God comes, and who shall stand be 
 
 fore His fear ? " 
 Ode IV. — " The day is near, the Judgment is at 
 
 hand " . 
 Ode IX. — "The Lord draws nigh, the righteous 
 
 Throne's Assessor" . 
 
 Orthodoxy Sunday (ist Sunday in Lent) • . 
 
 S. Methodius I. — (a.d. 836) .... 
 
 Idiomela for a Sunday of the Fourth Tone . » 
 
 S. Joseph of the Studium — (a.d. 830) . . • 
 
 Canon at Lauds for Sunday of the Prodigal Son (Sep- 
 tuagesima) ....... 
 
 174 
 176 
 
 178 
 
 181 
 
 184 
 
 192 
 193 
 
 195 
 
 Cento from the Canon of SS. Timothy and Maura ; 
 " Let our Choir new Anthems raise " . , 
 
CONTENTS. II 
 
 PAGE 
 
 S. Joseph of the Studium —continued. 
 
 Cento from the Canon for the Monday of the First 
 Tone ; in the Paracletice : " ylnd ivilt Thou par- 
 don^ LordP" 204 
 
 Cento from the Canon of the Bodiless Ones (Tuesday 
 in the Week of the Fourth Tone) : " Stars of the 
 Morning "........ 206 
 
 Canon for Ascension Day : — 
 
 Ode I. — " After three days Thou didst rise " . 209 
 Ode III. — " Exalt, exalt, the Heavenly Gates" .212 
 Ode IV. — " Jesus, Lord of Life Eternal " . . 214 
 
 Ode V. — " Now that Death by death hath found 
 
 its ending" .... 21b 
 
 Ode VI. — " Rain down, ye heav'ns, eternal 
 
 bliss" 218 
 
 Ode VII. — " Wafting Him up on high " . .221 
 
 Ode VIII. — " Of twofold natures, Christ, the 
 
 Giver" . . . . . 223 
 
 Ode IX. — " Holy gift, surpassing comprehen- 
 sion " . ... 226 
 
 S. Theoctistus of the Studium — (circ. a.d. 890) . . 229 
 Cento from the " Suppliant Canon to Jesus" . . 229 
 
12 CONTENTS. 
 
 PAGE 
 
 Metropuanes of Smyrna — (clrc. a.d. 910) . . .233 
 
 From the Canon for Sunday of the Second Tone : — 
 
 "0 Unity of Threefold Light'' . . . .234 
 
 EUTHYMIUS — (a.d. 910) 236 
 
 Leo VI. — (A.D. 917) ....... 237 
 
 John Mauropus — (a.d. 1060) ..... 238 
 
 APPENDIX. 
 
 S. Stephen the Sabaite — (a.d. 725 — 794) • • . 240 
 Idiomela in the Week of the First Oblique Tone . 242 
 
 S. Joseph of the Studium (a.d. 83o): — 
 
 " The Pilgrims of Jcsus" 245 
 
 " The Return Home " 248 
 
PREFACE TO FIRST EDITION. 
 
 The following Translations have occupied a 
 portion of my leisure time for tne last twelve 
 years : and some of them have already appeared 
 in more than one ecclesiastical periodical. So 
 has also great part of the Introduction. 
 
 It is a most remarkable fact, and one which 
 shows how very little interest has been hitherto 
 felt in the Eastern Church, that these are literally, 
 I believe, the only English versions of any part 
 of the treasures of Oriental Hymnology. There 
 is scarcely a first or second-rate hymn of the 
 Roman Breviary which has not been translated : 
 of many we have six or eight versions. The 
 eighteen quarto volumes of Greek Church-poetry 
 
14 PREFACE TO FIRST EDITION. 
 
 can only at present be known to the English 
 reader by my little book. 
 
 Yet surely, if in the future Hymnal of the 
 English Church we are to build an eclectic 
 superstructure on the foundation of the Sarum 
 Book, the East ought to yield its full share or 
 compositions. And hence, I cannot but marvel 
 that the compilers of eclectic Hymnals, such as 
 the (modern) Sarum, the Hyfnns Ancient and 
 Modern^ and others, have never turned, to this 
 source. Here was a noble field open to them ; 
 and to me it is incomprehensible that they should 
 have so utterly neglected it. 
 
 There are difficulties in the task to which it is 
 as well to revert. Though the superior terseness 
 and brevity of the Latin Hymns renders a transla- 
 tion which shall represent those qualities a work 
 of great labour, yet still the versifier has the help 
 of the same metre ; his version may be line for 
 
PREFACE TO FIRST EDITION. I5 
 
 line ; and there is a great analogy between the 
 Collects and the Hymns, most helpful to the 
 translator. Above all, we have examples enough 
 of former translation by which we may take 
 pattern. 
 
 But in attempting a Greek Canon, from the 
 fact of its being in prose, — (metrical Hymns, as 
 the reader will learn, are unknown,) — one is alt 
 at sea. What measure shall we employ ? why 
 this more than that ? Might we attempt the 
 rhythmical prose of the original, and design it to 
 be chanted ? Again, the great length of the 
 Canons renders them unsuitable for our churches, 
 as wholes. Is it bettei simply to form centos of 
 the more beautiful passages ? or can separate 
 Odes, each necessarily imperfect, be employed 
 as separate Hymns ? And above all, we have 
 no pattern or example of any kind to direct our 
 labour. 
 
1 6 PREFACE TO FIRST EDITION. 
 
 These questions, and many others, have as yet 
 received no reply -, but will, in time, no doubt, 
 work out their answer. My own belief is, that 
 the best way to employ Greek Hymnology for 
 the uses of the English Church would be by 
 centos. 
 
 The reader will find, in the following pages, 
 examples of different methods of treatment. The 
 following are short Idiomela, &c., which might 
 serve as separate Hymns : — 
 
 5, The day is past and over. (Evening.) 
 
 20. O the mystery, passing wonder. (Maundy 
 Thursday.) 
 
 28. Christian! dost thou see them'^ (A Sunday 
 in Lent.) 
 
 35* ^y fr^^t the ancient foe's device. (Easter 
 Tide.) 
 
 6^. Those eternal boivers. (All Saints.) 
 
PREFACE TO FIRST EDITION. 1 7 
 
 84. TChe choirs of ransomed Israel. (Trans- 
 figuration.) 
 
 124. Are thy toils and ivoes increasing^] (Pas- 
 sion or Holy Week.) 
 
 Centos might perhaps be made from 
 
 The Canon for Easter, p. 95. 
 
 ,, Low Sunday, p. 118. 
 
 ,, Christmas, p. 1 30. 
 
 Lent p. 78. 
 
 p. 176. 
 
 I trust the reader will not forget the immense 
 difficulty of an attempt so perfectly new as the 
 present, where I have had no predecessors, and 
 therefore could have no master. If I have 
 opened the way for others to do better what I 
 have done imperfectly, I shall have every reason 
 to be thankful. I have kept most of the transla- 
 tions by me for at least the nine years recom- 
 
 B 
 
1 8 PREFACE TO FIRST EDITION. 
 
 mended by Horace -, and now offer them as a 
 contribution to the hymnology of our own 
 Church. And while fully sensible of their 
 imperfections, I may yet (by way of excuse 
 rather than of boast) say, almost in Bishop 
 Hall's words — 
 
 '• I first adventure : follow me who list. 
 And be the second Eastern Melodist." 
 
 Sackville College, 
 
 Feast of the Epiphany, 1862. 
 
PREFACE TO SECOND EDITION. 
 
 I had not ventured to hope that, whatever be 
 the beauty of these Hymns in their original lan- 
 guage, a Second Edition of the Translation should 
 so soon have been called for. And it has been 
 an additional pleasure to me to find that, not- 
 withstanding the miserable inferiority of the ver- 
 sion, the words of S. Cosmas, S. John Damas- 
 cene, and S. Joseph of the Studium, have been 
 already introduced into English congregations. 
 One Hymnal which has been kindly sent to me, 
 contains no less than eleven Greek Hymns. In 
 the present Edition, all those versions which did 
 not rhyme, — that is, which would be of no 
 practical use, are omitted. Of the Canon for 
 
20 PREFACE TO SECOND EDITION. 
 
 S. Thomas's Sunday more is given : and in some 
 cases where, of alternate rhymes, the one-half 
 was permitted to remain without consonance, the 
 defect has been remedied, I hope, without much 
 injury to the sense. It would be ungrateful if I 
 did not express my gratitude for the way in 
 which my little book has been received, notwith- 
 standing its manifold imperfections. 
 
 Sackville College. 
 Kov.iftb, 1862. 
 
PREFACE TO THIRD EDITION. 
 
 It is of course a matter of deep thankfulness to 
 me that the Eastern Church should now be more 
 and more widely brought before ordinary con- 
 gregations by means of some of the following 
 versions. God grant that this may be one little 
 help towards the great work of Re-union. 
 
 I have been more than once asked to what 
 tunes any of the hymns contained in this little 
 book may be sung. The following is a list of 
 all the settings with which I am acquainted : — 
 
 "Peace! It is I!" by the Rev. T, Helmore, M.A. 
 
 Second Edition. Novello. 1863. 
 "The Day of Resurrection:" by the Rev. T. Helmore, 
 
 M.A. Novello. 1863. 
 " The Day is past and over :" by the Rev. T. Helmore, 
 
 M.A. Second Edition. Novello. 1865. 
 
22 PREFACE TO THIRD EDITION. 
 
 " The Day is past and over :" by Arthur Henry Brown 
 
 Organist of Brentwood. Second Edition. Masters. 
 " Fierce was the wild billow:" by Edith Kerr. Novello. 
 Fortitude : a Sacred Song, [i.e., " Christian, dost thou 
 
 see them ?"] Music by M. E. H. S. Novello. 
 Hymns of the Holy Eastern Church ; set to music for 
 
 four voices by Edmund Sedding. London, Masters. 
 
 [This contains five.] 
 Hymns of the Eastern Church. In competent score for 
 
 four voices. Second Edition. London : Novello. 
 
 Leicester : Crossley and Clarke. [This contains six. 
 
 As it has no distinguishing title, it is referred to in 
 
 the following page as H.E.C.] 
 
 In the Church Hymnal of the Rev. J. F. 
 Young, which having appeared in Philadelphia 
 is reprinting in London, eleven of these hymns 
 occur ; the Greek being given as well as the 
 English. 
 
 Each of the above melodies will be found 
 noticed at the end of the Hymn which has been 
 set to it. 
 
 And so once more I commit this attempt to 
 
PREFACE TO THIRD EDITION. 2^ 
 
 further the cause of English Hymnology to God's 
 blessing : and I cannot do it better than in the 
 quaint old words of a forgotten poet : — 
 
 " I long have long'd to do some little good, 
 (According to the best I understood,) 
 By Thy good grace assisting, which I do 
 Most humbly beg for : O adjoin it to 
 My longing ardent soul; and have respect 
 To this my weak endeavour, and accept 
 (In Thy great mercy) botla of it and me, 
 Ev'n as we dedicate ourselves to Thee." 
 
 Sackville College, 
 April, 1866 
 
NOTE. 
 
 §6^\\\xv^ of il)c ^a!5fcrn ©^urci^, 
 
 Translated, with Notes and an Introduction, by the 
 
 REV. J. M. NEALE, D.D. 
 
 FOURTH EDITION, 
 
 With Music, from Greek and other sources, Verifications, Various 
 Readings, and Prose Translations, by 
 
 S. G. HATHERLY, Mus. B. 
 
 *«* Sixteen of the total number of Sixty four pieces of Music 
 arc unaltered from the Greek. 
 
INTRODUCTION. 
 
 As a general rule, the first poetical attempts of 
 the Eastern, like those of the Western, Church, 
 were in classical measures. But as classical 
 Greek died out from being a spoken language, — 
 as new trains of thought were familiarized, — as 
 new words were coined, — a versification became 
 valueless, which was attached with no living 
 bonds to the new energy, to the onward move- 
 ment. Dean Trench lias admirably expressed 
 this truth in the introduction to his " Sacred 
 Latin Poetry," and showed how the " new wine 
 must be put into new bottles." Ecclesiastical 
 terms must be used, which rebel against classical 
 metre : in Greek, no less than in Latin, five 
 words in eight would be shut out of the principal 
 
 c 
 
26 INTRODUCTION. 
 
 dassical rhythms. Now, the Gospel was preached 
 to the poor. Church hymns must be the life- 
 expression of all hearts. The Church was forced 
 to make a way for saying in poetry what her 
 message bade her say.* 
 
 S. Gregory Nazianzen, the first Greek Church 
 poet, used only the ordinary classical measures. 
 S. Sophronius of Jerusalem employed (and in 
 
 * As an illustration of this remark, it is worth while noticing 
 how very few examples of Hexameters occur in the New 
 Testament. I believe that the following are all that are toler- 
 able ; that is, that can so be scanned without one or two false 
 quantities : — 
 
 S. Luke xxi. 1 8. 0pl| ck t^s K€(paXris vp.wv oh jxr] anoXrjTai. 
 S. John xiii. 5* fidWei vSwp els rov vinrripa, Kal ijp^aro 
 
 ULTTTeiV. 
 
 S. John xiii. 16. ovk eiXTi [^'] SoCXos p-el^wu tov Kvplov avrov. 
 S. John xvii. 20. koL irepl rwv TriarcvaoyTuy dia rod Koyov 
 
 avTOi'v. 
 Titus iii. 2. fnjdeva ^\aa(p7]ixe7v, a/xaxovs eluai, eViei/cels. 
 
 Keb. xii. 13. koI rpox^as opdav noiriaaTe ro7s ttoo'Ij' 
 
 VflUU. 
 
/NTRODUCTION. 2 7 
 
 their way not unhappily). Anacreontics : and his 
 hymns on various festivals have some elegance. 
 But there is a certain degree of dilettante-ism, 
 rather than of earnestness, in these compositions ; 
 and the most airy, tripping, frivolous measure 
 that the Greek Muse possessed, never, by any 
 possibility, could form the ordinary utterance of 
 the Church. The Church compositions of S. 
 Sophronius, though called Trotrjfiaray are in fact 
 mere prose : as those grand prayers on the 
 Epiphany. 
 
 How then was the problem to be solved as to 
 
 There are some which are very near a hexameter : as S. Matt. 
 xxiii. 6 — 
 
 Kal ras TrpwroKaOedpias iv rats avvayoo'^ats. 
 A tolerable pentameter occurs in Rom. vi. 13 — 
 
 Kal TO, fJ.eK7i vfioi]/ OTrAa SiKaioavurjs' 
 and a remarkable iambic in the Lord's Prayer. 
 
 Thv &pToy T]fJiS)v rhv iiriovanov ZiBov. 
 
 C 2 
 
INTRODUCTION. 
 
 the composition of Eastern Church Song ? In 
 Latin, somewhat before the time of S. Sophronius, 
 A.D. 630, it was answered by that glorious intro- 
 duction of rhyme. Why not in Greek also ? 
 
 Now, it is no less true in Greek, than in Latin, 
 that there was a tendency to rhyme from the very 
 beginning. Open Homer : look for caudate 
 rhymes : — 
 
 NrjfjbepTrj^ re koI ^Ayfr6vhr]<; koI KaWidvaa-aa' 
 "EvOah^ €7)V KXvjJLevT), 'Idvetpa kol ' Icjitdvao-cra, 
 
 II. xviii. 46. 
 
 ''Aareo'; aWojievoio' Oewv Be Fe /jLrjvL<; dvrJKev, 
 Uaai he OrjKe irovov, iroXKolcn he K^Be* e<p7]Kev' 
 '/29 ^A')(t\ev<; Tpcoea-cri, irovov kol Krjhea 6rJKev' 
 
 II. xxi. 523. 
 
 Ov fjiev jap fiel^ov Kkeo<; dvepo^, 6(ppa Kev rjacv 
 H 6 TL iroa-alv re pe^ei koX x^P^^^ Ferfcrcv 
 
 Odyss. viii. 147. 
 
INTRODUCTION. 29 
 
 Leonines are still more common. The reader's 
 attention is particularly requested to those that 
 follow : — 
 
 II. ii. 220. "S^^tcrro? 8' ^A')(^iXrji /laXiar rjv, 77S' 
 
 484. "Eairere vvv fioi, MovaaL, ' OXv/nirca 
 
 Sco/jLar e')(ov(Tai' 
 475" '-Peta BiaKpLvcoatv, eVet K6 vofMco 
 
 fjLLJ6(00-LV. 
 
 iii, 84. ''/2? €(j)a6^' ol 8' e(T')(0VT0 fjbd')(r/<^, 
 
 avew T iyevovTo. 
 V. ^2^. ^fl (plXoL, avepe^ ecrre, koX oXklijlov 
 
 r]TOp eXeaOe. 
 vi. 242. Tov S' 'EXivT] fivOoLau TrpoorrjvSa 
 fX€LXi')(^iotac. 
 Od. i. 40. 'Efc yap 'Opiarao rlai^ eaaerai 
 ^ArpeFlSao. 
 397* AvTCLp eyai Foc/colo Fava^ eaofi 
 
 rj/JL6T€pOiO. 
 
30 INTRODUCTION. 
 
 iv. 121. 'Ek 3' 'EXipTj OaXdjiovo OvcoSeo^ 
 vy^op6<^oLo. 
 xiv. 37^' ^^cr7rLSa<;, oaaai dpiarai evl arpar^ 
 TjSe /jbeyiaraL. 
 
 And I might mark multitudes more : but these 
 are enough by way of example. The question 
 then occurs at once, Why did not the new life, 
 instilled into the Greek as well as into the Latin 
 language by Christianity, seize the grand capa- 
 bility of Rhyme in the one case as well as in the 
 other ? How stately it would have been in 
 anapaestics ! how sweet in trochaics ! Why was 
 it neglected ? 
 
 For this reason : the reader must remember 
 
 that HARDLY ONE OF THE RHYMES I HAVE BEEN 
 POINTING OUT IN HoMER WOULD BE RHYMES TO 
 
 A Greek ear. Read them accentually, and you 
 find apicrrai and fiiyLCTTai, are no more double 
 
INTRODUCTION. 3 1 
 
 rhymes to a Greek than gloriously and ferociously 
 are to us : /jLovcrai and e^^ovcrac, no more than 
 glory and victory. Accent, in the decline of the 
 language, was trampling down quantity. Now 
 accent is not favourable to such rhymes, though 
 many poems have been thus composed in the 
 newer Greek : 
 
 evpov (ptkov Ko/jbard/crj 
 Ka6' oirep TerpajcovaKi]. 
 
 But it was not sufficiently removed from every-day 
 life, — too familiar, — had too little dignity. There 
 was an innate vulgarity about it which rendered 
 it impossible to the Church. 
 
 Now, let it be observed, accentuation even in 
 Latin was not without its difficulty. In the new 
 style, dissyllables, whatever their real quantity, 
 were always read — and so we read them 
 now — as trochees. Ferox, velox, sceptrum. 
 
32 INTRODUCTION. 
 
 Hence a verse in the early metrical hymns, such 
 as — 
 
 " Castos fides somnos juvat," 
 
 a dimeter iambic, would have been read in 
 mediaeval times, Castos fides somnos juvat, and 
 so have virtually become a dimeter trochaic. 
 
 Popular poetry soon devised its own metre, 
 political verse, as it was called, because used for 
 e very-day domestic matters. This was none 
 other than a favourite metre of Aristophanes, 
 iambic tetrameter catalectic, — our own ballad 
 rhythm : — 
 
 "A Captain bold of Halifax, who lived in country quarters." 
 
 And this, sometimes with rhyme, sometimes 
 without, is the favourite Romaic metre to the 
 present day. For example : — 
 
 ftr; hid 6vpa<; ^aiveiv Se Xe^/w tov<; KXeirTajS^d' 
 3a9, 
 
INTRODUCTION. 33 
 
 ')((oaTov<if e^Kkel(TTOv^y eXKOVTa<; Orjpia, areXo/Sd- 
 
 ra<;, 
 7rdvTa<; ocroc irapa ra vo/iiifjua Spcacrc rov ^lov, 
 Koi rcov jJLOVOiTpoTrovvTCdv he, ifkrjv iv iprjfiov 
 
 TpOTTOC^;. 
 
 The Church never attempted this sing-song 
 stanza, and preferred falling back on an older form. 
 
 From the brief allusions we find to the subject 
 in the New Testament, we should gather that 
 " the hymns and spiritual songs " of the Apostles 
 were written in metrical prose. Accustomed as 
 many of the early Christians were to the Hebrew 
 Scriptures, this is not unlikely ; and proof seems 
 strong that it was so. Compare these passages : — 
 
 Eph. V. 14. Wherefore he saith : eyecpe 6 
 KadevScov, 
 Kol dvdara eK rcov veKpwv 
 eTTL^avaei croi o Xpiaro'^, 
 
34 INTRODUCTION. 
 
 Undoubtedly the fragment of a hymn. Again : — 
 
 Apoc. iv. 8. /leydXa kol Oavfiaara ra epya 
 crov, 
 KvpL€ 6 ©eo? 6 iravTOKpaTCDp' 
 hiKaiaL KOL akrqOivaX al oSoi aov, 
 
 And nearly coeval with these we have the Gloria 
 in Excelsis, the Ter Sanctus^ and the Joyful Light. 
 Also the Eastern phase, so to speak, of the Te 
 Deum ; the KaO' iKaarrjv rjfjLepav. And to this 
 rhythmical prose the Church now turned. 
 
 Then, not to pursue the subject with a detail 
 of which this Introduction will not admit, we 
 find that by the beginning of the eighth century, 
 verse, properly speaking (and that with scarcely 
 an exception), had been discarded for ever from 
 the hymns of the Eastern Church ; those hymns, 
 occupying a space beyond all comparison greater 
 
INTRODUCTION. 35 
 
 than they do in the Latin, being written in 
 measured prose. And now to explain the 
 system. 
 
 The stanza which is to form the model of the 
 succeeding stanzas, — the strophe, in fact, — is 
 called the Hlrmos, from its drawing others after 
 it. The stanzas which are to follow it are 
 called troparia, from their turning to it. 
 
 Let Ps. cxix. 13, be the Hirmos ; — 
 
 " I will talk of Thy commandments 
 and have respect unto Thy ways." 
 
 Then verse 15 would be a troparion to it : — 
 
 " With my lips have been I telling : 
 of all the judgments of Thy mouth." 
 
 So would 17 : — 
 
 O do well unto Thy sen'ant : 
 
 that I may live, and keep Thy word.' 
 
^6 INTRODUCTION. 
 
 and Ps. cii. 1 6 
 
 "When the Lord shall build up Sion: 
 and when His glory shall appear." 
 
 Let verse 44 be a Hirmos : 
 
 " So shall I always keep Thy law : 
 yea, for ever and ever." 
 
 and 45 will be a troparion to it : — 
 
 "And I will walk at liberty : 
 for I seek Thy commandments." 
 
 These troparia are always divided for chanting 
 by commas, — utterly irrespective of the sense. 
 This separation into commatisms renders it very 
 difficult to read them without practice. Take 
 an example, with the corresponding effect in 
 English : — 
 
 QaXdacra^ to ipvOpalev 7r6Xayo<;, a0p6')(oc<i 
 X')(yeaLV, o TraXaLos Trefeucra? IcrparjX, aravpOTV' 
 
INTRODUCTION. 
 
 37 
 
 TTOt? M&)o-ea)9 %e/30"t, rod ^AfjLokrjK. ttjv Bvva/jnv, 
 €V rfj eprjfjbw irpoTrcocraro. 
 
 " Israel in ancient times passing on foot with, unbedewed 
 steps the Red Gulf, of the sea, turned to flight by, the cross- 
 typifying arms, of Moses the might of Amalek, in the wilder- 
 ness." 
 
 The perfection of troparia is in a Canon, of 
 which I shall say more presently. I need not 
 trouble the reader with the minute distinction 
 between troparia and sticker a; as a troparion follows 
 a Hirmos, so a sticheron follows an homoion^ and 
 then becomes a prosomoion. There are also 
 idiomela^ — that is, stanzas which are their own 
 models, — and an infinite variety of names expres- 
 sive of the different kind of troparia. 
 
 A collection of any number of troparia, pre- 
 ceded by their Hirmos, sometimes merely quoted 
 by its initial words, sometimes given at length, 
 and with inverted commas, is an Ode, 
 
38 INTRODUCTION. 
 
 Let the Hirmos, be as before — 
 
 " With my lips have I," &c. 
 
 and the Ode might follow thus : — 
 
 Hirmos. 
 
 ••With my lips have I been telling: of all the judgments of 
 Thy mouth. 
 
 " Let us break their bonds asunder : and cast away their 
 cords from us. 
 
 " I am weary of my groaning : and every night I wash my 
 bed. 
 
 " For he lieth waiting secret: ly as a lion in his den. 
 
 " I am poured out like water: and all my bones are out of 
 joint." 
 
 Glory, 
 
 "I will talk of thy commandments: and have respect unto 
 thy ways." 
 
 Both now. 
 
 And let this be most carefully observed : an 
 Ode is simply a Sequence under somewhat dif- 
 ferent laws. Just when the system of Greek 
 
INTRODUCTION. 39 
 
 ecclesiastical poetry was fully developed, S. 
 Notker and the Monks of S. Gall hit out a 
 similar one for the Latin Church : the Sequence 
 or the Prose. It was not copied from the East, 
 for we have S. Notker's own account of the way 
 in which he invented it. It prospered to a certain 
 extent ; that is, it became one, though the least 
 important, branch of Ecclesiastical verses. 
 
 Now the perfection of Greek poetry is attained 
 by the Canons at Lauds, of which I proceed to 
 speak. 
 
 A Canon consists of Nine Odes, — each Ode 
 containing any number of troparia from three to 
 beyond twenty. The reason for the number 
 nine is this : that there are nine Scriptural 
 canticles, employed at Laads, (et? rou "Op9pov), 
 on the model of which those in every Canon are 
 formed. The first : that of Moses after the 
 passage of the Red Sea — the second, that of 
 
40 INTRODUCTION. 
 
 Moses in Deuteronomy (chap, xxxiii.) — the 
 third, that of Hannah — the fourth, that of 
 Habakkuk — the fifth, that of Isaiah (xxvi. 
 9 — 20) — the sixth, that of Jonah — the seventh, 
 that of the Three Children (verses 3 — 34, of 
 our "Song" in the Bible Version) — the eighth, 
 Benedicite — the ninth, Magnificat and Benedidus. 
 
 From this arrangement two consequences fol- 
 low. The first, that, as the Second Canticle is 
 never recited except in Lent, the Canons never 
 have any second Ode. The second, that there 
 is generally some reference, either direct or in- 
 direct, in each Ode, to the Canticle of the same 
 number : in the first Ode, e.g.y to the Song of 
 Moses at the Red Sea : in the third to that of 
 Hannah. This gives rise, on the one hand, to a 
 marvellous amount of ingenuity, in tracing the 
 most far-fetched connexions, — in discovering the 
 most remote types ; — it brings out into the clearest 
 
INTRODUCTION. 4I 
 
 light the wonderful analogies which underlie the 
 surface of Scripture narration -, and so far 
 imbues each Ode with a depth of Scriptural 
 meaning which it could scarcely otherwise reach. 
 On the other, it has a stiffening and cramping 
 effect ; and sometimes, especially to the unini- 
 tiated, has somewhat of a ludicrous tendency. 
 It would be curious to sum up the variety of 
 objects of which, in a thousand Sixth Odes, we 
 find Jonah's Whale a type. On the whole, this 
 custom has about the same disadvantages and 
 advantages which Warton points out as re- 
 sulting from the four rhymes of a Spenserian 
 stanza ; — the advantages, — picturesqueness, in- 
 genuity, discovery of new beauties : the disad- 
 vantages, — art not concealed by art, tautology, 
 imparity of similitudes, a caricature of typology, 
 painful and affected elaboration. 
 
 The Hirmos, on which each Ode is based, is 
 
 D 
 
42 INTRODUCTION. 
 
 sometimes quoted at length at the commencement, 
 in which case it is always distinguished by in- 
 verted commas ; or the first few words are 
 merely cited as a note to the singer, for whose 
 benefit the Tone is also given. 
 
 The next noticeable matter is that these Odes 
 are usually arranged after an acrostich, itself 
 commonly in verse : sometimes alphabetical. 
 The latter device was probably borrowed from 
 the Psalms ; as for example the 25, II2, II9. 
 
 The arrangement is not to be considered as a 
 useless formality or pretty-ism : it was of the 
 greatest importance, when so many Canons had 
 to be remembered by heart. We know to what 
 curious devices the Western Church, in matters 
 connected with the Calendar, had recourse as a 
 Memorta Technica ; and not a few of her short 
 hymns were alphabetical, either by verses or by 
 lines ; I know no instance of any other kind of 
 
INTRODUCTION. 43 
 
 acrostich. Besides the line which forms the 
 initials of Greek Canons, the name of the com- 
 poser likewise finds a frequent place. And it is 
 worth noticing that, whereas the authors of the 
 world-famous hymns of the West, with a few 
 exceptions (such as the Vexilla Regis ^ the Dies 
 Ira, the Veni Sancte Spiritus), are unknown, the 
 case in the East is reversed. The acrostich may, 
 or may not, run through the Theotokia, of which 
 I now proceed to speak. 
 
 Each Ode is ended by a troparion, dedicated 
 to the celebration of S. Mary, and thence named 
 Theotokion, Sometimes there is another, which 
 commemorates her at the Cross ; and then it is 
 a Stauro-theotokion, In long Canons, a stanza, 
 sometimes intercalated at the end of the third or 
 sixth Odes, is called a Cathisma, because the 
 congregation are then allowed to sit. There is 
 also the Oicos, literally the House, — which is the 
 
 D 2 
 
44 INTRODUCTION. 
 
 exact Italian Statiza, — about the length of three 
 ordinary troparia. The Catavasui is a troparion 
 in which both choirs come down together, and 
 stand in the middle of the Church, singing it in 
 common. 
 
 The acrostichs are usually in iambics, — some- 
 times none of the best : e.g. — 
 
 eKTrXrjTTOfiaL aov tov<; Xoyov^; Za')(^apLa, 
 
 on the feast of S. Zacharias the Prophet : — and 
 generally bringing in some paronomasia on the 
 Saint's names ; as — 
 
 (pepcovv/jLOP (7€ rod Geov Bcopov aefico, on that of 
 
 S. Dorotheus. 
 
 Or again : — 
 
 Tpv(j)7)<; [leOe^eiv a^iwaov fie, Tpv(pcov' 
 
 and of S. Clement : 
 
 jjbekirw ae, Kkrjfxa rf]^ vo'qTr}^ a/iTreXov. 
 
INTRODUCTION. 45 
 
 But there are examples of acrostichs which take 
 the form of an hexameter, as — 
 
 eUdBi, oi/pavov et9 ^evirjv aevr) rj\de rerdprr]. 
 Tov iravapLarov ev daKr]Tai<^ MaKapcov KvBdtvo)- 
 and 
 
 Tcfiodeov TOV ^Attoo-toXov, aafiacn TOLoSe lyepaLpo)' 
 and 
 
 TOV OeoprjfJLOva Tprjjoptov tov dolSt/jLOV aSco* 
 
 I shall more than once have occasion to observe 
 that, while the earlier Odes, which treat of such 
 subjects as the Resurrection, Ascension, Nativity, 
 are magnificent specimens of religious poetry, the 
 later ones, composed in commemoration of mar- 
 tyrs, of whom nothing but the fact of their 
 martyrdom is known, are often grievously dull 
 and heavy. Herein the Eastern Church would 
 have done well ; to have had, for such as these, 
 a Canon of the Common of Martyrs, instead of 
 
46 INTRODUCTION. 
 
 celebrating each differently ; if the tautology which 
 composes such Odes can indeed be called differefit. 
 
 I said, some short time since, that the Greek 
 Ode and the Latin Notkerian Sequence were 
 essentially the same. This being so, it is to 
 introduce confusion into the very axioms of 
 hymnology to call that kind of Sequence, as 
 Mone does, by the name of Troparion. The 
 Troparion does not answer to the Sequence, but 
 to each stanza of the Sequence. The differences 
 between Odes and Sequences may be briefly 
 summed up as follows : — 
 
 The Hinnos in the former has a number of 
 Troparia following it and based on it, whereas 
 in the latter the Troparia run in couples ; that is, 
 one Hirmos has one follower, or Troparion, and 
 there an end ; then, another follows another, 
 and so on. There are sometimes triplets, but 
 these are not common. 
 
INTRODUCTION. 
 
 47 
 
 2. The Hirmos in Greek Odes is always an 
 already existing Troparion ; whereas, in Latin, 
 the writer generally composed that as much as 
 any other part of the Sequence. But in certain 
 Sequences this was not always the case. Godes- 
 chalkus sometimes took a verse from the Psalms. 
 
 3. Sometimes, indeed, a whole Sequence was 
 made super some other Sequence, and then it 
 became a vast Troparion, the different verses 
 takmg the place of the commatisms in Greek Odes. 
 In the February number of The Ecclesiologist for 
 1859, ^^ given a list of Hirmos-Sequences, from 
 the Brander MS. of S. Gall. But even in these 
 cases, it is better not to call them Troparia, as 
 they have so little real resemblance to Greek 
 stanzas of that kind : I had rather see them 
 called Homoia. 
 
 4. The rhythm in the Greek is far more exact. 
 Not only the syllabic arrangement, but the ac- 
 
48 INTRODUCTION. 
 
 centuation is the same ; whereas in Latin, the 
 accentuation is often counter ; that is, an iambic 
 dimeter in the Hirmos is answered by a trochaic 
 dimeter in the Troparion. For example, if the 
 Hirmos were, — 
 
 " The Lord is great in Sion : 
 and high above all people," 
 
 the requirements of a Sequence would be satisfied 
 with the Troparion, 
 
 "Look upon my misery: 
 and forgive me all my sins." 
 
 Such a licence would not for one moment be 
 allowed in the Greek. 
 
 I next have to speak of the books in which 
 Greek Hymnology is to be found. They consist 
 principally of sixteen volumes. 
 
 a. Twelve of the Metiaa : — which would 
 answer, in Western Ritual, to the Breviary, 
 minus the ferial offices. But, whereas in the 
 
INTRODUCTION. ^9 
 
 West, the only human compositions of the 
 Breviary are the lections from the sermons of 
 the Fathers, the hymns, and a few responses — 
 the body of the Eastern Breviary is ecclesiastical 
 poetry : poetry not, strictly speaking, written in 
 verse, but in measured prose. This is the staple 
 of those three thousand pages — under whatever 
 name the stanzas may be presented — forming 
 Canons and Odes ; as, Troparia, Idiomela, 
 Stichera, Stichoi, Contakia, Cathismata, Theo- 
 tokia, Triodia, Staurotheotokia, Catavasiae, — or 
 whatever else. Nine-tenths of the Eastern 
 Service-book is poetry. 
 
 /S. The Paracletice, or Great Octoechus : in 
 eight parts. 
 
 This contains the Ferial OfEce for eight weeks. 
 Each week has on Sunday — 
 
 A Canon of the Trinity. 
 
 A Canon of the Resurrection. 
 
50 INTRODUCTION. 
 
 A Canon of the Cross and Resurrection. 
 
 A Canon of the Mother of God (one or more). 
 
 On Monday : 
 
 A Canon of Penitence. 
 A Canon of the Angels. 
 
 On Tuesday : 
 
 A Canon of Penitence. 
 
 A Canon of the Forerunner. 
 
 On Wednesday : 
 
 A Canon of the Cross. 
 
 A Canon of the Mother of God. 
 
 On Thursday : 
 
 A Canon of the Apostles. 
 A Canon of S. Nicolas. 
 
 On Friday : 
 
 A Canon of the Passion. 
 
 A Canon of the Mother of God (two). 
 
, _ — _ 
 
 INTRODUCTION. 5 1 
 
 On Saturday : 
 
 
 A Canon of 
 
 Prophets and Martyrs. 
 
 A Canon of the Dead. 
 
 In the first week, the whole of the Canons are 
 
 1 sung to the first 
 
 Tone : in the second, to the 
 
 second, and so on. The Greek Tones answer 
 
 to our Gregorian, 
 
 thus : — 
 
 Latin. 
 
 Greek. 
 
 Tone I. . . 
 
 . I. 
 
 II. .. 
 
 . I. Plagal. 
 
 III. .. 
 
 . II. 
 
 IV. .. 
 
 . II. Plagal. 
 
 V. .. 
 
 . III. 
 
 VI. 
 
 Varys (heavy.) 
 
 VII. .. 
 
 .IV. 
 
 VIII. .. 
 
 . IX. Plagal. 
 
 The Paracletice forms a quarto volume 
 
 (double columns) 
 
 of 350 pages : at least half 
 
 is the work of J 
 
 oseph of the Studium. The 
 
52 INTRODUCTION. 
 
 OctoechuSy sometimes called the Little Octoechus, 
 contains the Sunday services from the Para- 
 cletice : they are often printed separately. 
 
 <y. The Triodion : the Lent volume, which 
 commences on the Sunday of the Pharisee and 
 Publican (that before Septuagesima) and goes 
 down to Easter. It is so called, because the 
 leading Canons have, during that period, only 
 three Odes. 
 
 S. The Pefjtecostartofjy — more properly the Pente- 
 costar'wn Charmosynotty — the Office for Easter-tide. 
 On a moderate computation, these volumes to- 
 gether comprise 5000 closely printed quarto 
 pages, in double columns, of which at least 4000 
 are poetry. 
 
 The thought that, in conclusion, strikes one is 
 this : the marvellous ignorance in which English 
 ecclesiastical scholars are content to remain of 
 this huge treasure of divinity — the gradual com- 
 
INTRODUCTION. 53 
 
 pletion of nine centuries at least. I may safely 
 calculate that not one out of twenty who peruse 
 these pages will ever have read a Greek " Canon " 
 through ; yet what a glorious mass of theology 
 do these offices present ! If the following pages 
 tend in any degree to induce the reader to study 
 these books for himself, my labour could hardly 
 have been spent to a better result. 
 
( 54 ) 
 
 FIRST EPOCH. 
 
 A.D. 360 A. D. 726. 
 
 It is not my intention to dwell on the hymn 
 writers of this period, such as S. Gregory 
 Nazianzen and S. Sophronius, because their 
 works have not been employed in the Divine 
 Office, are merely an imitation of classical writers, 
 and, however occasionally pretty, are not the stuff 
 out of which Church-song is made. There is 
 but one writer in this epoch who gives spring- 
 promise of the approaching summer, and that is 
 S. Anatolius. 
 
( 55 ) 
 
 S. ^ttatolius. 
 +■458. 
 
 The first poet who emancipated himself from 
 the tyranny of the old laws — hence to be com- 
 pared to Venantius Fortunatus in the West — and 
 who boldly struck out the new path of harmo- 
 nious prose, was S. Anatolius of Constantinople. 
 His commencements were not promising. He 
 had been apocrlsiarius ^ or legate, from the arch- 
 heretic Dioscorus, to the Emperor's Court : and 
 at the death of S. Flavian, in consequence of the 
 violence received in the ^^ Robbers' Meeting'' at 
 Ephesus, A.D. 449, was, by the influence of his 
 Pontiff, raised to the vacant throne of Constanti- 
 nople. He soon, however, vindicated his ortho- 
 doxy : and in the Council of Chalcedon, he pro- 
 
^6 S. ANATOLIUS. 
 
 cured the enactment of the famous 28th Canon, 
 by which, (in spite of all the efforts of Rome,) 
 Constantinople was raised to the second place 
 among Patriarchal Sees. Having governed his 
 Church eight years in peace, he departed to his 
 rest in a.d. 458. His compositions are not 
 numerous, and are almost all short, but they are 
 usually very spirited. 
 
S. ANATOLIUS. 57 
 
 STICHERA FOR A SUNDAY OF THE 
 FIRST TONE. 
 
 ^o<f)€pa<; TpLKv/jbia^, 
 Fierce was the wild billow ; 
 
 Dark was the night ; 
 Oars labour' d heavily ; 
 
 Foam glimmer' d white ; 
 Trembled the mariners ; 
 
 Peril was nigh ; 
 Then said the God of God, 
 
 —*' Peace ! It is I !" 
 
 Ridge of the mountain-wave. 
 
 Lower thy crest ! 
 Wail of Euroclydon, 
 
 Be thou at rest ! 
 
 B 
 
58 S. ANATOLIUS. 
 
 Sorrow can never be, — 
 
 Darkness must fly, — 
 Where saith the Light of Light, 
 
 — " Peace ! It is I ! 
 
 Jesu, Deliverer ! 
 
 Come Thou to me : 
 Soothe Thou my voyaging 
 
 Over Life's sea ! 
 Thou, when the storm of Death 
 
 Roars, sweeping by. 
 Whisper, O Truth of Truth ! 
 
 —** Peace! It is I ! " 
 
 [The above hymn has been set by my friend Mr. Helmore ; 
 also in H. E, C, of which it forms No. i : also by Miss Kerr. 
 The last melody is, to my mind, especially beautiful.] 
 
S. ANATOLIUS. 59 
 
 EVENING HYMN. 
 
 Tr)v 'r]iJbepav SieXOcov. 
 This little hymn, which, I believe, is not 
 used in the public service of the Church, is a 
 great favourite in the Greek Isles. Its peculiar 
 style and evident antiquity may well lead to the 
 belief that it is the work of our present author. 
 It is, to the scattered hamlets of Chios and 
 Mitylene, what Bishop Ken's Evening Hymn is 
 to the villages of our own land ; and its melody 
 singularly plaintive and soothing. 
 
 The day is past and over ; 
 
 All thanks, O Lord, to Thee ! 
 I pray Thee, that offenceless 
 The hours of dark may be. 
 
 E 2 
 
6o S. ANATOLIUS. 
 
 O Jesu ! keep me in Thy sight, 
 
 And save me through the coming night ! 
 
 The joys of day are over : 
 
 I lift my heart to Thee ; 
 And call on Thee, that sinless 
 
 The hours of sin may be. 
 O Jesu ! make their darkness light. 
 And save me through the coming night ! 
 
 The toils of day are over : 
 
 I raise the hymn to Thee ; 
 And ask that free from peril 
 
 The hours of fear may be. 
 O Jesu ! keep me in Thy sight. 
 And guard me through the coming night 
 
 Lighten mine eyes, Saviour, 
 
 Or sleep in death shall 1 ; 
 And he, my wakeful tempter. 
 
 Triumphantly shall cry : 
 
S. ANATOLIUS. 6 1 
 
 "He could not make their darkness light. 
 Nor guard them through the hours of 
 night ! '* 
 
 Be Thou my soul's preserver, 
 O God ! for Thou dost know 
 
 How many are the perils 
 
 Through which I have to go : 
 
 Lover of men ! O hear my call, 
 
 And guard and save me from them all ! 
 
 [Set by Mr. Helmore : also by Mr. Arthur Brown. Both 
 settings have reached a second Edition.] 
 
62 S. ANATOLIUS. 
 
 J>. <i&tcpl|cn'^ ST^ap, 
 
 STICHERA AT VESPERS. 
 
 Tu> BacnXei koX AeairoTrj. 
 The Lord and King of all things 
 
 But yesterday was born : 
 And Stephen's glorious offering 
 
 His birthtide shall adorn. 
 No pearls of orient splendour, 
 
 No jewels can he show ; 
 But with his own true heart's-blood 
 
 His shining vestments glow. 
 Come, ye that love the Martyrs, 
 
 And pluck the flow'rs of song. 
 And weave them in a garland 
 
 For this our suppliant throng : 
 
S. ANATOLIUS. 63 
 
 And cry, — O thou that shinest 
 
 In grace's brighest ray, 
 Christ's valiant Protomartjr, 
 
 For peace and favour pray ! 
 
 Thou first of all Confessors, 
 
 Thou of all Deacons crown, 
 Of every following athlete 
 
 The glory and renown : 
 Make supplication, standing 
 
 Before Christ's Royal Throne, 
 That He would give the kingdom. 
 
 And for our sins atone ! 
 
64 S. ANATOLIUS. 
 
 STICHERA FOR CHRISTMAS-TIDE. 
 
 fxe^a Kol irapaZo^ov davfia. 
 
 A great and mighty wonder ! 
 
 A full and holy cure ! 
 The Virgin bears the Infant, 
 
 With Virgin-honour pure! 
 
 The Word becomes Incarnate, 
 (*) And yet remains on high : 
 And Cherubim sing anthems 
 To shepherds from the sky. 
 
 (*) Compare S. Thomas: Verbum supernum prodiens, 
 Nee Patris Unquens dexteram. 
 
S. ANATOLIUS. 6^ 
 
 And we with them triumphant 
 
 Repeat the hymn again : 
 " To God on high be glory, 
 
 And peace on earth to men ! '* 
 
 While thus they sing your Monarch, 
 Those bright angelic bands, 
 
 Rejoice, ye vales and mountains ! 
 Ye oceans, clap your hands ! 
 
 Since all He comes to ransom, 
 
 By all be He adored. 
 The Infant born in Bethlehem, 
 
 The Saviour and the Lord ! 
 
 And idol forms shall perish. 
 
 And error shall decay. 
 And Christ shall wield His sceptre. 
 
 Our Lord and God for aye. 
 
 [In Mr. Young's book. Melody of Christus der ist me'in 
 Leben. Harmony by M. Vulpius, 1609.] 
 
(' 66 ) 
 
 SECOND EPOCH. 
 
 A.D. 726 A.D. 820. 
 
 The second period of Greek Hymnology is 
 very nearly, as I said, coincident with the Icono- 
 clastic controversy. Its first writer, indeed, died 
 shortly after the commencement of that stormy 
 age, and took no share in its Councils or suffer- 
 ings ; while the last hymnographer who bore a 
 part in its proceedings, S. Joseph of the Studium, 
 belongs to the decline of his art. With these two 
 exceptions, the ecclesiastical poets of this period 
 were not not only thrown into the midst of that 
 great struggle, but, with scarcely one exception, 
 took an. active share in it. 
 
 A few words on that conflict of one hundred 
 
{ 67 ) 
 
 and sixteen years are absolutely necessary, if we 
 would understand the progress and full develop- 
 ment of Greek Hymnography. No controversy 
 has been more grossly misapprehended ; none, 
 without the key of subsequent events, could 
 have been so difficult to appreciate. Till Cal- 
 vinism, and its daughter Rationalism, showed 
 the ultimate development of Iconoclast princi- 
 ples, it must have been well nigh impossible to 
 realize the depth of feeling on the side of the 
 Church, or the greatness of the interests 
 attacked by her opponents. We may, perhaps, 
 doubt whether even the Saints of that day fully 
 understood the character of the battle ; whether 
 they did not give up ease, honour, possessions, 
 life itself, rather from an intuitive perception 
 that their cause was the cause of the Catholic 
 faith, than from a logical appreciation of the 
 results to which the Image-destroyers were 
 
( 68 ) 
 
 tending. Just as in the early part of the Nes- 
 torian controversy, many and many a simple 
 soul must have felt intuitively that the title of 
 Theotocos was to be defended, without seeing the 
 full consequences to which its denial would sub- 
 sequently lead. The supporters of Icons, by 
 universal consent, numbered amongst their ranks 
 all that was pious and venerable in the Eastern 
 Church. The Iconoclasts seem to have been a 
 legitimate outbreak of that secret creeping 
 Manichaeism, which, under the various names of 
 Turlupins, Bogomili, or Good-men, so long 
 devastated Christ's fold. 
 
 We must keep the landmarks of the contro- 
 versy in sight. Commenced by Leo the Isaurian, 
 in A.D. 726, the persecution was carried on by 
 his despicable son, Constantine Copronymus, 
 who also endeavoured to destroy monasticism. 
 The great Council of Constantinople, attended by 
 
( 69 ) 
 
 338 prelates, in 752; which rejected the use of 
 images, was the culminating success of the 
 Iconoclasts. Lulling at the death of Constan- 
 tine, the persecution again raged in the latter 
 years of his successor Leo, and was only ter- 
 minated by the death of that prince, and the 
 succession of Constantine and Irene. The 
 Second Council of Nicsea, Seventh CEcu- 
 menical (a.d. 787), attended by 377 Bishops, 
 seemed to end the heresy; but it again broke 
 out under the Iconoclast Emperor, Leo the 
 Armenian (8 1 3), and after having been carried on 
 under the usurper Michael, and his son Theo- 
 philus, ended with the death of the latter in 
 842. In the Hymnographers of this epoch, it 
 may be noticed that the Second Council of 
 Nicsea forms the culminating point of ecclesias- 
 tical poetry. Up to that date, there is a vigour 
 and freshness which the twenty-eight years of 
 
( 7° ) 
 
 peace succeeding the Council corrupted, and that 
 rapidly, with the fashionable language of an 
 effete court, and deluged with Byzantine bom- 
 bast. 
 
 i 
 
( 71 ) 
 
 ^. Silntircto of Crete. 
 
 A.D. 660. . . .A.D. 732. 
 
 Andrew was born at Damascus, about the 
 year 660, and embraced the monastic life at 
 Jerusalem, from which city he sometimes takes 
 his name. Hence he was sent on ecclesiastical 
 business to Constantinople, where he became a 
 Deacon of the Great Church, and Warden of 
 the Orphanage. His first entrance on public 
 life does no credit to his sanctity. During the 
 reign of Philippicus Bardanes, (7 1 1 — 714) he 
 was raised by that usurper to the Archiepiscopate 
 of Crete ; and shortly afterwards was one of 
 the Pseudo-Synod of Constantinople, held under 
 the Emperor's auspices in a.d. 712, which 
 condemned the Sixth CEcumenical Council, and 
 
72 S. ANDREW OF CRETE. 
 
 restored the Monothelite heresy. At a later 
 period, however, he returned to the faith of the 
 Church, and refuted the error into which he had 
 fallen. Seventeen of his Homilies, rather 
 laboured than eloquent, remain to us : that in 
 which he rises highest is, not unnaturally, his 
 sermon on S. Titus, Apostle of Crete. He died 
 in the island of Hierissus, near Mitylene, about 
 the year 732. 
 
 As a poet, his most ambitious composition is 
 the Great Canon ; which, partially used during 
 other days of Lent, is sung right through on the 
 Thursday of Mid-Lent week, called, indeed, 
 from that hymn. His Triodia in Holy Week, 
 and Canon on Mid-Pentecost, are fine ; and he 
 has a great variety of spirited Idiomela scattered 
 through the Triodion and Pentecostarion, 
 
 i 
 
S. ANDREW OF CRETE. 73 
 
 STICHERA FOR GREAT THURSDAY. 
 
 TO fliya /J,V(TT7]pL0V. 
 
 O the mystery, passing wonder, 
 
 When, reclining at the board, 
 ** Eat," Thou saidst to Thy Disciples, 
 
 " That True Bread with quickening stored 
 " Drink in faith the healing Chalice 
 
 ** From a dying God outpoured.'* 
 
 Then the glorious upper chamber 
 
 A celestial tent was made, 
 "When the bloodless rite was offered, 
 
 And the soul's true service paid, 
 
74 S. ANDREW OF CRETE. 
 
 And the table of the feasters 
 As an altar stood displayed. 
 
 Christ Is now our mighty Pascha, 
 
 Eaten for our mystic bread : 
 Take we of His broken Body, 
 
 Drink we of the Blood He shed, 
 As a lamb led out to slaughter, 
 
 And for this world offered. 
 
 To the Twelve spake Truth eternal. 
 To the Branches spake the Vine : 
 
 ** Never more from this day forward 
 Shall I taste again this wine, 
 
 Till I drink it in the kingdom 
 
 Of My Father, and with Mine." 
 
 Thou hast stretched those hands for silver 
 That had held the Immortal Food ; 
 
S. ANDREW OF CRENE. J^ 
 
 With those lips that late had tasted 
 
 Of the Body and the Blood, 
 Thou hast given the kiss, O Judas ; 
 
 Thou hast heard the woe bestowed. 
 
 Christ to all the world gives banquet 
 
 On that most celestial Meat : 
 Him, albeit with lips all earthly. 
 
 Yet with holy hearts we greet : 
 Him, the sacrificial Pascha, 
 
 Priest and Victim all complete. 
 
 [In Mr. Young's book. Melody of Pange lingua, harmonised 
 by Dr. Schroeder. I may add that I purposely chose this Stanza 
 to suit the melody of S. Thomas's great hymn.] 
 
 F 2 
 
76 S. ANDREW OF CRETE. 
 
 TROPARIA FOR PALM SUNDAY. 
 
 The following Stanzas are from the Triodion sung at Compline 
 on Palm Sunday : which has the same name among the Greeks 
 as among ourselves. 
 
 ^l7](Tov<; virep rod Koafiov. 
 
 Jesus, hastening for the world to suffer. 
 
 Enters in, Jerusalem, to thee : 
 With His Twelve He goeth forth to offer 
 
 That free sacrifice He came to be. 
 
 They that follow Him with true affection 
 Stand prepared to suffer for His Name : 
 
 Be we ready then for man's rejection. 
 
 For the mockery, the reproach, the shame. 
 
S. ANDREW OF CRETE. 77 
 
 Now, in sorrow, sorrow finds its healing : 
 In the form wherein our father fell, 
 
 Christ appears, those quick'ning Wounds re- 
 vealing, 
 Which shall save from sin and death and hell. 
 
 Now, Judsea, call thy Priesthood nigh thee ! 
 
 Now for Deicide prepare thy hands ! 
 Lo ! thy Monarch, meek and gentle by thee ! 
 
 Lo ! the Lamb and Shepherd in thee stands ! 
 
 To thy Monarch, Salem, give glad greeting ! 
 
 Willingly He hastens to be slain 
 For the multitude His entrance meeting 
 With their false Hosanna's ceaseless strain. 
 *^ Blest is He That comes," they cry, 
 *^ On the Cross for man to die ! " 
 
78 S. ANDREW OF CRETE 
 
 THE GREAT CANON, 
 
 CALLED ALSO 
 
 THE KING OF CANONS. 
 
 It would be unpardonable not to give a portion of that which 
 the Greeks regard as the King of Canons — the Great Canon of 
 the Mid-Lent week. It is a collection of Scriptural examples, 
 turned to the purpose of penitential Confession. It is impos- 
 sible to deny the beauty of many stanzas, and the ingenuity of 
 some tropological applications. But the immense length of the 
 Canon, for it exceeds three hundred stanzas, and its necessary 
 tautology, must render it wearisome, unless devotionally used 
 under the peculiar circumstances for which it is appointed. The 
 following is a part of the earlier portion. 
 
 TloOev dp^ofiai Oprjvelv ; 
 
 Whence shall my tears begin ? 
 What first-fruits shall I bear 
 Of earnest sorrow for my sin ? 
 Or how my woes declare ? 
 
S. ANDREW OF CRETE. 79 
 
 O Thou ! the Merciful and Gracious One 
 Forgive the foul transgressions I have done. 
 
 With Adam I have vied, 
 
 Yea, pass'd him, in my fall ; 
 And I am naked now, by pride 
 
 And lust made bare of all -, 
 Of Thee, O God, and that Celestial Band, 
 And all the glory of the Promised Land. 
 
 No earthly Eve beguil'd 
 
 My body into sin : 
 A spiritual temptress smiled. 
 
 Concupiscence within : 
 Unbridled passion grasp'd the unhallow'd sweet : 
 Most bitter — ever bitter — was the meat. 
 
 If Adam's righteous doom. 
 Because he dared transgress 
 Thy one decree, lost Eden's bloom 
 And Eden's loveliness : 
 
8o S. ANDREW OF CRETE. 
 
 What recompence, O Lord, must I expect, 
 "Who all my life Thy quickening laws neglect ? 
 
 By mine own act, like Cain, 
 
 A murderer was I made : 
 By mine own act my soul was slain, 
 
 When Thou wast disobeyed : 
 And lusts each day are quickened, warring still 
 Against Thy grace with many a deed of ill. 
 
 Thou formed'st me of clay, 
 O Heav'nly Potter ! Thou 
 In fleshly vesture didst array. 
 With life and breath endow. 
 Thou Who didst make, didst ransom, and dost 
 
 know. 
 To Thy repentant creature pity show ! 
 
 My guilt for vengeance cries ; 
 But yet Thou pardonest all, 
 
S. ANDREW OF CRETE. 8 1 
 
 And whom Thou lov'st Thou dost chastise, 
 And mourn'st for them that fall : 
 Thou, as a Father, mark'st our tears and pain, 
 And welcomest the prodigal again. 
 
 I lie before Thy door, 
 
 O turn me not away ! 
 Nor in mine old age give me o'er 
 
 To Satan for a prey ! 
 But ere the end of life and term of grace, 
 Thou Merciful ! my many sins efface ! 
 
 The Priest beheld, and pass'd 
 
 The way he had to go : 
 A careless glance the Levite cast. 
 
 And left me to my woe : 
 But Thou, O Jesu, Mary's Son, console, 
 Draw nigh, and succour me, and make me whole] 
 
82 S. ANDREW OF CRETE. 
 
 Thou Spotless Lamb divine, 
 
 Who takest sins away, 
 Remove, remove, the load that mine 
 
 Upon my conscience lay : 
 And, of Thy tender mercy, grant Thou me 
 To find remission of iniquity ! 
 
 [In Mr. Young's book : composed by Dr. Schroeder.] 
 
 STICHERA FOR THE SECOND WEEK 
 OF THE GREAT FAST. 
 
 01) yap l3\67r€L<; tov<s Tapdrrovra^i. 
 
 Christian ! dost thou see them 
 On the holy ground. 
 
 How the troops of Midian 
 Prowl and prowl around ? 
 
S. ANDREW OF CRETE. 83 
 
 Christian ! up and smite them, 
 
 Counting gain but loss : 
 Smite them by the merit 
 
 Of the Holy Cross ! 
 
 Christian ! dost thou feel them, 
 
 How they work within. 
 Striving, tempting, luring. 
 
 Goading into sin ? 
 Christian ! never tremble ! 
 
 Never be down-cast ! 
 Smite them by the virtue 
 
 Of the Lenten Fast ! 
 
 Christian ! dost thou hear them, 
 
 How they speak thee fair? 
 " Always fast and vigil ? 
 
 Always watch and prayer ? " 
 Christian ! say but boldly : 
 
 " While I breathe, I pray : " 
 
84 
 
 S. ANDREW OF CRETE. 
 
 
 Peace shall follow battle, 
 
 
 Night shall end in day. 
 
 
 " Well I know thy trouble, 
 
 
 O my servant true ; 
 
 
 Thou art very weary, — 
 
 
 I was weary too : 
 
 
 But that toil shall make thee, 
 
 
 Some day, all Mine own : 
 
 
 But the end of sorrow 
 
 
 Shall be near My Throne." 
 
 [In H. 
 
 E. C, where it is No. 2. Also, as Fortitude, a 
 
 Sacred Song, by M. E. II. S. This is, of course, not intended | 
 
 to be used 
 
 in Church ; but, as a song, it is extremely pretty.] 
 
( 85 ) 
 
 A.D. 634 A.D. 734. 
 
 S. Germanus of Constantinople was born in that 
 city about 634. His father, Justinian, a patrician, 
 had the ill-fortune to excite the jealousy of the 
 Emperor Constantine Pogonatus, who put him to 
 death, and obliged Germanus to enrol himself 
 among the Clergy of the Great Church. Here 
 he became distinguished for piety and learning, 
 and in process of time was made Bishop of Cyzi- 
 cus. In this capacity he assisted, with S. Andrew 
 of Crete, in the Synod of Constantinople of which 
 I have just spoken : and no doubt, he might be 
 the more favourably disposed to Monothelitism, 
 because he had been so deeply injured by its 
 great opponent, Pogonatus. However, he also. 
 
86 S. GERMANUS. 
 
 at a late period, expressly condemned that heresy. 
 Translated to the throne of Constantinople in 7 15, 
 he governed his Patriarchate for some time in 
 tranquillity. At the beginning of the attack of 
 Leo the Isaurian on Icons, his letters, in opposi- 
 tion to the Imperial mandate, were the first 
 warnings which the Church received of the 
 impending storm. Refusing to sign the decrees 
 of the Synod which was convoked by that 
 Emperor in a.d. 730, and stripping off his Patri- 
 archal robes, with the words — " It is impossible 
 for me. Sire, to innovate, without the sanction 
 of the CEcumenical Council," he was driven from 
 his See, not, it is said, without blows, and 
 returned to his own house at Platanias, where he 
 thenceforth led a quiet and private life. He 
 died shortly afterwards, aged about one hundred 
 years, and is regarded by the Greeks as one of 
 their most glorious Confessors. 
 
S. GERMANUS. 87 
 
 The poetical compositions of S. Germanus are 
 few. 
 
 He has stanzas on S. Simeon Stylites, on the 
 Prophet Elias, and on the Decollation of S. John 
 Baptist. His most poetical work is perhaps his 
 Canon on the Wonder-working Image in Edessa. 
 But probably the following simpler stanzas, for 
 Sunday in the Week of the First Tone, will 
 better commend themselves to the English 
 reader. 
 
 By fruit, the ancient Foe's device 
 Drave Adam forth from Paradise : 
 Christ, by the cross of shame and pain, 
 Brought back the dying Thief again : 
 " When in Thy kingdom. Lord," said he, 
 " Thou shalt return, rem.ember me ! " 
 
 Thy Holy Passion we adore 
 And Resurrection evermore : 
 
S. GERMANUS. 
 
 With heart and voice to Thee on high, 
 As Adam and the Thief we cry : 
 " When in Thy kingdom Thou shalt be 
 " Victor o'er all things, think of me ! " 
 
 Thou, after three appointed days, 
 Thy Body's Temple didst upraise: 
 And Adam's children, one and all. 
 With Adam, to New Life didst call : . 
 " When Thou," they cry, " shalt Victor be 
 " In that Thy kingdom, think of me ! " 
 
 Early, O Christ, to find Thy Tomb, 
 The weeping Ointment-bearers come : 
 The Angel, cloth'd in white, hath said, 
 " Why seek the Living with the dead ? 
 " The Lord of Life hath burst death's chain, 
 " Whom here ye mourn and seek in vain.'* 
 
 The Apostles, on Thy Vision bent, 
 To that appointed mountain went : 
 
S. ANDREW OF CRETE. 89 
 
 And there they worship when they see, 
 And there the message comes from Thee, 
 That every race beneath the skies 
 They should disciple and baptize. 
 
 We praise the Father, God on High, 
 The Holy Son we magnify : 
 Nor less our praises shall adore 
 The Holy Ghost for evermore ; 
 This grace. Blest Trinity, we crave ; 
 Thy suppliant servants hear and save. 
 
( 90 ) 
 
 + circ. A.D. 780. 
 
 S. John Damascene has the double honour of 
 being the last but one of the Fathers of the 
 Eastern Church, and the greatest of her poets. 
 It is surprising, however, how little is known of 
 his life. That he was born of a good family at 
 Damascus, — that he made great progress in 
 philosophy, — that he administered some charge 
 under the Caliph, — that he retired to the monas- 
 tery of S. Sabas, in Palestine, — that he was the 
 most learned and eloquent writer with whom the 
 Iconoclasts had to contend, — that at a compara- 
 tively late period of life he was ordained Priest 
 of the Church of Jerusalem, and that he died after 
 
S. JOHN DAMASCENE. 9 1 
 
 754, and before 787, seems to comprise all that 
 has reached us of his biography. His enemies, 
 from an unknown reason, called him Mansur :* 
 whether he were- the same with John Arklas, 
 also an ecclesiastical poet, is not so certain. 
 
 As a poet, he had a principal share in the 
 Octoechus, of which I have already spoken. His 
 three great canons are those on Easter, the 
 Ascension, and S. Thomas's Sunday, the first and 
 third of which I shall give either wholly or in 
 part. Probably, however, many of the Idiomela 
 and Stichera which are scattered about the office- 
 books under the title of John and John the Hermit, 
 are his. His eloquent defence of Icons has 
 deservedly procured him the title of The Doctor of 
 Christian Art. 
 
 * He was called Ibn-Mansur, from the name of his father. 
 — Assemani, Bib. Orient, ii. 97. R. F. L. 
 
 G 2 
 
9- S. JOHN DAMASCENE. 
 
 CANON FOR EASTER DAY, 
 
 CALLED THE " GOLDEN CANON," OR, THE 
 "QUEEN OF CANONS." 
 
 The circumstances under which the Canon is sung are thus 
 eloquently described by a modern writer. The scene is at 
 Athens. 
 
 ** As midnight approached, the Archbishop, 
 with his priests, accompanied by the King and 
 Queen, left the Church, and stationed them- 
 selves on the platform, which was raised con- 
 siderably from the ground, so that they were 
 distinctly seen by the people. Every one now 
 remained in breathless expectation, holding their 
 unhghted tapers in readiness when the glad 
 moment should arrive, while the priests still 
 continued murmuring their melancholy chant in 
 a low half-whisper. Suddenly a single report 
 
S. JOHN DAMASCENE. p^ 
 
 of a cannoa announced that twelve o'clock had 
 struck, and that Easter day had begun ; then the 
 old Archbishop elevating the cross, exclaimed in 
 a loud exulting tone, ' Christos anesti ! ' ' Christ 
 is risen !' and instantly every single individual of 
 all that host took up the cry, and the vast multi- 
 tude broke through and dispelled for ever the 
 intense and mournful silence which they had 
 maintained so long, with one spontaneous shout 
 of indescribable joy and triumph, ' Christ is 
 risen !' * Christ is risen!' At the same moment, 
 the oppressive darkness was succeeded by a blaze 
 of light from thousands of tapers, which, com- 
 municating one from another, seemed to send 
 streams of fi-re in all directions, rendering the 
 minutest objects distinctly visible, and casting the 
 most vivid glow on the expressive faces full of 
 exultation, of the rejoicing crowd ; bands of 
 music struck up their gayest strains -, the roll of 
 
94 S. JOHN DAMASCENE. 
 
 the drum through the town, and further on the 
 pealing of the cannon announced far and near 
 these * glad tidings of great joy •/ while from hill 
 and plain, from the sea-shore and the far olive- 
 grove, rocket after rocket ascending to the clear 
 sky, answered back with their mute eloquence, 
 that Christ is risen indeed, and told of other 
 tongues that were repeating those blessed words, 
 and other hearts that leap for joy ; everywhere 
 men clasped each other's hands, and congratulated 
 one another, and embraced with countenances 
 beaming with delight, as though to each one 
 separately some wonderful happiness had been 
 proclaimed ; — and so in truth it was ; — and all 
 the while, rising above the mingling of many 
 sounds, each one of which was a sound of glad- 
 ness, the aged priests were distinctly heard chant- 
 ing forth a glorious old hymn of victory in tones 
 so loud and clear, that they seemed to have re- 
 
S. JOHN DAMASCENE. 95 
 
 gained their youth and strength to tell the world 
 how * Christ is risen from the dead, having 
 trampled death beneath His feet, and henceforth 
 they that are in the tombs have everlasting life.' " 
 That which follows is the " glorious old Hymn 
 of Victory." 
 
 ODE I. 
 
 avacrTaa€co<; rj/jLepa. 
 
 *Tis the Day of Resurrection : 
 
 Earth ! tell it out abroad ! 
 The Passover of gladness ! 
 
 The Passover of God ! 
 From Death to Life Eternal, — 
 
 From this world to the sky, 
 Our Christ hath brought us over, 
 
 "With hymns of victory. 
 
96 S. JOHN DAMASCENE. 
 
 Our hearts be pure from evil, 
 
 That we may see aright 
 The Lord in rays eternal 
 
 Of Resurrection-Light : 
 And, listening to His accents, 
 
 May hear, so calm and plain. 
 His own — All Hail! — and hearing, 
 
 May raise the victor strain ! 
 
 Now let the Heav'ns be joyful ! 
 
 Let earth her song begin ! 
 Let the round world keep triumph, 
 
 And all that is therein : 
 Invisible and visible 
 
 Their notes let all things blend, — 
 For Christ the Lord hath risen, — 
 
 Our joy that hath no end. 
 
 [Set by Mr. Helmore: a very spirited melody. Also in 
 Mr. Young's book. : composed by Dr. Schroeder.] 
 
S. JOHN DAMASCENE. 97 
 
 ODE III. 
 
 Aevre irofia Trico/jLev. 
 Come, and let u^s drink of that New River, 
 
 Not from barren Rock divinely poured, 
 But the Fount of Life that is for ever 
 
 From the Sepulchre of Christ the Lord. 
 
 All the world hath bright illumination, — 
 Heav'n and Earth and things beneath the 
 earth : 
 
 *Tis the Festival of all Creation : 
 
 Christ hath ris'n. Who gave Creation birth : 
 
 Yesterday with Thee in burial lying. 
 Now to-day with Thee aris'n I rise ; 
 
 Yesterday the partner of Thy dying, 
 With Thyself upraise me to the skies. 
 
 [In Mr. Young's book : composed by Dr. Schroeder.] 
 
pS S. JOHN DAMASCENE. 
 
 ODE IV. 
 
 eVl tt)? 6eLa<; (j)v\aKrj<;. 
 
 Stand on thy watch-tower, Habakkuk the Seer^ 
 And show the Angel, radiant in his light : 
 ' To-day,' saith he, ' Salvation shall appear, 
 * Because the Lord hath ris'n, as God of Might.* 
 
 The male that opes the Virgin's womb is He ; 
 The Lamb of Whom His faithful people eat ; 
 Our truer Passover from blemish free ; 
 Our very God, Whose name is all complete. 
 
 This yearling Lamb, our Sacrifice most blest, 
 Our glorious Crown, for all men freely dies : 
 Behold our Pascha, beauteous from His rest, 
 The healing Sun of Righteousness arise. 
 
S. JOHN DAMASCENE. 99 
 
 Before the ark, a type to pass away, 
 David of old time danced : we, holier race, 
 Seeing the Antitype come forth to-day, 
 Hail, with a shout, Christ's own Almighty 
 grace. 
 
lOO S. JOHN DAMASCENE. 
 
 ODE V. 
 
 opOplaco/jLev opdpov paOeo^. 
 
 • 
 
 Let us rise in early morning, 
 
 And, instead of ointments, bring 
 
 Hymns of praises to our Master, 
 And His Resurrection sing : 
 
 We shall see the Sun of Justice 
 Risen with healing on His wing. 
 
 Thy unbounded loving-kindness, 
 They that groaned in Hades' chain, 
 
 Prisoners, from afar beholding. 
 Hasten to the light again 
 
 And to that eternal Pascha 
 
 Wove the dance and raised the strain. 
 
S. JOHN DAMASCENE. lOl 
 
 Go ye forth, His Saints, to meet Him ! 
 
 Go with lamps in every hand ! 
 From the sepulchre He riseth : 
 
 Ready for the Bridegroom stand : 
 And the Pascha of salvation 
 
 Hail, with His triumphant band. 
 
102 S. JOHN DAMASCENE. 
 
 ODE VI. 
 
 KarriXOe^ eV rot? KarcoTdTOt^;, 
 
 Into the dim earth's lowest parts descending, 
 And bursting by Thy might the infernal chain 
 
 That bound the prisoners. Thou, at three days' 
 ending. 
 As Jonah from the whale, hast risen again. 
 
 Thou brakest not the seal, Thy surety's token. 
 Arising from the Tomb, Who left'st in Birth 
 
 The portals of Virginity unbroken. 
 
 Opening the gates of heaven to sons of earth. 
 
 Thou, Sacrifice ineifable and living. 
 Didst to the Father by Thyself atone 
 
 As God eternal : resurrection giving 
 
 To Adam, general parent, by Thine own. 
 
S. JOHN DAMASCENE. I03 
 
 ODE VII. 
 
 '0 7raLBa<; i/c Kafiivov. 
 
 Who from the fiery furnace saved the Three, 
 Suffers as mortal ; that, His Passion o'er. 
 This mortal, triumphing o'er death, might be 
 Vested "with immortality once more : 
 
 He Whom our fathers still confest 
 
 God over all, for ever blest. 
 
 The women with their ointment seek the Tomb : 
 
 And Whom they mourned as dead, with many a 
 tear. 
 
 They worship now, joy dawning on their gloom, 
 
 As Living God, as mystic Passover -, 
 Then to the Lord's Disciples gave 
 The tidings of the vanquished grave. 
 
I04 S. JOHN DAMASCENE. 
 
 We keep the festal of the death of death ; 
 
 Of hell o'erthrown : the first-fruits pure and 
 
 bright, 
 Of life eternal ; and with joyous breath 
 Praise Him that won the victory by His might : 
 
 Him Whom our fathers still confest 
 
 God over all, for ever blest. 
 
 All hallowed festival, in splendour born ! 
 
 Night of salvation and of glory ! Night 
 
 Fore-heralding the Resurrection morn ! 
 
 When from the tomb the everlasting Light, 
 A glorious frame once more his own, 
 Upon the world in splendour shone. 
 
S. JOHN DAMASCENE. I05 
 
 ODE vm. 
 
 avTT] ^ kXtjti], 
 
 Thou hallowed chosen morn of praise. 
 That best and greatest shinest ! 
 
 Lady and Queen and Day of days, 
 Of things divine, divinest ! 
 
 On thee our praises Christ adore 
 
 For ever and for evermore. 
 
 Come, let us taste the Vine's new fruit 
 
 For heavenly joy preparing : 
 To-day the branches with the Root 
 
 In Resurrection sharing : 
 Whom as True God our hymns adore 
 For ever and for evermore. 
 
 H 
 
lo6 S. JOHN DAMASCENE. 
 
 Rise, Sion, rise, and looking forth. 
 Behold thy children round thee ! 
 
 From East and West, and South and North, 
 Thy scatter' d sons have found thee ! 
 
 And in thy bosom Christ adore 
 
 For ever and for evermore. 
 
 O Father ! O co-equal Son ! 
 
 O co-eternal Spirit ! 
 In Persons Three, in Substance One, 
 
 And One in power and merit ; 
 In Thee baptized, we Thee adore 
 For ever and for evermore ! 
 
 [No. X in Mr. Bedding's book. A very appropriate melody.] 
 
 i 
 
S. JOHN DAMASCENE. I07 
 
 ODE IX. 
 
 Thou New Jerusalem, arise and shine ! 
 
 The glory of the Lord on thee hath risen ! 
 
 Sion, exult ! rejoice with joy divine, 
 
 Mother of God ! Thy Son hath burst His prison ! 
 
 O heavenly Voice ! O word of purest love ! 
 * Lo ! I am with you alway to the end ! * 
 This is the anchor, steadfast from above, 
 The golden anchor, whence our hopes depend. 
 
 O Christ, our Pascha ! greatest, holiest, best ! 
 God's Word and Wisdom and effectual Might ! 
 Thy fuller, lovelier presence manifest. 
 In that eternal realm, that knows no night ! 
 
 H 2 
 
I08 S. JOHN DAMASCENE. 
 
 THE STICHERA OF THE LAST KISS. 
 
 Aevre reXevTaiov aaTracrfJiOV Eco/juev. 
 The following Stichera, which are generally 
 (though without any great cause) attributed to 
 S. John Damascene, form, perhaps, one of the 
 most striking portions of the service of the 
 Eastern Church. They are sung towards the con- 
 clusion of the Funeral Office, while the friends 
 and relations are, in turn, kissing the corpse ; 
 the Priest does so last of all. Immediately after- 
 wards, it is borne to the grave ; the Priest casts 
 the first earth on the coffin, with the words, 
 " The earth is the Lord's and all that therein 
 is : the compass of the world, and they that 
 dwell therein." I have omitted four of the 
 stanzas, as being almost a repetition of the rest. 
 
s. JOHN damascen:^. 109 
 
 Take the last kiss, — the last for ever ! 
 
 Yet render thanks amidst your gloom : 
 He, severed from his home and kindred. 
 
 Is passing onwards to the tomb : 
 For earthly labours, earthly pleasures. 
 
 And carnal joys, he cares no more : 
 Where are his kinsfolk and acquaintance ? 
 
 They stand upon another shore. 
 Let us say, around him pressed. 
 Grant him. Lord, eternal rest ! 
 
 The hour of woe and separation. 
 
 The hour of falling tears is this : 
 Him that so lately was among us 
 
 For the last time of all we kiss : 
 Up to the grave to be surrendered. 
 
 Sealed with the monumental stone, 
 A dweller in the house of darkness, 
 
 Amidst the dead to lie alone. 
 
no S. JOHN DAMASCENE. 
 
 Let US say, around him pressed. 
 Grant him, Lord, eternal rest ! 
 
 Life, and life's evil conversation, 
 
 And all its dreams, are passed away : 
 The soul hath left her tabernacle : 
 
 Black and unsightly grows the clay. 
 The golden vessel here lies broken : 
 
 The tongue no voice of answer knows 
 Hushed is sensation, stilled is motion ; 
 
 Toward the tomb the dead man goes. 
 Let us cry with heart's endeavour. 
 Grant him rest that is for ever ! 
 
 What is our life ? A fading flower ; 
 
 A vapour, passing soon away -, 
 The dewdrops of the early morning : — 
 
 Come gaze upon the tombs to-day. 
 
S. JOHN DAMASCENE. Ill 
 
 Where now is youth? Where now is beauty, 
 
 And grace of form, and sparkling eye ? 
 All, like the summer grass, are withered ; 
 All are abolished utterly ! 
 
 While our eyes with grief grow dim, 
 Let us weep to Christ for him ! 
 
 Woe for that bitter, bitter moment, 
 
 The fearful start, the parting groan. 
 The wrench of anguish, from the body 
 
 When the poor soul goes forth alone ! 
 Hell and destruction are before her ; 
 
 Earth in its truest worth she sees ; 
 A flickering shade -, a dream of error ; 
 
 A vanity of vanities. 
 
 Sin in this world let us flee, 
 That in heaven our place may be. 
 
 Draw nigh, ye sons of Adam ; viewing 
 A likeness of yourselves in clay : 
 
112 S. JOHN DAMASCENE. 
 
 Its beauty gone ; its grace disfigured ; 
 
 Dissolving in the tomb's decay ; 
 The prey of worms and of corruption, 
 
 In silent darkness mouldering on ; 
 Earth gathers round the coffin, hiding 
 The brother, now for ever gone. 
 Yet we cry, around him pressed, 
 Grant him. Lord, eternal rest ! 
 
 When, hurried forth by fearful angels, 
 
 The soul forsakes her earthly frame, 
 Then friends and kindred she forgetteth. 
 
 And this world's cares have no more claim*, 
 Then passed are vanity and labour ; 
 
 She hears the Judge's voice alone ; 
 She sees the inefi'able tribunal : 
 
 Where we, too, cry with suppliant moan, 
 For the sins that soul hath done, 
 Grant Thy pardon. Holy One ! 
 
S. JOHN DAMASCENE. II3 
 
 Now all the organs of the body, 
 
 So full of energy before, 
 Have lost perception, know not motion. 
 
 Can suffer and can act no more. 
 The eyes are closed in death's dark shadow ; 
 
 The ear can never hear again ; 
 The feet are bound ; the hands lie idle ; 
 
 The tongue is fast as with a chain. 
 Great and mighty though he be. 
 Every man is vanity. 
 
 Behold and weep me, friends and brethren ! 
 
 Voice, sense, and breath, and motion gone ; 
 But yesterday I dwelt among you ; 
 
 Then death's most fearful hour came on. 
 Embrace me with the last embracement ; 
 
 Kiss me with this, the latest kiss ; 
 Never again shall I be with you ; 
 
 Never with you share woe or bliss. 
 
TI4 S. JOHN DAMASCENE. 
 
 I go toward the dread tribunal 
 
 Where no man's person is preferred ; 
 Where lord and slave, where chief and soldier, 
 
 Where rich and poor alike are heard : 
 One is the manner of their judgment : 
 
 Their plea and their condition one : 
 And they shall reap in woe or glory 
 
 The earthly deeds that they have done. 
 I pray you, brethren, I adjure you, 
 
 Pour forth to Christ the ceaseless prayer. 
 He would not doom me to Gehenna, 
 
 But in His glory give me share ! 
 
S. JOHN DAMASCENE. II5 
 
 IDIOMELA FOR ALL SAINTS. 
 
 Ta9 eSpa? ra? alwvla^. 
 
 Those eternal bowers 
 
 Man hath never trod, 
 Those unfading flowers 
 
 Round the Throne of God : 
 Who may hope to gain them 
 
 After weary fight ? 
 Who at length attain them 
 
 Clad in robes of white ? 
 
 He, who gladly barters 
 All on earthly ground ; 
 
 He who, like the Martyrs, 
 Says, * I WILL be crown'd : * 
 
1X6 S. JOHN DAMASCENE. 
 
 He, whose one oblation 
 Is a life of love ; 
 
 Clinging to the nation 
 Of the Blest above. 
 
 Shame upon you, legions 
 
 Of the Heavenly King, 
 Denizens of regions 
 
 Past imagining ! 
 What ! with pipe and tabor 
 
 Fool away the light, 
 When He bids you labour, — 
 
 When He tells you,—' Fight ! ' 
 
 While I do my duty, 
 
 Struggling through the tide, 
 Whisper Thou of beauty 
 
 On the other side ! 
 
S. JOHN DAMASCENE. II7 
 
 Tell who will the story 
 Of our notu distress : 
 
 Oh the future glory ! 
 Oh the loveliness ! 
 
 [No. 3 in H. E. C. A very sweet melody.] 
 
Il8 S. JOHN DAMASCENE. 
 
 S. THOMAS'S SUNDAY. 
 
 The four following Odes are the first four of our Saint's 
 Canon for S. Thomas's Sunday, called also Renewal Sunday : 
 with us Low Sunday. The first Stanzas are marked with in- 
 verted commas, as being HirmoL 
 
 ODE I. 
 
 dcrwfiev Trdvre^ XaoL 
 
 " Come, ye faithful, raise the strain 
 
 "Of triumphant gladness ! 
 "God hath brought His Israel 
 
 "Into joy from sadness : 
 " Loosed from Pharaoh's bitter yoke 
 
 "Jacob's sons and daughters ; 
 **Led them with unmoistened foot 
 
 "Through the Red Sea waters." 
 
S. JOHN DAMASCENE. Tip 
 
 'Tis the Spring of souls to-day -, 
 
 Christ hath burst His prison ; 
 And from three days' sleep in death, 
 
 — As a sun, hath risen. 
 All the winter of our sins, 
 
 Long and dark, is flying 
 From His Light, to Whom we give 
 
 Laud and praise undying. 
 
 Now the Queen of Seasons, bright 
 
 With the day of Splendour, 
 With the royal Feast of feasts, 
 
 Comes its joy to render ; 
 Comes to glad Jerusalem, 
 
 Who with true aifection 
 Welcomes, in unwearied strains, 
 
 Jesu's Resurrection. 
 
 Neither might the gates of death, 
 Nor the tomb's dark portal, 
 
120 S. JOHN DAMASCENE. 
 
 Nor the watchers, nor the seal, 
 
 Hold Thee as a mortal : 
 But to-day amidst the Twelve 
 
 Thou didst stand, bestowing 
 That Thy peace, which evermore 
 
 Passeth human knowing. 
 
 Cata'vasia. " 'TJs the day of Resurrection." (p. 38.) 
 [No. 2 in Mr. Sedding's book. A genuine Easter melody.] 
 
S. JOHN DAMASCENE. 121 
 
 ODE m. 
 
 arepecoo-ov fie, XpLcrrL 
 
 "On the rock of Thy commandments 
 "Fix me firmly, lest I slide : 
 
 "With the glory of Thy Presence 
 "Cover me on every side ; 
 
 "Seeing none save Thee is holy, 
 " God, for ever glorified ! " 
 
 New immortal out of mortal, 
 
 New existence out of old : 
 This the Cross of Christ accomplished, 
 
 This the Prophets had foretold : 
 So that we thus newly quickened, 
 
 Might attain the heavenly fold. 
 
122 S. JOHN DAMASCENE. 
 
 Thou "Who comprehendest all things, 
 
 Comprehended by the tomb, 
 Gav'st Thy body to the graveclothes 
 
 And the silence and the gloom : 
 Till through fast-closed doors Thou earnest 
 
 Thy Disciples to illume. 
 
 Every nail-print, every buffet. 
 
 Thou didst freely undergo, 
 As Thy Resurrection's witness 
 
 To the Twelve Thou cam'st to show : 
 So that what they saw in vision. 
 
 Future years by faith might know 
 
 Catavasia. " Come, and let us drink of that New River." 
 (p. 97-) 
 
 [No. 3 in Mr. Bedding's book.] 
 
S. JOHN DAMASCENE. I23 
 
 ODE IV. 
 
 fjuifya TO iiva-rrjpiov. 
 
 ** * Christ, we turn our eyes to Thee, 
 
 " * And this mighty mystery ! ' 
 
 " Habakkuk exclaimed of old, 
 
 " In the Holy Spirit bold : 
 
 " * Thou shalt come in time appointed, 
 
 ** For the help of Thine anointed ! '* 
 
 Taste of myrrh He deign'd to know, 
 "Who redeemed the source of woe : 
 Now He bids all sickness cease 
 Through the honey-comb of peace : 
 And to this world deigns to give 
 That sweet food by which we live. 
 
 I 2 
 
124 ^- JOHN DAMASCENE. 
 
 Patient Lord ! with loving eye 
 Thou invitest Thomas nigh, 
 Showing Him that Wounded Side : 
 While the world is certified, 
 How the third day, from the grave, 
 Jesus Christ arose to save. 
 
 Blest, O Didymus, the tongue 
 Where that first confession hung : 
 First the Saviour to proclaim 
 First the Lord of Life to name : 
 Such the graces it supplied, 
 — That dear touch of Jesu's side ! 
 
 Cata-vasia. " Stand on thy watch-tower, Habakkuk the 
 Seer." (p. 98.) 
 
S. JOHN DAMASCENE. 1 25 
 
 ODE V. 
 
 eic vvKTo^ opdpl^oPTe^;, 
 
 "Reconciliation's plan devising, 
 
 "Fellow-sharer of the Father's Throne, 
 " Thee, O Christ, we, very early rising, 
 
 " Tender lover of our spirits, own ! " 
 
 When Thy Friends, with deep dismay con- 
 founded. 
 
 Stood amaz'd, and knew not where to fly. 
 All the darkness that their souls surrounded 
 
 Thou didst scatter with Thy drawing nigh. 
 
 Touch how awful, how consolatory ! 
 
 When, O Thomas, thou didst stretch thine 
 hand. 
 
I 
 
 126 S. JOHN DAMASCENE. i 
 
 i I 
 
 And that Side, resplendent in its glory, 
 • Didst explore, because He gave command! 
 
 Unbelief of Thomas was the Mother 
 
 Of Thy Church's most unshaken Creed : 
 Thou, O Saviour, wise above all other, 
 Had'stjbefore the world was, thus decreed. 
 
 Catavasia. " Let us rise in early morning." (p. loo.) 
 
( 127 ) 
 
 Surnamed the Melodist. 
 -j- A.D. 760. 
 
 S. Cosmas of Jerusalem holds the second place 
 amidst Greek Ecclesiastical poets. Left an 
 orphan at an early age, he was adopted by 
 the father of S. John Damascene ; and the two 
 foster-brothers were bound together by a friend- 
 ship which lasted through life. They excited 
 each other toHymnology,and assisted, corrected, 
 and polished each other's compositions. Cosmas, 
 like his friend, became a monk of S. Sabas : and 
 against his will was consecrated Bishop of 
 Maiuma, near Gaza, by John, Patriarch of 
 
128 S. COSMAS. 
 
 Jerusalem ; the same who ordained S. John 
 Damascene Priest. After administering his 
 diocese with great holiness, he departed this 
 life in a good old age, about 760, and is comme- 
 morated by the Eastern Church on the 14th of 
 October. 
 
 " Where perfect sweetness dwells, is Cosmas gone ; 
 But his sweet lays to cheer the Church live on," 
 
 says the stichos prefixed to his Hfe. 
 
 His compositions are tolerably numerous, and 
 he seems to have taken a pleasure in competing 
 with S. John Damascene, as in the Nativity, the 
 Epiphany, the Transfiguration, where the Canons 
 of both are given. To Cosmas, a considerable 
 part of the Octoechus is owing. The best of his 
 compositions, besides those already mentioned, 
 seem to be his Canons on S. Gregory Nazianzen, 
 and the Purification. He is the most learned of 
 
S. COSMAS. 129 
 
 the Greek Church poets : and his fondness for 
 types, boldness in their application, and love of 
 aggregating them, make him the Oriental Adam 
 of S. Victor. It is owing partly to a compressed 
 fulness of meaning, very uncommon in the Greek 
 poets of the Church, partly to the unusual harsh- 
 ness and contraction of his phrases, that he is 
 the hardest of ecclesiastical bards to compre- 
 hend. 
 
130 S. COSMAS. 
 
 CANON FOR CHRISTMAS DAY. 
 
 This is perhaps the finest, on the whole, of the Canons of i 
 Cosmas ; and may fairly be preferred to the rival composition ' 
 of S. John Damascene. 
 
 ODE I. 
 
 XpicrTO<; yevvarai' So^do-are. 
 
 Christ is born ! Tell forth His fame ! 
 Christ from Heaven ! His love proclaim ! 
 Christ on earth ! Exalt His Name ! 
 Sing to the Lord, O world, with exultation ! 
 Break forth in glad thanksgiving, every nation ! 
 For He hath triumphed gloriously ! 
 
S. COSMAS. 131 
 
 Man, in God's own Image made, 
 
 Man, by Satan's wiles betrayed, 
 
 Man, on whom corruption preyed. 
 
 Shut out from hope of life and of salvation, 
 
 To-day Christ maketh him a new creation. 
 
 For He hath triumphed gloriously ! 
 
 For the Maker, when His foe. 
 
 Wrought the creature death and woe. 
 
 Bowed the Heav'ns, and came below,* 
 
 And in the Virgin's womb His dwelling making, 
 
 Became true man, man's very nature taking ; 
 
 For He hath triumphed gloriously ! 
 
 He, the Wisdom, Word, and Might, 
 God, and Son, and Light of light, 
 Undiscovered by the sight 
 
 * The reference is, of course, to Psalm xviii. 9; — "He 
 bowed the Heavens also, and came down." 
 
S. COSMAS. 
 
 Of earthly monarch, or infernal spirit, 
 Incarnate was, that we might Heav'n inherit ; 
 
 For He hath triumphed gloriously ! 
 
 [In Mr. Young's book. The melody by Dr. Schroeder,] 
 
S. COSMAS. 133 
 
 ODE m. 
 
 Tft) TTpo Toyv alcovcov. 
 
 Him, of the Father's very Essence, 
 
 Begotten, ere the world began, 
 And, in the latter time, of Mary, 
 Without a human sire, made Man : 
 Unto Him, this glorious morn. 
 
 Be the strain outpoured ! 
 Thou That liftest up our horn. 
 Holy art Thou, Lord ! 
 
 The earthly Adam, erewhile quickened 
 By the blest breath of God on high. 
 
 Now made the victim of corruption. 
 By woman's guile betray'd to die. 
 
134 S. COSMAS. 
 
 He, deceived by woman's part, 
 
 Supplication pour'd ; 
 Thou Who in my nature art, 
 
 Holy art Thou, Lord ! 
 
 Thou, Jesus Christ, wast consubstantial 
 
 With this our perishable clay. 
 And, by assuming earthly nature, 
 Exaltedst it to heavenly day. 
 
 Thou, That wast as mortal born, 
 
 Being God ador'd. 
 Thou That liftest up our horn. 
 Holy art Thou, Lord ! 
 
 Rejoice, O Bethlehem, the city 
 
 Whence Judah's monarchs had their birth 
 Where He that sitteth on the Cherubs, 
 
 The King of Israel, came on earth : 
 
S, COSMAS. 135 
 
 Manifested this blest morn, 
 As of old time never, 
 
 He hath lifted up our horn, 
 He shall reign for ever ! 
 
1^6 S. COSMAS. 
 
 ODE IV. 
 
 Rod of the Root of Jesse, 
 
 Thou, Flower of Mary born. 
 From that thick shady mountain * 
 
 Cam'st glorious forth this morn : 
 Of her, the ever Virgin, 
 
 Incarnate wast Thou made, 
 The immaterial Essence, 
 
 The God by all obeyed ! 
 
 Glory, Lord, Thy servants pay 
 To Thy wondrous might to-day 
 
 • The reference is to the Song of Habakkuk ; [iii. 3], 
 where the LXX. give — "God shall come from Teman, and 
 The Holy from the tliick and shady mountain of Paran." 
 
S. COSMAS. 1:^7 
 
 The Gentiles' expectation, 
 
 Whom Jacob's words foretell, 
 "Who Syria's pride shalt vanquish, 
 
 Samaria's pride shalt quell ; 
 Thoii from the Root of Tudah 
 
 Like some fair plant dost spring. 
 To turn old Gentile error 
 
 To Thee, its God and King ! 
 
 Glory, Lord, Thy servants pay 
 To Thy wondrous mighr to-day! 
 
 In Balaam's ancient vision 
 
 The Eastern seers were skilled , 
 They marked the constellations. 
 
 And joy their spirits filled : 
 For Thou, bright Star of Jacob, 
 
 Arising in Thy might, 
 Didst call these Gentiles first-fruits 
 
 To worship in Thy light. 
 
138 S. COSMAS. 
 
 They in holy reverence bent. 
 Gifts acceptable present. 
 
 As on a fleece descending 
 
 The gentle dews distil, 
 As drops the earth that water, 
 
 The Virgin didst Thou fill. 
 For Media, leagued with Sheba, 
 
 Falls down and worships Thee : 
 Tarsnish and Ethiopia, 
 
 The Isles and Araby. 
 
 Glory, Lord, Thy servants pay 
 To Thy wondrous might to-day I 
 
 [In Mr. Young's book. The melody by Dr. Schroeder.] 
 
S. COSMAS. 139 
 
 ODE V. 
 06o<; a)v elpr{V7)<^, 
 
 Father of Peace, and God of Consolation ! 
 
 The Angel of the Counsel dost Thou send 
 To herald peace, to manifest Salvation, 
 
 Thy Light to pour, Thy knowledge to extend ; 
 Whence, with the morning's earliest rays, 
 Lover of men ! Thy Name we praise. 
 
 'Midst Caesar's subjects Thou, at his decreeing, 
 Obey'dst and was enrolled : our mortal race, 
 
 To sin and Satan slave, from bondage freeing. 
 Our poverty in all points didst embrace : 
 
 And by that Union didst combine 
 
 The earthly with the All-Divine. 
 
 K 2 
 
140 S. COSMAS. 
 
 Lo ! Mary, as the world's long day was waning, 
 Incarnate Deity conceived and bore ; 
 
 Virgin in birth, and after birth, remaining • 
 And man to God is reconciled once more : 
 
 Wherefore in faith her name we bless. 
 
 And Mother of our God confess. 
 
S. COSMAS. 
 
 ODE VI. 
 
 Girkar^yyaiv 'Icovdv, 
 
 As Jonah, issuing from his three days' tomb, 
 At length was cast, uninjured, on the earth ; 
 
 So, from the Virgin's unpolluted womb 
 
 The Incarnate Word, That dwelt there, had 
 His Birth : 
 
 For He, "Who knew no taint of mortal stain, 
 
 Willed that His Mother spotless should remain. 
 
 Christ comes. Incarnate God, amongst us now. 
 Begotten of the Father ere the day : 
 
 And He, to Whom the sinless legions bow. 
 Lies cradled, 'midst unconscious beasts on hay : 
 
 And, by His homely swaddHng-bands girt in, 
 
 Looses the many fetters of our sin. 
 
142 S. COSMAS. 
 
 Now the New Child of Adam's race draws nigh, 
 To us, the faithful, given : This, this is He 
 
 That shall the Father of Eternity, 
 
 The Angel of the Mighty Counsel, be : 
 
 This the eternal God, by Whose strong hands 
 
 The fabric of the world supported stands. 
 
S. COSMAS. 
 
 ^43 
 
 ODE vri. 
 
 ol TratSe? evcre^ela. 
 
 The Holy Children boldly stand 
 Against the tyrant's fierce command : 
 The kindled furnace they defy, — 
 No doom can shake their constancy : 
 They in the midmost flame confess'd, 
 "God of our Fathers ! Thou art bless'd ! ' 
 
 The Shepherds keep their flocks by night ; 
 The Heav'n glows out with wondrous light 
 The glory of the Lord is there, 
 The Angel-bands their King declare : 
 The watchers of the night confess'd, 
 "God of our Fathers ! Thou art bless' d ! ' 
 
144 S. COSMAS. 
 
 The Angel ceas'd ; and suddenly 
 
 Seraphic legions fill'd the sky : 
 
 " Glory to God," they cry again : 
 
 " Peace upon earth, good will to men : 
 
 "Christ comes!'* — And they that heard 
 
 confess'd, 
 " God of our fathers ! Thou art bless'd ! " 
 
 What said the Shepherds ? — " Let us turn 
 This new-born miracle to learn." 
 To Bethlehem's gate their footsteps drew : 
 The Mother with the Child they view : 
 j They knelt and worshipped, and confessed, 
 I " God of our Fathers ! Thou art bless'd ! " 
 
S. COSMAS. 145 
 
 ODE VIII. 
 
 6axjfiaT0<; virepcpvov'^ t) Bpoa-o/36\o(;, 
 
 The dewy freshness that the furnace flings 
 Works out a wond'rous type of future things : 
 Nor did the flame the Holy Three consume, 
 Nor did the Godhead's fire thy frame entomb, 
 Thou, on Whose bosom hung the Word : 
 Wherefore we cry with heart's endeavour, 
 "Let all Creation bless the Lord, 
 And magnify His Name for ever ! '' 
 
 Babel's proud daughter once led David's race 
 From Sion, to their exile's woful place : 
 Babel now bids her wise men, gifts in hand. 
 Before King David's Royal Daughter stand, 
 
146 S. COSMAS. 
 
 The Mother of the Incarnate Word : 
 Wherefore we cry with heart's endeavour, 
 ^*Let all Creation bless the Lord, 
 And magnify His Name for ever ! " 
 
 From music grief held back the exile's hand : 
 "How sing the Lord's song in an alien land ? 
 But Babel's exile here is done away, 
 And Bethlehem's harmony this glorious day 
 By Thee, Incarnate God, restored : 
 Wherefore we cry with heart's endeavour, 
 "Let all Creation bless the Lord, 
 And magnify His Name for ever ! " 
 
 Of old victorious Babel bore away. 
 The spoils of Royal Sion and her prey : 
 But Babel's treasure now, and Babel's kings, 
 Christ, by the guiding star, to Sion brings. 
 
S. COSMAS. 
 
 147 
 
 There have they knelt, and there ador'd : 
 "Wherefore we cry with heart's endeavour, 
 " Let all Creadon bless the Lord, 
 And magnify His Name for ever ! *' 
 
148 S. COSMAS. 
 
 ODE IX. 
 
 fiv(rT7]pcov ^evov. 
 
 O wond'rous mystery, full of passing grace ! 
 
 The grot becometh Heav'n : the Virgin's breast 
 The bright Cherubic Throne : the stall that place. 
 
 Where He, Who fills all space, vouchsafes to 
 rest : 
 
 Christ our God, to Whom we raise 
 
 Hymns of thankfulness and praise ! 
 
 The course propitious of the unknown Star 
 
 The Wise-men foUow'd on its heavenly way, — 
 Until it led them, beckoning from afar. 
 
 To where the Christ, the I^ng of all things, 
 lay : 
 Him in Bethlehem they find, 
 Born the Saviour of mankind. 
 
S. COSMAS. 149 
 
 " Where is the Child," they ask, " the new-born 
 King, 
 Whose herald-light is glittering in the sky, — 
 To Whom our offerings and our praise we 
 bring ? " 
 And Herod's heart is troubled utterly. 
 Armed for war with God, in vain 
 Would he see that Infant slain. 
 
150 S. COSMAS. 
 
 TRANSFIGURATION. 
 
 I shall, perhaps, render the following Canon more ac- 1 
 ceptable to most readers if, instead of translating the Odes in | 
 detail, I make a oento from the more remarkable Troparia. 
 
 They are principally from the first four Odes. 
 
 X^po^ ^Icrparjk, 
 
 The choirs of ransomed Israel, 
 
 The Red Sea's passage o'er, 
 Uprais'd the hymn of triumph 
 
 Upon the further shore : 
 And shouted, as the foeman 
 
 Was whelm'd beneath the sea,- 
 * Sing we to Judah's Saviour, 
 
 For glorified is He !* 
 
S. COSMAS. 151 
 
 Amongst His Twelve Apostles 
 
 Christ spake the Words of Life, 
 And show'd a realm of beauty 
 
 Beyond a world of strife : 
 ' When all My Father's glory 
 
 Shall shine expressed in Me, 
 Then praise Him, then exalt Him, 
 
 For magnified is He ! ' 
 
 Upon the Mount of Tabor 
 
 The promise was made good ; 
 When, baring all the Godhead, 
 
 In light itself He stood : 
 And they, in awe beholding. 
 
 The Apostolic Three, 
 Sang out to God their Saviour, 
 
 For magnified was He ! 
 
 In days of old, on Sinai, 
 
 The Lord of Sabaoth came. 
 
152 S. COSMAS. 
 
 In majesty of terror, 
 
 In thunder-cloud and flame : 
 On Tabor, with the glory 
 
 Of sunniest light for vest, 
 The excellence of beauty 
 
 In Jesus was expressed. 
 
 All hours and days Inclin'd there, 
 
 And did Thee worship meet , 
 The sun himself adored Thee, 
 And bow'd him at Thy feet : 
 While Moses and Elias, 
 
 Upon the Holy Mount, 
 The co-eternal glory 
 
 Of Christ our God recount. 
 
 holy, wonderous Vision ! 
 
 But what, when this life past. 
 The beauty of Mount Tabor 
 
 Shall end in Heav'n at last ? 
 
S. COSMAS. 153 
 
 But what, when all the glory 
 
 Of uncreated light 
 Shall be the promis'd guerdon 
 
 Of them that win the fight ? 
 
 [No. 5 in Mr. Sedding's book.] 
 
( 154 ) 
 
 + A.D. 806. 
 
 Tarasius, raised by Constantine and Irene from 
 the post of Secretary of State, at one step, though 
 a layman, to the Patriarchate of Constantinople, 
 (a.d. 784) was the chief mover in the restoration 
 of Icons and the Second Council of Nicaea. 
 Strongly opposing the divorce of Constantine 
 from Maria, h-e refused to celebrate that Emperor's 
 nuptials with Theodora. But when they had 
 been performed, he was with some difficulty 
 persuaded to pardon the priest who had officiated 
 at them. On this, S. Plato, and the monks of 
 the all-influential Studium, forsook his com- 
 
S. TARASIUS. 155 
 
 munion ; nor was the schism composed till the 
 Patriarch yielded and retracted his pardon. He 
 died February 25th, a.d. 806, on which day he is 
 commemorated both by the East and West. 
 His hymns are unimportant. The longest is the 
 Canon on the Invention of S. John Baptist, May 
 25th. It is in no wise remarkable. Nor do I 
 know any of his compositions which would be 
 sufficiently interesting to the English reader, to 
 make it worth versification here. 
 
 L 2 
 
( 156 ) 
 A.D. 759 ^•^' ^^^' 
 
 S. Theophanes, who holds the third place 
 among GreQk Church-poets, was born in 759, 
 his father being Governor of the Archipelago. 
 Betrothed in childhood to a lady named Megalis, 
 he persuaded her, on their wedding-day, to 
 embrace the monastic life. He retired to the 
 monastery of Syngriana, in the early part of the 
 reign of Constantine and Irene. From the 
 fiftieth year of his age he was nearly bedi'idden ; 
 but his devotion to the cause of Icons marked 
 him out as one of the earHest victims of Leo the 
 Armenian, who, after imprisoning him for two 
 
S. THEOPHANES. I57 
 
 years, banished him to Samothrace. On the 
 third day after his arrival in that inhospitable 
 region, worn out with sufferings and sickness, 
 he departed this life: a.d. 8 1 8. He is chiefly 
 famous for his History, with which we have 
 now nothing to do. "With the one exception of 
 S. Joseph of the Studium, Theophanes is the 
 most prolific of Eastern Hymnographers ; and in 
 his writings we first see that which has been the 
 bane and ruin of later Greek poetry, the com- 
 position of hymns, not from the spontaneous 
 effusion of the heart, but because they were 
 wanted to fill up a gap in the Office-book. 
 
 Because the great festivals and the chief Saints 
 of the Church had their Canon and their Stichera, 
 therefore, every martyr, every confessor, who 
 happened to give his name to a day, must have 
 his Canon and Stichera also, just for uniformity. 
 How different the Latin use, where not even the 
 
158 S. THEOPHANES. 
 
 Apostles have separate hymns received by the 
 whole Church, but supply themselves from 
 the Coi7imon ! Hence the deluge of worthless 
 compositions that occur in the Menaea : hence 
 tautology, repeated till it becomes almost sicken- 
 ing ; the merest commonplace, again and again 
 decked in the tawdry shreds of tragic language, 
 and twenty or thirty times presenting the same 
 thought in slightly varying terms. Theophanes, 
 indeed, must be distinguished from the host of 
 inferior writers that about his time began to over- 
 whelm the Church. Many of his subjects are of 
 world-wide interest. The Eastern martyrs, whom 
 he celebrates, are, for the most part, those who 
 have won for themselves the greatest name in 
 the annals of history. But still we find him thus 
 honouring some, of whom all that can be said is, 
 that they died for the Kame of Christ. And 
 though the poet brings more matter to his task 
 
S. THEOPHANES. 1 59 
 
 than do others, many long stanzas, that keep 
 pretty close to their subject, concerning a Saint 
 of whom there is nothing especial to say, must 
 become tedious. 
 
l6o S. THEOPHANES. 
 
 IDIOMELA 
 ON FRIDAY OF CHEESE-SUNDAY, 
 
 THAT IS, 
 
 OF QUINQUAGESIMA. 
 
 At this period of the year the weeks are named, not from the 
 Sundays that precede, but from those that follow them. Quin- 
 quagesima is termed Tyrophagus, because up to that time, but 
 not beyond, cheese is allowed. The Friday previous is appro- 
 priated to the Commemoration of All Holy Ascetes ; in order^ 
 as the Synaxarion says, that, by the remembrance of their con- 
 flict, we may be invigorated for the race that is set before us. 
 
 AevT6 airavre^ iTLaroi. 
 
 Hither, and with one accord, 
 Sing the servants of the Lord : 
 Sing each great ascetic sire ; — 
 Anthony shall lead the choir : 
 
S. THEOPHANES. l6l 
 
 Let Euthymius next him stand ; 
 
 Then in order all the band. 
 
 Make we joyous celebration 
 
 Of their heavenly conversation ; 
 
 Of their glory, how they rise, 
 
 Like another Paradise -, 
 
 These the trees our God hath plac'd. 
 
 Trees, with fruit immortal grac'd ; 
 
 Bringing forth, for Christ on high, 
 
 Flowers of Life that cannot die ; 
 
 With the sweetness that they fling 
 
 Mortal spirits nourishing. 
 
 Filled with God, and ever blest. 
 For our pardon make request ! 
 
 Egypt, hail, thou faithful strand ! 
 Hail, thou holy Libyan land ! 
 Nurturing- for the realm on high 
 Such a glorious company ! 
 
1 62 S. THEOPHANES. 
 
 They by many a toil intense, 
 Chastity and continence, 
 Perfect men to God upreared, 
 Stars to guide us have appeared : 
 They, by many a glorious sign, 
 Many a beam of Power Divine, 
 To the earth's remotest shore 
 Far and wide their radiance pour. 
 Holy Fathers, bright and blest, 
 For our pardon make request ! 
 
 By what skill of mortal tongue 
 Shall your wondrous acts be sung ? 
 All the conflicts of the soul, 
 All your struggles towards the goal ; 
 And your virtues' prize immense. 
 And your victories over sense. 
 How perpetual watch ye kept 
 Over passion, prayed and wept : 
 
S. THEOPHANES. 1 63 
 
 Yea, like very angels came, 
 
 Visible in earthly frame. 
 
 And with Satan girt for fight 
 
 Utterly o'erthrew his might. 
 
 Fam'd for signs and wonders rare, 
 
 Join to ours, great Saints, your prayer : 
 Ask that we, ye ever blest. 
 May attain the Land of Rest ! 
 
164 S. THEOPHANES. 
 
 STICHERA AT THE FIRST VESPERS 
 OF CHEESE-SUNDAY. 
 
 (Quinquagcsima.) 
 
 ADAM'S COMPLAINT. 
 
 The reader can hardly fail to be struck with the beautiful idea 
 in the third stanza, where the foliage of Paradise is asked to 
 make intercession for Adam's recall. The last stanza, Milton, 
 as an universal scholar, doubtless had in his eye, in Eve's lament- 
 ation. 
 
 '^ The Lord my Maker, forming me of day, 
 By His own Breath, the breath of Hfe convey'd : 
 O'er all the bright new world He gave me sway, 
 A little lower than the Angels made. 
 But Satan, using for his guile 
 The crafty serpent's cruel wile, 
 Deceiv'd me by the Tree ; 
 
S. THEOPHANES. I 65 
 
 And severed me from God and grace, 
 And wrought me death, and all my race. 
 As long as time shall be. 
 O Lover of the sons of men ! 
 Forgive, and call me back again ! 
 
 " In that same hour I lost the glorious stole 
 
 Of innocence, that God's own Hands had made; 
 
 And now, the tempter poisoning all my soul, 
 
 I sit, in fig leaves and in skins arrayed : 
 
 I sit condemn'd, distress'd, forsaken ; 
 
 Must till the ground whence I was taken 
 
 By labour's daily sweat. 
 
 But Thou, That shalt hereafter come. 
 
 The Offspring of a Virgin-womb, 
 
 Have pity on me yet ! 
 
 O turn on me those gracious eyes, 
 
 And call me back to Paradise ! 
 
l66 S. THEOPHANES. 
 
 " O glorious Paradise ! O lovely clime ! 
 
 O God-built mansion ! Joy of every Saint ! 
 
 Happy remembrance to all coming time ! 
 
 Whisper, with all thy leaves, in cadence faint, 
 
 One prayer to Him Who made them all, 
 
 One prayer for Adam in his fall ! — 
 
 That He, Who formed thy gates of yore. 
 
 Would bid those gates unfold once more 
 
 That I had closed by sin : 
 
 And let me taste that holy Tree 
 
 That giveth immortality 
 
 To them that dwell therein : 
 
 Or have I fallen so far from grace 
 
 That mercy hath for me no place ? " 
 
 Adam sat right against the Eastern gate. 
 By many a storm of sad remembrance tost : 
 '* O me ! so ruined by the serpent's hate ! 
 O me ! so glorious once, and now so lost ! 
 
S. THEOPHANES. 167 
 
 So mad that bitter lot to cRoose ! 
 Beguil'd of all I had to lose ! 
 Must I then, gladness of my eyes,— 
 Must I then leave thee. Paradise, 
 And as an exile go ? 
 And must I never cease to grieve 
 How once my God, at cool of eve, 
 Came down to walk below ? 
 O Merciful! on Thee I call: 
 O Pitiful ! forgive my faU ! " 
 

 { 
 
 i68 ) 
 
 
 ^. 
 
 •CljcoDoce 
 
 of tljc 
 
 d&tuDiuni, 
 
 
 1 
 1 
 
 A.D. 826. 
 
 
 Theodore of the Studium, by his suiferings 
 and his influence, did more, perhaps, in the cause 
 of Icons than any other man. His uncle, S. 
 Plato, and himself, had been cruelly persecuted 
 by Constantine, for refusing to communicate with 
 him after his illicit marriage with Theodora, at a 
 time when, as we have seen, the firmness of even 
 the Patriarch Tarasius gave way. Raised sub- 
 sequently to be Hegumen of the great abbey of 
 the Studium, the first at Constantinople, and 
 probably the most influential that ever existed in 
 the world, Theodore exhibited more doubtful 
 
S. THEODORE OF THE STUDIUM. 1 69 
 
 conduct in the schism which regarded the re- 
 admission to communion of Joseph, the priest 
 who had give the nuptial benediction to Con- 
 stantine : but he suffered imprisonment on this 
 account with the greatest firmness. When the 
 Iconoclastic persecution again broke out under 
 Leo the Armenian, Theodore was one of the 
 first sufferers : he was exiled, imprisoned, 
 scourged, and left for dead. Under Michael 
 Curopalata he enjoyed greater liberty ; but he 
 died in banishment, Nov. ITth, a.d. 826. His 
 Hymns are, in my judgment, superior to those 
 of S.Theophanes, — and nearly, if not quite, equal 
 to the works of S. Cosmas. In those (compara- 
 tively few) which he has left for the Festivals of 
 Saints, he does not appear to advantage : it is in 
 I is Lent Canons, in the Triodion, that his great 
 excellency lies. The contrast there presented 
 between the rigid, unbending, unyielding cha- 
 
 M 
 
IJO S. THEODORE OF THE STUDIUM. 
 
 racter of the man in his outward history, and the 
 fervent gush of penitence and love which his 
 .inward Hfe, as revealed by these compositions, 
 manifests, is very striking ; — it forms a remark- 
 able parallel to the characters of S. Gregory VII., 
 Innocent III., and other holy men of the Western 
 Church, whom the world, judging from a super- 
 ficial view of their characters, has branded with 
 unbending haughtiness, and the merest formality 
 in religion, while their most secret writings show 
 them to have been clinging to the Cross in an 
 ecstasy of love and sorrow. 
 
S. THEODORE OF THE STUMUM. J71 
 
 CANON FOR APOCREOS. 
 
 Apocreos is our Sexagesima, and is so called, 
 
 because meat is not eaten beyond it. The 
 
 Synaxarion (which will explain the following 
 poem) begins thus : 
 
 " On this day, we commemorate the 
 Second and impartial Coming of our Lord 
 Jesus Christ. 
 
 Stichos, When He, the Judge of all things, 
 sits to doom, 
 Oh grant that I may hear his joyful 
 * Come I ' 
 
 This commemoration the most Divine Fathers 
 set after the two parables " {i.e., rhe Gospels of 
 
 M 2 
 
1/2 S. THEODORE OF THE STUDIUM. 
 
 the two preceding Sundays, The Pharisee and 
 Publican, and the Prodigal Son) ** lest any one, 
 learning from them the mercy of God, should 
 live carelessly, and say, * God is merciful, and 
 whenever I wish to relinquish sin, it will be in 
 my power to accomplish my purpose.' They 
 therefore here commemorated that fearful day, 
 that, by the consideration of death, -and the ex- 
 pectation of the dreadful things that shall here- 
 after be, they might terrify men of negligent life, 
 and bring them back again to virtue, and might 
 teach them not simply to put confidence in God's 
 mercy, considered by itself, but to remember also 
 that the Judge is just, and will render to every 
 man according to his works." As the Eastern 
 Church has no such season as Advent, this com- 
 memoration becomes more peculiarly appropriate. 
 The Canon that follows is unfortunate in pro- 
 voking a comparison with the unapproachable 
 
S. THEODORE OF THE STUDIUM. 1 73 
 
 majesty of the Dies Ira. Yet during the four 
 hundred years by which it anticipated that 
 sequence, it was undjubtedly the grandest Judg- 
 ment-hymn of the Church. Its faults are those 
 of most of the class : it eddies round and round 
 the subject, without making way, — its different 
 portions have no very close connexion with each 
 other, — and its length is accompanied by con- 
 siderable tautology. Yet, in spite of these de- 
 fects, it is impossible to deny that the great 
 common-places of Death and Judgment are very 
 nobly set forth in this poem. On account of its 
 length, I give the first three and last Odes only. 
 
174 S. THEODORE OF THE STUDIUM. 
 
 ODE I. 
 
 TTjv rjfjLepai- ri]v (^pLKTrjv, 
 
 That fearful Day, that Day of speechless dread, 
 When Thou shalt come to judge the quick and 
 dead 
 
 I shudder to foresee, 
 
 O God ! what then shall be ! 
 
 When Thou shalt come, angelic legions round. 
 With thousand thousands, and with trumpet 
 sound , 
 
 Christ, grant me in the air 
 With saints to meet Thee there ! 
 
 Weep, O my soul, ere that great hour and day. 
 When God shall shine in manifest array. 
 Thy sin, that thou may'st be 
 In that strict judgment free ! 
 
S. THEODORE OF THE STUDIUM. 1 75 
 
 The terror ! — liell-fire fierce and unsufficed : 
 The bitter worm : the gnashing teeth : — O 
 Christ, 
 
 Forgive, remit, protect ; 
 
 And set me with the elect ! 
 
 That I may hear the blessed voice that calls 
 The righteous to the joy of heavenly halls . 
 And, King of Heaven, may reach 
 The realm that passeth speech ! 
 
 Enter Thou not in judgment with each deed, 
 Nor each intent and tiiought in strictness read : 
 
 Forgive, and save me then, 
 
 O Thou That lovest men ! 
 
 Thee, One in Three blest Persons ! Lord o'er all ! 
 Essence of essence. Power of power, we call ! 
 
 Save us, O Father, Son, 
 
 And Spirit, ever one ! 
 
 [In Mr. Young's book. Composed by Dr. Schroeder.] 
 
176 
 
 s. 
 
 THEODORE OF THE STUDIUM. 
 
 
 
 
 ODE III. 
 
 
 
 
 '0 Kvpio<; ep^erai. 
 
 
 God 
 
 comes 
 
 ; — and who shall stand before His 
 
 fear? 
 
 Who bide His Presence, when He draweth near ? 
 My soul, my soul, prepare 
 To kneel before Him there ! 
 
 Haste, — weep, — be reconciled to Him before 
 The fearful judgment knocketh af the door • 
 
 Where, in the Judge's eyes, 
 
 All bare and naked lies. 
 
 Have mercy. Lord, have mercy. Lord, I cry, 
 When with Thine angels Thou appear'st on high : 
 
 And each shall doom inherit, 
 
 According to his merit. 
 
S. THEODORE OF THE STUDIUM. 1 77 
 
 How can I bear Thy fearful anger, Lord ? 
 
 I, that have so often transgressed Thy word ? 
 But put my sins away, 
 And spare me in that day ! 
 
 miserable soul, return, lament, 
 Ere earthly converse end, and life be spent : 
 Ere, time for sorrow o'er, 
 The Bridegroom close the door ! 
 
 Yea, I have sinned, as no man sinned beside : 
 With more than human guilt my soul is dyed : 
 
 But spare, and save me here. 
 
 Before that day appear ! 
 
 Three Persons in One Essence uncreate. 
 On Whom, both Three and One, our praises 
 wait, 
 
 Give everlasting light. 
 
 To them that sing Thy might ! 
 
178 S. THEODORE OF THE STUDIUM. 
 
 ODE IV. 
 
 i(piaTr]K€v rj y/xepa. 
 
 The Day is near, the Judgment is at hand, 
 Awake, my soul, awake, and ready stand ! 
 Where chiefs shall gd with them that filled the 
 
 throne, 
 Where rich and poor the same tribunal own ; 
 And every thought and deed 
 Shall find its righteous meed. 
 
 There with the sheep the shepherd of the fold 
 Shall stand together ; there the young and old ; 
 Master and slave one doom shall undergo -, 
 Widow and maiden one tribunal know. 
 Oh woe, oh woe, to them 
 Whom lawless lives condemn ! 
 
S. THEODORE OF THE STUDIUM. 179 
 
 That Judgment-seat, impartial in decree. 
 
 Accepts no bribe, admits no subtilty : 
 
 No orator persuasion may exert, 
 
 No perjured witness wrong to right convert r 
 But all things, hid in night. 
 Shall then be dragged to light. 
 
 Let me not enter in the land of woe. 
 Let me not realms of outer darkness know ! 
 Nor from the wedding-feast reject Thou me, 
 For my soiled vest of immortality ; 
 
 Bound hand and foot, and cast 
 
 In anguish that shall last ! 
 
 When Thou, the nations ranged on either side. 
 The righteous from the sinners shalt divide, 
 Then give me to be found amongst Thy sheep, 
 Then from the goats Thy trembling servant keep : 
 That I may hear the voice 
 That bids Thy Saints rejoice ! 
 
.l8o S. THEODORE OF THE STUDIUM. 
 
 When righteous inquisition shall be made, 
 And the books opened, and the thrones arrayed, 
 My soul, what plea to shield thee canst thou know, 
 Who hast no fruit of righteousness to show, 
 No holy deeds to bring 
 To Christ the Lord and King ? 
 
 I hear the rich man's wail and bitter cry. 
 
 Out of the torments of eternity ; 
 
 I know, beholding that devouring flame, 
 
 My guilt and condemnation are the same ; 
 And spare me. Lord, I say. 
 In the great Judgment Day ! 
 
 The Word and Spirit, with the Father One, 
 One Light and emanation of One Sun, 
 The Word by generation, we adore. 
 The Spirit by procession, evermore ; 
 And with creation raise 
 The thankful hymn of praise. 
 
S. THEODORE OF THE STUDIUM, 181 
 
 ODE IX. 
 
 ' O KvpL09 spj^srai. 
 
 The Lord draws nigh, the righteous Throne's 
 
 Assessor, 
 The just to save, to punish the transgressor : 
 
 Weep we, and mourn, and pray, 
 
 Regardful of that day ; 
 When all the secrets of all hearts shall be 
 Lit with the blaze of full eternity. 
 
 Clouds and thick darkness o*er the Mount 
 
 assembling, 
 Moses beheld the Eternal's glory, trembling : 
 
 And yet he might but see 
 
 God's feebler Majesty. 
 
l82 S. THEODORE OF THE SIUDIUM. 
 
 And I — I needs must view His fullest Face : 
 O spare me, Lord ! O take me to Thy grace ! 
 
 David of old beheld, in speechless terror. 
 The session of the Judge — the doom of error : 
 
 And what have I to plead 
 
 For mercy in my need ? 
 Nothing save this : O grant me yet to be, 
 Ere that day come, renewed and true to Thee ! 
 
 Here, fires of deep damnation roar and glitter : 
 The worm is deathless, and the cup is bitter : 
 There, day that hath no morrow. 
 And joy that hath no sorrow : 
 And who so blest that he shall fly the abyss, 
 RaisM up to GoD*s Right Hand, and speechless 
 bliss ! 
 
 My soul with many an act of sin is wounded : 
 With mortal weakness is my frame surrounded : 
 
S. THEODORE OF THE STUDIUM. 183 
 
 My life is well nigh o'er : 
 
 The Judge is at the dooi : 
 How wilt thou, miserable spirit, fare, 
 What time He sends His summons through the 
 air ? 
 
184 S. THEODORE OF THE STUDIUM. 
 
 ORTHODOXY SUNDAY. 
 
 The first Sunday in Lent is kept in memory : 
 primarily, of the final triumph of the Church 
 over the Iconoclasts in 842 ; and, incidentally, of 
 her victory over all other heresies. It has a kind 
 of commiination appropriate to itself alone. The 
 following Canon is ascribed to S. Theodore of 
 the Studium, though Baronius has thought that 
 it cannot be his, because it implies that peace 
 was restored to the Church, whereas that hymno- 
 grapher died while the persecution still con- 
 tinued. Very possibly, however, it was written 
 on the temporary victory of the Church, which 
 did occur in the time of S. Theodore ; and then, 
 in 842, may have been lengthened and adapted to 
 
S. THEODORE OF THE STUDIUM. 185 
 
 the then state of things, perhaps by Naucratius, 
 the favourite disciple of S. Theodore. It is, 
 perhaps, the most spirited of all the Canons, 
 though many of its expressions savour too much 
 of bitterness and personal feeling to be well de- 
 fended, and the reader must constantly bear in 
 mind that the poet feels the cause, not so much 
 of Icons, as of the Incarnation itself, to be at 
 stake. I have only given about one-third of the 
 poem. The stanzas are these : Ode I. Tropar. 
 1, 2 ; III. 6 ; IV. I, 2, 3 J V. I, 3, 4, 5 i VI. I 5 
 IX. 2, 3, 4, 5. 
 
 ^apLarrjptov dhrjv. 
 
 A song, a song of gladness ! 
 
 A song of thanks and praise ! 
 The horn of our salvation 
 
 Hath God vouchsafed to raise ! 
 
]36 S. THEODORE OF THE STUDIUM. 
 
 A monarch true and faithful, 
 And glorious in her might. 
 
 To champion Christ's own quarrel, 
 And Orthodoxy's right ! 
 
 Now manifest is glory ; 
 
 Now grace and virtue shine : 
 Now joys the Church regaining 
 
 Her ornaments divine : 
 And girds them on in gladness. 
 
 As fits a festal day, 
 After long months of struggle, 
 
 Long years of disarray. 
 
 Now cries the blood for vengeance, 
 
 By persecutors poured. 
 Of them that died defending 
 
 The likeness of the Lord: 
 
S. THEODORE OF THE STUDIUM. 187 
 
 The likeness, as a mortal 
 
 That He vouchsaf d to take, 
 Long years ago, in Bethlem, 
 
 Incarnate for our sake. 
 
 Awake, O Church, and triumph 
 
 Exult, each realm and land ! 
 And open let the houses, 
 
 The ascetic houses stand ! 
 And let the holy virgins 
 
 With joy and song take in 
 Their relics and their Icons, 
 
 Who died this day to win ! 
 
 Assemble ye together 
 
 So joyous and so bold, 
 The ascetic troops, and pen them 
 
 Once more within the fold ! 
 
 N 2 
 
1 88 S. THEODORE OF THE STUDIUM. 
 
 If Strength again he gather,* 
 
 Again the foe shall fiill : 
 If counsel he shall counsel, 
 
 Our God shall scatter all. 
 
 The Lord, the Lord hath triumphed 
 Let all the world rejoice ! 
 
 Hush*d is the turmoil, silent 
 His servants' tearful voice : 
 
 * This is from the magnificent Emmanuel Ode sung at 
 Great Compline on high festivals. 
 
 " Having become mighty, ye have been subdued. 
 " For God is ivith us. 
 
 "And if ye shall again become mighty, again 
 ye shall be subdued. 
 
 " For God is luith us. 
 
 " And if ye shall devise any device, the 
 Lord shall scatter it, 
 
 " For God is ivith us.^^ 
 
S. THEODORE OF THE STUDIUM, 189 
 
 And the One P'alth, the True Faith, 
 Goes forth from East to West, 
 
 Enfolding, in its beauty. 
 The earth as with a vest. 
 
 They rise, the sleepless watchmen 
 
 Upon the Church's wall ; 
 With yearning supplication 
 
 On God the Lord they call : 
 And He, though long time silent, 
 
 Bow'd down a gracious ear. 
 His people's earnest crying 
 
 And long complaint to hear. 
 
 Sing, sing for joy, each desert ! 
 
 Exult, each realm of earth ! 
 Ye mountains, drop down sweetness ! 
 
 Ye hillocks, leap for mirth I 
 
igO S. THEODORE OF THE STUDIUM. 
 
 For Christ the Word, bestowing 
 His blessed peace on men, 
 
 In Faith's most holy union 
 Hath knit His Church a^ain. 
 
 The God of vengeance rises : 
 
 And Christ attacks the foe, 
 And makes His servants mighty 
 
 The wicked to o'erthrovv : 
 And now Thy condescension 
 
 In boldness may we hymn. 
 And now in peace and safety 
 
 Thy sacred Image limn. 
 
 O Lord of loving kindness, 
 How wondrous are Thy ways ! 
 
 What tongue of man suffices 
 Thy gentleness to praise ? 
 
S. THEODO-E OF THE STUDIUM. I9I 
 
 Because of Thy dear Image 
 Men dared Thy Saints to kill, 
 
 Yet didst Thou not consume them, 
 But bear'st their insults still. 
 
 Thou Who has fixed unshaken 
 
 Thy Church's mighty frame. 
 So that hell-gates shall never 
 
 Prevail against the same ; — 
 Bestou^ upon Thy people 
 
 Thy peace, that we may bring 
 One voice, one hymn, one spirit, 
 
 To glorify our King ! 
 
( ^92 ) 
 
 d&. st9rt(jo::jiu$ I 
 
 + A.D. S26. 
 
 S. Methodius L, a native of Syracuse, embraced 
 the monastic life at Constantinople. Sent as 
 legate from Pope Paschal to Michael the Stam- 
 merer, he was imprisoned by that prince in a 
 close cell, and there passed nine years, on account 
 of his resolute defence of Icons. Having been 
 scourged for the same cause, by the Emperor 
 Theophilus, he made his escape from prison ; 
 and vi'hen peace was restored to the Church was 
 raised to the throne of Constantinople. His first 
 care was to assemble a Synod for the restoration 
 (»f Icons ; and it is, properly speaking, that Synod 
 
S. METHODIUS. I93 
 
 which the Greeks celebrate on Orthodoxy 
 Sunday. With this Council the Iconoclast 
 troubles ceased. S. Methodius died November 
 4th, 846. His compositions are very (ew^ and 
 are chiefly confined to Idiomela. 
 
 Si Kal TCL rrapovTa. 
 
 Are thy toils and woes increasing ? 
 
 Are the Foe's attacks unceasing ? 
 Look with Faith unclouded, 
 Gaze with eyes unshrouded, 
 On the Cross ! 
 
 Dost thou fear that strictest trial ? 
 
 Tremblest thou at Christ's denial ? 
 Never rest without it, 
 Clasp thine hands about it, 
 — That dear Cross 
 
194 S. METHODIUS. 
 
 Diabolic legions press thee ? 
 
 Thoughts and works of sin distress thee ? 
 
 It shall chase all terror, 
 
 It shall right all error, 
 That sweet Cross ! 
 
 Draw'st thou nigh to Jordan's river ? 
 Should'st thou tremble ? Need'st thou 
 quiver ? 
 
 No ! if by it lying, — 
 No ! if on it dying, — 
 On the Cross ! 
 
 Say then, — " Master, while I cherish 
 That sweet hope, I cannot perish ! 
 
 After this life's story, 
 
 Give Thou me the glory 
 For the Cross ! " 
 
( 195 
 
 ^* SiO'Sicpl) of t{]c ^tntJium* 
 
 The third period of Greek Hymnology opens 
 with its most voluminous writer, S. Joseph of the 
 Studium. A Sicilian by birth, he left his native 
 country on its occupation by the Mahometans in 
 830, and went to Thessalonica, w^here he em- 
 braced the monastic life. Thence he removed to 
 Constantinople, but, in the second Iconoclastic 
 persecution, he seems to have felt no vocation for 
 confessorship, and went to Rome. Taken by 
 pirates, he was for some years a slave in Crete, 
 where he converted many to the Faith ; and 
 having obtained his liberty, and returned to the 
 Imperial City, he stood high in the favour, first 
 
196 S. JOSEPH OF THE STUDIUM. 
 
 of S. Ignatius, then of Photius, whom he accom- 
 panied into exile. On the death of that great 
 man he was recalled, and gave himself up entirely 
 to Hymnology. A legend, connected with his 
 death, is related of him. A citizen of Constan- 
 tinople betook himself to the chi*rch of S. 
 Theodore in the hope of obtaining some benefit 
 from the intercessions of that martyr. He waited 
 three days in vain ; then, just as he was about to 
 leave the church in despair, S. Theodore 
 appeared. "I," said the vision, ** and the other 
 Saints, whom the poet Joseph has celebrated in 
 his Canons, have been attending his sou] to 
 Paradise : hence my absence from my church." 
 The Eastern Communion celebrates him on the 
 3rd of April. But of the innumerable compo- 
 sitions of this most laborious writer, it would be 
 impossible to find many which, to Western taste, 
 give the least sanction to the position which he 
 
S. JOSEPH OF THE STUDIUM. 1 97 
 
 holds in the East. The insufferable tediousness 
 consequent on the necessity of filling eight Odes 
 with the praises of a Saint of whom nothing, 
 be3^ond the fact of his martyrdom, is known, and 
 doing this sixty or seventy different times, — the 
 verbiage, the bombast, the trappings with which 
 Scriptural simplicity is elevated to the taste of a 
 corrupt Court, are each and all scarcely to be 
 paralleled. He is by far the most prolific of the 
 hymn- writers. 
 
198 S. JOSEPH OF THE STUDIUM. 
 
 SUNDAY OF THE PRODIGAL SON. 
 
 (Septuagesima.) 
 
 The Sunday before Septuagesima, and Septuagesima itself 
 are, respectively, in the Greek Church, the Sunday of the 
 Pharisee and Publican, — and the Sunday of the Prodigal 
 Son, — those parables forming the Gospel for the day, and 
 serving for the key-note to the offices. The following Troparia 
 are from the Canon at Lauds on Septuagesima. (Ode VI. and 
 Ode Vlil. Trop. 2, 3.) 
 
 /Su^o? d/jLaprri/idrcov. 
 
 The abyss of many a former sin 
 
 Encloses me, and bars me in : 
 
 Like billows my transgressions roll : ' 
 
 Be Thou the Pilot of my soul -, 
 
 And to Salvation's harbour bring, 
 
 Thou Saviour and Thou glorious King ! 
 
S. JOSEPH OF THE STUDIUM. IQQ 
 
 My Father's heritage abused, 
 
 Wasted by lust, by sin misused ; 
 
 To shame and want and misery brought. 
 
 The slave to many a fruitless thought, 
 
 I cry to Thee, Who lovest men, 
 
 O pity and receive again ! 
 
 In hunger now, — no more possessed 
 Of that my portion bright and blest, 
 The exile and the alien see 
 Who yet would fain return to Thee . 
 And save me, Lord, who seek to raise 
 To Thy dear love the hymn of praise ! 
 
 With that blest thief my prayer I make, 
 
 Remember for Thy mercy's sake ! 
 
 With that poor publican I cry. 
 
 Be merciful^ O God most High I 
 
 With that lost Prodigal I fain 
 
 Back to my home would turn again ! 
 
200 S. JOSEPH OF THE STUDIUM. 
 
 Mourn, mourn, my soul, with earnest care. 
 And raise to Christ the contrite prayer : — 
 O Thou, Who freely wast made poor, 
 My sorrows and my sins to cure, 
 Me, poor of all good works, embrace, 
 Enriching with Thy boundless grace I 
 
 [In Mr. Young's book. Melody of Yater unser im 
 Himmelreich : harmonised by Ch. H. Pink. A striking 
 melody.] 
 
S. JOSEPH OF THE STUDIUM. 201 
 
 LET OUR CHOIR NEW ANTHEMS 
 RAISE. 
 
 A Cento from the Canon for SS. Timothy and Maura 
 May 3rd. 
 
 rojv lepoiv aOXocpoptov. 
 
 Let our Choir new anthems raise : 
 
 Wake the morn with gladness : 
 God Himself to joy and praise 
 
 Turns the Martyrs' sadness : 
 This the day that won their crown, 
 
 Opened Heav'n's bright portal ; 
 As they laid the mortal down. 
 
 And- put on th' immortal. 
 
202 S. JOSEPH OF THE STUDIUM. 
 
 Never flinched they from the flame, 
 
 From the torture, never ; 
 Vain the foeman's sharpest aim, 
 
 Satan's best endeavour : 
 For by faith they saw the Land 
 
 Decked in all its glory, 
 "Where triumphant now they stand 
 
 With the victor's story. 
 
 Faith they had that knew not shame. 
 
 Love that could not languish -, 
 And eternal Hope o'ercame 
 
 Momentary anguish. 
 He Who trod the self-same road. 
 
 Death and Hell defeated ; 
 Wherefore these their passions show'd 
 
 Calvary repeated. 
 
 Up and follow. Christian men ! 
 Press through toil and sorrow ! 
 
S. JOSEPH OF THE STUDIUM. 203 
 
 _ __ . 
 
 Spurn the night of fear, and then, — 
 
 Oh the glorious morrow ! 
 Who will venture on the strife ? 
 
 Who will first begin it ? 
 Who will seize the Land of Life ? 
 
 Warriors , up and win it ? 
 
 o 2 
 
204 S- JOSEI'H OF THE STUDIUM. 
 
 AND WILT THOU PARDON, LORD. 
 
 The following Stanzas are a Cento from the Canon for the 
 Monday of the First Tone, in the Paracletice. 
 
 TMV a/jLapTt(ov fJLOv rrjv ttXtjOvv. 
 
 And wilt Thou pardon, Lord, 
 A sinner such as I ? 
 Although Thy book his crimes record 
 Of such a crimson dye ? 
 
 So deep are they engrav'd, — 
 So terrible their fear. 
 The righteous scarcely shall be savM, 
 And where shall I appear ? 
 
S. JOSEPH OF THE STUDIUM. 2O5 
 
 My soul, make all thiags known 
 To Him Who all things sees : 
 That so the Lamb may yet atone 
 For thine iniquities. 
 
 Thou Physician blest, 
 Make clean my guilty soul ! 
 
 And me, by many a sin oppress'd. 
 Restore, and keep me whole ! 
 
 1 know not how to praise 
 Thy mercy and Thy love : 
 
 But deign Thy servant to upraise, 
 And I shall learn above ! 
 
 [In Mr. Young's book. Composed by Dr. Schroeder.] 
 
206 S. JOSEPH OF THE STUDIUM. 
 
 STARS OF THE MORNING. 
 
 A Cento from the Canon of the " Bodiless Ones ;" Tuesday in 
 the Week of the Fourth Tone. 
 
 Stars of the morning, so gloriously bright, 
 Fill'd with celestial resplendence and light ; 
 These that, where night never followeth day. 
 Raise the Trishagion ever and aye : 
 
 These are Thy counsellors : these dost Thou 
 
 own, 
 God of Sabaoth ! the nearest Thy throne ; 
 These are Thy ministers ; these dost Thou 
 
 send, 
 Help of the helpless ones ! man to defend. 
 
S. JOSEPH OF THE STUDIUM. 20/ 
 
 These keep the guard, amidst Salem's dear 
 
 bowers : 
 Thrones, Principalities, Virtues, and Powers : 
 Where with the Living Ones, mystical Four, 
 Cherubin, Seraphin, bow and adore. 
 
 "Who like the Lord ?" — thunders Michael, the 
 
 Chief: 
 Raphael, " the Cure of God," comforteth grief: 
 And, as at Nazareth, prophet of peace, 
 Gabriel, " the Light of God," bringeth release. 
 
 Then, when the earth was first poisM in mid- 
 space, — 
 Then, when the planets first sped on their race, — 
 Then, when were ended the six days' employ, — 
 Then all the sons of God shouted for joy. 
 
208 S. JOSEPH OF THE STUDIUM. 
 
 Still let them succour us ; still let them fight, 
 Lord of angelic hosts, battling for right ! 
 Till, where their anthems they ceaselessly pour. 
 We with the Angels may bow and adore ! 
 
 fNo. 6inH. E. C] 
 
S. JOSEPH OF THE STUDIUM. 2C9 
 
 CANON FOR ASCENSION DAY. 
 
 This is the crowning glory of the poet Joseph ; he has here 
 with a happy boldness entered into the lists with S. John 
 Damascene, to whom, on this one occasion, he must be pro- 
 nounced superior. 1 have preserved the alphabetic arrange- 
 ment, and " Joseph's Ode " at the end. All the Catavasias are 
 in Iambics. 
 
 ODE. I. 
 
 A fter three days Thou didst rise 
 Visible to mortal eyes : 
 First the Eleven worshipped Thee,— 
 Then the rest in Galilee : 
 Then a cloud in glory bore 
 Thee to Thine own native shore. 
 
210 S. JOSEPH OF THE STUDIUM. 
 
 B oldly David pour'd the strain : 
 God ascends to Heav'n again : 
 With the trumpet's pealing note 
 Alleluias round Him float ; 
 As He now, by hard-won right, 
 Seeks the Fount of purest Light ! 
 
 C rime on crime, and grief on grief, 
 Left the world without relief : 
 Now that aged, languid race, 
 God hath quickened by His grace : 
 As Thy going up we see, 
 Glory to Thy Glory be ! 
 
 Catavasm. 
 
 D arkness and awe, when Sinai's top he trod, 
 Taught him of faltering tongue the Law of 
 God: 
 
S. JOSEPH OF THE STUDIUM. 211 
 
 The mist was scattered from his spirit's eye. 
 He prais'd and hymn'd the Maker of the 
 
 sky, 
 When He That is and was and shall be, 
 
 passed by. 
 
212 S. JOSEPH OF THE STUDIUM. 
 
 ODE III. 
 
 eTTCLpare 7rv\d<;, 
 
 E xalt, exalt, the Heavenly Gates, 
 
 Ye chiefs of mighty name ! 
 The Lord and ICing of all things waits, 
 
 Enrob'd in earthly frame." 
 So to the higher seats they cry, 
 
 The humbler legions of the sky. 
 
 or Adam's sake, by Serpent-guile 
 Distress'd, deceiv'd, o'erthrown, 
 
 Thou left'st Thy native Home awhile, 
 Thou left'st the Father's Throne : 
 
 Now he is deck'd afresh with grace. 
 
 Thou seek'st once more the Heavenly place. 
 
S. JOSEPH OF THE STUDIUM. 21 3 
 
 G lad festal keeps the earth to-day, 
 Glad festal Heav'n is keeping : 
 
 The Ascension-pomp, in bright array. 
 Goes proudly sky-ward sweeping : 
 
 The Lord the mighty deed hath done. 
 
 And join'd the severed into one. 
 
 Catavasia. 
 
 €pp7]^e 7a9T/oo9. 
 
 H er fetters of the barren womb it rent, 
 It crush'd the malice of the insolent. 
 The cry of her — the prophetess, who 
 
 brought 
 A contrite spirit, and a humble thought 
 To Him, Who bids His Throne by earnest 
 
 prayer be sought. 
 
214 S. JOSEPH OF THE STUDIUM. 
 
 ODE IV. 
 
 ^Ir}aou<; 6 ^o)oB6ty]<;, 
 
 J Esus, Lord of Life Eternal, 
 
 Taking those He lov'd the best, 
 
 Stood upon the Mount of Olives, 
 And His Own the last time blest : 
 
 Then, though He had never left it, 
 Sought again his Father's breast. 
 
 K nit is now our flesh to Godhead, 
 Knit in everlasting bands : 
 
 Call the world to highest festal : 
 Floods and oceans, clap your hands 
 
 Angels, raise the song of triumph ! 
 Make response, ye distant lands ! 
 
S. JOSEPH OF THE STUDIUM. 215 
 
 L oosing Death with all its terrors 
 Thou ascended'st up on high ; 
 
 And to mortals, now Immortal, 
 Gavest immortality : 
 
 As Thine own Disciples saw Thee 
 Mounting victor to the sky I 
 
 Catavasia. 
 
 M onarch of monarchs, Sole of Sole, to Thee, 
 WoRD> Glorious in Thy Father's Majesty, 
 And sending Thy co-equal Spirit bright 
 To teach, to comfort, and to guide aright. 
 Thine own Apostles sang : All glory to Thy 
 might ! 
 
2l6 S. JOSEPH OF THE STUDIUM. 
 
 ODE V. 
 
 V6Kp(oaa<; rov OdvaTOv, 
 
 N ow that Death by death hath found his 
 ending, 
 Thou dost call to Thee Thy loved Eleven ; 
 And from holy Olivet ascending 
 
 On a cloud art carried up to Heaven. 
 
 O that wondrous Birth ! that wondrous Rising ! 
 That more wondrous mounting to the sky ! 
 So Elias, earthly things despising, 
 In a fiery chariot went on high. 
 
 P arted from Him, still they watch'd His going : 
 * Why stand gazing thus ?' the Angel said : 
 * This same Jesus, all His glory showing. 
 Shall return to judge the quick and dead.' 
 
S. JOSEPH OF THE STUDIUM. 217 
 
 Cata'uasia. 
 
 Q uicken'd and cleans'd, receive remission new 
 In the descending Spirit's fiery dew, 
 Sons of the Church, and light-formed genera- 
 tion ! 
 For lo ! the law goes forth from Sion's 
 
 nation, 
 The cloven to'ngues of flame the Para- 
 clete's salvation! 
 
2l8 S. JOSEPH OF THE STUDIUM. 
 
 ODE VI. 
 
 pavdrcoaav rjfjLLV dvco6ep, 
 
 R ain down, ye heav'ns, eternal bliss ! 
 The Cherub-cloud to-day 
 Bears Jesus where His Father is, 
 Along the starry way ! 
 
 S under' d of old were Heaven and Earth : 
 But Thou, Incarnate King ! 
 Hast made them one by that Thy Birth, 
 And this Thy triumphing. 
 
 T hy victor-raiment, wherefore red ? 
 What mean the marks of pain 
 That print Thy form ?' — the Angels saidj 
 The ascending Monarch's train. 
 
S. JOSEPH OF THE STUDIUM. 219 
 
 Catavasia. 
 
 V ery Oblation, by the scourges torn ! 
 Nailed to the bitter Cross, O Virgin-born ! 
 As once the Prophet from the monster's 
 
 maw, 
 So now Thy love, accomplishing the Law, 
 Adam from utter death to perfect Life would 
 
 draw. 
 
 Oicos, 
 ra Trj<; yrj<i iirl Tr)<? 77)9. 
 
 V anities earthly in earth will we lay, 
 Ashes with ashes, the dust with the clay : 
 Lift up the heart, and the eye, and the love, 
 Lift up thyself, to the regions above : 
 Since the Immortal hath entered of late, 
 Mortals may pass at the heavenly gate. 
 
 P 2 
 
220 S. JOSEPH OF THE STUDIUM. 
 
 Stand we on Olivet : mark Him ascend, 
 Wliose is the glory and might without end ; 
 There, with His own ones, the Giver of 
 
 Good 
 Blessing them once more, a little while 
 
 stood. 
 " Nothing can part us, — nor distance, nor 
 
 foes , 
 Lo ! I am tor you, and who can oppose ?" 
 
S. JOSEPH OF THE STUDIUM. 221 
 
 ODE VII. 
 
 W afting Him up on high, 
 
 The glorious cloud receives 
 The Lord of Immortality, 
 
 And earth the Victor leaves : 
 The Heavenly People raise the strain, 
 The Apostles pour the hymn again ; — 
 God of our Fathers, Thou art blest ! 
 
 Y e faithful, tell your joys ! 
 
 All hearts with gladness bound ! 
 God is gone up with a merry noise, — 
 
 The Lord with the trumpet's sound ! 
 To Him we cry, by woes once tried. 
 Now glorious at the Father's side, — 
 
 God of our Fathers, Thou art blest ! 
 
222 S. JOSEPH OF THE STUDIUM. 
 
 Z ealous for God of yore, 
 
 With zeal still Moses burns : 
 " Come, Heavenly Spirits, and adore 
 
 The Victor Who returns ; 
 Rise, Angel legions, rise and sing 
 The ancient hymn to greet the I^ng, — 
 God of our Fathers, Thou art blest !" 
 
 Catavasm. 
 
 J oin'd with the trumpet-peal, the din and 
 shout. 
 Cornet, flute, sackbut, dulcimer rang out, 
 And bade adore the golden deity ; 
 The Spirit's gentler voice gives praise to 
 Thee, 
 O co-eternal One — O consubstantial Three ! 
 
S. JOSEPH OF THE STUDIUM. 223 
 
 ODE VIII. 
 
 Hirmos. "Him of the Father."* 
 
 Tov ej Bvcrl ral'^ ovdiai^. 
 
 O f twofold natures, Christ, the Giver 
 Of immortality and love, 
 Ascendeth to the Father's glory, 
 Ascendeth to the Throne above : 
 Wherefore He, this glorious morn. 
 
 Be by all ador'd : 
 Thou That liftest up our horn, 
 Holy art Thou, Lord ! 
 
 * I have specified this Hirmos, because the reader can see it 
 Dy turning back, to page 133. 
 
224 S. JOSEPH OF THE STUDIUM. 
 
 S laves are set free, and captives ransom'd 
 The Nature that He made at first 
 He now presenteth to the Father, 
 The chains of her damnation burst : 
 This the cause that He was born, 
 
 Adam's race restor'd: 
 Thou That Hftest up our horn. 
 Holy art Thou, Lord! 
 
 mptied awhile of all His brightness. 
 He enter'd thus the glorious fight ; 
 O'erthrew the foe, mankind exalted 
 Far above every Pow'r and Might : 
 Therefore bare He pains and scorn. 
 
 Calvary's heart-blood pour'd: — 
 Thou That liftest up our horn, 
 Holy art Thou, Lord ! 
 
S. JOSEPH OF THE STUDIUM. 225 
 
 Catavasia. 
 
 P raising the Lord they stood, the Martyr 
 
 Three, 
 Untouch'd amidst the fire, and wholly free: 
 With them associate, let the world's wide 
 
 frame 
 To Him Whose healing dew restrain'd the 
 
 flame, 
 Send up the hymn of praise, and magnify 
 
 His Name! 
 
226 S. JOSEPH OF THE STUDIUM. 
 
 ODE IX. 
 
 0) rcop hwpeoiv. 
 
 H oly gift, surpassing comprehension ! 
 
 Wond'rous mystery of each fiery tongue ! 
 
 Christ made good His Promise in Ascen- 
 sion : 
 
 O'er the Twelve the cloven Hames have 
 liung ! 
 
 S pake the Lord, or ere He left the Eleven : 
 ** Here in Salem wait the Gift I send; 
 Till the Paraclete come down from 
 
 Heaven : 
 Everlasting Guide and Guard and Friend." 
 
S. JOSEPH OF THE STUDIUM. 227 
 
 O that shame, now ended in that glory ! 
 Pain untold, now lost in joy unknown ! 
 Tell it out with praise, the whole glad story, 
 Human nature at the Father's Throne ! 
 
 Catavasm. 
 
 D eclare, ye Angel Bands that dwell on high, 
 How saw ye Him, the Victor, drawing nigh ? 
 What strange new visions burst upon youi 
 
 sight ? 
 One in the form of Man, That claims by 
 
 right 
 The very throne of God, the unapproached 
 
 Light ! 
 
 Exaposteilarion, 
 
 E ternal ! After Thine own will 
 
 Thou born in time would'st be : 
 
228 S. JOSEPH OF THE STUDIUM. 
 
 After the self-same counsel still 
 
 Was Thine Epiphany ; 
 Thou in our flesh didst yield Thy breath, 
 
 Immortal God, for man : 
 Thou by Thy death didst conquer Death, 
 
 Through Thine Almighty plan : 
 Thou, rising Victor to the sky, 
 
 Fill'st Heav'n and earth above : 
 And send'st the Promise from on high. 
 
 The Spirit of Thy love ! 
 
( 229 ) 
 
 €l)cocti.0tu^ of tl)c J)tutiium. 
 
 -]- circ. A.D. 890. 
 
 He is said to have bet.-n the friend of S. Joseph; but is only 
 known to us by the " Suppliant Canon to Jesus," to be found 
 at the end of the Paracktice. The following is a Cento 
 formed from it. 
 
 ^Irjaov yXuKvrare. 
 
 Jesu, Name all names above, 
 
 Jesu, best and dearest, 
 Jesu, Fount of perfect love, 
 
 Holiest, tenderest, nearest ; 
 Jesu, source of grace completest, 
 Jesu purest, Jesu sweetest, 
 
 Jesu, Well of power Divine, 
 
 Make me, keep me, seal me Thine ! 
 
230 S. THEOCTISTUS OF THE STUDIUM. 
 
 Jesu, open me the gate 
 
 That of old he enter'd, 
 Who, in that most lost estate, 
 
 Wholly on Thee ventur'd ; 
 Thou, Whose Wounds are ever pleading, 
 And Thy Passion interceding, 
 
 From my misery let me rise 
 
 To a Home in Paradise ! 
 
 Thou didst call the Prodigal : 
 
 Thou didst pardon Mary : 
 Thou Whose words can never fall, 
 
 Love can never vary: 
 Lord, to heal my lost condition. 
 Give — for Thou canst give — contrition 
 
 Thou canst pardon all mine ill 
 
 If Thou wilt: Osay, "I will!" 
 
S. THEOCTISTUS OF THE STUDIUM. 2'j. 
 
 Woe, that I have turned aside 
 
 After fleshly pleasure ! 
 Woe, that I have never tried 
 
 For the Heavenly Treasure ! 
 Treasure, safe in Home supernal -, 
 Incorruptible, eternal ! 
 
 Treasure no less price hath won 
 
 Than the Passion of The Son ! 
 
 Jesu, crown'd with Thorns for me. 
 Scourged for my transgression, 
 
 Witnessing, through agony. 
 That Thy good confession ! 
 
 Jesu, clad in purple raiment. 
 
 For my evils making payment ; 
 Let not all Thy woe and pain. 
 Let not Calvary, be in vain ! 
 
232 S. THEOCTISTUS OF THE S TUDIUM. 
 
 When I reach Death's bitter sea 
 And its waves roll higher, 
 
 Help the more forsaking me 
 As the storm draws nigher : 
 
 Jesu, leave me not to languish, 
 
 Helpless, hopeless, full of anguish 
 Tell me, — " Verily I say. 
 Thou shalt be with Me to-day !' 
 
( 233 
 
 -]- circ. A.D. 910. 
 
 He was Bishop of that See towards the close 
 of the ninth century, and is principally famous for 
 his Canons in honour of the Blessed Trinity, — 
 eight in number, one to each Tone. They are 
 sung at Matins on Sundays : and if the writer 
 has not always been able to fuse his learning and 
 orthodoxy into poetry, nor yet to escape the 
 tautology of his brother bards, these composi- 
 tions are stately and striking. Metrophanes was 
 a vigorous supporter of S. Ignatius ; and the 
 partisan of Rome in her contest with Photius. 
 
 It would be impossible, without wearying the 
 reader, to translate the whole of one of the 
 Triadic Canons ; but a Cento from one of them 
 may not be unacceptable. 
 
 Q 
 
234 METROPHANES OF SMYRNA. 
 
 O UNITY OF THREEFOLD LIGHT. 
 
 From the Ganon for Sunday of the Second Tone. 
 Tpt(f>6y'yr}<; Mova^ 6eap')(^LKr}. 
 
 O Unity of Threefold Light, 
 
 Send out Thy loveliest ray, 
 And scatter our transgressions' night, 
 
 And turn it into day ; 
 Make us those temples pure and fair. 
 
 Thy glory loveth well, 
 The spotless tabernacles, where 
 
 Thou may'st vouchsafe to dwell ! 
 
 The glorious hosts of peerless might 
 That ever see Thy Face, 
 
METROPHANES OF SMYRNA. 235 
 
 Thou mak'st the mirrors of Thy Light, 
 
 The vessels of Thy grace : 
 Thou, when their wond'rous strain they weave, 
 
 Hast pleasure in the lay : 
 Deign thus our praises to receive. 
 
 Albeit from lips of clay ! 
 
 And yet Thyself they cannot know, 
 
 Nor pierce the veil of light 
 That hides Thee from the Thrones below. 
 
 As in profoundest night : 
 How then can mortal accents frame 
 
 Due tribute to the King ? 
 Thou, only, while we praise Thy Name, 
 
 Forgive us as we sing ! 
 
 Beyond Metrophanes, it will not be necessary 
 to carry our translations. The following names 
 may, however, be mentioned. 
 
 o 2 
 
( 236 ) 
 
 <giitlE)pmiUiB^* 
 
 -(- A.D. 910. 
 
 Euthymius, usually known as Syngelus, (the 
 same as Syncellus, the confidential Deacon of the 
 Patriarch of Constantinople,) who died about 
 916, is the author of a Penitential Canon to S 
 Mary, which is highly esteemed in the East. It 
 would scarcely, however, be possible to make 
 even a Cento from it which would be acceptable 
 to the English reader. 
 
( 237 ) 
 
 Heo VI. 
 
 A.D. 917. 
 
 Our next name is that of a Royal Poet, 
 Leo VI., the Philosopher, who reigned from 
 886 to 917, and left behind him the Idiomela, or 
 detached stanzas, on the Resurrection, sung at 
 Lauds. They are better than might have been 
 expected from an imperial author, and the 
 troubler of the Eastern Church by a fourth 
 marriage. 
 
 The same thing may be said of the Exapostei- 
 laria of his son, Constantine Porphyrogenitus, 
 whose life lasted till 959. 
 
( 238 ) 
 
 + A.D. 1060. 
 
 John Mauropus, Metropolitan of Euchaita, 
 sometimes called the last of the Greek Fathers, 
 left a number of hymns, printed at Eton in 161O; 
 and if not boasting much poetical fire, at least 
 graced with a gentle and Isocratean eloquence. 
 As they have not been employed by the Church, 
 they claim no further notice here. 
 
 With this Metropolitan, Greek Hymnology 
 well-nigh ceased : at least the only other name 
 that need be mentioned is that of Philotheus, 
 Patriarch of Constantinople, who died in 1376. 
 This man, the warm supporter of the dogma of 
 the Uncreated Light ^ was the composer of several 
 stanzas for Orthodoxy Sunday, and the Canon 
 for July 16th, on the Holy Fathers : both in the 
 very worst taste. 
 
APPENDIX 
 
( 240 ) 
 A.D. 725 A.D. 794. 
 
 S. Stephen, called the Sabaite, from the monas- 
 tery of S. Sabas, was the nephew of S. John 
 Damascene, who placed him in that house. He 
 was then ten years of age : he passed fifty-nine 
 years in that retreat ; and was the earliest of the 
 hymnographers who lived to see the final restora- 
 tion of Icons. He has left but few poetical 
 compositions. The two best are those on 
 the Martyrs of the monastery of S. Sabas — 
 (March 20th) — on which a monk of that house 
 would be likely to write con amore ; and on the 
 Circumcision. His style seems formed on that of 
 
S. STEPHEN THE SABAITE. 24 1 
 
 S. Cosmas, rather than on that of his own uncle. 
 He is not deficient in elegance and richness of 
 typology, but exhibits something of sameness, 
 and is occasionally guilty of very hard metaphors, 
 as when he speaks of " the circumcision of the 
 tempest of our souls.'* He is commemorated on 
 the 13th of July. 
 
242 S. STEPHEN THE SABAITE. 
 
 IDIOMELA IN THE WEEK OF THE 
 FIRST OBLIQUE TONE. 
 
 These Stanzas, which strike me as very sweet, are not in all 
 the editions of the Octoechus. 
 
 KOTTOV T6 KOi KCLfXaTOV. 
 
 Art thou weary, art thou languid, 
 
 Art thou sore distrest ? 
 " Come to me" — saith One — '* and coming, 
 Be at rest !" 
 
 Hath He marks to lead me to Him, 
 
 If He be my Guide ? 
 " In Hi^ Feet and Hands are Wound-prin&s, 
 And His Side." 
 
S. STEPHEN THE SABAITE. 243 
 
 Is there Diadem, as Monarch, 
 
 That His Brow adorns ? 
 *' Yea, a Crown, in very surety, 
 
 But of Thorns ! " 
 
 Ifl find Him, if I follow. 
 
 What His guerdon here ? 
 " Many a sorrow, many a labour. 
 Many a tear." 
 
 If I still hold closely to Him, 
 
 What hath He at last ? 
 ** Sorrow vanquish'd, labour ended, 
 Jordan past ! " 
 
 If I ask Him to receive me, 
 
 Will He say me nay ? 
 " Not till earth, and not till Heaven 
 Pass away ! " 
 
244 S- STEPHEN THE SABAITE. 
 
 Finding, following, keeping, struggling, 
 
 Is He sure to bless ? 
 "Angels, Martyrs, Prophets, Virgins, 
 Answer, Yes ! *' 
 
 [No. 4. in Mr. Sedding's book : also No. 4 in H. E. C. Both 
 very sweet melodies ; — but that in H. E. C, which gives a differ- 
 ent version of the 4th line throughout, is, to my mind, singularly 
 touching.] 
 
S. JOSEPH OF THE STUDIUM. 245 
 
 THE PILGRIMS OF JESUS. 
 
 O happy band of pilgrims, 
 If onward ye will tread 
 
 With Jesus as your Fellow 
 To Jesus as your Head ! 
 
 O happy, if ye labour 
 As Jesus did for men : 
 
 O happy, if ye hunger 
 As Jesus hunger'd then ! 
 
 The Cross that Jesus carried 
 He carried as your due : 
 
 The Crown that Jesus weareth 
 He weareth it for you. 
 
246 S. JOSEPH OF THE STUDIUM. 
 
 The Faith by which ye see Him, 
 The Hope, in which ye yearn, 
 
 The Love that through ail troubles 
 To Him alone will turn, — 
 
 What are they, but vaunt-couriers 
 To lead you to His Sight ? 
 
 What are they, save the effluence 
 Of Uncreated Light ? 
 
 The trials that beset you. 
 The sorrows ye endure, 
 
 The manifold temptations 
 
 That Death alone can cure, — 
 
 What are they, but His jewels 
 Of right celestial worth ? 
 
 What are they but the ladder. 
 Set up to Heav'n on earth ? 
 
S. JOSEPH OF THE STUDIUM. 247 
 
 O happy band of pilgrims, 
 Look upward to the skies ; — 
 
 Where such a light affliction 
 Shall win you such a prize I 
 
248 S. JOSEPH OF THE STUDILM. 
 
 THE RETURN HOME. 
 
 Safe home, safe home in port I 
 — Rent cordage, shattered deck, 
 Torn sails, provisions short, 
 And only not a wreck : 
 But oh ! the joy upon the shore 
 To tell our voyage-perils o'er ! 
 
 The prize, the prize secure ! 
 
 The athlete nearly tell ; 
 
 Bare all he could endure, 
 
 And bare not always well : 
 But he may smile at troubles gone 
 Who sets the victor-garland on ! 
 
S. JOSEPH OF THE STUDIUM. 249 
 
 No more the foe can harm : 
 
 No more of leaguer 'd camp, 
 
 And cry of night-alarm, 
 
 And need of ready lamp : 
 And yet how nearly he had failed, — 
 How nearly had that foe prevailed ! 
 
 The lamb is in the fold 
 
 In perfect safety penn'd : 
 
 The lion once had hold, 
 
 And thouglit to make an end : 
 But One came by with Wounded Side, 
 And for the sheep the Shepherd died. 
 
 The exile is at Home ! 
 
 — O nights and days of tears, 
 
 O longings not to roam, 
 
 O sins, and doubts, and fears, — 
 What matter now (when so men say) 
 The King has wip'd those tears away ? 
 
 R 
 
250 S. JOSEPH OF THE STUDIUM. 
 
 O happy, happy Bride ! 
 Thy widow'd hours are past, 
 The Bridegroom at thy side, 
 Thou all His own at last ! 
 The sorrows of thy former cup 
 In full fruition swallow'd up! 
 
 [No. 5 in H. E. C. This, of all the melodies written for, 
 or adapted to, these hymns, is my own especial favourite. One 
 feels that the anonymous writer of such a plaintive, yet sooth- 
 ing, melody, must have been one — to quote Archbishop Trench's 
 words with regard to the author of Vent, Sancte Spiritus, — 
 acquainted with great sorrows, but also with great consola- 
 tions.] 
 
 PRiNTKn nv 
 
 SPOTTISUOOnE AND CO., NEW-STKEhT SQUARE 
 LONDON 
 
WORKS by the late Rev. Dr. NEALE, 
 
 PUBLISHED BY 
 
 J. T. HAYES, 17 HENRIETTA STREET, 
 CO VENT GARDEN. 
 
 THE AUTHOR'S LAST TWO WORKS. 
 
 I. 
 
 Pj-ice 2s. 6d. ; by post ^ 2s. <)d. 
 
 Original ^equettces, 
 
 HYMNS, 
 AND OTHER ECCLESIASTICAL VERSES, 
 
 BY 
 
 THE LATE REV. DR. NEALE, 
 
 SACKVILLE COLLEGE, EAST GRINSTED. 
 
 ' It had long been my wish, especially when I had occasion to 
 notice the great favour which God had bestowed on my translations 
 from Mediaeval Hymnology, to collect some oimyown Hymns and 
 Sequences as a poor little offering to the Great Treasury. Laid 
 aside in spring last from all active work by a severe and dangerous 
 illness, the wish was more strongly impressed on my mind, and I 
 felt that no kind of composition could be more suitable for one who 
 might soon be called to have done with earthly composition for 
 ever.' — Preface (1866). 
 
THE LATE DR. NEALE'S WORKS. 
 
 II. 
 
 Price \s. ; by post ^ \s. 2d. 
 
 gtabaf ^^Tafcr gpecio^a: 
 
 FULL OF BEAUTY STOOD THE MOTHER. 
 
 BY 
 
 THE LATE DR. NEALE. 
 
 • The companion Sequence to the Siahat Mater Dolorosa is now- 
 presented to the reader — Stabat Mater Speciosa ; this is the hymn 
 of the Cradle, as the other of the Cross. ... I cannot but wonder 
 that it has never hitherto appeared in an English translation ; nor 
 even, so far as I know, been reprinted in this country.' — Authors 
 Preface. 
 
 *^* The above Work, a7id the Original Sequences, were 
 the last efforts cf Dr. Neale on his Sick Bed, and were only 
 finished two or th?-ee days befo7-e his decease. 
 
THE LATE DR NEALE'S WORKS. 
 
 Fine Edition^ on Toned Paper ^ price \s. 6d. cloth ; by post, is. 8d. 
 The Cheap Edition, gd. ; by post, lod. 
 
 THE 
 
 '^^gff)m of '^exnaxb of 
 ^Uoxlaix, 
 
 ON THE HEAVENLY COUNTRY. 
 
 EDITED AND TRANSLATED BY 
 
 THE LATE DR. NEALE. 
 
 And Bernard, minstrel of the Cross ; 
 
 And Bernard, who with home-sick view, 
 Counting all other joys but loss, 
 
 Jerusalem the Golden drew.' 
 
 Neale^s Original Sequences. 
 
 • This Rhythm is that which will most surely enshrine John 
 Mason Neale's memory in the Church of England as a dear and 
 honoured treasure. His song will long be the solace of sad hearts 
 on earth, but he is now learning a brighter and sweeter one.' 
 Dr. Littledale s Preface to the Eighth Edition. 
 
THE LATE DR. NEALE'S WORKS. 
 
 NEW AND SECOND EDITION OF THE COMPANION 
 VOLUME TO THE RHYTHM OF S. BERNARD. 
 
 Price \s. 6d. ; by post, is. 8d. 
 
 HYMNS, 
 
 CHIEFLY MEDIEVAL, 
 
 ON THE 
 
 §og$ & glories of paradise. 
 
 BY 
 
 THE LATE DR. NEALE. 
 
 ' Dr. Neale has intended this volume as a companion to his 
 translation of " Bernard of Morlaix," but it is much more miscella- 
 neous in its contents, which, were it not for the gravity and unity 
 of their subjects, would be almost grotesquely varied,' — Guardian. 
 
 ' This little book contains some perfect gems.' — Ecclesiastic. 
 
THE LATE DR. NEALE'S WORKS. 
 
 Fine Edition, on Toned Paper, \s. 6d. ; by post, is. Sd. 
 Cheap Edition, is.; by post, is. id. 
 
 ^gmn^, suitable for §ttt)ali5s 
 
 ORIGINAL OR TRANSLATED. 
 
 BY 
 
 THE LATE DR. NEALE. 
 WITH PREFACE BY DR. LITTLEDALE. 
 
 • The hymns in this neat little collection are selected from various 
 volumes of his Sacred Poetry, and are admirably suited to form a 
 companion to his " Readings for the Aged." Almost all of them 
 are well-known favourites with persons acquainted with Dr. Neale's 
 poetry, and they are such as to lead those who are yet strangers to 
 it to lose no time in filling up this gap in their knowledge of con- 
 temporary poetry.' — Literary Churchman. 
 
 ' This beautiful collection should be in the hands of every one 
 who visits the sick.' — Church Review. 
 
THE LATE DR. NEALE'S WORKS. 
 
 A VOLUME OF CHOICE SERMONS BY DR. NEALE. 
 
 SECOND EDITION, CONSIDERABLY ENLARGED. 
 6s. ; by post, 6s. ^d. 
 
 %f)e gong of gongs : 
 
 A VOLUME OF SERMONS THEREON. 
 
 BY 
 
 THE LATE DR. NEALE. 
 
 *^* Many Sermons have been added which have never hitherto 
 been published. 
 
 ' Its style is that of Dr. Neale himself^peculiar, forcible, 
 attractive, epigrammatic, and thoroughly original ; while the Bibli- 
 cal knowledge displayed in it, and the deep lessons brought out by 
 a mystical treatment of words of Sacred Writ, would no doubt 
 astonish some professing Bible Christians of another school.' — 
 Union Review. 
 
I