Englands Antiphon | Page 2

have passed

centuries ago into the "high countries" of song.
My object is to erect, as it were, in this book, a little auricle, or spot of
concentrated hearing, where the hearts of my readers may listen, and
join in the song of their country's singing men and singing women.
I will build it, if I may, like a chapel in the great church of England's
worship, gathering the sounds of its never-ceasing choir, heart after
heart lifting up itself in the music of speech, heart after heart
responding across the ages. Hearing, we worship with them.
For we must not forget that, although the individual song springs from
the heart of the individual, the song of a country is not merely
cumulative: it is vital in its growth, and therefore composed of
historically dependent members. No man could sing as he has sung,
had not others sung before him. Deep answereth unto deep, face to face,
praise to praise. To the sound of the trumpet the harp returns its own
vibrating response--alike, but how different! The religious song of the
country, I say again, is a growth, rooted deep in all its story.
Besides the fact that the lyric chiefly will rouse the devotional feeling,
there is another reason why I should principally use it: I wish to make
my book valuable in its parts as in itself. The value of a thing depends
in large measure upon its unity, its wholeness. In a work of these limits,
that form of verse alone can be available for its unity which is like the
song of the bird--a warble and then a stillness. However valuable an
extract may be--and I shall not quite eschew such--an entire lyric, I had
almost said however inferior, if worthy of a place at all, is of greater
value, especially if regarded in relation to the form of setting with
which I hope to surround it.
There is a sense in which I may, without presumption, adopt the name
of Choragus, or leader of the chorus, in relation to these singers: I must
take upon me to order who shall sing, when he shall sing, and which of
his songs he shall sing. But I would rather assume the office of master
of the hearing, for my aim shall be to cause the song to be truly heard;
to set forth worthy points in form, in matter, and in relation; to say with
regard to the singer himself, his time, its modes, its beliefs, such things

as may help to set the song in its true light--its relation, namely, to the
source whence it sprung, which alone can secure its right reception by
the heart of the hearer. For my chief aim will be the heart; seeing that,
although there is no dividing of the one from the other, the heart can do
far more for the intellect than the intellect can do for the heart.
We must not now attempt to hear the singers of times so old that their
language is unintelligible without labour. For this there is not room,
even if otherwise it were desirable that such should divide the volume.
We must leave Anglo-Saxon behind us. In Early English, I shall give a
few valuable lyrics, but they shall not be so far removed from our
present speech but that, with a reasonable amount of assistance, the
nature and degree of which I shall set forth, they shall not only present
themselves to the reader's understanding, but commend themselves to
his imagination and judgment.
CHAPTER I.
SACRED LYRICS OF THE THIRTEENTH CENTURY.
In the midst of wars and rumours of wars, the strife of king and barons,
and persistent efforts to subdue neighbouring countries, the mere
effervescence of the life of the nation, let us think for a moment of that
to which the poems I am about to present bear good witness--the true
life of the people, growing quietly, slowly, unperceived--the leaven hid
in the meal. For what is the true life of a nation? That, I answer, in its
modes of thought, its manners and habits, which favours the growth
within the individual of that kingdom of heaven for the sake only of
which the kingdoms of earth exist. The true life of the people, as
distinguished from the nation, is simply the growth in its individuals of
those eternal principles of truth, in proportion to whose power in them
they take rank in the kingdom of heaven, the only kingdom that can
endure, all others being but as the mimicries of children playing at
government.
Little as they then knew of the relations of the wonderful story on
which their faith was built, to everything human, the same truth was at
work then which is now--poor as the recognition of