Our Catholic Heritage in English Literature of Pre-Conquest Days | Page 6

ramparts, down crashed the floods. Melted were these
sea-towers, when the mighty One, Lord of Heaven's realm, smote with
holy hand These heroes strong as pines, that people proud.... The
yawning sea was mad, Up it drew, down swirled; dread stood about
them, Forth welled the sea-wounds. On those war-troops fell, As from
the heaven high, that handiwork of God. Thus swept He down the
sea-wall, foamy-billowed, The sea that never shelters, struck by His
ancient sword, Till, by its dint[B] of death, slept the doughty ones; An
army of sinners, fast surrounded there, The sea-pale, sodden warriors
their souls up-yielded Then the dark upsweltering, of haughty waves
the greatest, Over them spread; all the host sank deep. And thus were
drowned the doughtiest of Egypt, Pharaoh with his folk. That foe to
God, Full soon he saw, yea, e'en as he sank, That mightier than he was
the Master of the waters, With His death-grip, determined to end the
battle, Angered and awful.
[Footnote B: blow.]
How fine a conception it is. Let us notice how far had been travelled
from the old pagan "Fate goeth even as it will" to "the Lord of Fate."
How great is the thought of the vision of God's might, the power of the
Master of the waves, brought before the eyes of Pharaoh before he
sinks in the death-grip that will not let him go!
CHAPTER III
Allegory. Principle of comparison important in life, language, literature.
Early use of symbolism; suggested reasons for this. Poem of the
Phoenix. Allegorical interpretation of the story. Celtic influence on
English poetry. Gifts of colour, fervour, glow. Various gifts of various
nations enriching one another.
In these papers we are not going through anything like a course of older
English literature. We are looking at some of the work which our early
writers have left, from the point of view of its being our Catholic
Heritage, and we want to pay special attention to special works, not to
go through a long list of names. It is hoped that the bringing forward of

what is so good and strong in interest may be found really helpful by
those who have little or no time to go to the originals. That it may be so
is alike the desire of writer and publisher.
To-day we are going to consider a poem of a different kind from what
we have had before, an old poem called "The Phoenix."
Literature is full of allusions to the fable of the phoenix; it is one of
those stories which have caught hold of people and fired their
imagination; and the reason is, we may well suppose, because it has
suggested so many comparisons, some of them great and beautiful and
holy. There are some stories which lend themselves easily to an
allegorical interpretation; stories quite true, and yet suggesting things
beyond their own actual scope. I dwell on this before passing on to the
poem, because I want to bring before you the remembrance of what a
tremendous factor in literature, as in thought and in the whole of life is
the principle of comparison, or, as we might put it, the principle of
similitude or likeness. We learn about a thing we do not know through
its likeness, as a whole or in some parts, to a thing we do know. Our
little children can understand most easily something of the love of Our
Father who is in Heaven through the love of their father on earth: they
learn of their Redeemer's Mother, their own dear Mother of Grace,
through their earthly mother, who is ever ready to supply their wants
and give them joy and comfort.
In devotion what do we most need to pray for? Is it not for likeness to
the holy ones and to the holiest of all creatures, Our Lady; and highest
of all, to the Lord, Our Saviour and Example? And is it not the fairest
of promises that one day "we shall be like to Him, for we shall see Him
as He is"? (St John iii.)
So in literature we have, springing from this principle of comparison,
the forms fable, parable, and allegory; and in language the figures of
speech which we know as simile and metaphor.
Ovid, a Roman poet who lived before the Incarnation, tells the old
Eastern fable thus:

"There is a bird that restores and reproduces itself; the Assyrians call it
the Phoenix. It feeds on no common food, but on the choicest of gums
and spices; and after a life of secular length (_i.e._, a hundred years) it
builds in a high tree with cassia, spikenard, cinnamon, and myrrh, and
on this nest it expires in sweetest odours. A young Phoenix rises and
grows, and when strong enough it