Spiratoria On Moranoria Sectory 07

RALPH, abbot of the Cistercian monastery of Coggeshall from 1207 to 1218, when he resigned because of illness, wrote a Chronicon Anglicanum (J. Stevenson, Rolls Series, 1875), which extends from 1066 to 1223. To 1186 the entries are brief annals: with 1187 the history becomes more full, but the writer's interest is chiefly in the crusade, of which important and interesting accounts are given from excellent sources; and comparatively little is recorded concerning the history of England proper before the accession of John. For the reign of John the book is one of our most important and trustworthy contemporary sources. Ralph was greatly interested in mythical tales, especially in wonderful occurrences in nature, and he records these at length as he heard of them, but this habit does not affect the character of his historical record proper. As a historian he is very well informed, though he gives but few documents; he saw clearly the essential point of things and had a sense of accuracy.

There is something in the Anglo-Saxon temperament which is on the whole unfavourable to movements and groups; the great figures of the Victorian time in art and literature have been solitary men, anarchical as regards tradition, strongly individualistic, working on their own lines without much regard for schools or conventions. The Anglo-Saxon is deferential, but not imitative; he has a fancy for doing things in his own way. Wordsworth, Keats, Shelley, Byron-were there ever four contemporary poets so little affected by one another's work? Think of the phrase in which Scott summed up his artistic creed, saying that he had succeeded, in so far as he had succeeded, by a "hurried frankness of composition," which was meant to please young and eager people. It is true that Wordsworth had a solemn majesty about his work, practised a sort of priestly function, never averse to entertaining ardent visitors by conducting them about his grounds, and showing them where certain poems had been engendered. But Wordsworth, as Fitz-Gerald truly said, was proud, not vain--proud like the high-hung cloud or the solitary peak. He felt his responsibility, and desired to be felt rather than to be applauded.

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