believed and do believe, with all their heart and minds, in the mystery of the Holy Incarnation, a vast multitude of thoughts, and words, and deeds of Christians must ever remain a riddle and a mystery. Well, we at least are satisfied with our company. Sit anima mea cum sanctis! Would that we could hope that such a mind as Mr. Greg's could learn to be dissatisfied with his associates, and to join the vast and continuous and widespread throng of the worshippers of Christ the Lord!

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ART. III.-1. The Latin Poems commonly attributed to Walter Mapes. Collected and edited by THOMAS WRIGHT, Esq. M.A. (Camden Society).

2. Political Poems and Songs. Edited by THOMAS WRIGHT, Esq. M.A. Two vols. (Rolls Series.)

3. The Repressor of overmuch Blaming of the Clergy. By REGINALD PECOCK, D.D. Edited by CHURCHILL BABINGTON, B.D. (Rolls Series.)

WE are apt to think that the witty canon of S. Paul's, who held up to the world's ridicule the 'drab-coated men of Pennsylvania,' because he had lost a few hundreds by their repudiation, was purely a product of modern times; but, in fact, we have his exact counterpart in the twelfth century. At that period Walter Mapes, Archdeacon of Oxford, and Rector of Westbury-upon-Trym, having been defrauded of some of his clerical dues by the intrusions on his domain of the Cistercian or White monks, determined to revenge himself on this already powerful order by his pen. Giraldus Cambrensis tells us of this quarrel, himself taking a lively interest therein, as a friend of the Archdeacon, and an enemy of the Cistercians. 'He was a man,' says Giraldus, ' of conspicuous fame for his knowledge of letters, and illustrious for the wit of his courtly language. In high favour with Henry II., and one of the King's travelling justices to administer the law, he was wont, when put to his oath to render justice to all, to make the reservation of Jews and White monks, to whom, he said, he would show neither justice nor equity. Wrong it were,' said he, 'that they should receive justice, who act unjustly towards all men.' An abbot, highly extolling his monastery to the King, in the presence of the Archdeacon, as the place most hateful to the devil,' Mapes replied, 'No doubt the spot is hateful to him, for here it is that many of his good friends receive castigation.' Why so bitter against the Cistercians?' said the Abbot. 'Because I know well their immoderate claims,' said the Archdeacon. Indeed, if 'you knew them better you would think them much more moderate,' said the Abbot. Thus the very devils are forced to 'speak the truth,' answered the Archdeacon: 'moderate, indeed, is your claim, if judged by its merits.'1 Many other of these repartees are recorded by Giraldus; but at length, the Arch

1 Of course the point of this appears much better in the Latin.

deacon being on his sick-bed, and apparently near his end, a deputation of Cistercians went to him, to excite him to penitence for his hard sayings, and to propose, as an atonement, that he should take the habit of their Order. Upon this the Archdeacon summoned his servants, and said, 'Should I, in any 'fit of weakness or wandering sense, ask to be invested with 'the Cistercian habit, straightway bind me with chains and restrain me as a lunatic.' Then he desired the monks to leave him, and that he might be troubled with such visitors no more.

Walter Mapes considered that he had a mission, perhaps not a more disinterested one than that of Canon Sydney Smith to defend Chapters; and this mission was to write down the new order, which, according to him, with all its pretences to austerity and extra holiness, was a great deal worse than the old ones. To his devotion to this mission we owe, in great part, those clever and spirited satires which are scattered up and down in mediæval manuscripts, many of which have been collected and edited by the learned labours of Mr. Thomas Wright. For if, as Mr. Wright thinks, not many of Mapes' own satires remain, and none of those which he specially directed against the Cistercians, yet, nevertheless, the Archdeacon set the fashion, and gave the pattern for these pungent effusions, which are not to be regarded simply as the expressions of hostility of one 'man against an order of monks, but of the indignant patriotism ' of a considerable portion of the English nation, against the 'encroachments of civil and ecclesiastical tyranny.' 1 These poems assumed a definite and special character, and were distinguished by a peculiar designation, namely, 'The Poems of Golias the Bishop.' Golias Poems' came to be a term of distinct meaning. From this the French term goliard or goulard, implying a clerical satirist, wit, or buffoon, was drawn, which appears in Chaucer in an English dress.

'He was a jangler and a goliardeis,

And that was most of sinne and harlotries.'

Miller's Tale.

That these poems were intensely popular, the numerous translations made of them into French and English sufficiently testify. They were the foundation of the grand poem of Piers Ploughman, and, as a standing protest against ecclesiastical abuses, they may be held to have fitted men in no small degree for the teaching of Wycliffe, and afterwards for the Reformation. But there is one special effect of them which we desire to notice before proceeding to give a few specimens of translations from Mr. Wright's collection, and that is, the effect which they

1 Introduction to Mapes' Poems (Camden Society).

may have had in creating the popularity which surrounded the first establishment of the friars in this country. In a remarkable passage in Piers Ploughman's 'Crede' (which is a poem entirely distinct from the 'Vision' of Piers Ploughman, and by another writer), the influence of the 'Golias Poems' is suggested as the probable cause of the origin of the friars.1 The old orders had been so held up to ridicule and contempt by these satires, that a new order, proceeding on entirely different principles, seemed naturally to arise out of them. If this were so, and the 'goliards' were indeed instrumental in bringing so many proselytes to the ranks of the Mendicants, a curious retribution awaited them. For, in a few years' time, when the first fervour of the friars had abated, and greed and luxury began to display itself among them, it was at the head of these orders that the whole power of clerical satire was hurled. Both the 'Crede' and the Vision' of Piers Ploughman exhibit this, and numerous sharp effusions upon the friars will be found in Mr. Wright's volumes edited for the Master of the Rolls, and in the Appendix to Mr. Brewer's Eccleston.' Lordly bishops and lazy monks are now almost forgotten, and every wit steps forward to have a fling at the ubiquitous and obtrusive brethren of S. Dominic or S. Francis, who jostled the parish priest out of his dues, levied toll upon the faithful in the very teeth of the monks, and made the trade of the pardoner of none effect, as notably appeareth in Dan Chaucer. And now to give some specimens of these Golias Poems. The first, printed in Mr. Wright's Camden Society Volume, The Revelation of Golias the Bishoppe,' has, as he tells us, been frequently translated. Two versions are given in the Appendix, the first of which is in very harmonious English. As a specimen, take the satirist's views on bishops, archdeacons, and rural deans :—

6

'Woe to the horned 2 guydes of this poor mangled flock,
That doth both hurt and maim the same with armed head,
Whiles on their hornes they beare eche one of them a locke,
And do not feede their sheape, but with their sheape are fedd.
And yf he anie fault amonge the people finde,

That our faithe is broken, to saye he will not spare,
And drawe them to the lawe, and fast there doth them bynd,
Till he hathe pulde their fleece, and made their purses bare.

'I read the chapter next, and there did understand

The Archdeacon's trade and life, whose course was next of all,
If anie thinge by chaunce did scape the Bisshoppe's hand,

With toothe and naile to snatche, and teares in peices small.

1 'I trowe that some wikked wyght wroughte this orders,

Thorugh that gleym of that gest that Golias is y-calde.'-1. 479 (Ed. Skeat). 2 Allusion to the mitre.

And when he hears the pleas of persons at debate,
In forme of canon lawe he worketh subtiltie;
For he the canon law can turne even in like sorte

To Symon's court, which is th' Archdeacon's mercurie.

'The Deane is th' Archdeacon's dogge, that waighteth near and farre ;
But with the canon law his barkinge grees not well,
For he doth discorde singe, and from the rule doth jarre,
And is to Symon like that did both buye and sell.
The Deane is like a hound that can the foote find out,
And by the sent can seke where he may luker get,
And can by sleight bringe in clerkes' purses all about,
Whom he had caught before within his maister's nette.'

Nor do the inferior clergy fare any better than the dignitaries in the hands of this bitter satirist :

"The person dothe commit the soules of all our sheepe
Into the vicares hands, withe spirituall power;
But to himself the rentes and profittes he doth kepe,
Which boldiie without feare he lettes not to devoure.

He doth his wandringe soule in many partes devide,

And dothe tenne churches hold or moe within his handes,
And yet he cannot well in eche of these abide,

Muche like an accedent, that in no case still stands.

And higher is the roofe advaunced of his hawle,

Then is Allhollowes churche, made highe with hands of men,

In valewe eke much more did cost his wenches pall,

Then all th' alter is worth, that covereth altres tenne.
He maketh toyles and parkes and buyldinges conninglie,
And coynes, and other toyes, and ringis to weren on hande,
And all this he dothe make of Goddes patrimonie,

Whom he fees at his doore, and lettes him naked stand.
The vicare rules the soules committed to his charge
Even as he dothe his owne, for to the end he maye
More freelie other leese, he lettes his own at large,

First to be lost, and thus to missecheeffe leads the way.

Thus all enormitie dothe from the clergie rise,

And where they ought on God to set their mynde and care,
They myddle with affayres and forbidden marchandise

And occupie themselves with much unhonest ware.'

The next poem in the Camden volume is a very clever and spirited piece, and one of the most rhythmical in flow of the whole collection. It is called 'Metamorphosis Golia Episcopi,' and is, as Mr. Wright suggests, a satire upon the intrusions of the monks on the Universities. We think the Robertus theologus corde vivens mundo,' about whom Mr. Wright is puzzled, can be no other than Grosseteste, the great light of Oxford in the beginning of the thirteenth century, and if so, this will to a certain extent determine the date of the poem. It is rather startling to find at that period the monks spoken of thus:

:

'Gens est hic nequitiæ, grex perditionis ;
Impius, et pessimus hæres Pharaonis,
Speciem exterius dans religionis,

Sed subest scintillula superstitionis.