BOOK V. Boethius asks questions concerning Chance (pr. 1). An example

from the courses of the rivers Tigris and Euphrates (met. 1). Boethius asks questions concerning Free-will (pr. 2). God, who sees all things, is the true Sun (met. 2). Boethius is puzzled by the consideration of God's Predestination and man's Free-will (pr. 3). Men are too eager to inquire into the unknown (met. 3). Philosophy replies to Boethius on the subjects of Predestination, Necessity, and the nature of true Knowledge (pr. 4); on the impressions received by the mind (met. 4); and on the powers of Sense and Imagination (pr. 5). Beasts look downward to the earth, but man is upright, and looks up to heaven (met. 5). This world is not eternal, but only God is such; whose prescience is not subject to necessity, nor altered by human intentions. He upholds the good, and condemns the wicked; therefore be constant in eschewing vice, and devote all thy powers to the love of virtue (pr. 6).

§ 9. It is unnecessary to enlarge here upon the importance of this treatise, and its influence upon medieval literature. Mr. Stewart, in the work already referred to, has an excellent chapter 'On Some Ancient Translations' of it. The number of translations that still exist, in various languages, sufficiently testify to its extraordinary popularity in the middle ages. Copies of it are found, for example, in Old High German by Notker, and in later German by Peter of Kastl; in Anglo-French by Simun de Fraisne; in continental French by Jean de Meun[10], Pierre de Paris, Jehan de Cis, Frere Renaut de Louhans, and by two anonymous authors; in Italian, by Alberto della Piagentina and several others; in Greek, by Maximus Planudes; and in Spanish, by Fra Antonio Ginebreda; besides various versions in later times. But the most interesting, to us, are those in English, which are somewhat numerous, and are worthy of some special notice. I shall here dismiss, as improbable and unnecessary, a suggestion sometimes made, that Chaucer may have consulted some French version in the hope of obtaining assistance from it; there is no sure trace of anything of the kind, and the internal evidence is, in my opinion, decisively against it.

§ 10. The earliest English translation is that by king Ælfred, which is particularly interesting from the fact that the royal author frequently deviates from his original, and introduces various notes, explanations, and allusions of his own. The opening chapter, for example, is really a preface, giving a brief account of Theodoric and of the circumstances which led to the imprisonment of Boethius. This work exists only in two MSS., neither being of early date, viz. MS. Cotton, Otho A VI, and MS. Bodley NE. C. 3. 11. It has been thrice edited; by Rawlinson, in 1698; by J. S. Cardale, in 1829; and by S. Fox, in 1864. The last of these includes a modern English translation, and forms one of the volumes of Bohn's Antiquarian Library; so that it is a cheap and accessible work. Moreover, it contains an alliterative verse translation of most of the _Metres_ contained in Boethius (excluding the _Proses_), which is also attributed to Ælfred in a brief metrical preface; but whether this ascription is to be relied upon, or not, is a difficult question, which has hardly as yet been decided. A summary of the arguments, for and against Ælfred's authorship, will be found in Wülker's _Grundriss zur Geschichte der angelsächsischen Litteratur_, pp. 421-435.

§ 11. I may here mention that there is a manuscript copy of this work by Boethius, in the original Latin, in Corpus Christi College, Cambridge, No. 214, which contains a considerable number of Anglo-Saxon glosses. A description of this MS., by Prof. J. W. Bright and myself, is printed in the American Journal of Philology, vol. v, no. 4.

§ 12. The next English translation, in point of date, is Chaucer's; concerning which I have more to say below.

§ 13. In the year 1410, we meet with a _verse_ translation of the whole treatise, ascribed by Warton (Hist. E. Poetry, § 20, ed. 1871, iii. 39) to John Walton, Capellanus, or John the Chaplain, a canon of Oseney. 'In the British Museum,' says Warton, 'there is a correct MS. on parchment[11] of Walton's translation of Boethius; and the margin is filled throughout with the Latin text, written by Chaundler above mentioned [i. e. Thomas Chaundler, among other preferments dean of the king's chapel and of Hereford Cathedral, chancellor of Wells, and successively warden of Wykeham's two colleges at Winchester and Oxford.] There is another less elegant MS. in the same collection[12]. But at the end is this note:--'Explicit liber Boecij de Consolatione Philosophie de Latino in Anglicum translatus A.D. 1410, per Capellanum Ioannem. This is the beginning of the prologue:--"In suffisaunce of cunnyng and witte[13]." And of the translation:--"Alas, I wrecch, that whilom was in welth." I have seen a third copy in the library of Lincoln cathedral[14], and a fourth in Baliol college[15]. This is the translation of Boethius printed in the monastery of Tavistock in 1525[16], and in octave stanzas. This translation was made at the request of Elizabeth Berkeley.'

Todd, in his Illustrations of Gower and Chaucer, p. xxxi, mentions another MS. 'in the possession of Mr. G. Nicol, his Majesty's bookseller,' in which the above translation is differently attributed in the colophon, which ends thus: 'translatus anno d_omi_ni millesimo ccccx^o. per Capellanum Iohannem Tebaud, alius Watyrbeche.' This can hardly be correct[17].

I may here note that this verse translation has _two_ separate Prologues. One Prologue gives a short account of Boethius and his times, and is extant in MS. Gg. iv. 18 in the Cambridge University Library. An extract from the other is quoted below. MS. E Museo 53, in the Bodleian Library, contains both of them.

§ 14. As to the work itself, Metre 1 of Book i. and Metre 5 of the same are printed entire in Wülker's Altenglisches Lesebuch, ii. 56-9. In one of the metrical prologues to the whole work the following passage occurs, which I copy from MS. Royal 18 A xiii:--

'I have herd spek and sumwhat haue y-seyne, Of diuerse men[18], that wounder subtyllye, In metir sum, and sum in prosë pleyne, This book translated haue[19] suffishantlye In-to[20] Englissh tongë, word for word, wel nye[21]; Bot I most vse the wittes that I haue; Thogh I may noght do so, yit noght-for-thye, With helpe of god, the sentence schall I saue.

To Chaucer, that is floure of rethoryk In Englisshe tong, and excellent poete, This wot I wel, no-thing may I do lyk, Thogh so that I of makynge entyrmete: And Gower, that so craftily doth trete, As in his book, of moralitee, Thogh I to theym in makyng am vnmete, [Gh]it most I schewe it forth, that is in me.'

This is an early tribute to the excellence of Chaucer and Gower as poets.

§ 15. When we examine Walton's translation a little more closely, it soon becomes apparent that he has largely availed himself of Chaucer's prose translation, which he evidently kept before him as a model of language. For example, in Bk. ii. met. 5, l. 16, Chaucer has the expression:--'tho weren the cruel clariouns ful hust and ful stille.' This reappears in one of Walton's lines in the form:--'Tho was ful huscht the cruel clarioun.' This is poetry made easy, no doubt.

In order to exhibit this a little more fully, I here transcribe the whole of Walton's translation of this metre, which may be compared with Chaucer's rendering at pp. 40, 41 below. I print in italics all the words which are common to the two versions, so as to shew this curious result, viz. that Walton was here more indebted to Chaucer, than Chaucer, when writing his poem of 'The Former Age,' was to himself. The MS. followed is the Royal MS. mentioned above (p. xvi).

BOETHIUS: BOOK II: METER V.

A VERSE TRANSLATION BY JOHN WALTON.

Full wonder _blisseful was_ that rather _age_, When mortal men couthe _holde hem_-selven[22] _payed_ To fede hem-selve[23] with-oute suche _outerage_, _With mete that trewe feeldes_[24] have arrayed; _With acorne[s] thaire hunger_ was alayed, And so thei couthe sese thaire talent; Thei had[den] yit no queynt[e] craft assayed, As _clarry_ for to _make_ ne _pyment_[25].

_To de[y]en purpure couthe thei noght_ be-thynke, _The white flees, with venym Tyryen_; _The rennyng_ ryver yaf hem lusty drynke, And _holsom sleep the[y]_ took _vpon the_ grene. _The pynes_, that so full of braunches been, That was thaire hous, to kepe[n] _vnder schade_. _The see[26] to kerve_ no _schippes_ were there seen; Ther was no man that _marchaundise_ made.

They liked not to sailen vp and doun, But kepe hem-selven[27] where thei weren bred; _Tho was ful huscht the cruel clarioun_, For _eger hate_ ther was _no blood I-sched_, Ne therwith was non _armour_ yet be-bled; _For_ in that tyme who durst have be so _wood_ Suche bitter _woundes_ that he nold have dred, With-outen réward, for to lese his _blood_.

_I wold oure tyme_ myght _turne_ certanly, And wise[28] _maneres_ alwey with vs dwelle; _But love of hauyng brenneth_ feruently, _More_ fersere _than the_ verray _fuyre_ of helle. _Allas!_ who _was_ that man _that_ wold him melle With[29] _gold and_ gemmes that were _kevered_ thus[30], _That first_ began to myne; I can not telle, But that he fond _a perel[31] precious_.

§ 16. MS. Auct. F. 3. 5, in the Bodleian Library, contains a _prose_ translation, different from Chaucer's. After this, the next translation seems to be one by George Colvile; the title is thus given by Lowndes: 'Boetius de Consolatione Philosophiæ, translated by George Coluile, alias Coldewel. London: by John Cawoode; 1556. 4to.' This work was dedicated to Queen Mary, and reprinted in 1561; and again, without date.

There is an unprinted translation, in hexameters and other metres, in the British Museum (MS. Addit. 11401), by Bracegirdle, temp. Elizabeth. See Warton, ed. Hazlitt, iii. 39, note 6.

Lowndes next mentions a translation by J. T., printed at London in 1609, 12mo.

A translation 'Anglo-Latine expressus per S. E. M.' was printed at London in quarto, in 1654, according to Hazlitt's Hand-book to Popular Literature.

Next, a translation into English verse by H. Conningesbye, in 1664, 12mo.

The next is thus described: 'Of the Consolation of Philosophy, made English and illustrated with Notes by the Right Hon. Richard (Graham) Lord Viscount Preston. London; 1695, 8vo. Second edition, corrected; London; 1712, 8vo.'

A translation by W. Causton was printed in London in 1730; 8vo.

A translation by the Rev. Philip Ridpath, printed in London in 1785, 8vo., is described by Lowndes as 'an excellent translation with very useful notes, and a life of Boethius, drawn up with great accuracy and fidelity.'

A translation by R. Duncan was printed at Edinburgh in 1789, 8vo.; and an anonymous translation, described by Lowndes as 'a pitiful performance,' was printed in London in 1792, 8vo.

In a list of works which the Early English Text Society proposes shortly to print, we are told that 'Miss Pemberton has sent to press her edition of the fragments of Queen Elizabeth's Englishings (in the Record Office) from Boethius, Plutarch, &c.'

§ 17. I now return to the consideration of Chaucer's translation, as printed in the present volume.

I do not think the question as to the probable date of its composition need detain us long. It is so obviously connected with 'Troilus' and the 'House of Fame,' which it probably did not long precede, that we can hardly be wrong in dating it, as said above, about 1377-1380; or, in round numbers, about 1380 or a little earlier. I quite agree with Mr. Stewart (Essay, p. 226), that, 'it is surely most reasonable to connect its composition with those poems which contain the greatest number of recollections and imitations of his original;' and I see no reason for ascribing it, with Professor Morley (English Writers, v. 144), to Chaucer's youth. Even Mr. Stewart is so incautious as to suggest that Chaucer's 'acquaintance with the works of the Roman philosopher ... would seem to date from about the year 1369, when he wrote the Deth of Blaunche.' When we ask for some tangible evidence of this statement, we are simply referred to the following passages in that poem, viz. the mention of 'Tityus (588); of Fortune the debonaire (623); Fortune the monster (627); Fortune's capriciousness and her rolling wheel (634, 642); Tantalus (708); the mind compared to a clean parchment (778); and Alcibiades (1055-6);' see Essay, p. 267. In every one of these instances, I believe the inference to be fallacious, and that Chaucer got all these illustrations, _at second hand_, from Le Roman de la Rose. As a matter of fact, they are all to be found there; and I find, on reference, that I have, in most instances, already given the parallel passages in my notes. However, to make the matter clearer, I repeat them here.

Book Duch. 588. Cf. Comment li juisier _Ticius_ S'efforcent ostoir de mangier; Rom. Rose, 19506. Si cum tu fez, las _Sisifus_, &c.; R. R. 19499.

Book Duch. 623. The dispitouse debonaire, That scorneth many a creature.

I cannot give the exact reference, because Jean de Meun's description of the various moods of Fortune extends to a portentous length. Chaucer reproduces the general impression which a perusal of the poem leaves on the mind. However, take ll. 4860-62 of Le Roman:--

Que miex vaut asses et profite Fortune _perverse et contraire_ Que la mole et _la debonnaire_.

Surely 'debonaire' in Chaucer is rather French than Latin. And see _debonaire_ in the E. version of the Romaunt, l. 5412.

Book Duch. 627. She is the monstres heed y-wryen, As _filth over y-strawed with floures_.

Si di, par ma parole ovrir, Qui vodroit _un femier covrir_ De dras de soie ou _de floretes_; R. R. 8995.

As the second of the above lines from the Book of the Duchesse is obviously taken from _Le Roman_, it is probable that the first is also; but it is a hard task to discover the particular word _monstre_ in this vast poem. However, I find it, in l. 4917, with reference to Fortune; and her _wheel_ is not far off, six lines above.

B. D. 634, 642. Fortune's capriciousness is treated of by Jean de Meun at intolerable length, ll. 4863-8492; and elsewhere. As to her wheel, it is continually rolling through his verses; see ll. 4911, 5366, 5870, 5925, 6172, 6434, 6648, 6880, &c.

B. D. 708. Cf. Et de fain avec _Tentalus_; R. R. 19482.

B. D. 778. Not from Le Roman, nor from Boethius, but from Machault's _Remède de Fortune_, as pointed out by M. Sandras long ago; see my note.

B. D. 1055-6. Cf. Car le cors Alcipiades Qui de biauté avoit adés ... _Ainsinc le raconte Boece_; R. R. 8981.

See my note on the line; and note the spelling of _Alcipiades_ with a _p_, as in the English MSS.

We thus see that all these passages (except l. 778) are really taken from Le Roman, not to mention many more, already pointed out by Dr. Köppel (_Anglia_, xiv. 238). And, this being so, we may safely conclude that they were _not_ taken from Boethius directly. Hence we may further infer that, in all probability, Chaucer, in 1369, was not very familiar with Boethius in the Latin original. And this accounts at once for the fact that he seldom quotes Boethius at first hand, perhaps not at all, in any of his earlier poems, such as the Complaint unto Pite, the Complaint of Mars, or Anelida and Arcite, or the Lyf of St. Cecilie. I see no reason for supposing that he had closely studied Boethius before (let us say) 1375; though it is extremely probable, as was said above, that Jean de Meun inspired him with the idea of reading it, to see whether it was really worth translating, as the French poet said it was.

§ 18. When we come to consider the style and manner in which Chaucer has executed his self-imposed task, we must first of all make some allowance for the difference between the scholarship of his age and of our own. One great difference is obvious, though constantly lost sight of, viz. that the teaching in those days was almost entirely oral, and that the student had to depend upon his memory to an extent which would now be regarded by many as extremely inconvenient. Suppose that, in reading Boethius, Chaucer comes across the phrase 'ueluti quidam clauus atque gubernaculum' (Bk. iii. pr. 12, note to l. 55), and does not remember the sense of _clauus_; what is to be done? It is quite certain, though this again is frequently lost sight of, that he had no access to a convenient and well-arranged Latin Dictionary, but only to such imperfect glossaries as were then in use. Almost the only resource, unless he had at hand a friend more learned than himself, was to guess. He guesses accordingly; and, taking _clauus_ to mean much the same thing as _clauis_, puts down in his translation: 'and he is as a _keye_ and a stere.' Some mistakes of this character were almost inevitable; and it must not greatly surprise us to be told, that the 'inaccuracy and infelicity' of Chaucer's translation 'is not that of an inexperienced Latin scholar, but rather of one who was no Latin scholar at all,' as Mr. Stewart says in his Essay, p. 226. It is useful to bear this in mind, because a similar lack of accuracy is characteristic of Chaucer's other works also; and we must not always infer that emendation is necessary, when we find in his text some curious error.

§ 19. The next passage in Mr. Stewart's Essay so well expresses the state of the case, that I do not hesitate to quote it at length. 'Given (he says) a man who is sufficiently conversant with a language to read it fluently without paying too much heed to the precise value of participle and preposition, who has the wit and the sagacity to grasp the meaning of his author, but not the intimate knowledge of his style and manner necessary to a right appreciation of either, and--especially if he set himself to write in an uncongenial and unfamiliar form--he will assuredly produce just such a result as Chaucer has done.

'We must now glance (he adds) at the literary style of the translation. As Ten Brink has observed, we can here see as clearly as in any work of the middle ages what a high cultivation is requisite for the production of a good prose. Verse, and not prose, is the natural vehicle for the expression of every language in its infancy, and it is certainly not in prose that Chaucer's genius shews to best advantage. The restrictions of metre were indeed to him as silken fetters, while the freedom of prose only served to embarrass him; just as a bird that has been born and bred in captivity, whose traditions are all domestic, finds itself at a sad loss when it escapes from its cage and has to fall back on its own resources for sustenance. In reading "Boece," we have often as it were to pause and look on while Chaucer has a desperate wrestle with a tough sentence; but though now he may appear to be down, with a victorious knee upon him, next moment he is on his feet again, disclaiming defeat in a gloss which makes us doubt whether his adversary had so much the best of it after all. But such strenuous endeavour, even when it is crowned with success, is strange in a writer one of whose chief charms is the delightful ease, the complete absence of effort, with which he says his best things. It is only necessary to compare the passages in Boethius in the prose version with the same when they reappear in the poems, to realise how much better they look in their verse dress. Let the reader take Troilus' soliloquy on Freewill and Predestination (Bk. iv. ll. 958-1078), and read it side by side with the corresponding passage in "Boece" (Bk. v. proses 2 and 3), and he cannot fail to feel the superiority of the former to the latter. With what clearness and precision does the argument unfold itself, how close is the reasoning, how vigorous and yet graceful is the language! It is to be regretted that Chaucer did not do for all the Metra of the "Consolation" what he did for the fifth of the second book. A solitary gem like "The Former Age" makes us long for a whole set[32]. Sometimes, whether unconsciously or of set purpose, it is difficult to decide, his prose slips into verse:--

It lyketh me to shewe, by subtil song, With slakke and délitáble soun of strenges (Bk. iii. met. 2. 1).

Whan Fortune, with a proud right hand (Bk. ii. met. 1. 1)[33].'

The reader should also consult Ten Brink's History of English Literature,