Alfred the Great: His Abbeys of Hyde, Athelney and Shaftesbury

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E. Stock, 1900 - 162 pages

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Page 75 - St. Mary's to sweep away all the rotten bones " that be called relics, which we may not omit, lest it " should be thought that we came more for the treasure " than for avoiding the abominations of idolatry.
Page 96 - ... brave mind, and, as we have heard say, not unacquainted with the art of self-defence, if he had not been a follower of a better calling, no sooner heard the sound of the robbers, before he saw them, than he rose up against them before he was wounded, and, shouting as loud as he could, struggled against them, crying out that they were devils and not men; for he himself knew no better, as he thought that no men would dare to attempt such a deed. He was, however, wounded before any of his people...
Page 89 - ... from your kingdom, shall shortly be again seated with honour on your throne ; of which I give you this extraordinary token : your fishers shall this day bring home a great quantity of large fish in baskets; which will be so much the more extraordinary because the river, at this time hard-bound with ice, could warrant no such expectation; especially as the air now dripping with cold rain mocks the art of the fisher. But, when your fortune shall succeed to your wishes, you will act as becomes a...
Page 41 - ... hurled from the bishop's castle on the houses of the townspeople, who, as I have said, rather wished success to the empress than to the bishop, which caught and burned the whole abbey of nuns within the city, and the monastery which is called Hyde without the walls. Here was an image of our Lord crucified, wrought with a profusion of gold and silver and precious stones, through the pious solicitude of Canute, who was formerly king and presented it This being seized by the flames and thrown to...
Page 123 - mid Angles a worse deed done than this was, since they first Britain-land sought. Men him murdered, but God him glorified. He was in life an earthly king; he is now after death a heavenly saint. Him would not his earthly kinsmen avenge, but him hath his heavenly Father greatly avenged. The earthly murderers would his memory on earth blot out, but the lofty Avenger hath his memory in the heavens and on earth wide-spread.
Page 77 - abbey," he says, " is a close with pits and holes of foun" dations. The convent barn is standing, and good houses " have been built .... [out of the ruins]. Several " coats of arms taken from the abbey are to be seen ; " and fragments of painted glass have been put up in " the windows."1 What Cole calls the convent barn still stands partially. It was, probably, of old the monks
Page 32 - ... and whispered great promises to secure the favour of the nobility : whence a poet of those times admirably observes, A monster in the church from Losing rose, Base Simon's sect, the canons to oppose. Peter, thou'rt slow ; see Simon soars on high ; If present, soon thou'd'st hurl him from the sky.* Oh grief, the church is let to sordid hire, The son a bishop, abbot is the sire.
Page 89 - I am Cuthbert, if ever you heard of me ; God hath sent me to announce good fortune to you ; and since England has already largely paid the penalty of her crimes, God now, through the merits of her native saints, looks upon her with an eye of mercy. You too, so pitiably banished from your kingdom, shall shortly be again seated with honour on your throne ; of which I give you this extraordinary token : your fishers shall this day bring home a great quantity...
Page 12 - ... wandered nightly through the buildings, Edward, his son and successor, removed the remains of his father, and gave them a quiet resting-place in the new minster. * These and similar superstitions, such as that the dead body of a wicked man runs about, after death, by the agency of the devil, the English hold with almost inbred credulity...
Page 94 - ... from beyond the sea ; of whom, finding that he had not as large a number as he wished, he procured as many as possible of the same Gallic race, some of whom, being children, he ordered to be taught in the same monastery, and at a later period to be admitted to the monastic habit. I have myself seen a young lad of pagan birth who was educated in that monastery, and by no means the hindmost of them all.

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