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A43253
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The legend of St. Cuthbert with the antiquities of the Church of Durham / by B.R., Esq.
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Hegge, Robert, 1599-1629.; R. B. (Richard Baddeley)
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1663
(1663)
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Wing H1370; ESTC R15307
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20,137
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102
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the hay discovered part of a loaf which some Shepherd had hid at which the Saint right glad said Grace and thankfully giving the horse one half satisfied himself with the other and lodging there all night the next day came to Mailros where he no sooner entred but Boysilous Prior of the same Abbey as if he had read in his Forehead a Prophetical Physiognomie of his future Sanctity ran and embraced him in his armes and presented him to Eâ—ta the Abbot who committed him to Boysilous for his Tutor with whom I leave him teaching him St. Johns Gospel which book in honour of the Scholar was kept in Durham in Prior Turgots time called Codex Sancti Cuthberti on which after so many Centuries of years no Moth ever durst presume to feed This Lindisferne by the royal Charter of Oswald became the Mother Church and Nursery of Religion amongst the Bernicians under Aidanus from whom the Episcopal race of the Prelates of Durham reckon their succession In antient description it was an Island but twice a day and embraced by Neptune only at full tide and at Ebbe shaked hands with the Continent for so I may call the voluminous Isle of Great Britaine in proportion of this littel Isle which in a Monk of Durhams Topographie was in compasse 8. miles In this Holy Island so Christned for St. Cuthberts sanctity stood the renowned Monastery founded by King Oswald where Finanus Aidanus his successor built a Cathedral of wood thatched with reeds which resembleth those times when Jupiter angustâ vix totus stabat in aede Inque Jovis dextrâ fictile fulmen eâ—at Frondibus ornabant quae jam Capitolia gemmis Pascebatque suas ipse senator oves But is was not long till Eadbert Saint Cuthbert his successor instead of this consecrated thatch apparreld over the whole Church with a robe of Lead a work of devotion and cost though it is not the Mason but the Worshipper that makes a Church In this Island 14. Bishops successively ascended the Episcopal seat among whom St. Cuthbert was accounted as a glorious Star of the first magnitude in the firmanent of the Church who when he had lived a Monasterial life 15 years in the Abby of Mailros was preferred by Eata to the Priory of Lindisferne which dignity he bare 12 years in such sanctity of life that the Devil as I cannot blame him was much grieved at his Vertues who among other Cheats with which the Monks make the Devil a fool in a certain village as the Saint was preaching set an house on fire to draw the people from his Sermon which when the Countrey folk marvelled they could not quench it was discovered to St. Cuthbert to be phantastical fire and the Devils delusion But after 12 years as before he resigned up his Priorship to become an Hermit choosing the Island Ferne seated in the main Ocean for the place of his Hermitage Anno Dom. 676. This Isle as void of men as full of Devils became the scene or stage whereon Saint Cuthbert acted all his Miracles for at his arrival the Spirits that had frequented this Isle were glad to fly and forego their title The Rocks poured out their water and the Earth as if there had been a return of the Golden Age brought forth Corne without Tillage And here he consecrated 9 years to Contemplation so wholly devoted to Heaven that he forgot he was on Earth and in a whole year to put off his shoes And although he wanted Men for his Auditors yet he ceased not to preach to the Birds that eat up his Corn who so confuted them out of this text Non aliena concupisces that they would never after eat his barley In like manner he reclaimed two Crows from stealing and rapine that pluckt off his thatch from his Anchorage to build their nest and made them so penitent that they lay at his feet prostrate for absolution and the next day brought him a piece of Pork to make him satisfaction with many more Wonders if they might be related upon the credit of a Legend But here is enough to shew what advantage the Monks took of that Ages Devotion whose practices were to devise Miracles of their Saint which as Superstition is alwayes credulous were as easily believed Thus to gain a reverend opinion from the Pagans of Christianity to cozen the people with Legends of wonders who while they defended Truth with Falshood and their Impostures discovered to wiser Ages have made Religion rather suspected than any way advanced it for Truth never needed the protection of Forgery but will carry away the Victory without Hypocrisie But Saint Cuthbert recalls my digression to his Isle where he had so many combats with the Devil that if you will borrow an Optick Glasse from Superstition you may see the print of his feet in many places there till this day It any landed at his Island to see him in devotion he ran into his Hermitage and discoursed out of his window only in love he bare to the Abbatesse of Collingham at great entreaty he sayled into Cocket Isle to her where every night as his custom was going down to the shore to pray two Sea-monsters came kneeling to him and worshipping him who when they had received their blessing returned to the deep and he again to his Anchorage where whiles he imprisoned himself and lived more obscured in his Cell the more illustrious was his fame abroad and in a Synod at Twiford upon Slu in the presence of King Egfrid he was chosen Bishop This dignity was prophesied unto him when he was a boy by an Infant of 3 years old who gravely told told him It becomed not a Bishop to play with children But Saint Cuthbert had so wedded his affections to a solitary life that neither letters nor Embassadors from the Synod could either command or perswade him to take upon him the government of the Church till the King himself attended with the Lords of the Nobility sail'd to this Isle and with the same company might have besieged and taken a City whiles he was conquering St. Cuthbert's resolution Thus though the case be now altered honour pursued him that fled from her and preferment found him out that hid himself from it The Bishoprick of Hexam was then void to which Eata removing gave place to St. Cuthbert to be installed in Lindisferne King Egfrid also to enlarge his Diocesse gave him a great part of the City of Yorke and also the City of Luell with 5. miles circuit about it where Saint Cuthbert built a Nunnery besides other Royal Donations as the Abbey of Mailros and Rippon But St. Cuthbert his minde was alway on his anchorage whither he shortly betook himself and in his Cell ended his life and began his miracles Anno Domini 687. But if I were to make his Funeral Oration 1 would not insert among his praises that he was an Anchoret for thus to unman himself to contemplate himself into a Deity
S. t CUTHBERT THE LEGEND OF St. CVTHBERT WITH THE ANTIQUITIES OF THE Church of DURHAM By B. R. Esq LONDON Printed for Christopher Eccleston at his shop in St. Dunstans Churchyard 1663. The PROLOGVE THough much of the ensuing Discourse be no more consistent with common Reason and probability the the Fables in the Alchoran and so cannot have any design of engaging the faith of the Reader to the veritie of the relations yet things of this nature giving some shaddow of satisfaction to the mind and being free from any real prejudice to Vertue of Religion men thriftie enough in the expence of their time are not seldome content to allow some wast hours in reading them and perhaps with some profit and observation At that time when this Legend bears date Miracles were cheap enough and the credulous ignorance of the Vulgar was easily abused with religious impostures But howsoever such juggles may appear now to the eyes of the more generally knowing and undeceived world I should have charitie enough to believe that the antique invention of them was upon the accompt of promoting the esteem of Holy Religion were not the observation too palpably notorious that they all tended over much to the end of private gain or reputation to the Miracle-mongers Not that I call in question the reasonablenesse of that antient policy how ridiculous soever it appears now for he was no unwise or unlearned * Sir W. Raleigh man which said That the wisdom of one age is the foolishnesse of another Who was the Author of this Book or when by him compiled or upon what accompt though probably for his own private divertisement I do ignore in an equal degree and am not able to give any other accompt thereof then what the Treatise it self affords Had he published it himself without any improbable conjecture it had passed censure with greater security the Author being a master of so much stile and language as the Book it self bespeaks him I am only instrumental in committing it to the Stationer and guilty of the vanity of this Prologue B. R. THE LEGEND OF St. CVTHBERT WITH The ANTIQUITIES of the Church of DURHAM HISTORY and PROPHECY set back to back make up the true Image of Janus whose two faces Time past and future honour as their Overseers In History Time lives after she is dead in Prophecy before she is born In the one she beholds what she was in the other what she will be But sith the Theorie of Time to come is the prerogative of a Deity Man must be modestly content with this blessing bestowed by History upon Mortality that through our Grandfathers eyes we may see what hath been This is all our sublunary Eternity if at the funeral of things History become the Epitaph and rescue their memories from the grave that entombs their ashes And this duty I owe to that Countrey where I had my Cradle to renew the decayed Epitaphs upon the Tombstone of her Antiquities Geographers deal with Countries even as Astronomers with their Asterisms and fancy them into shapes and resemblances so that by the liberty of phantasie Italy is compared to a mans legg Spaine to an Oxhide Britaine to an Hatchet I may liken the Bishoprick to the Letter Δ and Durham to a Crab supposing the City for the body and the Suburbs for the clawes This Countrey lyeth in the bosome of the Ocean and is embraced in the armes of two chrystal Rivers Teese and Derwen The antient Inhabitants in the time of the Romans were the Brigants in the Heptarchie of the Saxons they were called Deiri for the honour of which Province the Children thereof in the time of Aella being to be sold at Rome gave occasion of the replanting of Christianity by Angustine the English Apostle sent hither by Pope Benedictus at the entreaty of Gregory then Archdeacon of Rome who facetely alluding to the names of their Nation Province and King concluded ut Angli Angelis similes de irâ Dei eruerentur Allelujah cantare docerentur The first of the Saxon Kings who made conquest as well of Religion as Men that in this Province was dipt in the sacred Laver of Baptism was the renowned Oswald Qui Genti suae primitias sanctitatis dederit and is observed to be the first of the English Race that was illustrious by miracles This Prince sent once for a learned Monk out of Scotland Aidanus by name to convert his Subjects from Paganism and seated him in the Episcopal Chair of Lindisferne Anno Dom. 635. where while the Bishop taught in the Scotish tongue the King understanding both languages stood and interpreted his Sermons in English This great Monarch that great and pious Founder of the Church to whose womb all the Churches in the North owe their birth in a battel with a Pagan Prince lost his life and the day But with this advantage whiles Penda left him not a head to wear a Crown withall he received a more glorious Diadem of Martyrdom And as fury persecuting revenge after death tore his body in pieces so the devotion of Time dispersed the reliques to several places Nempe jacere Uno non potuit tanta ruina loco For whose sepulchre there was as great contention amongst the English Churches as in old time amongst the Graecians for the Cradle of Homer His Corps were brought to Lindisfern and from thence translated with St. Cuthbert his body to Durham Abbey His Arm was preserved in a Silver Casket at Bedburga or Bambrough not far seated from the Holy Island and at that time the great Metropolis of those parts This sacred Relique retained the blessing of Aidanus and was honored as a Monument of incorruption An History which to this effect by Beda is related That upon an Easter day as the King sate at dinner his servants told him that there was poor folk that expected alms at his gate who forthwith bid him both carry them meat and distribute the platter which was of silver among them with which fact of charity Aidanus who sate by him much delighted took him by the right arm with this hearty wish Never let this arm perish This glorious Martyrs death was the end of Aidanus life and the Pagans at one blow kill'd a Prince and a Bishop with sorrow who thought it a sin to live after so good a King was dead the Soul of which Bishop St Cuthbert happened to see in the dead of the night carried up with great melodie by a Quire of Angels into Heaven which vision so seized upon his affection that resolving upon an holier course of life he betook himself to the Monastery of Mailros built by Aidanus by the bank of Tweede and in his journey thither shewed a great specimen of his humility devotion and gratitude for being seized upon both by night and hunger he was forced to enter into an empty cottage where he found no other host for entertainment than a horse who eating and turning up