BOOK V. 357

NOTES TO BOETHIUS 419

NOTES TO TROILUS 461

INTRODUCTION TO BOETHIUS.

§ 1. DATE OF THE WORK.

In my introductory remarks to the Legend of Good Women, I refer to the

close connection that is easily seen to subsist between Chaucer's

translation of Boethius and his Troilus and Criseyde. All critics seem now

to agree in placing these two works in close conjunction, and in making the

prose work somewhat the earlier of the two; though it is not at all

unlikely that, for a short time, both works were in hand together. It is

also clear that they were completed before the author commenced the House

of Fame, the date of which is, almost certainly, about 1383-4. Dr. Koch, in

his Essay on the Chronology of Chaucer's Writings, proposes to date

'Boethius' about 1377-8, and 'Troilus' about 1380-1. It is sufficient to be

able to infer, as we can with tolerable certainty, that these two works

belong to the period between 1377 and 1383. And we may also feel sure that

the well-known lines to Adam, beginning--

'Adam scriveyn, if ever it thee befalle

_Boece_ or _Troilus_ to wryten newe'--

were composed at the time when the fair copy of Troilus had just been

finished, and may be dated, without fear of mistake, in 1381-3. It is not

likely that we shall be able to determine these dates within closer limits;

nor is it at all necessary that we should be able to do so. A few further

remarks upon this subject are given below.

§ 2. BOETHIUS.

Before proceeding to remark upon Chaucer's translation of Boethius, or (as

he calls him) Boece, it is necessary to say a few words as to the original

work, and its author.

Anicius Manlius Torquatus Severinus Boethius, the most learned philosopher

of his time, was born at Rome about A. D. 480, and was put to death A. D.

524. In his youth, he had the advantage of a liberal training, and enjoyed

the rare privilege of being able to read the Greek philosophers in their

own tongue. In the particular treatise which here most concerns us, his

Greek quotations are mostly taken from Plato, and there are a few

references to Aristotle, Homer, and to the _Andromache_ of Euripides. His

extant works shew that he was well acquainted with geometry, mechanics,

astronomy, and music, as well as with logic and theology; and it is an

interesting fact that an illustration of the way in which waves of sound

are propagated through the air, introduced by Chaucer into his House of

Fame, ll. 788-822, is almost certainly derived from the treatise of

Boethius _De Musica_, as pointed out in the note upon that passage. At any

rate, there is an unequivocal reference to 'the felinge' of Boece 'in

musik' in the Nonnes Preestes Tale, B 4484.

§ 3. The most important part of his political life was passed in the

service of the celebrated Theodoric the Goth, who, after the defeat and

death of Odoacer, A. D. 493, had made himself undisputed master of Italy,

and had fixed the seat of his government in Ravenna. The usual account,

that Boethius was twice married, is now discredited, there being no clear

evidence with respect to Elpis, the name assigned to his supposed first

wife; but it is certain that he married Rusticiana, the daughter of the

patrician Symmachus, a man of great influence and probity, and much

respected, who had been consul under Odoacer in 485. Boethius had the

singular felicity of seeing his two sons, Boethius and Symmachus, raised to

the consular dignity on the same day, in 522. After many years spent in

indefatigable study and great public usefulness, he fell under the

suspicion of Theodoric; and, notwithstanding an indignant denial of his

supposed crimes, was hurried away to Pavia, where he was imprisoned in a

tower, and denied the means of justifying his conduct. The rest must be

told in the eloquent words of Gibbon[1].

'While Boethius, oppressed with fetters, expected each moment the sentence

or the stroke of death, he composed in the tower of Pavia the "Consolation

of Philosophy"; a golden volume, not unworthy of the leisure of Plato or

Tully, but which claims incomparable merit from the barbarism of the times

and the situation of the author. The celestial guide[2], whom he had so

long invoked at Rome and at Athens, now condescended to illumine his

dungeon, to revive his courage, and to pour into his wounds her salutary

balm. She taught him to compare his long prosperity and his recent

distress, and to conceive new hopes from the inconstancy of fortune[3].

Reason had informed him of the precarious condition of her gifts;

experience had satisfied him of their real value[4]; he had enjoyed them

without guilt; he might resign them without a sigh, and calmly disdain the

impotent malice of his enemies, who had left him happiness, since they had

left him virtue[5]. From the earth, Boethius ascended to heaven in search

of the SUPREME GOOD[6], explored the metaphysical labyrinth of chance and

destiny[7], of prescience and freewill, of time and eternity, and

generously attempted to reconcile the perfect attributes of the Deity with

the apparent disorders of his moral and physical government[8]. Such topics

of consolation, so obvious, so vague, or so abstruse, are ineffectual to

subdue the feelings of human nature. Yet the sense of misfortune may be

diverted by the labour of thought; and the sage who could artfully combine,

in the same work, the various riches of philosophy, poetry, and eloquence,

must already have possessed the intrepid calmness which he affected to

seek. Suspense, the worst of evils, was at length determined by the

ministers of death, who executed, and perhaps exceeded, the inhuman mandate

of Theodoric. A strong cord was fastened round the head of Boethius, and

forcibly tightened till his eyes almost started from their sockets; and

some mercy may be discovered in the milder torture of beating him with

clubs till he expired. But his genius survived to diffuse a ray of

knowledge over the darkest ages of the Latin world; the writings of the

philosopher were translated by the most glorious of the English Kings, and

the third emperor of the name of Otho removed to a more honourable tomb the

bones of a catholic saint, who, from his Arian persecutors, had acquired

the honours of martyrdom and the fame of miracles. In the last hours of

Boethius, he derived some comfort from the safety of his two sons, of his

wife, and of his father-in-law, the venerable Symmachus. But the grief of

Symmachus was indiscreet, and perhaps disrespectful; he had presumed to

lament, he might dare to revenge, the death of an injured friend. He was

dragged in chains from Rome to the palace of Ravenna; and the suspicions of

Theodoric could only be appeased by the blood of an innocent and aged

senator.'

This deed of injustice brought small profit to its perpetrator; for we read

that Theodoric's own death took place shortly afterwards; and that, on his

death-bed, 'he expressed in broken murmurs to his physician Elpidius, his

deep repentance for the murders of Boethius and Symmachus.'

§ 4. For further details, I beg leave to refer the reader to the essay on

'Boethius' by H. F. Stewart, published by W. Blackwood and Sons, Edinburgh

and London, in 1891. We are chiefly concerned here with the 'Consolation of

Philosophy,' a work which enjoyed great popularity in the middle ages, and

first influenced Chaucer indirectly, through the use of it made by Jean de

Meun in the poem entitled Le Roman de la Rose, as well as directly, at a

later period, through his own translation of it. Indeed, I have little

doubt that Chaucer's attention was drawn to it when, somewhat early in

life, he first perused with diligence that remarkable poem; and that it was

from the following passage that he probably drew the inference that it

might be well for him to translate the whole work:--

'Ce puet l'en bien des clers enquerre

Qui _Boëce de Confort_ lisent,

Et les sentences qui là gisent,

_Dont grans biens as gens laiz feroit

Qui bien le lor translateroit_' (ll. 5052-6).

I.e. in modern English:--'This can be easily ascertained from the learned

men who read Boece on the Consolation of Philosophy, and the opinions which

are found therein; as to which, any one _who would well translate it for

them_ would confer much benefit on the unlearned folk':--a pretty strong

hint[9]!

§ 5. The chief events in the life of Boethius which are referred to in the

present treatise are duly pointed out in the notes; and it may be well to

bear in mind that, as to some of these, nothing further is known beyond

what the author himself tells us. Most of the personal references occur in