Page:King Alfred's Old English version of St. Augustine's Soliloquies - Hargrove - 1902.djvu/60

LIV ALFRED'S VERSION OF THE SOLILOQUIES ligentia continentur, et eam quam sibi fingit cogitatio, quae graece sive phantasia sive phantasma dicitur, breviter exponas.'

Thus Alfred was a mediator for his people; he culled and appropriately interpreted the ideas which he thought would most help them.

3. Alfred was influenced by a sense of artistic completeness. Book III grows naturally out of Books I and II, and gives a finishing touch to the work as a whole. Augustine himself left his work unfinished, and Alfred performed a skilful as well as venturesome task in under taking to complete it. How wisely he did this will be seen when it is considered that he drew the material for Book III from Augustine's other writings as far as possible, and after that from other Christian Fathers whose authority was weighty. He then welded these together, at the same time making large use of Scripture.

Observing more closely, we note that the theme of Book III is itself a logical outgrowth of the other books: Book I - knowledge of God; Book II - knowledge of the soul; Boole III - state of knowledge and the soul after death. Reason sas shown that we may have a sufficient knowledge of the nature and existence of God and the soul's immortality while in this life, but that at best this is partial, because of the prison of flesh and the sinfulness we are heir to. Our power of vision must be increased and made clearer before we can behold and see that supernal Beatific Vision - but this cannot occur in the present world, though it shall occur in the next. It is not enough to know God and the soul in this world nor to know that both shall exist eternally, nor yet that they shall live eternally. Alfred added in Book III the one thing still needful to know, namely, that knowledge will continue and increase in the next word.

1 ib. 34.