Page:The Classical Heritage of the Middle Ages.djvu/279

 nc] GREEK CHRISTIAN POETRY 261 the hymn. Rhyme is present, but the verse does not depend on it as essentially as upon accent and number of syllables. Acrostics also are frequent. The hymns of Romanos are not short, nor are they simple either in verse-structure or contents ; but they are magnificent. They are lyrical and dramatic nar- ratives, long for lyrics, though short for narrative poems, like Pindar's fourth Pythian ode or the sev- enty-eighth Psalm. They carry much feeling, and they pray or exhort. They exhibit tendencies toward the expression of theological dogma, wherein they re- flect the Eastern Church. Also, in their stateliness and form and in their occasional lack of diversity, they exhibit the qualities which may be seen in ecclesiasti- cal Byzantine art. A Byzantine poet, amid the pomp of the present, and with the ecclesiastical and dogmatic development of the past inbred in him, could hardly reproduce the evangelical simplicity of the Gospels. Romanos^ hymns were farther removed from this than the hymns of the Western Church. In his hymn to the nativity the baby Christ is wr€powruys (supra-es- sential), and is felt to be so throughout the hymn. In its refrain he is TraiStW vcoi', 6 irpo alwvo}v Oeoq, the "new- bom child, God before all ages." Likewise the Hymn of the Virgin out the Cross is a stately dialogue between the Virgin and her divine Son, in which he shows her the necessity of his crucifixion. It has none of the con- vulsed sorrow of the Stabat Mater. On the other hand, there is deep emotion in the hymn upon Judas the Betrayer, with its refrain of *IAeci>«, rXea>?, TAeo)?, yevov ^fiiv ! The poet's dramatic power is marked, some of his hymns moving dramatically to a climax.