Page:The Dream of the Rood - ed. Cook - 1905.djvu/25

Rh art, thought deeply and read widely about the cross of Christ, and finally have been enabled to write this account of its invention by St. Helena.

3. The joys of sense, the pride of life, have departed with my youth. I am now an old man; yet I realize that I am not only ransomed from the power of sin, but have received special grace from on high, and by divine assistance have brought to a close this poem on a subject very near to my heart.

Dietrich, in advocating the assignment of the Dream of the Rood to Cynewulf, insists upon the following points of connexion between that Elene and the Dream :

1. The theme of both is the cross. Indeed, Cynewulf has much to say of the cross in the Christ. We might especially compare the following extract (Chr. 1081–1102): 'There shall sinful men, sad at heart, behold the greatest affliction. Not for their behoof shall the cross of our Lord, brightest of beacons, stand before all nations, wet with the pure blood of heaven's King, stained with His gore, shining brightly over the vast creation. Shadows shall be put to flight when the resplendent cross shall blaze upon all peoples. But this shall be for an affliction and a punishment to men, to those malefactors who knew no gratitude to God, that He, the King, was crucified on the holy rood for the sins of mankind, on that day when He whose body knew no sin nor base iniquity lovingly purchased life for men with the price with which He ransomed us. For all this will He rigorously exact recompense when the red rood shall shine brightly over all in the sun's stead.' Rh