In Praise of the Lord

Who complains that he is aided by the late gift of virtue?

Who thinks the promises of God proceed with slow step?

Who measures the urn of the eternal Judge by human standard,

and thinks it slow, that the ages must

hasten the day which repays merits with reward?

A noble glory bears witness by a mighty deed.

For where the slow Arar glides past its banks

with stagnant current, and Diuvix unfolds its sluggish stream.

Where by the Rhine the Aeduan youth of the brothers is born,

I recall a marriage of the highest devotion and faith;

yet divine law increased the merit of their love:

and it was the vow of both, that whichever should outlive the other in death,

should entrust to pious grief the care of the tomb.

But the prior page of decree assigned the wife to read it.

Then the anxious husband bids, with generous mouth, to be hollowed out

stones that after death become dwellings for the limbs:

that she, coming later, joining eternal covenants,

might, so that those whom the same couch had held while living,

after receiving God, might be raised up in a common tomb.

His wife, foreseeing, perceived the vows of her husband,

and to chaste times granted great miracles.

For when arms are joined to the deceased limbs,

and the hand, drawn back, binds fetters to the trunk,

lest to those for whom the offices of human life are fulfilled,

a shapeless drifting should befall the disjointed.

Immense to tell, at what time life was completed,

the husband was to be joined, his place foreseen, to his companion.

After the door of death was unlocked by the man's death,

and the now unwelcome light again disclosed the dreadful abode:

the woman was found stretching forth her left palm,

inviting her companion with the gesture of living love.

Who gave affection to the tomb? Who loosed the bonds?

Whence does the buried woman see the shade of the husband yet to come?

You do this, You, Christ God, Your signs are at work,

and little by little You teach sleeping limbs to rise again: You, whom the holy prophets sang as coming,

the incorrupt offspring of God, and ruler of the ruling one.

Without whom the mighty Father determines nothing great,

at whose command the sea has stood fixed within certain shores,

nor is it permitted for the immense deep to run out over the lands,

and level shores enclose the mountainous waves:

who have endowed the steadfast earth with varied gift

for our use, generous in paternal piety.

By Your path, mortals commit seeds to the furrows,

and new offspring comes forth from the dry turf:

You bid the vines flow with fruitful nectar,

You press out juices pleasing to men's feasts, and healthful

to health from trees, You press out sweet honey.

You bid every race of living things serve man,

and moreover the lakes to bend beneath heavy fruits,

and new returns to be born from no seed.

You cause various rivers to profit our labor,

and to renew the age blessed with sacred fountains:

with You as guide, the seas lay open to sail-bearing prows,

and the sailor laid out ports divided by straits.

You, after the elements were set in fixed forms,

lest the celestial machine begin to grow torpid with rude countenance,

marked out the world with varied gift:

and whatever shines in the sky, Your right hand fashioned.

With these signs it pleased to weave the hall of the Lord.

Now, lest the seas be driven inhospitable by no lands,

and the eager sailor might count on a constant port:

a thick-set island is fixed enough in the swelling sea.

Nor yet, surrounded by the raging wave, does it fear,

and, resting on a small circle amid the straits, it stands firm,

trusting in You as guide, whose venerable covenant

by equal law joins highest and lowest alike,

nor allows the imposed bounds to be crossed anywhere.

And lest the earth lie too flat, or bare,

You bade the hills rise up, fit for great vines,

and ample groves to weave their shades.

Then, lest a vast horror pervade the torpid forests,

You add innumerable offspring to the tall glades,

lest the woodland lack a dweller, nor the seeker lack prey.

Then many birds, and a thousand swarms of voices

to resound in mortal harmony with tuneful daylight.

So it pleased You to weave the year with varied forms,

and to add fruit to mortals by pleasant turn:

lest too long a day should scorch the world overmuch,

nor a too-short one snatch away the just heat from things being born:

and lest labor shake all things with unceasing effort,

dewy night gives rest to the weary cares of men:

and that human welfare might lead a secure age,

of your own accord, wholesome herbs rise from the turf.

These the Father himself sows by his nod, rich, not by the plowshare.

Not even if my inmost parts were covered by an iron wall,

an iron voice, and though I had a thousand tongues for singing,

could I go through all the gifts of your piety.

But that Father of yours, placed in a hidden seat,

not easy of sight to anyone, and to be dreaded by all,

sent You as Lord to the earth, and Master of life.

And whoever venerates the Son with due honor,

let him dedicate his vows to both, and eternal life.

You, steadfast in chastity and right, and ready to bend

the laws after sin, if headlong folly

has driven anyone from you beyond the prescribed limit of life.

That the Father might allow our eyes to look upon You,

He clothed You in human face, and perishable limbs.

For who would dare to lift up frail sight,

if He had wished to set such a one before the trembling earth,

such as You are, when You hurl thunderbolts with mighty right hand,

and bid present punishment be feared when it is aimed:

or when, appeased, You divide rains upon the thirsting fields,

and bring forth uncertain ears of grain in the furrows?

Yet lest anything should fail to show forth Your notable origin,

You shall be conceived of a virgin: it is not enough to be chaste,

nor could she who was married join a brother to the Lord,

lest the taint of shame be absent far even from the womb.

Soon, when by process a happy age had matured,

You attempt to hold untaught minds by paternal admonitions,

and offer the right way to those slipping.

And that the precepts sent wholly from God might be made clear,

You take away power from death, and, disease being loosed,

You bid despaired-of ones take up the offices of life again,

and You restore day to the blind, and lest anything

should remain untried, whereby faithless error might perish,

You reveal understanding to the tombs, and bid limbs

long since buried to rise again into the upper air,

and the beloved corpses recognize their own name.

But after a fit follower had drunk in the law,

so that the heavenly spirit might strip itself

of its mortal hall, intent on the law, whereby You might teach all things

must be endured for the highest God, and rightly each one

should take up eternal life for himself by contempt of death:

thus, bearing the Father's commands fulfilled, You returned

to the secrets of the highest pole, where the shining ether

forbids sluggish clouds to kindle in its own sky:

and that there might be a sure abundance for the perishing multitude,

which keeps God's precepts from wretched ears,

lest new laws should not yet hold those long dead:

You bid the deadly bars of the infernal prison be loosed for us,

and countless people emerge from the darkness.

Only those are shut in, whom an impious life has marked:

and You divide places of punishment for the shades to come,

for those who will not believe in You, or who feign to believe in themselves.

Holy God, venerable pledge of the highest God,

at whose name spirits, driven out by violent death

from their own breasts, and having seized others' breasts,

cry out, and grow pale, and, being commanded, withdraw

just as many miracles concerning You have shown before,

when they are held suspended between earth and heaven,

because through You nothing is permitted to the bound enemy.

But now You grant me Constantine as lord in merit, as father in piety,

easy in command, master in the law of living,

and equal to the edicts which the law established by You decrees,

victorious, and joyful.

Nothing better than this offspring have You given to the earth before,

nor will You give it, would that his own children might equal their father!