The Divine Office: A Study of the Roman BreviaryQuigley, Edward J.
Religion
The Divine Office: A Study of the Roman Breviary
Quigley, Edward J.
Catholic Church. Breviary; Divine office
Very many metrical arrangements of the Psalms by non-Catholic authors
exist in English. Most of these metrical efforts are very poor,
unreliable in giving the sense, and awkward and ungainly in poetic
forms. An interesting book is Prothero's _Psalms in Human Life_. The
author was a Protestant, hence his numbering of the Psalms may at first
sight be confusing,
Sermons fresh and beautiful, full of unction, and full of texts, sublime
and practical, are to be found in the Psalms. A work, little known in
our islands, is Monsignor Doublet's fine work, _Psaumes etudies en vue
de la Predication_ (3 vols. 8th Edition. 12s.).
A charming booklet, dealing chiefly with the Psalms as prayers, is
Rolland Gosselin's _Prieres et Meditations bibliques_ (Paris. 1917.
Bauchesne. 3s.).
_10. Hymns._ Immense labour has been devoted to the study of Latin
sacred poetry. The _Analecta Hymnica_ in 60 huge volumes testifies to
the learning and zeal of its Jesuit authors. Ordinary mortals content
themselves with lesser works, such as Pimont's _Hymnes du Breviare
Romain_ (Paris Poussielgne. 2 vols, 12-1/2 francs), or with _La Poesie
du Breviaire, Les Hymns_, by l'abbe C. Albin. Price 6 francs. The
opinions and judgments in neither book are infallible; and some of
Pimont's findings have been roughly criticised and sometimes rejected.
But both books give good, sound knowledge of Breviary hymns and thus
help to make their recitation a pious and a rational exercise, not a
mechanical, soulless labour.
Translation of poetry has ever been a study and a pastime. Every cleric
is familiar with the prose translations which aided his boyhood's
labours in rendering the poetry of Horace and Euripides into modern
speech. But prose efforts are one thing, and poetical efforts are
another, and just as many have laboured to present Virgil and Homer in
modern language, in metre, in rhyme, in rhythm; so, many poets and
verse-makers, in different ages and in different climes, have laboured
to turn into modern poetic form and into their own national tongue the
poems of the Breviary. The Breviary hymns have met with several good,
kind, translating poets; but very often they have been rudely handled by
well-meaning verse builders. Passing over in charitable silence the
indifferent efforts of those people, it may interest some students of
the Breviary to read the efforts of well-known authors to translate the
liturgy, its anthems, responses, collects, hymns, into good English.
Public-domain text, read in full here on John Shaqi.
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