Richelieu's "Treatise on Perfection"

As any reader knows, one book leads not only to another, but to a new appreciation of connections and insights. So when I received an email from TAN Books about a new translation of Cardinal Richelieu's Treatise on Perfection, I immediately thought of Marie de Vignerot, whose biography I'd just read.

Bronwen McShea mentions this book first on page 21, recounting how the then Bishop of Luçon, Armand du Plessis, "labored intensively over a Catholic catechism to ground and fortify the faith of the clergy of Luçon. It would be published in 1621 under the title Instruction du Chretien and reissued in various editions thereafter."

The book is mentioned again on page 175, when McShea (citing a different first date of publication, 1620), describes how "the duchesse secured authorization to republish the work under a new title, Traitte de la Perfection du Chretien par l'Eminentissime Cardinal Duc de Richelieu" in 1646. The gentlemen Vignerot selected updated the spelling and syntax of the original to the current fashion so that readers "encountered, therefore, a deceased Richelieu who was reverent, scholarly, pastoral, even saintly--but not old-fashioned."!

McShea also highlights the frontispiece that Vignerot commissioned by Claude Mellan, which is in the Public Domain.

The TAN Books description:

For many people, the name of Cardinal Richelieu will immediately call to mind the ambitious and cynical villain of Alexander Dumas’s The Three Musketeers and its many cinematic adaptations. But the real Cardinal Armand Jean du Plessis, Duke of Richelieu (1585–1642), was a very different person than this fictional portrayal. A prelate of great sanctity, learning and wisdom, and an ardent devotee of the Mother of God, he lived in a profoundly turbulent era, when all of Europe (including France) was shaken by religious and political unrest. This man of God and servant of the people labored tirelessly to ensure the flourishing of the Catholic Church and the Kingdom of France, both of which he loved dearly.

Cardinal Richelieu, who was a close friend of Pope Urban VIII and a key proponent of the reforms of the Council of Trent, was also an extremely popular spiritual author in his day. His timeless but long-forgotten masterpiece the Treatise on Perfection, presented here in English for the first time, overflows with wise insights and helpful guidance for nourishing a fruitful and sustainable spiritual life, particularly for those who are trying to balance prayer and devotion with complex and demanding secular responsibilities (as he himself did so successfully.) Cardinal Richelieu believed that the humble and diligent fulfillment of one’s proper and legitimate duties in society is the single most important moral responsibility of the Christian, and also often the most effective form of prayer.

This work also outlines the nine tortures of hell according to Saint Augustine, the joys of heaven, distractions at prayer, twenty spiritual counsels, and much more. Here is a book that will stir your heart to love God above everything by cultivating piety, virtue, and moderation in whatever state of life you are called to. Here is a book that pulls wisdom from some of the greatest saints to help you become a saint.

According to the Translator's Introduction, Father Robert Nixon, OSB used primarily the Latin edition, Tractatus de Perfectione Christiani, published in 1651, with occasional reference to the 1646 French edition for clarification and nuance, so Richelieu's niece's efforts to promote his memory endure.

I'm thinking of adding this to my wish-list for the New Year!

Book Review: Four Novellas by Gertrud von le Fort

I purchased this book at Eighth Day Books a couple of weeks ago (and there's still copy on the shelf as I post this review!). According to the publisher, Ignatius Press:

Newly translated into English for the first time, these four novellas from the acclaimed German writer Gertrud von le Fort are from her later works of historical fiction. Ominous and mysterious, these page-turning stories bring to life momentous chapters in from the past.

The Innocents, set in Germany after the Second World War, is a poignant family drama about the horrors of war, the suffering of the innocent, and the demands of justice.

The Ostracized Woman traces the fate of a Prussian family at the end of World War II to the heroic deed of an ancestor done centuries before.

The Last Meeting imagines the last encounter between Madame de La Valliére and Madame de Montespan, rival mistresses of King Louis XIV of France.

The Tower of Constance leads the reader into the heart of the infamous French prison of the same name while exploring the role of conscience in the religious and philosophical conflicts of the eighteenth-century.

Reading them in the translation by Michael J. Miller, what I noticed most was the tension and suspense that von le Fort created in each of these tales. Some great mystery, some great injustice, must be brought to reconciliation--through sacrifice, understanding, or mercy. Each story or novella is a moral mystery and each is effectively paced and plotted.

For the last two stories, I was happy, however, that I had read Antonia Fraser's Love and Louis XIV: The Women in the Life of the Sun King several years ago. It helped me understand the background of the moral issues of the Most Christian King and his defense of orthodoxy in France in the context of his adultery, conflict between his mistresses, their own desires to confess their sin and be absolved, and of course, his control of the Church.

I recommend this volume of Gertrud von le Fort's later works: they are thought-provoking and moving.

The Vespers Hymn for the Feast of the Seven Sorrows of Mary

I admit that when I read the first line of this hymn for the Vespers (Evening Prayer) for today's feast, I had to read it again: "Iam toto subitus vesper eat polo"--"eat polo"?!?!?

Iam toto subitus vesper eat polo,
Et sol attonitum præcipitet diem,
Dum sævæ recolo ludibrium necis,
Divinamque catastrophen.

Spectatrix aderas supplicio parens,
Malis uda, gerens cor adamantinum:
Natus funerea pendulus in cruce
Altos dum gemitus dabat.

Pendens ante oculos Natus, atrocibus
Sectus verberibus, Natus hiantibus
Fossus vulneribus, quot penetrantibus
Te confixit aculeis!

Heu! sputa, alapæ, verbera, vulnera,
Clavi, fel, alœ, spongia, lancea,
Sitis, spina, cruor, quam varia pium
Cor pressere tyrannide!

Cunctis interea stas generosior
Virgo martyribus: prodigio novo,
In tantis moriens non moreris parens,
Diris fixa doloribus.

Sit summæ Triadi gloria, laus, honor,
A qua suppliciter, sollicita prece,
Posco virginei roboris æmulas
Vires rebus in asperis. Amen.

According to this website, this hymn dates to the eighteenth century:

Office hymn that was historically sung, first at Matins, subsequently at Vespers, on the feast of the Seven Sorrows of Our Lady. Its composition is ascribed to Callisto Palumbella, a bishop of the 18th century, who was a member of the Servites, and to whom the feast had been granted in 1688. The meter is minor asclepiadic in the first three lines of each strophe and glyconic in the fourth line. Within the space of its six stanzas the hymn details the sufferings of Christ upon the cross and stresses their effect on His Mother.

You probably won't be surprised to learn that Father Edward Caswall of the Oratory translated this hymn into English:

Come, darkness, spread o’er Heav’n thy pall,
And hide, O sun, thy face;
While we that bitter death recall,
With all its dire disgrace.

And thou, with tearful cheek, wast there;
But with a heart of steel,
Mary, thou didst his moanings hear,
And all his torments feel.

He hung before thee crucified;
His flesh with scourgings rent;
His bloody gashes gaping wide;
His strength and spirit spent.

Thou his dishonour’d countenance,
And racking thirst, didst see;
By turns the gall, the sponge, the lance,
Were agony to thee.

Yet still erect in majesty,
Thou didst the sight sustain ;—
Oh, more than Martyr! not to die
Amid such cruel pain!

Praise to the blessed Three in One;
Oh, may that strength be mine,
Which, sorrowing o’er her only Son,
Did in the Virgin shine!

And if you would like a beautiful image of the Seven Sorrows of the Blessed Virgin Mary, I recommend this one from Cedars & Stars!

More about this feast here.

The Month of Devotion to the Precious Blood

Although the Solemnity of the Precious Blood on July 1 was removed from the Church's calendar in 1969, the month of July is still traditionally dedicated to devotion to the Precious Blood of Jesus, by which we are saved. Devotion to the Precious Blood is obviously Eucharistic, because Catholics believe that we receive Jesus sacramentally in Holy Communion, Body, Blood, Soul, and Divinity. It also has connections to our devotion to the Sacred Heart of Jesus, since His heart was pierced by the soldier's lance on Calvary, and blood and water poured out. This devotion is rich and it's not just for Catholics: being washed in the Blood of Jesus is a common theme in traditional Protestant hymns.

Some of the Catholic hymns for the feast are ancient, like this one for Vespers:

Festivis resonent Compita vocibus:
Cives laetitiam frontibus explicent:
Tædis flammiferis ordine prodeant
Instructi pueri, et senes.

Quem dura moriens Christus in arbore
Fudit multiplici vulnere Sanguinem,
Nos facti memores, dum colimus, decet
Saltem fundere lacrimas.

Humano generi pernicies gravis
Adami veteris crimine contigit:
Adami integritas, et pietas novi
Vitam reddidit omnibus.

Clamorem validum Summus ab Æthero
Languentis Geniti si Pater audiit,
Placari potius Sanguine debuit,
Et nobis veniam dare.

Hoc quicumque stolam Sanguine proluit,
Abstergit maculas, et roseum decus,
Quo fiat similis protinus Angelis,
Et Regi placeat capit.

A recto instabilis tramite postmodum
Se nullus retrahat, meta sed ultima
Tangatur; tribuet nobile præmium,
Qui cursum Deus adiuvat.

Nobis propitius sis Genitor potens,
Ut quos Unigenæ Sanguine Filii
Emisti, et placido Flamine recreas,
Cæli ad culmina transferas. Amen.

The Catholic Encyclopedia describes this hymn for Vespers on the Solemnity of the Precious Blood of Jesus (1962 Calendar) thus:

The Vesper hymn of the feast, "Festivis resonent compita vocibus", comprising seven Asclepiadic stanzas, and the Matins hymn, "Ira justa conditoris imbre aquarum vindice", comprising six stanzas, have been translated by Caswall (Lyra Catholica, pp. 83, 85), Bagshawe (loc. cit., Nos. 95-6), Donahoe (loc. cit., pp. 249-52). The Vesper hymn was also translated by Potter (Annus Sanctus, Part I, p. 85), and the Matins hymn by O'Connor (Arundel Hymns, etc., 1902, No. 80), and by Henry (Sursum Corda, 1907, p. 5).

Father Edward Caswall's translation:

Forth let the long procession stream,
And through the streets in order wend;
Let the bright waving line of torches gleam,
The solemn chant ascend.

While we, with tears and sighs profound,
That memorable Blood record,
Which, stretch’d on his hard Cross, from many a wound
The dying Jesus pour’d.

By the first Adam’s fatal sin
Came death upon the human race;
In this new Adam doth new life begin,
And everlasting grace.

For scarce the Father heard from Heaven
The cry of his expiring Son,
When in that cry our sins were all forgiven,
And boundless pardon won.

Henceforth, whoso in that dear Blood
Washeth, shall lose his every stain;
And in immortal roseate beauty rob’d,
An angel’s likeness gain.

Only, run thou with courage on
Straight to the goal set in the skies;
He, who assists thy course, will give thee soon
The everlasting prize.

Father supreme! vouchsafe that we,
For whom thine only Son was slain,
And whom thy Holy Ghost doth sanctify,
May heavenly joys attain.

So what is an Asclepiadic stanza? It's a stanza in a Greek poetic meter:

An Asclepiad (Latin: Asclepiadeus) is a line of poetry following a particular metrical pattern. The form is attributed to Asclepiades of Samos and is one of the Aeolic metres.

As with other Aeolic metrical lines, the asclepiad is built around a choriamb. The Asclepiad may be described as a glyconic that has been expanded with one (Lesser Asclepiad) or two (Greater Asclepiad) further choriambs. . . .

Asclepiads were used in Latin by Horace in thirty-four of his odes, as well as by Catullus in Poem 30, and Seneca. Examples in English verse include parts of Sir Philip Sidney's Arcadia ("Here wrong's name is unheard, slander a monster is; / Keep thy sprite from abuse, here no abuse doth haunt. / What man grafts in a tree dissimulation?") and W. H. Auden's "In Due Season" ("Springtime, Summer and Fall: days to behold a world").

Knox and Caswall, and Faber: "Decora Lux" Translations

(Interior of Santa Prassede)

The June issue of Magnificat includes an art essay on a mosaic in the Church of St. Prassede in Rome and cites the ancient hymn honoring St. Peter and St. Paul, Decora Lux, words attributed to Elphis, the wife of Boethius. Ronald Knox translated the hymn (read more about its development here) thus:

What fairer light is this than time itself doth own,
The golden day with beams more radiant brightening?
The princes of God’s Church this feast day doth enthrone,
To sinners heavenward bound their burden lightening.

One taught mankind its creed, one guards the heavenly gate,
Founders of Rome, they bind the world in loyalty;
One by the sword achieved, one by the cross his fate;
With laurelled brows they hold eternal royalty.

Rejoice, O Rome, this day; thy walls they once did sign
With princely blood, who now their glory share with thee.
What city’s vesture glows with crimson deep as thine?
What beauty else has earth that may compare with thee?

To God the three in one eternal homage be,
All honor, all renown, all songs victorious,
Who rules both heaven and earth by one divine decree,
To everlasting years in empire glorious. 

The Oratorian Father Edward Caswall translated it as Bathed in Eternity's All-Beauteous Beam in his Lyra Catholica in 1849. Another Oratorian, Father Frederick Faber, translated it as It Is No Earthly Summer's Ray. More about the hymn in this book , The Hymns of the Breviary and Missal (, on page 262.

Happy Birthday to Mary Sidney Herbert

Mary (Sidney) Herbert, the Countess of Pembroke, was born on October 27, 1561. According to the Poetry Foundation:

Mary Sidney was the most important non-royal woman writer and patron in Elizabethan England. Without appearing to transgress the strictures against women's writing, she composed a sizable body of work, evading criticism by focusing on religious themes and by confining her work to the genres thought appropriate to women: translation, dedication, elegy, and encomium. Even more important to her success was her identity as the sister of Sir Philip Sidney. She began her public literary career after his death by encouraging works written in his praise, publishing his works, and completing his translation of the Psalms. Except for some business correspondence, all of her extant works were completed or published in the 1590s. Tantalizing later references indicate that she continued writing and translating until her death, but all subsequent works have been lost, probably to fire; her primary residences of Wilton and Baynards Castle burned in the seventeenth century. The extensive family correspondence mentioned by her brothers and other contemporaries has also been lost; her only surviving personal letters were written to her uncle, Robert Dudley, Earl of Leicester, in 1578; and to Robert Sidney's wife, Barbara Gamage, in 1591, offering the services of a nurse.

The daughter of Sir Henry Sidney and Mary Dudley, Mary Sidney was born on 27 October 1561 at Tickenhall near Bewdley, Worcestershire, on the Welsh border while her father was serving as lord Governor of the marches of Wales. He had been a companion of King Edward, who died in his arms. Her mother, a well-educated woman who was a close friend of Queen Elizabeth, was the daughter of the Earl of Northumberland, who was virtual ruler of England in King Edward's final years, and the sister of Elizabeth's favorite, Robert Dudley. Lady Sidney was badly scarred by smallpox after nursing the queen, and thereafter rarely appeared at court.

Describing her work on the psalter, the Poetry Foundation states:

Sometime in the early 1590s, probably while she was completing her Petrarch translation, the countess had begun the work for which she is known, her metric translation of Psalms 44-150 that completes and revises a project that her brother Philip had begun in his final years. Although the Psalms have always been an important part of Judeo-Christian worship, translating them into the vernacular for private meditation and public singing had become a particularly Protestant activity in the sixteenth century. When the countess first began her metric versions, she remained fairly close to the phrasing and interpretation familiar to her from Miles Coverdale's prose version in the Great Bible, incorporated into the Book of Common Prayer. Her more polished versions, transcribed by Sir John Davies of Hereford in the Penshurst manuscript, evidence a scholarly process of revision, however. Choosing Protestant scholarship based on the original Hebrew, the countess revised her Psalms to be closer to the Geneva Bible than to the Great Bible, with considerable reliance on Théodore de Bèze (in the original Latin and in Anthony Gilby's English translation), on John Calvin, and on Les Psaumes de David mis en rime Françoise, par Clément Marot, et Théodore de Bèze (1562). References are also made to other continental versions and to earlier English metrical Psalms, such as those by Anne Lok and Matthew Parker.

The countess used 128 different verse forms for the 107 Psalms she translated (Psalm 119 has twenty-two sections), making her achievement significant for metrical variety as well as for the content, Like her Genevan sources, the countess used the Psalms to comment on contemporary politics, particularly the persecution of "the godly," as Protestants called themselves. By expanding metaphors and descriptions present in the original Hebrew, Sidney also incorporated her experience at Elizabeth's court, as well as female experiences of marriage and childbirth.

Sir Philip Sidney offered this translation of the most famous psalm, number 23:

The Lord, the Lord my shepherd is, 

And so can never I 

Taste misery. 

He rests me in greene pasture his: 

By waters still, and sweete 

He guides my feete. 

He me revives : leades me the way, 

Which righteousnesse doth take, 

For his names sake. 

Yea though I should through valleys stray, 

Of deathes dark shade, I will 

Noe whitt feare ill. 

For thou, deere Lord, thou me besett'st: 

Thy rodd, and thy staff be 

To comfort me; 

Before me thou a table sett'st, 

Even when foes envious eye 

Doth it espy. 

Thou oil'st my head thou fil'st my cup: 

Nay more thou endlesse good, 

Shalt give me food. 

To thee, I say, ascended up, 

Where thou, the Lord of all, 

Dost hold thy hall.

Mary wrote this translation of Psalm 90:

Thou our refuge, thou our dwelling, 

O Lord, hast byn from time to time: 

Long er Mountaines, proudly swelling, 

Above the lowly dales did clime: 

Long er the Earth, embowl'd by thee, 

Bare the forme it now doth beare: 

Yea, thou art God for ever, free 

From all touch of age and yeare. 

O, but man by thee created, 

As he at first of earth arose, 

When thy word his end hath dated, 

In equall state to earth he goes. 

Thou saist, and saying makst it soe: 

Be noe more, O Adams heyre; 

From whence ye came, dispatch to goe, 

Dust againe, as dust you were. 

Graunt a thousand yeares be spared 

To mortall men of life and light: 

What is that to thee compared? 

One day, one quarter of a night. 

When death upon them storm-like falls, 

Like unto a dreame they grow: 

Which goes and comes as fancy calls, 

Nought in substance all in show.

John Donne praised this work highly in this poem:

UPON THE TRANSLATION OF THE PSALMS BY SIR
PHILIP SIDNEY, AND THE COUNTESS OF
PEMBROKE, HIS SISTER

ETERNAL God—for whom who ever dare
Seek new expressions, do the circle square,
And thrust into straight corners of poor wit
Thee, who art cornerless and infinite—
I would but bless Thy name, not name Thee now
—And Thy gifts are as infinite as Thou—
Fix we our praises therefore on this one,
That, as thy blessed Spirit fell upon
These Psalms' first author in a cloven tongue
—For 'twas a double power by which he sung
The highest matter in the noblest form—
So thou hast cleft that Spirit, to perform
That work again, and shed it here, upon
Two, by their bloods, and by Thy Spirit one ;
A brother and a sister, made by Thee
The organ, where Thou art the harmony.
Two that make one John Baptist's holy voice,
And who that Psalm, "Now let the Isles rejoice,"
Have both translated, and applied it too,
Both told us what, and taught us how to do.
They show us islanders our Joy, our King ;
They tell us why, and teach us how to sing.
Make all this all three choirs, heaven, earth, and spheres ;
The first, Heaven, hath a song, but no man hears ;
The spheres have music, but they have no tongue,
Their harmony is rather danced than sung ;
But our third choir, to which the first gives ear
—For Angels learn by what the Church does here—
This choir hath all. The organist is he
Who hath tuned God and man, the organ we ;
The songs are these, which heaven's high holy Muse
Whisper'd to David, David to the Jews ;
And David's successors in holy zeal,
In forms of joy and art do re-reveal
To us so sweetly and sincerely too,
That I must not rejoice as I would do,
When I behold that these Psalms are become
So well attired abroad, so ill at home,
So well in chambers, in Thy Church so ill,
As I can scarce call that reform'd until
This be reform'd ; would a whole state present
A lesser gift than some one man hath sent ?
And shall our Church unto our Spouse and King
More hoarse, more harsh than any other, sing ?
For that we pray, we praise Thy name for this,
Which, by this Moses and this Miriam, is
Already done ; and as those Psalms we call,
—Though some have other authors—David's all,
So though some have, some may some Psalms translate,
We Thy Sidneian psalms shall celebrate,
And, till we come th' extemporal song to sing
—Learn'd the first hour that we see the King,
Who hath translated those translators—may
These their sweet learned labours all the way
Be as our tuning, that when hence we part,
We may fall in with them, and sing our part!

Mary Sidney died on September 25, 1621.

A Hymn for Lent from Herebert

Eleanor Parker--the medievalist and blogger, not the actress--writes for The Catholic Herald about William Herebert of Oxford and his hymn translations:

Herebert’s name is not well known today, but his poems, beautiful and distinctive in their own right, also represent an important milestone for English Catholicism: he was one of the first people to turn the Latin hymns of the Church into English poetry.

We don’t have many details about Herebert’s life, but he was probably born in Herefordshire around 1270. He was educated at the universities of Paris and Oxford, where his contemporaries included Duns Scotus and William of Ockham, and in 1317 he became master of the Franciscan house in Oxford.

He was evidently a learned man, and his poems show that he gave careful thought to the difficult question of how best to express complex religious ideas in his own language.

Herebert’s poems survive in a manuscript book written in his own hand, noted down along with his Latin sermons and other texts useful for the medieval preacher. There are 23 short poems, arranged roughly according to the cycle of the liturgical year. Some are original compositions, but most are translations or reworkings of Latin or French texts, freely adapted into English. They include the first English verse translations of some well-known hymns, such as Veni Creator Spiritus and the Palm Sunday hymn All glory, laud and honour.

You could go to her blog, A Clerk of Oxford, and see several posts about William Herebert, including this one about a Lenten hymn:

This is a Middle English translation of the Lent hymn 'Audi, benigne Conditor', by the Franciscan friar William Herebert (c.1270-1333):

Lustne, mylde Wrouhte, oure bones wyth wepinge
In þys holy uastinge, vourti dawes lestynge.
Holy secher of monnes þouht, þou wost oure brotelnesse;
To hem þat beth yturnd to þe graunte vorȝyfnesse.
Meche, vorsoht, we habbeht agult; vorȝyf hem þat knoulecheth.
To worshype of þyn oune nome, to sunvol mon be leche.
Graunte ous pyne wyþouteuorth þe body wyth vastinge,
Þat oure gost wyþynneuorth veste vrom sunnynge.
Graunte ous, Holy Trinite, þat in Godhede art on,
Þat þe ȝyft of leyntes vast notfol boe to mon. Amen.

That is:

Hear, merciful Creator, our prayers with weeping
In this holy fasting, forty days lasting.
Holy searcher of man’s thought, thou knowest our brittleness; [frailty]
To them who are turned towards thee, grant forgiveness.
Much, truly, we have sinned; forgive them that acknowledge it.
For the honour of thine own name, be physician to sinful man.
Grant us so to mortify the body outwardly with fasting
That our souls inwardly may fast from sinning.
Grant us, Holy Trinity, who in Godhead art one,
That the gift of Lent’s fast may be beneficial to man. Amen.

Please read the rest there. She posts about her Catholic Herald article here, and promises more poems and hymns from William Herebert!

Alcuin of York's Pupil, Rabanus Maurus

Rabanus Maurus died on February 4, 856; he was a German Benedictine and pupil of Alcuin of York. According to the Catholic Encyclopedia:

Abbot of Fulda, Archbishop of Mainz, celebrated theological and pedagogical writer of the ninth century, born at Mainz about 776 (784?); died at Winkel (Vinicellum) near Mainz on 4 February, 856. He took vows at an early age in the Benedictine monastery of Fulda, and was ordained deacon in 801. A year later he went to Tours to study theology and the liberal arts, under Alcuin. He endeared himself to his aged master, and received from him the surname of Maurus in memory of the favourite disciple of St. Benedict. After a year of study he was recalled by his abbot, became teacher and, later, head-master of the monastic school of Fulda. His fame as teacher spread over Europe, and Fulda became the most celebrated seat of learning in the Frankish Empire.

The author of this entry concludes that "Rabanus was probably the most learned man of his age. In Scriptural and patristic knowledge he had no equal, and was thoroughly conversant with canon law and liturgy. His literary activity extended over the entire field of sacred and profane learning as then understood."

Two great hymns are attributed to him: the Veni, Creator Spiritus (to be distinguished from the Sequence for Pentecost, Veni, Sancte Spiritus) and Christe, sanctorum decus Angelorum ("Christ, the Fair Glory of the Holy Angels").

The Oratorian Father Edward Caswall translated the former:

Come, Holy Ghost, Creator blest,
And make our hearts Your place of rest;
Come with Your grace and heav'nly aid
And fill the hearts which You have made.

To You, the Counselor, we cry,
To You, the gift of God Most High;
The fount of life, the fire of love,
The soul's anointing from above.

In You, with graces sevenfold,
We God's almighty hand behold
While You with tongues of fire proclaim
To all the world His holy name.

Your light to ev'ry thought impart,
And shed Your love in ev'ry heart;
The weakness of our mortal state
With deathless might invigorate.

Drive far away our wily foe,
And Your abiding peace bestow;
With You as our protecting guide,
No evil can with us abide.

Teach us to know the Father, Son,
And You, from both, as Three in One
That we Your name may ever bless
And in our lives the truth confess.

Praise we the Father and Son,
And Holy Spirit, with them One,
And may the Son on us bestow
The gifts that from the Spirit flow!

The illustration depicts Alcuin of York in the center, with Rabanus on the left presenting his work to Otgar, the Archbishop of Mainz.

Happy Birthday, Father Edward Caswall

According to John Julian in the 1907 Dictionary of Hymnology:

Caswall, Edward, M.A., son of the Rev. R. C. Caswall, sometime Vicar of Yately, Hampshire, born at Yately, July 15, 1814, and educated at Brasenose College, Oxford, graduating in honours in 1836. Taking Holy Orders in 1838, he became in 1840 Incumbent of Stratford-sub-Castle, near Salisbury, and resigned the same in 1847. In 1850 (Mrs. Caswall having died in 1849) he was received into the Roman Catholic communion, and joined Dr. Newman at the Oratory, Edgbaston. His life thenceforth, although void of stirring incidents, was marked by earnest devotion to his clerical duties and a loving interest in the poor, the sick, and in little children. His original poems and hymns were mostly written at the Oratory. He died at Edgbaston, Jan. 2, 1878, and was buried on Jan. 7 at Redwall, near Bromsgrove, by his leader and friend Cardinal Newman. Caswall's translations of Latin hymns from the Roman Breviary and other sources have a wider circulation in modern hymnals than those of any other translator, Dr. Neale alone excepted. This is owing to his general faithfulness to the originals, and the purity of his rhythm, the latter feature specially adapting his hymns to music, and for congregational purposes. His original compositions, although marked by considerable poetical ability, are not extensive in their use, their doctrinal teaching being against their general adoption outside the Roman communion.

In other words, Father Caswall was a Catholic, writing hymns for Catholics! English Catholics needed these hymns for their renewed worship and devotion in the nineteenth century. His translations have been influential outside England too, as they are commonly used at Benediction (his translations of St. Thomas Aquinas), for the few Sequences that remain for Sunday Mass (for example, Veni, Creator Spiritus and Pange lingua gloriosi), and during the Stations of the Cross (the Stabat Mater/At the cross her station keeping).

He translated St. Bernard of Clairvaux's Je­su, Rex ad­mi­ra­bil­is for his Lyra Catholica: Containing All the Hymns of the Roman Breviary and Missal, with Others from Various Sources: Arranged for Every Day in the Week, and the Festivals and Saints' Days Throughout the Year: with a Selection of Hymns, Anthems, and Sacred Poetry, from Approved Sources, published in 1849:

O Jesus, King most wonderful,

Thou Conqueror renowned,
Thou Sweetness most ineffable,
In Whom all joys are found!

When once Thou visitest the heart,
Then truth begins to shine,
Then earthly vanities depart,
Then kindles love divine.

O Jesus, Light of all below,
Thou Fount of life and fire,
Surpassing all the joys we know,
And all we can desire!

Thy wondrous mercies are untold,
Through each returning day;
Thy love exceeds a thousand fold,
Whatever we can say.

May every heart confess Thy Name;
And ever Thee adore;
And seeking Thee, itself inflame,
To seek Thee more and more.

Thee may our tongues forever bless;
Thee may we love alone;
And ever in our lives express
The image of Thine own.

Here is the text of the original and here is setting by Palestrina!

John Mason Neale, RIP: On the Feast of Transfiguration

Today is the Feast of the Transfiguration of Our Lord--and it is also the anniversary of the death of John Mason Neale, the great Anglican hymnist and translator. He died in 1866. He translated this Greek hymn of St. Cosmas, the Melodist for the Feast of the Transfiguration. St. Cosmas, the Melodist was the bishop of Maiuma in the eighth century.

The choirs of ransomed Israel,
The Red Sea’s passage o’er,
Uprais’d the hymn of triumph
Upon the further shore:
And shouted, as the foeman
Was whelmed beneath the sea,—
‘Sing we to Judah’s Saviour,
For glorified is He!’

Amongst His Twelve Apostles
CHRIST spake the Words of Life,
And showed a realm of beauty
Beyond a world of strife:
‘When all My FATHER’s glory
Shall shine expressed in Me,
Then praise Him, then exalt Him,
For magnified is He!’

Upon the Mount of Tabor
The promise was made good;
When, baring all the Godhead,
In light itself He stood:
And they, in awe beholding,
The Apostolic Three,
Sang out to GOD their Saviour,
For magnified was He!

In days of old, on Sinai,
The LORD of Sabaoth came,
In majesty of terror,
In thunder-cloud and flame:
On Tabor, with the glory
Of sunniest light for vest,
The excellence of beauty
In JESUS was expressed.

All hours and days inclined there,
And did Thee worship meet,
The sun himself adored Thee,
And bowed him at Thy feet:
While Moses and Elias,
Upon the Holy Mount,
The co-eternal glory
Of CHRIST our GOD recount.


O holy, wonderous Vision!
But what, when this life past,
The beauty of Mount Tabor
Shall end in Heav’n at last?
But what, when all the glory
Of uncreated light
Shall be the promised guerdon
Of them that win the fight?

Image credit: Wikipedia commons, under Creative Commons Attribution license.

Edward Caswall on the "Son Rise Morning Show"!

I'll be on the Son Rise Morning Show today to discuss Edward Caswall on his birthday--a little earlier than my usual time--at 7:35 a.m. Eastern time (6:35 a.m. Central).

Who is Edward Caswall and why am I talking to Matt Swaim about him? His name might not be familiar, but many of his works may be. If you attended Stations of the Cross during Lent and sang the Stabat Mater in translation, "At the Cross her Station Keeping," that was Caswall's translation. If you sang the Benediction hymns O Salutoris Hostia and Tantum Ergo, from St. Thomas Aquinas' office for the Solemnity of Corpus Christi, in English, chances are you sang Caswall's translations. On Pentecost Sunday you might have sung Caswall's translation of the Veni, Creator Spiritus and on Corpus Christi Sunday his version of St. Thomas Aquinas' Pange lingua gloriosi!

According to the old Catholic Encyclopedia, Father Edward Caswall was an

Oratorian and poet, b. 15 July 1814, at Yately, Hampshire, of which place his father, the Rev. R. C. Caswall, was vicar; d. at the Oratory, Birmingham, 2 January, 1878. He was educated at Marlborough Grammar School and at Brasenose College, Oxford, where he was Hulme exhibitioner. Before leaving Oxford he published, under the pseudonym of Scriblerus Redivivus, "The Art of Pluck", in imitation of Aristotle, a witty satire upon the ways of the careless college student, which still has a circulation. To the eighth edition, in 1843, he wrote a special preface of regret for certain passages, now excluded, which, at that later date, he had come to regard as irreverent. In 1838 he was ordained deacon, and in 1839 priest, in the Church of England. In 1840 he became perpetual curate of Stratford-sub-Castle in the diocese of his uncle, Dr. Burgess, Bishop of Salisbury. In 1846 he published "Sermons on the Seen and the Unseen", a volume of thoughtful discourses marked by the same tender and fervent piety found in his well-known hymns, and by a clear leaning to certain elements of Catholic doctrine. Soon afterwards, having come under the influence of Cardinal (then Dr.) Newman and the "Tracts for the Times", he resigned his curacy and, in January, 1847, was received into the Church by Cardinal Acton at Rome. In 1849 Caswall's wife, who had also become a Catholic, died suddenly of cholera, and early in 1850 he became an Oratorian. In 1852 he was ordained priest, and lived at the Oratory until his death. He was buried at Rednal, in the private cemetery of the congregation, near the grave of Cardinal Newman. Besides various manuals of devotion, several of which he translated from the French, his principal works are: "Lyra Catholica", a translation of all the Breviary and Missal hymns with some others (often reprinted; last edition, London, 1884); "The Masque of Mary and other Poems", original poetry, thoughtful, imaginative, tender, and full of zealous faith, a book which drew from Cardinal Newman, in return, a remarkable poem addressed to the author (reprinted several times; last edition, London, 1887); "The Catholic's Latin Instructor in the principal Church offices and devotions" (frequently reprinted; last edition, London, 1897).

If you want to know more about Edward Caswall's life, Gracewing published a biography in 2005 and you could read excerpts here.

I looked through about eight months of Magnificat prayer magazines and found his work throughout the months in translations of Bernard of Cluny, St. Bernard of Clairvaux, and St. Francis Xavier, and many other anonymous authors. So why did Caswall translate so many Latin hymns? The Catholic Church in England needed these translations as it revived its public liturgical life--Mass had been illegal until the late eighteenth century progress toward religious freedom for Catholics. I refer you again to the great paper by Father Guy Nicholls of the Birmingham Oratory; as he comments, Caswall's translations and his original works provided the Oratory with a much needed repertoire of hymns for the congregation to sing at High Mass and Vespers. The clarity, simplicity, and directness of his translations were most appropriate for their purpose. The fact that they are still is use today shows that Caswall's translations are accessible for congregational singing, demonstrating one of the great legacies of the Oratory movement in England.

Tolkien's Beowulf

J.R.R. Tolkien's son Christopher has edited his father's translation and notes about the great poem Beowulf. Craig Williamson reviews it for The Wall Street Journal:

 

Over a thousand years before Bilbo Baggins crept into Smaug's lair to lift a cup from the dragon's hoard, a nameless slave came slinking into the dragon's cave in "Beowulf" to steal a cup that led to the worm's fiery retaliation. Long before Frodo Baggins battled the forces of evil in Gollum, Shelob and Sauron, Beowulf did battle with the monster Grendel, his mother and the dragon. Before there was Tolkien's Middle-earth, there was the Old English middangeard (literally, "middle-yard, middle-world"), a place where history and fantasy met, where heroes did battle with both their real enemies and the creatures of their collective imagination.

 

Tolkien was a scholar of Old English before he was the father of modern fantasy fiction, and he drew upon "Beowulf" and other Old English poems in the shaping of his imaginary worlds. Like Beowulf, for example, Frodo is both threatened by the exterior forces of monsters and men and vulnerable to the internal pull of pride and power. Gollum, like Grendel, is associated with kin-killing, an evil that undermines human fellowship in each story. And Aragorn's lament for past ages as he rides past the burial mounds near Rohan echoes the elegiac themes in the song of the last survivor in "Beowulf."

Now at last we have Tolkien's version of the poem, as well as several other important texts related to it. First and foremost is his prose translation, which he completed in 1926 at the age of 34 and revised over the years and which his son Christopher, who edited this volume, characterizes as "in one sense complete, but at the same time evidently 'unfinished.' " There is also a generous selection of lecture notes and commentary on the Old English text, geared to Tolkien's translation. This is followed by three versions, one in Old English, two in modern English, of a short story, "Sellic Spell" (a phrase from "Beowulf" that means "marvelous story"), and two versions of a short ballad by Tolkien called "The Lay of Beowulf."

Williamson discusses briefly the "ethics" of publishing these works that Tolkien had not prepared himself for publication:

The ethics of publishing an author's unfinished works are admittedly complex, but Christopher Tolkien has argued that his father's drafts, works in progress and commentaries are important to our understanding of his work. Both scholars and lay readers have long awaited Tolkien's "Beowulf" translation and its related materials, and everyone will find something of enduring interest in this collection. For Tolkien, "Beowulf" was both a brilliant and haunting work in its own right and an inspiration for his own fiction. It is a poem that will move us as readers, not forever but as long as we last. Or as Tolkien says, "It must ever call with a profound appeal—until the dragon comes."

The HarperCollins site announcing the publication has further comments by Christopher Tolkien:

The translation of Beowulf by J.R.R. Tolkien was an early work, very distinctive in its mode, completed in 1926: he returned to it later to make hasty corrections, but seems never to have considered its publication. This edition is twofold, for there exists an illuminating commentary on the text of the poem by the translator himself, in the written form of a series of lectures given at Oxford in the 1930s; and from these lectures a substantial selection has been made, to form also a commentary on the translation in this book.

From his creative attention to detail in these lectures there arises a sense of the immediacy and clarity of his vision. It is as if he entered into the imagined past: standing beside Beowulf and his men shaking out their mail-shirts as they beached their ship on the coast of Denmark, listening to the rising anger of Beowulf at the taunting of Unferth, or looking up in amazement at Grendel’s terrible hand set under the roof of Heorot.

Farewell to 2013; Hail to 2014!

John Mason Neale included this translation of the medieval hymn (Anonymous; Germany; 12th century), In hoc anni circulo in his 1853 Carols for Christmas-tide:

In the ending of the year
Life and light to man appear;
And the Holy Babe is here,
De Virgine;
And the Holy Babe is here,
De Virgine Mariâ.

What in ancient days was slain
This day calls to life again;
God is coming, God shall reign,
De Virgine;
God is coming, God shall reign,
De Virgine Mariâ.

From the desert grew the corn,
Sprang the lily from the thorn,
When the Infant King was born
De Virgine;
When the Infant King was born
De Virgine Mariâ.

On the straw He lays His head,
Hath a manger for His bed,
Thirsts and hungers and is fed
De Virgine;
Thirsts and hungers and is fed
De Virgine Mariâ.

Angel hosts His praises sing,
Three Wise men their off'rings bring,
Ox and ass adore the King,
Cum Virgine;
Ox and ass adore the King,
Cum Virgine Mariâ.

Wherefore let us all to-day
Banish sorrow far away,
Singing and exulting aye,
Cum Virgine;
Singing and exulting aye,
Cum Virgine Mariâ.

As 2013 draws to a close, thank you for your attention to and comments on this blog!

Image source.

King of Angels or King of the English? Adeste Fideles/O Come All Ye Faithful

Because I sent a contribution to the Christian Heritage Centre at Stonyhurst in England, they sent me a Christmas card, signed by Lord and Lady Windsor, Nicholas and Paola. The art for the outside of the Christmas card is one of the manuscript copies of John Francis Wade's "Adeste, Fideles". My husband took the pictures below:

 

The most familiar translation of this hymn, which was written by Wade in 1750, is by Frederick Oakeley, an Oxford Movement follower of Blessed John Henry Newman, who joined the Catholic Church in 1845.

There is a very common theory that this hymn contains a code referring to Bonnie Prince Charlie--Wade was a Jacobite, and an exile in Europe after the '45. The BBC cites this expert, Bennett Zon of Durham University:

He said "clear references" to the prince were in the lyrics, written by John Francis Wade in the 18th Century. The prince was defeated at the Battle of Culloden in 1746 after raising an army to take the British throne.Born shortly before Christmas in December 1720, Bonnie Prince Charlie was the grandson of England's last Catholic monarch, James II. He was born in exile in Italy and became the focus for Catholic Jacobite rebels intent on restoring the House of Stuart to the British throne.

Prof Zon, said there was "far more" to the carol - also known as Adeste Fideles - than was originally thought.

He said: "Fideles is Faithful Catholic Jacobites. Bethlehem is a common Jacobite cipher for England, and Regem Angelorum is a well-known pun on Angelorum, angels and Anglorum, English.

 

"The meaning of the Christmas carol is clear: 'Come and Behold Him, Born the King of Angels' really means, 'Come and Behold Him, Born the King of the English' - Bonnie Prince Charlie." Professor Zon said the Jacobite meaning of the carol gradually faded as the cause lost its grip on popular consciousness.

This interpretation has been around for a long time, however, according to this site. I can accept the possible code in the first verse, but wonder about the rest of the hymn. Did John Francis Wade really intend his fellow Jacobites to think of Bonnie Prince Charlie as "Deum de Deo" (God from God), "Lumen de Lumine" (Light from Light)? I have my doubts about that! Canon Oakeley's translation:

O come, all ye faithful,
Joyful and triumphant,
O come ye, O come ye to Bethlehem;
Come and behold Him
Born the King of angels;
Chorus:O come, let us adore Him,
O come, let us adore Him,
O come, let us adore Him,
Christ the Lord.

God of God,
Light of Light;
Lo, He abhors not the Virgin's womb:
Very God,
Begotten, not created; Chorus.

Sing, choirs of angels;
Sking in exultation,
Sing, all ye citizens of heaven above;
Glory to God
In the highest; Chorus.

Yea, Lord, we greet Thee,
Born this happy morning:
Jesus, to Thee be glory given;
Word of the Father,
Late in flesh appearing; Chorus.

Dom Prosper Gueranger on the First O Antiphon: O Sapientia

This site has the prayers composed by Dom Prosper Gueranger for the O Antiphons for the Magnifcat canticle at Vespers, December 17 through 23, starting with "O Wisdom, that proceedest from the mouth of the Most High, reaching from end to end mightily, and disposing all things sweetly, come
and teach us the way of prudence.":

O uncreated Wisdom, who art so soon to make Thyself visible to Thy creatures, truly Thou disposest all things. It is by Thy permission that the emperor Augustus issues a decree ordering the enrollment of the whole world. Each citizen of the vast empire is to have his name enrolled in the city of his birth. This prince has no other object in this order, which sets the world in motion, but his own ambition. Men go to and fro by millions, and an unbroken procession traverses the immense Roman world; men think they are doing the bidding of man, and it is God whom they are obeying. This world-wide agitation has really but one object; it is, to bring to Bethlehem a man and woman who live at Nazareth in Galilee, in order that this woman, who is unknown to the world but dear to heaven, and who is at the close of the ninth month since she conceived her Child, may give birth to this Child in Bethlehem; for the Prophet has said of Him: ‘His going forth is from the beginning, from the days of eternity. And thou, 0 Bethlehem! art not the least among the thousand cities of Judah, for out of thee He shall come.’O divine Wisdom! how strong art Thou in thus reaching Thine ends by means which are infallible, though hidden; and yet, how sweet, offering no constraint to man’s free-will; and withal, how fatherly, in providing for our necessities! Thou choosest Bethlehem for Thy birth-place, because Bethlehem signifies the house of bread. In this, Thou teachest us that Thou art our Bread, the nourishment and support of our life. With God as our food, we cannot die. O Wisdom of the Father, living Bread that hast descended from heaven, come speedily into us, that thus we may approach to Thee and be enlightened by Thy light, and by that prudence which leads to salvation.

OSV's The Catholic Answer Magazine features this article describing the O Antiphons and the well-known translation by John Mason Neale.

The Wise Virgins and the Advent of the Bridegroom

The Parable of the Ten Bridesmaids; Matthew, chapter 25 “Then the kingdom of heaven shall be compared to ten maidens who took their lamps and went to meet the bridegroom.[a] 2 Five of them were foolish, and five were wise. 3 For when the foolish took their lamps, they took no oil with them; 4 but the wise took flasks of oil with their lamps. 5 As the bridegroom was delayed, they all slumbered and slept. 6 But at midnight there was a cry, ‘Behold, the bridegroom! Come out to meet him.’ 7 Then all those maidens rose and trimmed their lamps. 8 And the foolish said to the wise, ‘Give us some of your oil, for our lamps are going out.’ 9 But the wise replied, ‘Perhaps there will not be enough for us and for you; go rather to the dealers and buy for yourselves.’ 10 And while they went to buy, the bridegroom came, and those who were ready went in with him to the marriage feast; and the door was shut. 11 Afterward the other maidens came also, saying, ‘Lord, lord, open to us.’ 12 But he replied, ‘Truly, I say to you, I do not know you.’ 13 Watch therefore, for you know neither the day nor the hour. (RSV)

The German chorale Wachet auf, ruft uns die Stimme by Philipp Nicolai, a 16th century Lutheran hymnist and pastor, reflects on Our Lord's counsel to "Watch therefore, for you know neither the day nor the hour." Note that the music for the hymn was written by Hans Sachs, one of Wagner's Meistersingers.

Catherine Winkworth translated the hymn in the 19th century:

1. Wake, awake, for night is flying,
The watchmen on the heights are crying;
Awake, Jerusalem, at last!
Midnight hears the welcome voices,
And at the thrilling cry rejoices:
Come forth, ye virgins, night is past!
The Bridegroom comes, awake,
Your lamps with gladness take;
Hallelujah!
And for His marriage-feast prepare,
For ye must go to meet Him there.

2. Zion hears the watchmen singing,
And all her heart with joy is springing,
She wakes, she rises from her gloom;
For her Lord comes down all-glorious,
The strong in grace, in truth victorious,
Her Star is risen, her Light is come!
Ah come, Thou blessed Lord,
O Jesus, Son of God,
Hallelujah!
We follow till the halls we see
Where Thou hast bid us sup with Thee!

3. Now let all the heavens adore Thee,
And men and angels sing before Thee,
With harp and cymbal's clearest tone;
Of one pearl each shining portal,
Where we are with the choir immortal
Of angels round Thy dazzling throne;
Nor eye hath seen, nor ear
Hath yet attain'd to hear
What there is ours,
But we rejoice, and sing to Thee
Our hymn of joy eternally.

An Advent Hymnn for Christ's Second Coming: The Dies Irae

If we think of the Dies Irae, The Day of Wrath, we think of it as the sequence in the Catholic Requiem Mass according to the Extraordinary Form of the Latin Rite--but it is the ultimate Advent hymn to proclaim Christ's Second Coming, which the first part of Advent anticipates. Here is a translation by the Very Reverend James Ambrose Dominic Aylward:

That day of wrath and grief and shame,

Shall fold the world in sheeted flame,
As psalm and Sibyl songs proclaim.

What terror on each breast shall lie
When, downward from the bending sky,
The judge shall come our souls to try.

The trump, through death's dominions blown,
Shall summon with a dreadful tone
The buried nations round the throne.

Nature and death in dumb surprise
Shall see the ancient dead arise,
To stand before the judge's eyes.

And lo, the written book appears,
Which all that faithful record bears,
From whence the world its sentence hears.

The Lord of judgment sits him down,
And every secret thing makes known ;
No crime escapes his vengeful frown.

Ah, how shall I that day endure ?
What patron's friendly voice secure,
When scarce the just themselves are sure ?

O king of dreadful majesty,
Who grantest grace and mercy free,
Grant mercy now and grace to me.

Good Lord, 'twas for my sinful sake,
That thou our suffering flesh didst take ;
Then do not now my soul forsake.

Thou soughtest me when I had strayed ;
Thy blood divine my ransom paid ;
Shall all that love be fruitless made ?

O just avenging judge, I pray,
For pity take my sins away,
Before the great accounting-day.

I groan beneath the guilt, which thou
Canst read upon my blushing brow ;
But spare, O God, thy suppliant now.

Thou, who didst Mary's sins unbind,
And mercy for the robber find,
Dost fill with hope my anxious mind.

Though worthless all my prayers appear, S
till let me not, my Saviour dear,
The everlasting burnings bear.

Give me at thy right hand a place,

Amongst thy sheep, a child of grace,

Far from the goats' accursed race.

Yea, when thy justly kindled ire

Shall bind the lost in chains of fire,

Oh, call me to thy chosen choir.

Lo, here I plead and suppliant bend,

Nor cease my contrite heart to rend,

That so thou spare me in the end.

Oh, on that day, that day of weeping,

When man shall wake from death's dark sleeping,

To stand before his judge divine,

Save, save this trembling soul of mine :

Yea, grant to all, O Saviour blest,

Who die in thee, the saints' sweet rest.

The original sequence is attributed to Thomas of Celano, a Franciscan from the thirteenth century. The translator, the Very Reverend James Ambrose Dominic Aylward, was a

Theologian and poet, born at Leeds, 4 April, 1813; died at Hinckley (England), 5 October, 1872. He was educated at the Dominican priory of Hinckley, entered the Order of St. Dominic, was ordained priest in 1836, became provincial in l850, first Prior of Woodchester in 1854, and provincial a second time in 1866. He composed several pious manuals for the use of his community and "A Novena for the Holy Season of Advent" gathered from the prophecies, anthems, etc., of the Roman Missal and Breviary (Derby, 1849). He reedited (London, 1867) a "Life of Blessed Virgin St. Catherine of Sienna", translated from the Italian by the Dominican Father John Fen (Louvain, 1609), also an English translation of Father Chocarne's "Inner Life of Lacordaire" (Dublin, 1867). His essays '' On the Mystical Elements in Religion, and on Old and Modern Spiritism " were edited posthumously by Cardinal Manning (London, 1874). Father Aylward's principal monument is his translation of Latin hymns, most of which he contributed to "The Catholic Weekly Instructor." In his "Annus Sanctus" (London, 1884) Orbey Shipley has reprinted many of them. He says of Father Aylward that he was "a cultivated and talented priest of varied powers and gifts."

An Advent Hymn: Creator of the Stars of Night

A Clerk of Oxford features this hymn in this blog post, which features different translations from the Middle Ages. The modern translation I'm most familiar with is, of course, by John Mason Neale:

Creator of the stars of night,
Thy people’s everlasting light,
Jesu, Redeemer, save us all,
And hear Thy servants when they call.

Thou, grieving that the ancient curse
Should doom to death a universe,
Hast found the medicine, full of grace,
To save and heal a ruined race.

Thou cam’st, the Bridegroom of the bride,
As drew the world to evening-tide;
Proceeding from a virgin shrine,
The spotless Victim all divine.

At Whose dread Name, majestic now,
All knees must bend, all hearts must bow;
And things celestial Thee shall own,
And things terrestrial, Lord alone.

O Thou Whose coming is with dread
To judge and doom the quick and dead,
Preserve us, while we dwell below,
From every insult of the foe.

To God the Father, God the Son,
And God the Spirit, Three in One,
Laud, honor, might, and glory be
From age to age eternally. Amen.

And the Latin original:

Conditor alme siderum
aetérna lux credéntium
Christe redémptor
ómnium exáudi preces súpplicum

Qui cóndolens intéritu
mortis perire saeculum
salvásti mundum languidum
donnas reis remedium.

Vergénte mundi véspere
uti sponsus de thálamo
egréssus honestissima
Virginis matris cláusula.

Cuius forti ponténtiae
genu curvántur ómnia
caeléstia, terréstia
nutu faténtur súbdita.

Te, Sancte fide quáesumus,
venture iudex sáeculi,
consérva nos in témpore
hostis a telo perfidi.

Sit, Christe rex piissime
tibi Patríque glória
cum Spíritu Paráclito
in sempitérna sáecula.
Amen.

So why is it particularly an Advent hymn, often sung at Vespers? It has been part of the Church's Divine Office for centuries, sung to Plainchat (Mode IV). The hymn speaks of Christ's coming for our salvation in terms of eternity and the universe. He created the stars and all light and He comes into the world as Incarnate man to bring us even greater light. This blog post, from a Benedictine monk in Ireland, quotes Pope Benedict XVI from his encyclical Spe Salve:

At the very moment when the Magi, guided by the star, adored Christ the new king, astrology came to an end, because the stars were now moving in the orbit determined by Christ. This scene, in fact, overturns the world-view of that time, which in a different way has become fashionable once again today. It is not the elemental spirits of the universe, the laws of matter, which ultimately govern the world and mankind, but a personal God governs the stars, that is, the universe; it is not the laws of matter and of evolution that have the final say, but reason, will, love–a Person. And if we know this Person and he knows us, then truly the inexorable power of material elements no longer has the last word; we are not slaves of the universe and of its laws, we are free.