Man be Merry

Extract

A Browse among mediaeval English Christmas Carols is an interesting as well as a seasonable pastime. From such collections of songs and poems as Sloane 2593, Eng. Poet. E.I., Brit. Mus. Addit. 5665, Trin. Coll. Camb. O.3, 58, Selden B. 26, and the Commonplace Book of Richard Hill, the grocer’s apprentice, Balliol 3541—to name not by any means all, but some of the most important sources of our knowledge of the subject—it is possible to gain an insight into the attitude towards Christmas revealed by these pre-Reformation popular songs. These collections, written down in the fifteenth and sixteenth centuries, though many of them were probably composed at an earlier date, have happily survived all the vicissitudes and perils which beset the path of manuscripts. History has shown us that England was indeed no island of saints in those days, far from it. In view of this it is at least gratifying to notice how the carols which bear the undoubted stamp of songs of the people, capable of appealing to all grades of society, are full of the simplest and sincerest piety with an awareness and appreciation of the Incarnation as the basis of the joy which they express. The exhortations to be merry are innumerable, but it is merriment with a difference. No empty unmeaning frivolity, but a light-hearted gaiety founded on a very sure and overwhelming piece of good fortune. The danger has been very real, for