THE CHESTER MYSTERIES. 189 
when Norman French was still dominant in English society, and 
the language used was always either French or Latin. There 
can be very little doubt that the Chester Mysteries were at one 
time performed in French, for even now we here and there come 
across untranslated bits, which, by the pens of many generations 
of copyists who were ignorant of that language, have, it is 
true, been robbed of all intelligible meaning, but are yet as 
unmistakably French as ever. We have, besides, to notice a 
remarkable similarity—sometimes it almost amounts to word for 
word—between some of the Chester Plays, and some of. the 
. corresponding plays in an old French collection known as the 
‘*Mystéres du vieil Testament,” which is much too exact and 
striking to be passed over as accidental. 
It was, of course, not only in England that these kind of 
representations were popular; they were a common feature of 
medizval life all over the Western world, and for a very long 
while a well-understood distinction was drawn between the two 
principal classes into which they were roughly divided. Those 
that were called miracles or miracle-plays represented incidents 
in the lives of the saints; martyrdoms most frequently. 
‘‘ Hii ben disguised as tormentours in clerkes plei,” is a satiri- 
cal description of an absurd fashion in dress in the reign of 
Edward 2nd. In many instances the names of the composers 
of some of these pieces have been handed down to us, such as 
the miracle play of S. Catherine, by Geoffrey of Gorham, after- 
wards Abbot of S. Albans; the miracle play of S. Nicholas, by 
Hilarius, an Englishman, who was a disciple of the celebrated 
Abelard. But the name of mysteries was reserved for those 
plays only whose subjects were intended to illustrate the leading 
truths of the Christian religion, and here we find, amongst other 
great differences, that all the many sets of mysteries that have 
come down to us are apparently different arrangements of a 
single series of scriptural scenes and illustrations, which was, as it 
were, the common property of the Western Church. The 
selection is always the same, or very nearly so, and, whether the 
number of the plays be few or many, the ¢heme of the entire series 
is always the same, and great, though unconscious dramatic art is 
shewn in the manner in which the central idea is continually 
impressed upon the beholder’s mind. That central idea is Christ: 
the Saviour of mankind. Christ promised: Christ come: Christ 
crucified: Christ risen: Christ to come again. This is she 
subject, not only of the Chester Mysteries, but of all the other 
Mysteries, too, whether in England or on the Continent. 
In the Chester Mysteries the series is arranged for a three 
day’s performance, in which the first day sets forth the Creation 
of the World and the Fall of Man, followed by Old Testament 
types and foreshadowings of the coming Saviour, and concluding 
with the Saviour’s birth, and his adoration by the Shepherds, 
and by the Wise Men from the East. 
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