BIBLIOTHECA NEERLANDICA EXTRA MUROS Published under the auspices of the International Association for Dutch Studies (formerly Working Committee of Professors and Lecturers of Dutch Language and Literature at Universities outside the Netherlands and Belgium) II THE MIRROR OF SALVATION A MORAL PLAY OF EVERYMAN translated from the Dutch by ADRIAAN J. BARNOUW Editorial board: Dr. P. Brachin (Paris), Dr. J. M. Jalink (formerly Bonn), Dr. J. E. Loubser (Port Elizabeth), Dr. L. E. Schmitt (Marburg), F. P. Thomassen (The Hague), Dr. W. Thys (Lille) , G. de Vries (Copenhagen), Dr. Th. Weevers (London). THE MIRROR OF SALVATION The Mirror of Salvation AMoral Play of Everyman c. 1490 translated from the Dutch by ADRIAAN ]. BARNOUW MARTINUS NI]HOFF / THE HAGUE / 1971 © I97I by Martinus Nijhoff, The Hague, Netherlands All rights reserved, including the right to translate 01' to reproduce this book 01' parts thereof in any form ISBN 978-90-247-5095-5 ISBN 978-94-011-7530-2 (eBook) DOl 10.1007/978-94-011-7530-2 TABLE OF CONTENTS ACKNOWLEDGMENT VII INTRODUCTION by Adriaan J. Barnouw IX THE MIRROR OF SALVATION A Moral Play of Everyman c. 1490 I V ACKNOWLEDGMENT The late professor Barnouw devoted the greater part of his life to the promulgation of Dutch language and culture abroad. Numerous are the books, articles, and addresses in which he, from New York, as a Queen Wilhelmina Professor at Columbia University, pointed out the richness of his homeland by the North Sea. This posthumously appearing translation of the 15th century Dutch morality play Elckerlijc may prove to be the most precious of them all. Not only did Barnouw provide netherlandists, anglists, and students of comparative literature with a handy tool in their not yet entirely closed search for the priority between Elckerlijc and its 16th century English counterpart Everyman; what is more, he brought us a small but real work of art marked with his absolute mastership of the English language, and with the skill of the real poet he undoub­ tedly was. He rendered the fate of a 15th century human being confronted with his ultimate destiny. And basically this destiny is still the same to the 20th century reader of The Mirror ot Salvation. We are therefore happy and proud to include this translation in a series of extramural contributions to the Dutch language and literature. We bring it as a tribute to the author of Elckerlijc, whoever he might have been, and as a token of gratitude and respectfulness to Bar­ nouw, one of the finest cultural embassadors the Low Countries have ever had. We kindly thank those who helped us prepare the book, especially the author's VII ACKNOWLEDGMENT children, Professor Erik Barnouw and Miss Elsa Barnouw, who followed closely the different steps leading to its pUblication. Walter Thys on behalf of the Editorial Board VIII INTRODUCTION In two world wars waged within the life time of one generation Death reaped a prolific harvest. His most formidable scythe in former days was not war but pestilence. But since medical science has forged all kinds of weapons wherewith to strike that dreaded tool out of his knuckles he resorted in our lifetime to a new technique of morticulture which has yielded him un­ dreamt-of results. Using race hatred as fertilizer he has grown on the soil of the globe a crop of dead whose size baffles the imagination. The executioners whom he employed in Hitler's Germany kept careful record of the loathsome work they did for him in torture camps and gas chambers. They reckoned that six million Jews were delivered to Death by their efforts. In Holland alone only fifteen thousand of her one hundred and fifty­ thousand Jews survived the massacre. Death was the chief war profiteer. Though his inflated power was reduced by the overthrow of his Nazi henchmen, his innings are still large as he stalks across the world with his satellites Poverty, Hunger, and Disease. How did this triumphant march of Death affect the minds of the living? What happened to the inner life of those who survived their daily confrontation with the ghastly evidence of the futility of all physical existence? Did it sober them into a resigned acceptance of their wretched lot? Has their suffering taught them to rec­ ognize the real value of life in the things of the spirit? Or has it merely provoked in them a rebellious mood, a IX INTRODUCTION defiance of the fate that has made them its victims? Most likely both effects will become apparent. Those who have saved their self-confidence and arrogance from the wreck of civilization are likely to return to their former way of life. But the meek will find consolation in humble surrender to the incomprehensible will of God, and since the meek far outnumber the masterful it may well be that a wave of mysticism will bring a religious revival. That is what happened in Europe after the ravages of the Black Death in the late Middle Ages. The flowering of mysticism in the Netherlands and the German Rhine valley was not a mere accident that cannot be accounted for by the historian. Noone felt safe in those days. The sight of a dying man was a reminder to the living that the next sunrise might be the last he would ever see. Hodie mihi, eras tibi, today my tum, tomorrow yours, was the message they read in his agonized face. They might at any moment be called before the judgment seat of the Most High. What good had they done to deserve His mercy? How could they atone for the evil they had committed? Contrition and confession alone might save them from utter damnation. Repent, repent, was the warning they read from the lips of the stricken, the counsel they heard from itinerant preachers and priests in the pulpit. Geert Groote, the founder of the Brother­ hood of the Common Life, was the most eloquent and persuasive of these reformers. In his native town of Deventer he gathered around him a group of likeminded disciples who formed a free community of brethren not bound by any monastic rules. Mystics they were, but in their devout search for God never forgot their fellow men. The religious revival they brought to the Netherlands and the Rhineland is known by the name of Modem Devotion. Their modernism lay in this combination of x INTRODUCTION practical religion with the self-centered care for their own souls. They entered the homes, the workshops, and the schools, and brought an element of piety and mysti­ cism into the drab life of the masses. The minds of people thus visited alternately by a haunting fear of death and mystical longing for a life in God must have been keenly sensitive to the message conveyed in the morality play of Elckerlifc, that is Everyman. It was written in the second half of the fifteenth century by a poet whose name was Peter and who was a citizen of Diest, a town in the Duchy of Brabant. The play opens, in imitation perhaps of the Book of Job, with a scene in Heaven. God is heard, and was seen on the stage maybe, lamenting the depravity of his creatures on earth who adored riches rather than Him who died for their sake. He calls for Death and commands him to go down to earth and summon Everyman before God's judgment seat to give an accounting. Everyman, who is foppishly dressed when Death accosts him, tries to obtain a respite by offering Death a bribe. But when Death cannot be tempted, Everyman asks, "May I come back again when I have shown my reck­ oning?" "You may not." "May not someone go with me there for company's sake?" "If you can find one brave enough to go with you, you certainly may." So Every­ man sets out on a quest for a willing fellow pilgrim. Fellowship is the first to be appealed to. "Don't despair," he tells Everyman, "I would go with you were it to hell." But when it dawns on him that he is invited on a journey from which there is no return, he hastily backs out. Kinship is equally lavish with protestations of loyalty and just as unwilling to come along when he realizes what is expected of him. Then Everyman turns to Property, who answers with a sneer, "Did you think I XI INTRODUCTION would follow you beyond the world? I tell you flat, I won't." Then he bethinks himself of Charity. But Charity is too weak to stand on her feet. "Are you so sick?" asks Everyman. "And you the cause of it. If you had satisfied my need, I would have cleared your reckoning which now is blotted to your undoing." However, Charity is in the mood to help him. She has. a sister called Contrition. "She will guide you and show you in what frame of mind to go to this accounting." Contrition takes him to Confession. "She is pure like a mountain rill: she will purge you." By Confession Charity is restored to health. She gives Everyman the robe of Remorse to wear and orders Wisdom, Strength, Beauty, and the Five Senses to stay by Everyman and give him advice and support. In their presence he makes his last will and testament; bequeathing half his goods, to the poor and the other half to the place where it is due to go. Then Contrition sends him to the priest for the extreme unction. When he returns they accompany him to the open grave.