Oh! quam dulce balneum, esca quam suävis,
Quæ sumenti digne fit Paradisi clavis:
Est ei quem reficis nullus labor gravis,
Licet sis fastidio cordibus ignavis.

Cor ignavi siquidem minime perpendit
Ad quid Christus optimum suum cor ostendit,
Super alas positum crucis, nec attendit
Quod reclinatorii vices hoc prætendit.

Hoc reclinatorium quoties monstratur
Piæ menti, toties ei glutinatur,
Sicut et accipiter totus inescatur
Super carnem rubeam, per quam revocatur.

25

30

XXV. Clichtoveus, Elucidat. Eccles. Paris, 1556 (not in the earlier editions).-Balde has a series of brief poems on the several instruments of the passion. This on the thorn-crown:

Hoc quale vides pressit Regem
Diadema tuum: fulget acutus
Utrinque lapis. Ferus in mediis
Sentibus istas reperit gemmas
Lictor, et alto vulnere fixit.
En ut radiant! rhamnus iaspis,
Paliurus onyx, spina smaragdus,
Tanto posthac verius omnes,
Homo, divitias regnaque mundi
Opulenta potes dicere Spinas.

13--18. There appeared a very good translation of some of

Primum fuit spinea,
Postmodum fit aurea
Tactu sancti verticis.

Spinarum aculeos
Virtus fecit aureos
Christi passionis ;
Quæ peccatis spineos,
Mortis æternæ reos,
Adimplevit bonis.

De malis colligitur,
Et de spinis plectitur
Spinea perversis :
Sed in aurum vertitur,
Quando culpa tollitur,
Eisdem conversis.

Jesu pie, Jesu bone,
Nostro nobis in agone
Largire victoriam ;

Mores nostros sic compone,
Ut perpetuæ coronæ
Mereamur gloriam.

Helm on soldier's forehead shining,
Laurel, conqueror's brows entwining,
High Priest's mitre dread!
'Twas of thorns; but now, behold,
"Tis become of purest gold.

Touched by that blest head.

20

25

30

35

these stanzas in Fraser's Magazine, May, 1849, p. 530. This stanza was rendered thus:

XXVI. [Walraff,] Corolla Hymnorum, p. 16; Daniel, Thes. Hymnol. vol. ii. p. 345.-Of this graceful little poem, which, to judge from internal evidence, is of no great antiquity, I am not able to give any satisfactory account. I have only met it twice, as noted above, and in neither case with any indication of its source or age. It is certainly of a very rare perfection in its kind.

8. improperium]=convicium, derisio, and probably connected with probrum, is a word peculiar to Church Latin. It occurs several times in the Vulgate, as Rom. xv. 3; Heb. xi. 26. The verb improperare (=ỏveidíšeı) is used by Petronius.

13, 14. cavernâ...maceria] He alludes to Cant. ii. 14 (Vulg.):

Columba mea in foraminibus petræ, in cavernâ macerie: on which words St Bernard writes (In Cant. Serm. 61): Foramina petræ, vulnera Christi. In his passer invenit sibi domum et turtur nidum, ubi reponat pullos suos: in his se columba tutatur, et circumvolitantem intuetur accipitrem.