The Homilies of the Anglo-Saxon Church / Containing the Sermones Catholici, or Homilies of Ælfric, in the Original Anglo-Saxon, with an English Version. Volume I.

THE FIRST PART,
CONTAINING
IN THE ORIGINAL ANGLO-SAXON, WITH AN ENGLISH VERSION.
MDCCCXLIV.
PRINTED BY RICHARD AND JOHN E. TAYLOR, RED LION COURT, FLEET STREET.

The work now presented to the Members of the Ælfric Society, the first fruit of its praiseworthy attempt to rescue from oblivion the literary remains of our forefathers, was selected for the earliest publication of the Society, on account both of its valuable matter and the beautiful medium by which it is conveyed.
Of the author of the Sermones Catholici we know nothing with certainty beyond his name, though from the words of his own preface, where he speaks of king Æthelred's days as past, and informs us that in those days he was only a monk and mass-priest, it follows that he was not Ælfric archbishop of Canterbury, who died in the year 1006, or ten years before the death of king Æthelred.
Besides the Homilies, the chief works attributed to our Ælfric are,—
In assigning to Ælfric, archbishop of York, the honour of being the author of the Homilies and other works enumerated above, it would have been gratifying to add, that the character of that prelate given by the chroniclers was beyond a doubt all that could be desired, and such as to render it highly probable that to him we are indebted for those noble and holy labours. Unfortunately the case is otherwise, the few facts recorded of Ælfric of York being for the most part quite irreconcileable with the portrait of the pious student which our imagination spontaneously draws, on calling to mind the exertions in the cause of religion and learning attributed to our Ælfric. Of the archbishop, Malmesbury speaks in terms of
The manuscript from which the text of the present volume is taken belongs to the Public Library at
To W. E. Buckley, Esq., Fellow of Brasenose College, and Professor of Anglo-Saxon in the University of Oxford, I return my sincere thanks for his kindness in removing my doubts of the integrity of the text by collation with the Bodleian manuscript; also to my greatly respected friend, the Reverend Daniel Rock, D.D., I acknowledge myself much indebted for the kind promptness with which he at all times satisfied my inquiries respecting the ancient observances of the Church, as well as other points of doubt, which his deep knowledge of ecclesiastical antiquities so well qualifies him to solve.