[64] In the famous manuscript of the "Ecclesiastical History" of Bede,
which is commonly known as the Moore manuscript, because it passed with
the library of Bishop Moore (Ely) to the University of Cambridge, is in
a hand which is thought to be as old as the time of Bede, who died in
735.

[65] Bede gives the "sense" of this first hymn as follows:--"Nunc
laudare debemus auctorem regni caelestis, potentiam creatoris et
consilium illius, facta patris gloriae; quomodo ille, cum sit aeternus
deus, omnium miraculorum auctor extitit, qui primo filiis hominum caelum
pro culmine tecti, dehinc terram custos humani generis omnipotens
creavit."--"Ecclesiastical History," iv. 24.

[66] Adolf Ebert's account of Bede in "History of Christian-Latin
Literature," translated by Mayor and Lumby in their admirable edition of
the third and fourth books of Bede's "Church History" (Pitt Press
Series), 1878, p. 11.

[67] The general correctness of our translation is assured by the fact
that the Latin text in which it is embodied supplies a Latin
translation, thus:--"quod ita latine sonat: 'ante necessarium exitum
prudentior quam opus fuerit nemo existit, ad cogitandum videlicet
antequam hinc proficiscatur anima, quid boni vel mali egerit, qualiter
post exitum judicanda fuerit.'"--"Bedæ Hist. Eccl.," iii., iv. (Mayor
and Lumby), p. 177.

[68] Page 14.

[69] There has been a recent discussion of this question by Professor
Wülcker in "Anglia," with a negative result. But the conclusion rests on