THE DUTCH LIBRARY.

THE DUTCH LIBRARY

III

A MARVELOUS HISTORY
OF MARY OF NIMMEGEN

Printed in the Netherlands

A
MARVELOUS HISTORY OF
MARY OF NIMMEGEN

WHO FOR MORE THAN SEVEN YEAR
LIVED AND HAD ADO WITH THE DEVIL

Translated from the Middle Dutch by
HARRY MORGAN AYRES
Associate Professor in Columbia University

With an introduction by
ADRIAAN J. BARNOUW
Queen Wilhelmina Professor in Columbia University

Of this series fifty copies have been printed
on real Dutch hand-made paper, in 8vo size

The miracle play of Mary of Nimmegen is one ofthe gems of Dutch mediaeval literature. Its heroineis a reincarnation of Beatrice, the runaway nun froma Brabant convent who, after wandering seven yearswith her paramour, and living other seven as a publicwoman, returned, a repentant sinner, to the conventto find that she had never been missed. For all thosefourteen years the Mother of God had served, in herperson, as sacristan, because Beatrice had never leta day go by without praying an Ave Maria.

The love idyll of this early legend has been turnedinto a grotesque caricature by the author of our miracleplay. The handsome youth whose seductionsproved stronger than the nun’s monastic vows is[ii]changed into “an ill-favored devil of a man”, as heis described by one of the tipplers in the Antwerptavern. Leering Moonen’s one eye is a mirror thatdistorts the smile of love into a grimace. His promiseto satisfy the girl’s craving for pleasure and finery isthe substitute magic whereby he works his charmupon her, and even that would have failed of its effectwithout the aid of Mary’s fit of despair. Despondencyis the devil’s abettor. To us moderns, accustomedto the searching analysis of mental reactions,the girl’s easy surrender to both the fit and the fiendis not sufficiently accounted for. But the author of“Mary of Nimmegen” did not attempt to unravel theinvolutions of the mind. His aim was to glorify theways of God’s mother to man, and the actions ofman required no further exposition than sufficed toexemplify her divine mercy in its fullness. For that[iii]purpose the relation between cause and effect couldbe expressed in the simplest of terms, such as giveforce to the proverbial wisdom of those early days.Wanhope is the devil’s snare. That homely truth, areflection of the mediaeval doctrine that wanhopewas one of the sins against the Holy Ghost, is illustratedby Mary’s reckless invocation of “eitherGod or all the fiends of Hell”, and Moonen appearson the scene at once in accordance with the Dutchadage which says that when you speak of the devilyou tread on his tail. English sense of decorum,whi