SOURCE: R. W. Chambers, "Bede," in Proceedings of the British Academy, Vol. XXII, 1936, pp. 129-56.

In the following lecture, Chambers presents Bede in historical context and asserts that, in the Ecclesiastical History, Bede captures two traditions: loyalty to Christ and loyalty to the chief.

Ours is an age in which those who delight in such things delight to take a 'master mind' and to throw him down from his pedestal. My friend and predecessor in this series, Tenney Frank, speaking of Cicero as a master mind, had to vindicate against cavillers his hero's claim to that title. Indeed, said Professor Frank, 'the first poet of Greece is perhaps the only human being who has attained an undisputed place of honour'. Yet even here he was too optimistic. I was brought up on Mahaffy's History of Greek Literature, and Mahaffy and Sayce between them taught me that Homer was...