History of the Christian Church, Volume IV: Mediaeval Christianity. A.D. 590-1073.

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for chanting. The name sequence was then applied to the text and in a wider sense also to regular
metrical and rhymed hymns. The book in which Sequences were collected was called Sequentiale.^491
Notker marks the transition from the unmeaning musical sequence to the literary or poetic
sequence. Over thirty poems bear his name. His first, attempt begins with the line
"Laudes Deo concinat orbis ubique totus."
More widely circulated is his Sequence of the Holy Spirit:
"Sancti Spiritus adsit nobis gratia."
"The grace of the Holy Spirit be present with us."^492
The best of all his compositions, which is said to have been inspired by the sight of the
builders of a bridge over an abyss in the Martinstobe, is a meditation on death (Antiphona de morte):
"Media vita in morte sumus:
Quem quaerimus adiutorem nisi te, Domine,
Qui pro peccatis nostris juste irasceris?
Sancte Deus, sancte fortis,
Sancte et misericors Salvator:
Amarae morti ne tradas nos."^493
This solemn prayer is incorporated in many burial services. In the Book of Common Prayer
it is thus enlarged:
"In the midst of life we be in death:
Of whom may we seek for succour, but of Thee,
O Lord, which for our sins justly art moved?
Yet, O Lord God most holy, O Lord most mighty,
O holy and most merciful Saviour,
Deliver us not into the bitter pains of eternal death.
Thou knowest, Lord, the secrets of our hearts.
Shut not up thy merciful eyes to our prayers:
But spare us, Lord most holy,
O God most mighty,
O holy and merciful Saviour,
Thou most worthy Judge eternal,
Suffer us not, at our last hour,
For any pains of death,
To fall from Thee."^494

(^491) For further information on Sequences see especially Neale’s Epistola Critica de Sequentiisat the beginning of the
fifth vol. of Daniel’s Thes. (p. 3-36), followed by literary notices of Daniel; also the works of Bartsch and Kehrein (who gives
the largest collection), and Duffield in Schaff’s Rel. Encyl. III. 161. Neale defines a sequentia: "prolongatiosyllabaeτου̑ Alleluia."
(^492) Translated by Neale, p. 32.
(^493) Daniel, II. 329; Mone, I. 397. Several German versions, one by Luther (1524): "Mitten wir im Leben sind mit dem Tod
umfangen." This version is considerably enlarged and has been translated into English by Miss Winkworth in "Lyra Germanica"
: "In the midst of life behold Death has girt us round. See notes in Schaff’sDeutsches Gesangbuch, No. 446.
(^494) The text is taken from The First Book of Edward VI., 1549 (as republished by Dr. Morgan Dix, N. Y. 1881, p. 268). In
the revision of the Prayer Book the third line was thus improved:
O Lord, who for our sins art justly displeased(irasceris)."

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