Gottfried of Strassburg, the author of the sensuous and passionate epic poem "Tristan and Isolde," composed a long poem in honour of Mary couched in the well-known terms of the loving worshipper:
Thou vale of roses,--violet-dell, Thou joy that makest hearts to swell, Eternal well Of valour; Queen of Heaven! Thou rosy dawn, thou morning-red, Thou steadfast friend when hope has fled, The living bread, Oh! Lady, hast thou given.
Thou sheen of flow'rs with love alight, Thou bridal crown, all maids' delight, Thou art bedight With heaven's golden splendour!
Thou of all sweetness sweetest shine, Thou sweeter than the sweetest wine, The sweetness thine, Is my salvation ever. Thou art a potion sweet of love, Sweetly pervading heaven above, To sailors rough Sang syrens sweeter never.
Thou enterest through eye and ear, Senses and soul pervading, Thou givest to the heart great cheer, A guerdon dear, A glory never fading.
The poet who wrote of Isolde's love potion here calls the Queen of Heaven a _potion sweet of love_, a strange metaphor to use in connection with the Mary of dogma. Another characteristic frequently alluded to is her _sweet perfume_, an attribute which we to-day do not look upon as exclusively celestial.
Quaintly delicate and tender are the love-songs of Brother Hans, an otherwise unknown monk of the fourteenth century. He himself tells us that he deserted his earthly mistress for the Queen of Heaven. Perhaps the dualism between earthly and transcendent love has never been expressed more clearly than by him; for in his case the worshipping love did not gradually lead up to Mary, the essence of womanhood, but an earthly love had to be killed so that the pure heavenly love could live.
Mary! Gentle mistress mine! I humbly kneel before you; All my heart and soul are thine.
Oh, Mary! Secret fountain, Closed garden of delight, The Prince of Heaven mirrors Him in thy beauty bright.
But after describing all the joys of heaven, Brother Hans comes to the conclusion that a man knows about as much of celestial matters as an ox knows of discant singing.
His relationship to Mary is tender, intimate and familiar:
Within my heart concealed There is a secret cell; At nightfall and at daybreak My lady there does dwell. The mistress of the house is she, I feel her love and care about. If she denies herself to me, Methinks the mistress has gone out.
