Opening
INSULA SANCTORUM ET DOCTORUM
OR,
IRELAND'S ANCIENT SCHOOLS AND SCHOLARS
BY THE MOST REV. JOHN HEALY, D.D., LL.D., M.R.I.A., BISHOP OF CLONFERT; COMMISSIONER FOR THE PUBLICATION OF THE BREHON LAWS; EX-PREFECT OF THE DUNBOYNE ESTABLISHMENT, MAYNOOTH COLLEGE.
SIXTH EDITION.
DUBLIN: SEALY, BRYERS & WALKER, 86 MIDDLE ABBEY STREET. M. H. GILL & SON, 50 UPPER O'CONNELL STREET. LONDON: BURNS & OATES, LIMITED, 28 ORCHARD STREET, W., AND 63 PATERNOSTER ROW, E.C.. NEW YORK, CINCINNATI AND CHICAGO: BENZIGER BROTHERS.
1912.
PRINTED BY SEALY, BRYERS AND WALKER, MIDDLE ABBEY STREET, DUBLIN.
PREFACE TO THE FOURTH EDITION.
Some smaller inaccuracies in the previous Editions have been corrected in this Edition; but no other changes have been made.
✠ JOHN HEALY, D.D., Bishop of Clonfert.
MOUNT ST. BERNARD, October, 1902.
PREFACE TO THE SECOND EDITION.
The FIRST EDITION of this work has been very favourably received both by the critics and by the public. It was exhausted nearly twelve months ago; but other engrossing occupations left the author little time to revise the text and prepare a new edition. In this SECOND EDITION many errors of the press have been corrected; several explanatory notes have been added, and some few inaccuracies have been rectified. Maps of the Aran Islands and Clonmacnoise have been inserted, and the Index has been greatly enlarged. It is hoped also, that the lower price of the present edition will bring it within the range of a wider circle of readers, and still further carry out the author's purpose of vindicating and enlarging the just renown of Ireland's ancient Saints and Scholars.
✠ JOHN HEALY, D.D.
MOUNT ST. BERNARD, Easter, 1893.
Preface
In the following pages it has been the author's purpose to give a full and accurate, but at the same time, as he hopes, a popular account of the Schools and Scholars of Ancient Ireland. It is a subject about which much is talked, but little is known, and even that little is only to be found in volumes that are not easily accessible to the general reader. In the present work the history of the Schools and Scholars of Celtic Erin is traced from the time of St. Patrick down to the Anglo-Norman Invasion of Ireland. The first three centuries of this period is certainly the brightest page of what is, on the whole, the rather saddening, but not inglorious record, of our country's history. It was not by any means a period altogether free from violence and crime, but it was certainly a time of comparative peace and security, during which the religious communities scattered over the island presented a more beautiful spectacle before men and angels, than anything seen in Christendom either before or since. It is an epoch, too, whose history can be studied with pleasure and profit, and in which Irishmen of all creeds and classes feel a legitimate pride.
It has been questioned, indeed, if the Monastic Schools of this period were really so celebrated and so frequented by holy men, as justly to win for Ireland her ancient title of the INSULA SANCTORUM ET DOCTORUM--the Island of Saints and Scholars. The author ventures to hope that the following pages will furnish, even to the most sceptical, conclusive evidence on this point. It has been his purpose to show not merely the extent, the variety, and the character of the studies, both sacred and profane, pursued in our Celtic Schools, but also the eminent sanctity of those learned men, whose names are found in all our domestic Martyrologies.
Perhaps the most striking feature in their character, speaking generally, was their extraordinary love of solitude and mortification. They loved learning much, it is true; but they loved God and nature more. They knew nothing of what is now called civilization, and were altogether ignorant of urban life; but still they had a very keen perception of the grandeur and beauty of God's universe. The voice of the storm and the strength of the sea, the majesty of lofty mountains and the glory of summer woods, spoke to their hearts even more eloquently than the voice of the preacher, or the writing on their parchments.
The author has sought throughout to put all the information, which he could collect in reference to his subject, in a popular and attractive form. At the same time he has spared no pains to consult all the available authorities both ancient and modern; and he has always gone to the original sources, whenever it was possible to do so. He does not pretend to have avoided all mistakes in matters of fact, nor to be quite free from errors in matters of opinion. But he can say that he has honestly done his best to make the study of this portion of our Celtic history interesting and profitable to the general reader. And there is no doubt that the study of the holy and self-denying lives of our ancient Saints and Scholars will exercise a purifying and elevating influence on the minds of all, but more especially of the young; will teach them to raise their thoughts to higher things, and set less store on the paltry surroundings of their daily life.
With the single exception of Iona, which may be considered as an Irish island, this volume deals only with our Monastic Schools at home. Irishmen founded during this period many schools and monasteries abroad; but it would require another volume to give a full account of those monasteries and their holy founders.
There are many friends to whom we owe thanks for assistance; but we have reason to believe that they would prefer not to have their names mentioned in this preface.
In conclusion, we have only to add, that these pages have not been written in a controversial spirit; because in our opinion little or nothing is ever to be gained by writing history in a spirit of controversy, which tends rather to obscure than to make known the truth. It is better from every point of view to let the facts speak for themselves; and hence not only in quoting authorities, but also in narrating events, we have, as far as possible, reproduced the language of the original authorities.
A few of the papers here published have appeared in the Irish Ecclesiastical Record, but they are now presented in a more popular form.
✠ JOHN HEALY, D.D.
PALMERSTON HOUSE, PORTUMNA, May, 1890.
[Gaelic]
"May the tongue of Sage and Saint be lasting."
I. PAGE
STATE OF LEARNING IN IRELAND BEFORE ST. PATRICK.
I.--THE DRUIDS 1 Learning of the Druids 1 Religious Worship 2 Sacrifice of Human Victims 3 Worship of the Elements 3 Enchantments 4 Acquaintance with Letters 4 Sun-Worship 5
II.--THE BARDS 7 The Files 7 The Ollamh-Poet 7 Historic Poet 8 Neidhe 9 Ollioll Olum 10 Ossian 10
III.--THE BREHONS 11 Office of Brehon thrown open to all possessing necessary qualifications 11 Morann 12 Their Course of Instruction 12
IV.--THE OGHAM ALPHABET 13 Inscribed Stones 13 Invention of the Ogham 14 Letters of the Ogham Alphabet 15
II. IRISH SCHOLARS BEFORE ST. PATRICK
I.--CORMAC MAC ART 16 Battle of Magh Mucruimhe 17 Fenian Militia 18 Finn Mac Cumhail 19 Feis of Tara 19 The Teach Miodhchuarta 21 Writings ascribed to Cormac 23 Saltair of Tara 23 Schools at Tara 23 Book of Aicill 25 Death of Cormac 26 Torna Eigas 28
II.--SEDULIUS 29 Evidence of Irish Birth 29 Religious Training 32 Writings of Sedulius 35 Carmen Paschale 36 Elegiac Poems 37
III.--CAELESTIUS AND PELAGIUS 39 Caelestius not an Irishman 39 Pelagius of British Birth, but of Scottish Origin 40 No evidence to show that Caelestius was either a Briton or Scot--His Character 41
III. LEARNING IN IRELAND IN THE TIME OF ST. PATRICK
I.--ST. PATRICK'S EDUCATION 43 Life at Marmoutier 44 St. Germanus of Auxerre 46 Patrick accompanied Germanus on his journey to Britain, A.D. 429 48 St. Patrick in the Island of Lerins 49 St. Patrick commissioned by St. Celestine to Preach the Gospel in Ireland 50
II.--ST. PATRICK'S LITERARY LABOUR IN IRELAND 50 Arrival in Ireland 50 He lights the Paschal Fire 51 Miraculous Destruction of the two Chief Druids of Erin 51 Patrick burns the idolatrous books at Tara and overturns the idols in Leitrim 52
III.--ST. PATRICK REFORMS THE BREHON LAWS 52 The Senchus Mor 52 Commission of Nine 53 Benignus 54 Church Organization 55 Friendly Alliance with the Bards 57 Church Music 58 St. Patrick accompanied by Bishops and Priests in his Mission to Ireland 59 Synod of Patrick, Auxilius and Iserninus 60 Holy See Supreme Judge of Controversies 60 Duties of Ecclesiastical Judges and Kings 61 Oral Instruction communicated by St. Patrick to his Disciples during Missionary Journeys 62 Books used by St. Patrick 63 Elements, or "Alphabets" of Christian Doctrine 63 Equipment of the young Priest beginning his Missionary Work 64 Patrick's Household 65 Patrick's Artificers 66
IV. THE WRITINGS OF SAINT PATRICK AND OF HIS DISCIPLES
I.--ST. PATRICK'S CONFESSION 67 Evidence in favour of its authenticity 68 The Saint's motive in writing it 69 Patrick's parents in Britain 71 Patrick met opposition in preaching the Gospel in Ireland 72
II.--THE EPISTLE TO COROTICUS 73
III.--THE LORICA, OR THE DEER'S CRY 75
IV.--SECHNALL'S HYMN OF ST. PATRICK 77 Secundinus 77 Sechnall, son of Patrick's sister, Darerca 79 Sechnall's father 79
V.--THE HYMN Sancti Venite 80 St. Sechnall the first Christian Poet in Erin 81
VI.--ST. FIACC OF SLETTY 81 Fiacc receives grade or orders 83 He founds two Churches 83 Fiacc's Metrical Life of St. Patrick 85
VII.--THE SAYINGS OF SAINT PATRICK 87
VIII.--THE Tripartite Life of St. Patrick 88 Its date and authorship 89
V. IRISH MONASTIC SCHOOLS IN GENERAL
I.--GENERAL VIEW OF AN IRISH MONASTERY 91 Monasticism always existed and always will exist in the Church 92 St. Martin of Tours, the Father of Monasticism in Gaul 93
II.--THE BUILDINGS 94 Cells of the Monks 95 Monastic Hospitality 96
III.--DISCIPLINE 97 The Abbot 98 The Monastic Family 99 The Rule 99 Food 101 Ordinary Dress 102
IV.--THE DAILY LABOUR OF THE MONASTERY 102 Religious Exercises 103 Study 103 Writing 104 Manual Labour 104 Church Furniture 105
V.--THE THREE ORDERS OF IRISH SAINTS 106
VI. SCHOOLS OF THE FIFTH CENTURY
I.--THE SCHOOLS OF ARMAGH 110 Emania 111 Daire 111 Patrick founds Armagh 112 Ecclesiastical Buildings at Armagh 113 St. Benignus 114 Death of Benignus 116 The Book of Rights attributed to Benignus 116 The School of Armagh, primarily a great Theological Seminary 117 The Moralia of St. Gregory the Great 117 Gildas the Wise 118 His Destruction of Britain 119 English Students at Armagh 119 Churches and Schools of Armagh burned and plundered between A.D. 670 and 1179 120 Imar O'Hagan 121 The Book of Armagh 122 The Mac Moyres 124
II.--THE SCHOOL OF KILDARE 125 St. Brigid 125 St. Mathona 126 St. Ita 127 St. Brigid born at Faughart 128 Events of her marvellous history 129 Brigid's religious vows 130 Brigid founds Kildare 130 Brigid the "Mary of Ireland" 131 Monastery of Men at Kildare 132 St. Conlaeth 132 St. Ninnidhius 132 Great Church of Kildare 133 Six Lives of St. Brigid 133 St. Brogan Cloen 134 Cogitosus 135 Round Tower of Kildare 138 Perpetual fire of Kildare 138 Art of Illumination in the Monastic Schools of Kildare 139 The Book of Leinster 140
VII. MINOR MONASTIC SCHOOLS OF THE FIFTH CENTURY
I.--THE SCHOOL OF NOENDRUM 141 St. Mochae 141 St. Colman of Dromore 143 Mochae of Noendrum enchanted for 150 years by the song of a Blackbird 144
II.--THE SCHOOL OF LOUTH 145 St. Mochta 145 School founded 147 The Druid Hoam 147 Book of Cuana 149
III.--THE SCHOOL OF EMLY 149 St. Ailbe 149 Pre-Patrician Bishops in Ireland 150 Life of St. Ailbe of Emly 151 Ailbe preached the Gospel in Connaught 152 Life of St. Declan 153 Sts. Ciaran, Ailbe, Declan, and Ibar yield subjection and supremacy to Patrick 153 Difficulties against the authenticity of the Lives of St. Ciaran, St. Declan, and St. Ailbe 155
IV.--ST. IBAR 155 Beg-Eri 156 School of Beg-Eri 157 Beg-Eri no longer an Island 158
V.--EARLY SCHOOLS IN THE WEST OF IRELAND 159 College at Cluainfois 160 School of St. Asicus of Elphin 161
VIII. SCHOOLS OF THE SIXTH CENTURY
THE MONASTIC SCHOOL OF ST. ENDA OF ARAN.
I.--LIFE OF ST. ENDA OF ARAN 163 Monastic Character of the Early Irish Church 163 Family of St. Enda 164 His Sister, St. Fanchea 165 He goes to Candida Casa 167 Goes to Aran 169
II.--THE ISLES OF ARAN 169 Aran Mor 170
III.--PAGAN REMAINS IN THE ISLES OF ARAN 172 Dun Ængusa 173 Dun Conchobhair 175 These Islands in ancient times the stronghold of a Warrior Race 176
IV.--CHRISTIAN ARAN OF ST. ENDA 177 The Curragh Stone 177 Enda founded his First Monastery at Killeany 177 Scholars of St. Enda 178 Columba and Ciaran at Aran 179 The Life of Enda and his Monks, simple and austere 180
V.--ANCIENT CHURCHES IN ARAN 181 Churches in Townland of Killeany 181 Telagh-Enda 182 The "Seven Churches" 182 The Tomb of St. Brecan 183 The Septem Romani 184 Ruins at Kilmurvey 185 Tempull na-Cheathair-Aluinn 186
IX. THE SCHOOL OF ST. FINNIAN OF CLONARD
I.--PRELIMINARY SKETCH OF CHRISTIAN SCHOOLS 188 The First Christian Schools 188 Schools of the Pagans 189 Episcopal Schools 190 School founded by John Cassian near Marseilles 190 Monastery of Lerins 192
II.--ST. FINNIAN OF CLONARD 193 Finnian's birth 194 Goes to Britain 195 Dubricius 196 St. David 196 Cathmael 197 Finnian returns to Erin 198
III.--THE SCHOOL OF CLONARD 199 Scholars of Clonard 201 Instruction altogether oral 202 Knowledge of the Sacred Scriptures 203 "Tutor of the Saints of Ireland" 203 Remains at Clonard 205 St. Aileran the Wise 206
X. THE SCHOOL OF CLONFERT
I.--ST. BRENDAN OF CLONFERT 209 Fostered by St. Ita 211 Brendan's progress in learning under St. Erc 211 Seminary at Cluainfois 212 Brendan's Rule 213 St. Brendan's Oratory on the summit of Brandon Hill 214 Brendan's Voyages 215 He goes to Britain 217 The Cursing of Tara 218 He founds the Monastery of Inchiquin 219 Founds Clonfert 220 Death of Brendan 221
II.--ST. MOINENN 222 St. Fintan 224 The Abbot Seanach Garbh 225 St. Fursey 226 Birth of Fursey 227
III.--ST. CUMMIAN THE TALL, BISHOP OF CLONFERT 228 Birth of Cummian 229 Pupil of St. Finbar 230 Cummian and King Domhnall 232 Paschal Controversy 233 The Irish Usage 234 Main charge brought against the Irish 235 A National Synod at Magh Lene 236 Cummian's Paschal Epistle 237 He appeals to the authority of the Church 238 Quotes the Synodical Decrees of St. Patrick 239 The Liber de Mensura Poenitentiarum 240
IV.--SUBSEQUENT HISTORY OF CLONFERT 242 Turgesius and the Danes 242 Old Cathedral of Clonfert 243
XI. THE SCHOOL OF MOVILLE
I.--ST. FINNIAN OF MOVILLE 245 His Boyhood and Education 246 Candida Casa 246 Finnian at Candida Casa 247 He goes to Rome 248 Returns to Ireland and founds a School at Moville 249 Columcille's Copy of St. Finnian's Psaltery 251 The Cathach 252 St. Finnian's Rule 253 His Death 254 The Hymn of St. Colman 255
II.--MARIANUS SCOTUS 256
XII. THE SCHOOL OF CLONMACNOISE
I.--ST. CIARAN OF CLONMACNOISE 258 Clonmacnoise 258 St. Ciaran at the School of Clonard 259 He goes to Aran 260 Visits St. Senan at Scattery 261 Founds Churches at Isell Ciaran and Hare Island, and the Monastery at Clonmacnoise 261 Origin of the Diocese of Clonmacnoise 262 Death of St. Ciaran 263 Festival of St. Ciaran 264 The Eclais Beg 265
II.--THE RUINED CHURCHES AT CLONMACNOISE 266 Round Tower 267 O'Rourke's Tower 268 De Lacy's Castle 269 Inscribed Tombstones 269
III.--THE SCHOLARS OF CLONMACNOISE 270 Grants to the School of Clonmacnoise 271 Colgan, or Colgu the Wise 272 Alcuin 272 The Ferleginds 273 The Prayer of St. Colgu 273 Scuap Chrabhaigh 274 Plundered by the Danes 274 Felim Mac Criffan 275
IV.--ANNALISTS OF CLONMACNOISE 276 Tighernach 276 Chronicon Scotorum 278 Gilla-Christ O'Maeileon 279 Annals of Clonmacnoise 279
V.--THE "LEABHAR-NA-H-UIDHRE" 280 Conn-na-m-Bocht 280
VI.--DICUIL, THE GEOGRAPHER 281 The De Mensura Orbis Terrarum 281 His Learning 284 Irish Pilgrimage to Jerusalem 285 The "Barns of Joseph" 286 Dicuil's reference to Iceland 287 Love of the Ancient Irish Monks for island solitudes 288 Iceland and the Faroe Isles occupied by Irish Monks prior to discovery of these islands by the Danes 289 Dicuil's testimony that Sedulius was an Irishman 290
XIII. THE COLUMBIAN SCHOOLS IN IRELAND
I.--ST. COLUMBA'S EDUCATION 291 St. Columba, a typical Celt 291 Early History 292 Goes to the School of St. Finnian at Moville 294 Columba at the School of Clonard 295 Columba at Glasnevin 296 He returns to his native territory 297
II.--COLUMBA FOUNDS DERRY 298 Columcille's original Church 298 Personal description of Columba 299
III.--THE SCHOOLS OF DURROW AND KELLS 301 Columba founded the Monastery of Durrow 301 Interesting incidents 302 Cormac Ua Liathain 303 The Book of Durrow 304 Ancient remains at Durrow 305 Assassination of De Lacy 306
IV.--THE FOUNDATION OF KELLS 306 King Diarmait 306 St. Columba's House 308 Round Tower of Kells 309 Book of Kells 309 This MS. caused the Battle of Cuil-Dreimhne 310 Columba's departure from Derry 312 Port-a-Churraich 314
XIV. THE COLUMBIAN SCHOOL IN ALBA
I.--IONA 315 Columba settles in Iona 316 Reilig Odhran 317 Columba's Monasteries 318 Scribes in Iona 319 Rule in Iona 319
II.--COLUMBA PROTECTS THE BARDS 320 Threatened destruction of the Bards 320 Convention of Drumceat 321 Columba's defence of the Bards 322 The Bardic Schools 323
III.--DEATH OF COLUMBA 324
IV.--WRITINGS OF COLUMBA 326 The Altus Prosator 327 In te Christe 328 Noli Pater 328 Irish Poems attributed to Columcille 329 Columba's Prophecies 329
V.--LIVES OF COLUMCILLE 330
VI.--OTHER SCHOLARS OF IONA 331 Baithen 331 Death of Baithen 333 Laisren 333 Seghine 333 Suibhne 334 Cuimine the Fair 334
VII.--ADAMNAN, NINTH ABBOT OF HY 335 Greek Tongue taught in the School of Hy 1170 years ago 336 Adamnan's Birth 336 His Parentage 337 King Finnachta 337 Adamnan goes to Iona 338 Vita Columbae 339 Adamnan introduces the new Paschal observance into Ireland 341 Dispute between Adamnan and Finnachta 342 Canon of Adamnan 342 Death of Adamnan--relics transferred to Ireland 343 Adamnan's writings 344 De Locis Sanctis 344 Expulsion of the Columbian Monks by the Pictish King Nectan 345 The "Gentiles" make their first descent on the Hebrides 346 Martyrdom of St. Blaithmac 347 The Rule of Columba 347
XV. THE LATER COLUMBIAN SCHOOLS IN IRELAND
I.--KELLS HEAD OF THE COLUMBIAN HOUSES 348 Kells pillaged by the Danes 348 The Cathach 348
II.--MARIANUS SCOTUS 349 Commentaries on the Epistles of St. Paul 351
III.--THE LATER SCHOOL OF DERRY 352 The Ua Brolchain 352 St. Maelisa O'Brolchain 353 Flaithbhertach O'Brolchain 354 The Abbot of Derry resolves to renovate his monastery and collects funds for the purpose 355 Synod of the Clergy of Ireland convened at Bri Mac Taidgh in Laeghaire 356 See of Derry established 357
IV.--GELASIUS 358 His name of Mac Liag 358 Gelasius becomes Abbot of Derry, 359 He reforms the morals of clergy and people 359 Synod of Kells 360 Synod of Mellifont 361 Synod of Brigh Mac-Taidgh 361 Synod of Clane 362 Gelasius consecrates St. Laurence O'Toole 362 Death of Gelasius 363
XVI. THE SCHOOL OF BANGOR
I.--ST. COMGALL OF BANGOR 364 Birth and parentage 365 Comgall enters the Monastery of Fintan 366 He visits Clonmacnoise, and receives the priesthood 367 Description of Bangor 367 St. Columba visits Comgall at Bangor 368 The fame of Comgall attracts crowds to Bangor 369 Death of Comgall 370
II.--ST. COLUMBANUS 370 His early life 371 Goes to Cluaninis and places himself under the care of Sinell 372 He enters Bangor 372 Preaches the Gospel in Gaul 373 He buries himself in the depths of the forest 373 Increase of Disciples 374 Founds a monastery at Luxeuil 375 Columbanus and his Irish Monks banished from Luxeuil 376 They establish themselves at Bregentz 376 He founds the Monastic Church of Bobbio 378 Death of Columbanus 378 His writings 379 The Bobbio Missal 380 The Antiphonarium Benchorense 381
III.--DUNGAL 381 Theologian, astronomer and poet 381 Dungal was an Irishman 382 Probably educated in the School of Bangor 382 Dungal goes to France 382 His Letter to Charlemagne on the two solar eclipses said to have taken place in A.D. 810 383 He opens a school at Pavia 385 The last struggle of Western Iconoclasm 385 The Libri Carolini 386 Synod of Frankfort 386 The Council of Nice 387 The Paris Conference 388 Claudius of Turin 389 Dungali Responsa contra perversas Claudii Taurinensis Episcopi Sententias 390 Character of Dungal's writings 391 His death 392
IV.--ST. MALACHY 393 Sketch of his life 393 He rebuilds the monastery at Bangor 394 Becomes Bishop of Connor 394 Founds the Monasterium Ibracense 395 Malachy transferred to the Primatial See 395 Difficulties in Armagh 395 Malachy honoured at Rome by Pope Innocent III. 396 Death at Clairvaux 397
XVII. THE SCHOOL OF CLONENAGH
I.--ST. FINTAN 398 Churches founded round the base of the Slieve Bloom mountains 398 Clonenagh 398 Fintan's Rule 401 St. Comgall a pupil of the School of Clonenagh 402 Miracles of St. Fintan 403 Fintan, "Father of the Irish Monks" 404
II.--ST. ÆNGUS 404 A Ceile De 405 He leads a solitary life 405 Dysert-Enos 406 Penitential Exercises 407 Ængus arrives at Tallagh 407 Martyrology of Tallagh 408 The Felire 409 Fothadh-na-Canoine 410 Invocation of the Saints 411 The Saltair-na-Rann 412 Opinions of Dr. Stokes with regard to the writings of Ængus 412 Death of Ængus 413
XVIII. THE SCHOOL OF GLENDALOUGH
I.--ST. KEVIN 414 Sketch of his Life 414 Kevin is placed under the care of St. Petroc 415 He goes to Glendalough 416 Description of Glendalough 417 St. Kevin's Bed 418 Tempull-na-Skellig 419 Glendalough, a Seminary of Saints and Scholars 420 Kevin meets Columba, Comgall and Canice at the hill of Uisnech 421 Death of Kevin 421 Writings attributed to Kevin 422
II.--RUINS AT GLENDALOUGH 422 The Cathedral 423 St. Kevin's Kitchen 423 Our Lady's Church 424 Trinity Church 424 Kevin's Yew Tree 425
III.--ST. MOLING 425 St. Moling 426 Teach Moling 426 Moling becomes Bishop of Ferns 427 Remission of the Cow-Tax 428 Writings attributed to St. Moling 429 Glendalough ravaged by the Danes 429 "Gilla-na-naomh Laighen" 430
XVIII. (continued)
THE SCHOOL OF GLENDALOUGH.
ST. LAURENCE O'TOOLE 432 His Parentage 433 He goes to Glendalough 434 Lorcan as a Student 435 He is placed at the head of St. Kevin's Great Establishment 436 Consecrated Archbishop of Dublin 437 Synod of the Irish Prelates at Clane 437 He reforms the Clergy 437 His Spirit of Mortification and Prayer 438 Dermott McMurrough and Maurice Fitzgerald attack Dublin 440 He stimulates the slothful king, Rory O'Connor, to action 441 Laurence O'Toole attends a General Council in Rome, and secures many privileges for the Church in Ireland 443 He travels to England in the interests of Rory O'Connor the discrowned king 444 Detained a prisoner in the monastery of Abingdon 444 His death 445 Canonization 446
XIX. SCHOOLS OF THE SEVENTH CENTURY
I.--THE SCHOOL OF LISMORE, ST. CARTHACH 447 He visits the School of Bangor 448 He founds a monastery at Rahan 449 "Effugatio" of Carthach from Rahan 450 He founds Lismore 453 Retires from community life to prepare for death 454 Miracles 454 Rule of Carthach 455
II.--ST. CATHALDUS OF TARENTUM 457 The Life of St. Cathaldus 457 His Birth-place 458 A Student at Lismore 460 He becomes a bishop 461 See of Rachau 462 Pilgrimage to Jerusalem 462 Taranto 463 Cathaldus endeavours to reform the licentious inhabitants of Taranto 463 His death at Taranto 464 Invention of the Saint's Relics 464
III.--OTHER SCHOLARS OF LISMORE 465 St. Cuanna 465 St. Colman O'Leathain 467 Aldfrid, King of Northumbria 468
IV.--SUBSEQUENT HISTORY OF LISMORE 466 Lismore ravaged by the Danes 469 Scenery at Lismore 471 Inscribed stones 472 The Crozier of Lismore 472 The Book of Lismore 473
XX. THE SCHOOLS OF DESMOND
I.--THE SCHOOL OF CORK 475 St. Finbarr 476 Gougane Barra 478 Cork in A.D. 1600 480 Death of St. Finbarr 482 His character 483 Assassination of Mahoun 484 Giolla Aedha O'Muidhin 486
II.--ST. COLMAN MAC UA CLUASAIGH 487 Pestilence in Ireland 487 St. Colman's Hymn 488
III.--THE SCHOOL OF ROSS 490 St. Fachtna 490 Geographical Poem of Mac Cosse 494
IV.--THE SCHOOL OF INNISFALLEN 495 St. Finan the Leper 496 St. Finan Cam 497
V.--THE ANNALS OF INNISFALLEN 500 Maelsuthain O'Cearbhail 500 Curious anecdote of Maelsuthain 502 Annals of Innisfallen 503 Description of Innisfallen 505
XXI. THE SCHOOLS OF THOMOND
I.--THE SCHOOL OF MUNGRET 506 St. Nessan 507 St. Munchin 508 Mungret plundered by the Danes 510 "The Learning of the Women of Mungret" 511
II.--THE SCHOOL OF INISCALTRA 513 Island of Iniscaltra 513 St. Columba of Terryglass 513 Death of St. Columba 515 St. Caimin 517 Round Tower of Iniscaltra 519 St. Caimin's Church 519 Sculptured stones 520 Iniscaltra ravaged by the Danes 521
III.--OTHER MONASTIC SCHOOLS OF THOMOND 522 St. Brendan of Birr 522 St. Cronan of Roscrea 523 Book of Dimma 524
XXII. LATER SCHOOLS OF THE WEST
I.--ST. COLMAN'S SCHOOL OF MAYO 527 The Easter Controversy 527 Inisboffin 531 Death of Colman 533
II.--ST. GERALD OF MAYO 534 Life of St. Gerald 534 Adamnan promulgates the celebrated "Lex Innocentiae" 537 Date of St. Gerald's Death 537
III.--SUBSEQUENT HISTORY OF THE SCHOOL OF MAYO 538 Cele O'Duffy 539
IV.--THE SCHOOL OF TUAM 540 St. Jarlath 541 "Meadow of Retreat" 542 St. Brendan visits St. Jarlath's School at Cluainfois 543 St. Jarlath founds Tuam 544
XXII. (continued)
CELTIC ART IN THE WESTERN MONASTERIES DURING THE REIGN OF TURLOUGH O'CONNOR.
I.--THE O'DUFFYS 547
II.--CELTIC ART AT CLONMACNOISE 550 The Ollamh-builder 551 Gobban Saer 551 Religh-na-Cailleach 552 Crosses and Architectural Ornaments in Sculpture at Tuam and Cong 554 Turlough rebuilds the Cathedral of Tuam 557 The Abbey of Cong 558 The Cross of Cong 560 The Chalice of Ardagh 562 The Shrine of St. Manchan 564
XXIII. IRISH SCHOLARS ABROAD
I.--ST. VIRGILIUS, ARCHBISHOP OF SALZBURG 566 Country of St. Virgilius 566 Accusations against Virgilius 569 Doctrine of the Antipodes 570 Virgilius, the Apostle of Carinthia 572 Discovery of the Tomb of Virgilius 573
II.--SEDULIUS, COMMENTATOR ON SCRIPTURE 574 Writings of Sedulius 574
III.--JOHN SCOTUS ERIGENA 576 Born in Ireland 576 Patronised by Charles the Bald 579 His Liber de Prædestinatione 581 Alleged Errors about the Real Presence 583 His Translation of the Pseudo-Dionysius 584 His Treatise De Divisione Naturae 586 This Book condemned A.D. 1225 587 His Death 588
IV.--FOREIGN SCHOLARS IN IRELAND 589 College of Slane 590 Dagobert, a Pupil of Slane 590 Egbert in Ireland 591 Studies in Connaught 592 St. Chad in Connaught 593 St. Willibrord in Ireland 594 Agilbert, Bishop of Paris, in Ireland 595
XXIV. GAEDHLIC SCHOOLS AND SCHOLARS OF ANCIENT ERIN
I.--ORGANIZATION OF THE GAEDHLIC PROFESSIONAL SCHOOLS 597 The Learned Professions in Erin 598 Degrees in Poetry, in Law, in History 600
II.--SCHOOL OF TUAIM DRECAIN 602 Three Schools at Tuaim Drecain 602 Cennfaeladh, Professor in all the Faculties 604
III.--CORMAC MAC CULLINAN 605 Disert-Diarmada 605 Cormac, King of Cashel 607 Not Bishop of Cashel 609 Cashel then a Royal Dun 610 Battle of Ballaghmoon 611
IV.--WRITINGS OF CORMAC MAC CULLINAN 612 Psalter of Caiseal 613 Cormac's Glossary 612
XXIV. (continued)
I.--GAEDHLIC SCHOLARS OF THE SIXTH AND SEVENTH CENTURIES 614 Amergin Mac Awley 615 Dallan Forgaill 616
II.--GAEDHLIC SCHOLARS OF THE NINTH AND TENTH CENTURIES 617 Maelmura of Fathan 617 Flann Mac Lonan 618 Eochaid O'Flinn 619
III.--GAEDHLIC SCHOLARS OF THE ELEVENTH CENTURY 620 Mac Liag 620 His writings 623 Cuan O'Lochain 624 The Monastery of Buite 625
IV.--DISCIPLINE OF THE LAY COLLEGES 628 Relations between pupils and Teachers laid down in the Senchus Mor 629 Corporal punishment sometimes inflicted 630
I. STATE OF LEARNING IN IRELAND BEFORE ST. PATRICK
"The wrath of Crom spoke in the storm, The blighted harvests felt his eye; The cooling shower, the sunshine warm, Answered the Druid's plaintive cry." --T. D. McGee.
It is not our purpose to discuss at length the state of learning and civilization in Ireland before the coming of St. Patrick. It is a question about which much difference of opinion exists even amongst learned men. A few remarks, however, on this subject will enable the reader to understand more clearly the literature and history of the Christian Schools of Ancient Ireland.
It is admitted by all that whatever learning existed in Erin during the pagan period of her history, was the exclusive possession of certain privileged classes amongst the Celtic tribes. They may be included in the three great orders, so familiar to the students of our ancient history--the Druids, Bards, and Brehons. We shall offer a few brief observations about each of these highly privileged classes.[1]
I.--THE DRUIDS.
In Ireland, as in all the Celtic nations, the Druids were priests and seers, and frequently poets and judges also, especially in the earliest periods of our history. We know from Cæsar that their learning, at least in Gaul, consisted for the most part in rather fanciful theories about the heavenly bodies, the laws of nature, and the attributes of their pagan deities. These doctrines, like their religious tenets, were not committed to writing, but were handed down by oral tradition; for they wished above all things to keep their knowledge to themselves, and to impress the common people with a mysterious awe for their own power and wisdom. It has been said[2] by some writers that druidism was a philosophy rather than a religion; but this statement cannot be admitted against the express testimony of Cæsar,[3] who must have often seen the Druids both in Gaul and Britain. He asserts[4] most distinctly that they attended to religious worship, offered sacrifice both in public and in private, and also expounded omens and oracles. Cæsar's statement in this single sentence offers a text for our observations. We must bear in mind what he says of the Druids of Gaul, as well as of the British Druids; because it is quite evident that the Druids of the three great Celtic nations about this period had practically the same religion. He says that they had exclusive charge of public worship, sometimes even offered human sacrifice; and we shall show, notwithstanding O'Curry,[5] that they did the same in Ireland also. A similar long course of instruction, generally extending to twenty years, was required for their disciples in Ireland as in Gaul. As judges, too, the Druids enforced their decisions by a kind of social excommunication, which few people dared to despise. It is curious how the Celtic races, even to this day, have recourse to similar excommunications, both in things social and political. The Druids of Gaul were subject to an Arch-Druid, who was, like the Jewish High Priest, elected for life. But above all, the Druids of Gaul taught the immortality of the soul, as also its transmigration, and appeared most anxious to inculcate these doctrines on all their disciples. This is the one saving doctrine of druidism, which thus prepared the way for Christianity.
There were Druids amongst all the Celtic tribes of France, Britain, and Ireland. The British Druids in the time of Cæsar were very famous both as priests and scholars; so that it was customary for the young Druids of Gaul to be sent over to Britain to finish their education in the colleges of the British Druids. Their chief establishment was in the Island of Anglesey, anciently called Mona; so at least it is called by Tacitus, although Cæsar seems to give that name to the Isle of Man. During the period immediately preceding the arrival of St. Patrick in Ireland, it seems highly probable that Mona was occupied by a colony of the Irish Celts. It is certain, at least, that very frequent and friendly intercourse took place between Ireland and Anglesey, from which it may be safely inferred that if the druidism of Anglesey was not of Irish origin, Irish as well as Gaulish Druids were certainly educated in that island.
The Druids worshipped not in temples made with hands. As in Palestine, and many Eastern countries, these pagan priests conducted their religious services in 'groves' and 'high places' under the shade of the spreading oaks, from which some writers derive their name--derw being the Celtic, not the Greek name for oak. Hence this tree was sacred in their eyes; their dwellings were surrounded with oak groves, whose dark foliage threw a sombre and solemn shade over the rude altars of unhewn stone on which they offered their sacrifices. The yew, blackthorn, and quicken were also regarded as sacred trees, at least by the Irish Druids, who made their divining rods in some cases from the yew, but oftener from oaken boughs. The mystic ogham characters were also cut by the Druids on staves made from the yew, at least so we are informed in some of our oldest Irish tales.[6]
Our knowledge of Irish druidism is derived chiefly from incidental references in the old romantic tales, and also in the Lives of the Saints, and especially in the Lives of St. Patrick, who came into direct antagonism with their entire system. It is certain that in other countries the Druids sometimes offered human victims in sacrifice; and there is some evidence that the same custom, although, perhaps, more rarely, prevailed in Ireland. There is a passage in the Book of Leinster,[7] which expressly states that the Irish used to sacrifice their children to Crom Cruach, or more correctly, Cenn Cruaich, the great gold-covered idol of Magh Slecht, on the borders of Cavan and Leitrim. Hence it was called the Plain of Slaughter, and the sight of the foul idol so excited the righteous zeal of St. Patrick that he smote it deep into the earth with a blow of his crozier. We also know from the Saint's "Confession" that the Irish to whom he preached the Gospel, had previously worshipped idols and unclean things,[8] which goes to prove that idol-worship was a part of the druidical ritual in Ireland.
There is no doubt also that the worship of the elements was a part of the druidical religion. Their most terrible oaths were sworn on the Sun and the Wind; and it was confidently believed that the perjurer could never escape the vengeance of these mighty elements. The account given in the Tripartite of St. Patrick's interview with the daughters of King Laeghaire by Cliabach Well, on the slopes of Cruachan, shows that the worship of fairy gods, or elves, was a part of the druidical religion; and the same is expressly stated in the very ancient metrical Life of the Apostle, by St. Fiacc of Sletty.[9]
It is evident also not only from Cæsar's statement, but also from several passages in our earliest extant writings, that one of the principal functions of the Druids was to act as haurispices, that is, to foretell the future, to unveil the hidden, to pronounce incantations, and ascertain by omens lucky and unlucky days. Hence we always find some of them living with the king in his royal rath; they are not only his priests, but still more his guides and counsellors on all occasions of danger or emergency. King Laeghaire had at Tara Druids and enchanters, who used to foretell the future by their druidism and heathenism;[10] and they announced the coming of the tailcend, or shaven-crown, that is St. Patrick, long before his arrival. They were powerful in charms and spells. They could bring snow on the plain, but could not, like Patrick, take it away; they could cover the land with sudden darkness, but could not, like him, dispel it. They were powerful for evil, but not for good; they could with the charm called the 'Fluttering Wisp,' strike their unhappy victim with lunacy, or afflict him by the elements; they would even promise to make the earth swallow him up, as they said it would swallow St. Patrick when he was preaching on the banks of the Moy in Tyrawley. Their incantations, too, were in some instances not only wicked, but filthy and unclean,[11] and as such were of course strictly prohibited by St. Patrick.
The Druids of Gaul, although unwilling to commit their doctrines to writing, were acquainted with the use of the Greek letters. The British Druids of Anglesey were even more learned; and we must infer that the Irish Druids possessed a similar culture. They had 'books,'[12] when St. Patrick met them at Tara; and two of them were entrusted with the education of the king's daughters at Cruachan. They were also skilled in medicine, and possessed a knowledge of healing herbs; they discoursed to their disciples on the nature of things,[13] and had some knowledge of astronomy. Thus vested with mysterious and supernatural powers, and possessed of an esoteric learning, that was exclusively their own, the Druids were held in great reverence and fear. "Tara was the chief seat of the idolatry and druidism of Erin,"[14] but we also find them at Cruachan in Connaught, and at Killala beyond the Moy[15]--both royal seats of the kings of that province. They accompanied the kings in their journeys and were present sometimes on the field of battle.[16] They were generally dressed in white, but wore an inner tunic to which reference is sometimes made. It is probable that one or more of them abode in the Raths of all the great nobles, who claimed to be righs, or kinglets, in their own territories. They were sworn enemies of Christianity, and frequently attempted to take St. Patrick's life by violence or poison. In the remote districts of the country some of them remained for several centuries after the island generally became Christian; and to this day we can find traces of ancient druidism in the superstitions of the people.
Their New Year's Day was about the 10th of March, and was deemed holy as the great day on which they cut the mistletoe from the sacred oak. The first of May was kept as a festival in honour of the Sun-God; and probably gave origin to that custom of lighting fires in honour of the god, which was afterwards transferred to the eve of the 24th of June, in order to do honour to St. John.
St. Patrick in his Confession clearly refers to this sun-worship as an idolatrous practice prevalent amongst our pagan forefathers. "That sun," he says, "which at His bidding we see rising daily for our sake will never reign, and its splendour will not last for ever; but those who adore it will perish miserably for all eternity." The great November festival called Samuin, seems to have been held especially in honour of the side, or fairy-gods, who dwelt in the bosom of the beautiful green hills of Erin, and were supposed to hold high revel throughout all the land on November Eve. But the Druids had influence even with these gods of the hills; and we are told that when Edain, the lovely queen of royal Tara, was stolen away from her husband, and hidden in the Land of Youth under Bri Leith, near Ardagh, in Longford, she was restored to her home and her husband by the mighty magic of Dallan the Druid.
We find reference made to the Druids as present with every colony that came to Erin, which shows at least that the old bards and chroniclers regarded them as an essential element of the nation. They were endowed with lands for their maintenance, and enjoyed special privileges and immunities, like the Bards and Brehons. But, as they were the priests of a false and idolatrous religion, it was sought as far as possible to remove every trace of their existence from the minds of the people; and hence after the revision of the Brehon Laws in the time of St. Patrick, we find all reference to the Druids, their rights, and their privileges, entirely expunged from that ancient code. Accordingly we know nothing about the Irish Druids, except what may be gathered from such accidental references as those to which we have already referred.
II.--THE BARDS.
Under this term we include both poets and chroniclers that is, the Fileadh and the Fer-comgne.[17] Sometimes history and poetry are represented as distinct branches of learning in ancient Erin; it is certain, however, that in pre-Christian times, and long after the introduction of Christianity, the chronicler made poetry the medium of preserving and communicating to posterity both the genealogical and historical records of his tribe or clan. It is true, indeed, that the Introduction to the Senchus Mor makes a careful distinction between the chronicler and the poet. "Until Patrick came, only three classes of persons were permitted to speak in public in Erin: a Chronicler to relate events and to tell stories; a Poet to eulogise and to satirize; a Brehon to pass sentence from precedents and commentaries." It is added that since Patrick's arrival, each of these professions is subject to his censorship; and it is noteworthy that no reference at all is made to the Druids after Patrick came to Erin, and this Brehon Code came to be purified. The commentator on the Senchus also notes that for a long time the judicature had belonged to the poets alone, that is, from the time of Amergin, the first poet-judge, down to the time of the Contention at Emhain Macha between the two Sages, Ferceirtne and Neidhe. The language which the poets spoke on that occasion was so obscure, that the chieftains could not understand what had passed between the rival Sages. It was therefore ordained by Conchobhar (Connor) and his chieftains, that thenceforward the poets should be deprived of that exclusive privilege which they had hitherto enjoyed, and made too exclusive; and that the men of Erin in general should be entitled to have their proper share in the judicature. This dim tradition clearly represents a protest against the technical language of an exclusive and privileged class, who, for their own purposes, sought to keep secret their traditionary lore. Thus it came to pass that thenceforward the profession of the judge and poet became quite distinct, and the judge assumed the post of official chronicler and keeper of the records of his tribe.
The function of the Bard, or poet, afterwards was 'to eulogize and to satirize;' and in this more restricted sense of the word the term poet or Bard is frequently employed in Christian times. We know, however, that as a matter of fact all our historical documents down to the tenth century are written in poetry, that is, in a certain metre and rhythm, which would help to preserve these compositions even without the aid of writing for the benefit of posterity; that is to say, the Chronicler was also a poet.
The File, or poet in the more restricted sense of the word, soon became a pest and a nuisance. He was willing enough to eulogize when he expected liberal rewards; but if he were disappointed in his hopes, or if from any other cause he wished to inflict the lash of his satire on any person, he never spared the poisoned shafts of his flashing wit. Hence Cormac Mac Cullinan, who knew the tribe well, derives File, the old Irish word for poet, from fi, poison, and li, brightness; because in eulogy the poet is bright, but in satire he is venomous. The poets were extortionate, too, in exacting rewards for their eulogistic verses, so that the order came to be more feared than loved, and at length incurred the danger of extinction, as we shall see further on. Hence, too, it is expressly ordained in the Senchus Mor that the poet who demands an excessive reward, or claims an amount to which he is not entitled, or composes unlawful satire, is to be deprived of half his 'honour price' for the first and second offence, and of his full honour price, or social status, for the third. Among the four dignitaries of a territory who might be degraded, besides the false-judging king, the stumbling bishop, and the unworthy chief, was the fraudulent poet, who demanded an exorbitant reward for his compositions.
No man was qualified to become Chief-poet, or Doctor in Poetry--'Ollamh-poet'--who was not able to compose an extempore stanza on any subject proposed to him. And the way in which it is done is this: "When the poet sees the person or thing before him he makes a verse at once with the ends of his fingers, or in his mind without studying, and he composes and repeats at the same time."[18] This, however, was after the reception of the New Testament in the time of St. Patrick. "Before Patrick's time the poet placed his (divining) staff upon the person's body, or upon his head, and found out his name, and the name of his father and mother, and discovered every unknown thing that was proposed to him in a minute or two or three." But St. Patrick abolished these profane rites amongst the poets when they believed, for they could not be performed without offering to idol gods, and thenceforward he made the profession pure.[19]
The chief duty of the Historic Poet, or Chronicler, was to register the genealogies of the men of Erin, and to recite lays of battle, and rhymed stories or tales of Courtships, Voyages, Cattle-spoils, Sieges, Slaughters, and other moving incidents by field and flood. The Ollamh-poet, or Doctor of Poetry, was required by law to spend at least twelve years in careful preparation for his final degree, and to have prepared for public recitation seven times fifty tales or stories of the character already indicated. He was also required to be perfectly familiar with the pedigrees of the principal families, their topographical distribution, the synchronisms of remarkable events both at home and abroad, and the etymologies of names in Erin. He was besides required to know the artistic rules of poetry, and to have a knowledge of the seven kinds of verse and their various metres. It is evident that these manifold accomplishments required long and careful study; and the necessity of this training explains, what many persons think incredible, the wonderful accuracy of our ancient historical and genealogical records, which the evidence of facts now proves to be on the whole undoubtedly authentic and trustworthy documents.
In the Book of Ballymote there is a long list of great historians and poets, who flourished in ancient Ireland; many of them, however, are now known only by name. All our ancient records point to the fact that the Tuatha de Danaan, who colonized this country before the Milesians, were a people of considerable civilization. Their royal family seems to have possessed great culture. Daghda, the king, and his wife the Great Queen--Mor Rigan--are both represented as distinguished poets, who flourished more than 1,000 years before Christ. Diancecht, the royal physician, was also a distinguished judge and poet; his daughter, the princess Etan, was a poetess; and her son was no less remarkable for poetic talent. About the same period flourished the poet Ogma, the traditional inventor of the Ogham alphabet.
The Milesians cultivated poetry with equal zeal. We have already referred to the poet-judge, Amergin, and we are told that a poet called Cir, and a harper named Ona, were amongst the first Milesian colonists. After the conquest of the country by the brothers Heber and Heremon, it was resolved to cast lots for the possession of these distinguished bards. The poet fell to Heremon and the harper to Heber, whence it came to pass that the Northerns were, in after times, distinguished for poetry; but the gift of music remained with their Southern brothers.
There is still extant[20] a curious genealogical poem attributed to Conor of the Red-Brows (about B.C. 6) which O'Curry seems to have regarded as genuine. But the most remarkable remnant of pre-Christian literature, if, indeed, it can be regarded as such, is the Dialogue of the two Sages, which is attributed to the reign of Conor Mac Nessa, king of Ulster, about the period of the birth of Christ. These two sages were Ferceirtne, the royal poet of Emania, and Neidhe, son of Adhna, the predecessor of Ferceirtne in the Chair of Poetry. The young Neidhe, after completing his education at home, went to Scotland, where he still further pursued his studies. Upon learning the death of his father he returned home, and happening to find the chief poet's chair just then empty by the temporary absence of the Professor Ferceirtne, who had succeeded his father, he put on the poet's Gown which he found lying on the chair, and sat down himself in state in the vacant seat. Thereupon Ferceirtne returned, and finding his place occupied, asked in poetic phrase who was the distinguished stranger upon whom rested the splendour of the poet's Gown. Neidhe answered him in language as poetic as his own, and thereupon began the famous Dialogue, in which the rival poets displayed all their various accomplishments in literature, history, and druidism. The victory was finally gained by the youthful Neidhe, who proved himself fully worthy of his father's Chair; but with modest condescension he yielded the place to the elder Ferceirtne, and consented to become his pupil and destined successor. The language of the Dialogue shows its great antiquity; but the frequent allusions, although only by way of prophecy to Christian usages, throw grave doubt, on its authenticity.
Learning is said to have greatly flourished in Erin during the reign of Conor Mac Nessa. He was certainly a bountiful benefactor to the poets; and, when their numbers and avarice raised loud complaints against them in other parts of the country, he invited the whole tribe to his own kingdom of Ulster, where he entertained them hospitably for seven years.
Ollioll Olum, that is Ollioll the Sage, was, as his name implies, a learned poet, who flourished from A.D. 186 to 234. He is said to have written several poems of great merit, three of which, according to O'Curry, are still preserved in the Book of Leinster. It is said also that Finn Mac Cumhaill was a poet as well as a warrior; and several poems are attributed to him in our ancient books.
He was at least the father of Erin's greatest poet--from him and "Graine of the golden hair the primal poet sprung." Finn flourished during the later heroic period, which corresponds to the third century of the Christian era. Ossian, or more properly Oisin, his son, is the Homer of Gaedhlic song, whose name and fame have floated down to us on the stream of time from those far distant and misty ages. Many poems still extant are attributed, and perhaps justly, to the grand old warrior Bard of Erin. The publications of the Ossianic Society have done much to make the history of the heroic period familiar to modern readers. More than one of our Irish poets,[21] too, have, with the quick ear of genius, caught up the faint echo of Ossian's song, and once more attuned the harp of Erin to the thrilling melodies of her heroic youth. Once more the Fenian heroes begin to tread the hills of fame, and the spirit of Ossian's vanished muse, like the quickening breath of spring, is felt over all the land.
Ossian! two thousand years of mist and change Surround thy name-- Thy Fenian heroes now no longer range The hills of fame. The very name of Finn and Goll sound strange-- Yet thine the same, By miscalled lake and desecrated grange, Remains, and shall remain.
The Druid's altar and the Druid's creed We scarce can trace; There is not left one undisputed deed Of all your race, Save your majestic song, which hath their speed And strength and grace, In that sole song they live and love and bleed, It bears them on through space. --T. D. M'Gee.
III.--THE BREHONS.
They formed the third of the learned and specially privileged Orders in ancient Erin. During the pre-Christian period the customary laws, by which the Celtic tribes were governed, were formulated in brief sententious rhymes. These rhythmical maxims of law were at first transmitted orally, but afterwards in writing from each generation of Poets to their successors. For up to the first century of the Christian era the Files or Poets had not only the custody of the laws, but also the exclusive right of expounding them to the people, and pronouncing judgments both civil and criminal. Even when the King himself undertook to adjudicate, the File was his official assessor, and the royal judge was guided by his advice in the administration of justice. The Poets were exceedingly jealous of this great privilege, and in order to exclude outsiders from any share in the administration of the law they preserved the archaic legal formula with the greatest secrecy and tenacity.
But as we have already seen, this jealous spirit over-reached itself, and in the reign of Conor Mac Nessa the men of Erin resolved to deprive the Poets of this exclusive privilege, and throw open the office of Brehon to all who duly qualified themselves by acquiring the learning necessary to enable them to discharge its duties.
It was after the office was thus thrown open to men of talent and industry that some of those ancient judges flourished in Erin, whose names and decisions are spoken of with the greatest reverence in the Senchus Mor. "It was," we are there told, "Sen, son of Aighe, who passed the first judgment respecting Distress at a territorial meeting held by the three noble tribes who divided this island." This points to legislation on the subject of Distress formulated at a tribe-assembly by a great jurist, and then solemnly ratified by popular consent. The gloss on this text adds that Sen was of the men of Connaught, and that the meeting was held at Uisnech in Westmeath. Another distinguished judge was Sencha, son of Ailell, on whose face three permanent blotches appeared whenever he pronounced a false judgment. Connla Cainbrethach (of the Fair Judgments) was the chief legal doctor of Connaught; he excelled the men of Erin in wisdom, for he was "filled with the grace of the Holy Ghost."[22] He it was who said that it was God, and not the Druids, who made the heavens, and the earth, the sun and the moon and the sea. This seems to imply that Connla was wise and courageous enough to reject the philosophy, and probably also the worship of the Druids. The Light had already arisen in the east, and the first faint dawnings of Christianity were beginning to illumine the horizon of Erin. Morann, another great judge, who flourished during the first century of our era, wore a chain around his neck, and if ever he pronounced a false judgment the chain tightened around his neck; but it began to expand again, when he came to speak what was just and true. These and other great judges of the same period appear to be undoubted historical characters, whose wisdom and learning, hallowed by the reverence of ages, appeared to their successors to be in some way divinely inspired. They were, it is true, at the time without the light of Revelation to guide them, but as the gloss says, the grace of the Holy Ghost would not be wanting to help men, who were striving according to their conscience to be just and good.
Cormac Mac Art, of whose writings we shall presently speak, did much to encourage the systematic study of law amongst the Brehons. He appears to have been the first who reduced to writing the traditional legal maxims of the Brehon's court, and thus may be regarded as the author of the earliest Code of Laws in pagan Ireland. This great work was afterwards purified and perfected in the time of St. Patrick, when the Senchus Mor, as it is now known, was first compiled.
These three Orders of Druids, Bards, and Brehons were, as we have seen, close corporations, invested with many privileges, and communicating a professional knowledge for the most part by oral instruction to their disciples. This course of instruction was very long and elaborate, sometimes extending to a period of twenty years. It included, as in more modern times, various steps or degrees of learning, the highest of which always was that of Ollamh or Doctor, whether in law, poetry, or divinity. The ordinary course was twelve years, and each year's work seems to have been as carefully fixed as in a modern college or university. A great portion of the work, after the purely elementary studies, consisted in getting off by rote either the bardic tales, or legal maxims with their leading cases, or historical poems and genealogies. This included a very perfect knowledge of topography, chronology, and family history. Versification of a very artificial and complicated character was also a portion of the programme. Besides the students had undoubtedly, at least in pre-Christian times, some kind of 'secret' language known only to the initiated. It would seem as if each profession or school had its own peculiar Oghamic alphabet, the key of which was known only to themselves; but in this matter we have no certain knowledge, and are left almost entirely to pure conjecture. Hereafter we shall see that the legal relations between the professor and his pupils were definitely ascertained, and are laid down in that portion of the Brehon Code which deals with the Law of Social Connections.
IV.--THE OGHAM ALPHABET.
We shall see presently, when treating of the literary history of Cormac Mac Art, that the use of letters, and most probably of Roman letters, was quite common in Erin before the coming of St. Patrick. Besides the Roman alphabet there was, however, an earlier and ruder alphabet, which seems to have been used in Erin even in the pre-historic times. This is called the Ogham alphabet which has had a very strange and curious history. It is a singular fact that all knowledge of the Ogham alphabet, as well as of the existence of any inscriptions written in its peculiar characters, had for a considerable period completely disappeared from the minds of Irish scholars. Yet the Ogham score was all the time contained in the Book of Ballymote,[23] and the key to its interpretation also. Inscribed stones too were thrown about unnoticed in various parts of the country down to the year 1820, when Mr. John Windele discovered the first inscription in the co. Cork.
Since that time no less than 200 inscribed stones have been discovered in various parts of the country, but especially in the South and West; and Irish scholars have directed their attention to decipher and explain these mysterious and time-worn lines. Twenty-two stones inscribed with similar characters have been found in Wales and Devonshire, that is in the South and West of England, and ten in Scotland. Almost all these inscriptions have been examined by the late Mr. Brash of Cork, a most painstaking and accurate investigator, who has published the result of his labours in a very interesting work on the subject.[24] His conclusions may be briefly summed up as follows[25]:--
The inscriptions have been invariably found on pillar stones and flags, and are nearly all of a sepulchral character. The lettering is in a style peculiar to the Gaedhlic race, and represents a very ancient dialect of the Gaedhlic language. The inscribed stones are found only in those districts, where the Gaedhils are known to have established themselves; and the mode of forming the characters and formulating the inscriptions is the same in Ireland, in Wales, and in Scotland. He asserts, moreover, that no Ogham monument hitherto discovered bears any trace of any Christian formula, or any symbol of Christian hope;[26] that any such symbols when found upon an Ogham stones, are manifestly of later date than the original inscription; and that the allusions in our ancient MSS. to the Ogham mode of writing have reference only to pre-Christian times. He thinks too that the Ogham mode of writing was not invented in Ireland, but carried to this country by a colony that landed on our south-western shores, and moved gradually from West to East, and thence across the Channel to Wales. He adds that in all probability this colony came originally from the East, then settled for some time in Egypt, and migrated thence to Spain--conclusions that are all in conformity with the common traditional account of the advent of the Milesian race to this country, as contained in our own ancient Books.
The invention of the Ogham is attributed in bardic history to Ogma, son of Elathan, a prince of the Tuatha de Danaans, that people whom all our national traditions represent as a more cultured race than any of the other colonies that took possession of this island in primitive times. The most singular fact connected with the Ogham inscriptions is their geographical distribution. They are in Ireland almost all confined to the South and West, and to those parts of Wales and England that could be most easily reached from the South of Ireland. The few inscriptions found elsewhere in Ireland are only found in those places, to which we have reason to know that families from the South-West migrated in early times. This certainly would seem to indicate that an immigrant colony landed somewhere in Kerry; and gradually diffusing themselves through the country carried this archaic form of writing along with them; but either they never succeeded in occupying the whole country, or before the occupation of the remoter parts they gradually gave up the Ogham, and adopted a form of writing more suitable for general use, but not so well adapted for brief permanent inscriptions in stone. Mr. Brash has declared that no Oghams of a Christian character have yet been discovered, nor is there any coeval reference to any Christian symbols on the Ogham pillar-stones, a fact which, if true, clearly proves that all the Oghams date from Pagan times. In most cases they are sepulchral inscriptions of the briefest character, merely giving the name of the deceased and the name of his father with, in a few instances, one or two short laudatory epithets.
The letters of the Ogham alphabet are divided into four groups of five letters each, twenty in all. Taking the angular edge of the upright pillar to be represented by a straight line the following is the score:--
Besides these we find a few dipthongal symbols, but apparently of later date:--
The line on which the letters are written is nearly always the rectangular line on the left hand side of the upright flag, facing the spectator. The inscription begins below at the left hand corner, and is read upwards, but sometimes it is continued downwards on the right hand angular line of the pillar on the same face. The vowels are generally not much larger than points on the very angle of the stone, or very short lines cutting the angular line; the consonants are much longer scores drawn to the left or to the right of the angular line as the word requires; the last five scores are longer lines across the angular line and oblique to it.[27]
From various references in our ancient MSS. it appears that the Oghams were written not merely on stones, but also on rods and tablets of wood, which could be easily tied up in bundles and carried from place to place. A letter written to a friend might thus consist of a bundle of rods, duly marked and numbered. The bark of trees, being easily notched, was probably used for the same purpose, and thus even before the introduction of parchment and Roman letters, there would be no want of writing materials. There is no evidence that before the introduction of Roman letters there was any other kind of alphabet in use except the Ogham. But as the Druids of Gaul, in the time of Cæsar, were acquainted with the use of the Greek letters, why should not the 'more learned' Druids of Britain and Ireland be familiar with the Greek or Roman alphabet? It will be seen in the next chapter that there is every reason to conclude that at least after the Roman occupation of Britain, they were quite familiar with Roman letters and Roman writing.
II. IRISH SCHOLARS BEFORE ST. PATRICK
"Crom Cruach and his sub-gods twelve," Said Cormac, "are but carven treene; The axe that made them, haft and helve, Had worthier of our worship been." --Ferguson.
We are frequently told that before the time of St. Patrick the Irish were an utterly barbarous people like the North American Indians. They had of course an unwritten language, but neither scholars, learning, nor even letters. Vague statements of certain Roman writers are cited in proof of these assertions--we shall appeal to the evidence of facts. The Roman writers of that period knew far less of ancient Ireland than even we do at present. It was beyond the sphere of their knowledge, as well as of their empire. But as a matter of fact the statements of Roman historians, so far as they go, tend to prove that a considerable amount of civilization existed in Erin during the time of the Roman occupation of Britain; and in proof of this statement it is quite enough to examine the history of Cormac Mac Art.
I.--CORMAC MAC ART.
The reign of Cormac Mac Art furnishes, perhaps, the most interesting chapter in the history of pre-Christian Ireland. He may be regarded with justice as the greatest king that ever reigned in ancient Erin. He was, as our poets tell us, a sage, a judge, and a scholar, as well as a great prince and a skilful warrior. His reign furnished, indeed, many rich themes for the romantic poets and story-tellers of subsequent ages, in which they greatly indulged their perfervid Celtic imagination. But the leading facts of his reign are all within the limits of authentic history, and are provable by most satisfactory evidence.
Cormac was the son of Art the Solitary, or the Melancholy, as he is sometimes called, and was grandson of the celebrated Conn the Hundred-Fighter. Hence he is sometimes called Cormac O'Cuinn, as well as Cormac Mac Art. His father was slain about the year A.D. 195, in the great battle of Magh Mucruimhe where, as at the battle of Aughrim in the same county, a kingdom was lost and won. Magh Mucruimhe was the ancient name of the great limestone plain extending from Athenry towards Oranmore; and the spot where King Art was killed has been called Tulach Art even down to our own times. It was between Oranmore and Kilcornan, and close to the townland of Moyvaela.[28] The victor in this great battle was Lughaidh, surnamed Mac Con, who had been for many years a refugee in Britain, and now returned with the king of that country and a host of foreigners to wrest the kingdom from Art, who was his maternal uncle. The flower of the chivalry of Munster perished also on that fatal field; for the seven sons of Ollioll Olum who had come to assist King Art, their mother's brother, were slain to a man on the field or in the rout that followed.
Fortunately for young Cormac, the king's son, he was just then at fosterage in Connaught, probably with Nia Mor, who was his cousin, and one of the sub-kings of the province at that time. So Mac Con, the usurper, found no obstacle to prevent him assuming the sovereignty of Tara; and we are told that he reigned some 30 years, from A.D. 196 to 226.
Meantime young Cormac was carefully trained in all martial exercises, as well as in all the learning befitting a king, until he came to man's estate. Then he came to Tara in disguise, and according to one account, was employed in herding the sheep of a poor widow, who lived close to Tara, when some of the sheep were seized for trespassing on the queen's private green or lawn. When this case of trespass was brought before the king in his court on the western slope of the Hill of Tara, he adjudged that the sheep should be forfeited for the trespass. "No," said Cormac, who was present, "the sheep have only eaten of the fleece of the land, and in justice only their own fleece should be forfeited for that trespass." The bystanders murmured their approval, and even Mac Con himself cried out--"It is the judgment of a king"--for kings were supposed to possess a kind of inspiration in giving their decisions. Then immediately recognising Cormac, whom he knew to be in the country, he tried to seize him on the spot. But Cormac leaped the mound of the Claenfert, and not only succeeded in effecting his escape, but also in raising such a body of his own and his father's friends, that he was able to drive the usurper from Tara. Mac Con fled to his own relatives in the South of Ireland, where he was shortly afterwards killed, at a place called Gort-an-Oir, near Cahir, in the Co. Tipperary.
So Cormac, disciplined in adversity, came to the throne in the year A.D. 227, according to the Four Masters.[29] During the earlier years of his reign he was engaged in continual wars with the provincial kings, who had yet to learn that Cormac was their master in fact as well as of right. We are told that he fought no less than fifty battles against these turbulent kings to vindicate his own position as High King of Erin. The accurate Tighernach furnishes us with brief notices of those various battles against the refractory sub-kings. In one year he fought three battles against the Ultonians. In another he fought four times against the Momonians. The Leinster King, Dunlaing, taking advantage of Cormac's absence from Tara, attacked the royal rath itself, and wantonly slaughtered thirty noble maidens with their attendants--thirty for each--who lived in a separate building on the north-western slope of Tara. Cormac promptly avenged this awful massacre by invading Leinster, and putting to death twelve sub-kings of that province; and besides he increased and enforced the payment of the ancient Borumean or cow-tribute imposed by his predecessors on the same province. The Ultonians, however, were his most inveterate foes; and twice, it seems, they succeeded in "deposing" him, that is, in driving him for some months from Tara. At length, however, the king gained a complete victory over his northern rivals, with the aid of Tadhg, a grandson of Ollioll Olum, and his Munster auxiliaries. Cormac rewarded the Munster hero by giving him, as he had promised, as much of the territory of Meath as Tadhg could drive round in his chariot from the close of the battle till sunset. The veteran hero, spent with loss of blood and battle-toil, still contrived to drive his chariot round a district extending from Duleek to the Liffey, which was afterwards called Cianachta--the land of Cian's descendants. Tadhg's father was Cian, son of Ollioll Olum, hence the name.
Cormac, now undisputed master of his kingdom, took measures to preserve the public peace and secure the prosperity of his dominions. He was the first, and we may say also, the last king of Erin, who maintained a standing army to check the arrogance of his turbulent sub-kings. This Fenian militia was, it is said, modelled after the Roman legions, which Cormac might have seen, or heard of at that time in Britain. They were quartered on the people in winter; but in summer they lived on the produce of the chase, and gave all their leisure to martial exercises. By this means they became most accomplished in all feats of arms, so that the fame of these Fenian heroes has come down to our own time in the living traditions of the people. The celebrated Finn Mac Cumhail was their general--a poet too, it was said, he was, and a scholar, as well as a renowned warrior. Ossian, the hero-poet, was his son; and the brave and gentle Oscar, who fell in the fatal field of Gabhra, was his grandson.
We are also told that Cormac kept a fleet on the sea for three years, and doubtless swept away the pirate ships of Britain and the islands, that used to make descents from time to time on the eastern coasts of Ireland.
But it is with the literary history of King Cormac's reign we are most concerned, and to this we invite the special attention of the reader. His first work was to re-establish the ancient Feis of Tara.
Tara even then had been the residence of the High Kings of Erin from immemorial ages. Slainge, the first king of the Firbolgs, was its reputed founder; and all the kings of that colony, as well as of the Tuatha De Danaan and Milesian race, had usually dwelt on the same royal hill. Ollamh Fodhla, one of the most renowned kings in the bardic history, "reigned forty years and died in his own house at Tara." It is said that this king was the first who convened the great Feis of Tara to legislate in solemn assembly for all the tribes of Erin. O'Flaherty adds that the same ancient monarch founded a "Mur Ollamhan," or college of learned doctors at Tara; but Petrie could find no authority for this statement except the term "Mur Ollamhan," which might, however, simply mean the mur, or fortified house of Ollamh Fodhla himself.
During the shadowy period that follows down to the Christian era, we hear little of Tara even in bardic history. An undoubtedly historical king, Tuathal Teachtmar, about the year 85 of the Christian era, took a portion of each of the four provinces to make a mensal demesne for the High King of Tara. He convened the states of the kingdom, too, on the royal hill in solemn assembly, and induced the assembled kings and chiefs to swear by all the elements that they would always yield obedience to the princes of his own race.
The Feis of Tara, then, was in existence before the time of Cormac; but it was seldom convened, and had almost fallen into disuse. Cormac it was, who made arrangements for the regular meetings of that great parliament of the nation, and provided adequate accommodation for the assembled notables. Here we are on firm historic ground and can enter into more minute details with security.
The object of this Feis of Tara was mainly three-fold.[30] First, to enact and promulgate what was afterwards called the cain-law, which was obligatory in all the territories and tribes of the kingdom, as distinguished from the urradhus, or local law. Secondly, to test and sanction the Annals of Erin. For this purpose each of the local Seanachies or historians brought in a record of the notable events that took place in his own territory. These were publicly read for the assembly, and when duly authenticated were entered on the great record of the King of Tara, called afterwards the "Saltair of Tara." Thirdly, to register in the same great national record the genealogies of the ruling families, to assess the taxes, and settle all cases of disputed succession among the tribes of the kingdom. Too often this was done by the strong hand; but it was Cormac's idea to fix the succession, as far as possible, according to definite principles amongst the ruling families. The absence of a strong central government to enforce this most wise provision was one main cause of the subsequent distracted state of the kingdom.
This great national assembly, convened for these purposes, met once every three years. The session continued for a week, beginning the third day before, and ending the third day after November day. When so many turbulent chieftains, oftentimes at feud amongst themselves, met together, it was necessary to keep the peace of Tara by very stringent regulations, enforced under the most rigorous penalties. It is to Cormac's prudent forethought we owe these regulations, which were afterwards inviolably observed as the law of Tara. Every provincial king and every sub-king had his own fixed place allotted to him near the High King by the marshals of Tara; and every chief was bound to take his seat under the place where his shield was hung upon the wall. Brawling was strictly forbidden, and to wound another was a capital crime.
In order to provide suitable accommodation for this great assembly, Cormac erected the Teach Miodhchuarta, which was capable of accommodating 1,000 persons, and was at once a parliament house, banquet hall, and hotel. We have two accounts of this great building, as well as of the other monuments at Tara, written about nine hundred years ago--one in poetry, the other in prose. The statements made by these ancient writers have been verified in every essential point by the measurements of the officers of the Ordnance Survey, who were enabled from these documents to fix the position and identity of all those ancient monuments at Tara.
"The Teach Miodhchuarta," says the old prose writer in the Dinnseanchus, "is to the north-west of the eastern mound. The ruins of this house--it was even then in ruins--are situate thus: the lower part to the north, and the higher part to the south; and walls are raised about it to the east and to the west. The northern side of it is enclosed and small; the lie of it is north and south. It is in the form of a long house, with twelve doors upon it, or fourteen, seven to the west and seven to the east. This was the great house of a thousand soldiers."[31] We ourselves have lunched on the grass-green floor of this once famous hall; and we can of our own knowledge testify to the accuracy of this ancient writer. The openings for the doors can still be traced in the enclosing mound; and curiously enough, one is so nearly obliterated that it is difficult still to say whether there were six or seven openings on each side. The building was seven hundred and sixty feet long, and originally nearly ninety feet wide, according to Petrie's measurements. There was a double row of benches on each side, running the entire length of the hall. In the centre there was a number of fires in a line between the benches, and over the fires was fixed a row of spits depending from the roof, at which a very large number of joints might be roasted. There is in the Book of Leinster a ground-plan of the building, and the rude figure of a cook in the centre turning the spit with his mouth open, and a ladle in his hand to baste the joint. The king of Erin took his place at the head of the hall on the south surrounded by the provincial kings. The nobles and officers were arranged on either side according to their dignity down to the lowest, or northern end of the hall, which was crowded with butlers, scullions, and retainers. They slept at night on the couches, but not unfrequently under them.
The appearance of Cormac at the head of this great hall is thus described in an extract copied into the Book of Ballymote from the older and now lost Book of Navan[32]:--
"Beautiful was the appearance of Cormac in that assembly. Flowing and slightly curling was his golden hair. A red buckler with stars and animals of gold, and fastenings of silver upon him. A crimson cloak in wide descending folds around him, fastened at his neck with precious stones. A neck torque of gold around his neck. A white shirt with a full collar, and intertwined with red gold thread, upon him. A girdle of gold inlaid with precious stones was around him. Two wonderful shoes of gold, with golden loops, upon his feet. Two spears with golden sockets in his hands, with many rivets of red bronze. And he was himself besides symmetrical and beautiful of form, without blemish or reproach."
This might be deemed a purely imaginary description, if the collection of antiquities in the Royal Irish Academy did not prove beyond doubt that golden ornaments similar to those referred to in this passage were of frequent use in Ireland. In the year 1810 two neck torques of purest gold, the same as those described above, were found on the Hill of Tara itself, and are now to be seen in the Academy's collection.
"Alas," says an old writer, "Tara to-day is desolate; it is a green grassy land; but it was once a noble hill to view, the mansion of warlike heroes, in the days of Cormac O'Cuinn--when Cormac was in his glory."
Everything at Tara, even its present desolation, is full of interest, and reminds us of the days "when Cormac was in his glory." His house is there within the circle of the great Rath na Riogh. The mound where he kept his hostages may still be seen beside his Rath. The stream issuing from the well Neamhnach, on which he built the first mill in Ireland for his handmaiden, Ciarnaid, to spare her the labour of grinding with the quern, still flows down the eastern slope of Tara Hill, and still, says Petrie, turns a mill. Even the well on the western slope, beside which Cormac's cuchtair, or kitchen, was built, has been discovered. The north-western claenfert, or declivity, where he corrected the false judgment of King Mac Con about the trespass of the widow's sheep may still be traced. The Rath of his step-mother, Maeve, can be seen not far from Tara; and to the west of the Teach Miodhchuarta may be noticed Rath Graine, the sunny palace of his daughter, the faithless spouse of Finn Mac Cumhail.
O'Flaherty tells us on the authority of an old poem found in the Book of Shane Mor O'Dugan, who flourished about A.D. 1390, that Cormac founded three schools at Tara--one for teaching the art of war, the second for the study of history, and the third was a school of jurisprudence. It was, doubtless, the first regular college founded in ancient Erin, and like the school of Charlemagne, was within the royal palace. The fact is extremely probable, especially as Cormac himself was an accomplished scholar in all these sciences. This brings us to the literary works attributed to Cormac Mac Art by all our ancient Irish scholars.
The first of these is a treatise still extant in manuscript entitled Teagusc na Riogh, or Institutio Principum. It is ascribed to King Cormac in the Book of Leinster written before the Anglo-Norman Invasion of Ireland. It takes the form of a dialogue between Cormac and his son and successor, Cairbre Lifeachair; "and," says the quaint old Mac Geoghegan, "this book contains as goodly precepts and moral documents as Cato or Aristotle did ever write." The language is of the most archaic type; some extracts have been translated and published in the Dublin Penny Journal.
A still more celebrated work, now unfortunately lost, the Saltair of Tara, has been universally attributed to Cormac by Irish scholars. Perhaps we should rather say it was compiled under his direction. "It contained," says an ancient writer in the Book of Ballymote, "the synchronisms and genealogies, as well as the succession of the [Irish] kings and monarchs, their battles, their contests, and their antiquities from the world's beginning down to the time it was written. And this is the Saltair of Tara, which is the origin and fountain of the histories of Erin from that period down to the present time." "This," adds the writer in the Book of Ballymote, "is taken from the Book of Ua Chongbhail"--that is the Book of Navan--a still more ancient but now lost work. Not only do the writer in the ancient Book of Navan, and the copyist in the Book of Ballymote, expressly attribute this work to Cormac, but a still more ancient authority, the poet Cuan O'Lochain, who died in A.D. 1024, has this stanza in his poem on Tara:--
"He [Cormac] compiled the Saltair of Tara, In that Saltair is contained The best summary of history; It is the Saltair which assigns Seven chief kings to Erin of harbours," &c., &c.
And it is, indeed, self-evident to the careful student of our annals that there must have been some one ancient "origin and fountain" from which the subsequent historians of Erin have derived their information--which existing monuments prove to be quite accurate--concerning the reign of Cormac and his more immediate predecessors in Ireland. The man who restored the Feis of Tara, and who, as we shall presently see, was also a celebrated judge and lawyer, was exactly such a person of forethought and culture as would gather together the poets and historians of his kingdom to execute under his own immediate direction this great work for the benefit of posterity. Keating tells us that it was called the Saltair of Tara because the chief Ollave of Tara had it in his official custody; and as Cormac Mac Cullinan's Chronicle was called the Saltair of Cashel, and the Biblical Poem of Aengus the Culdee was called the Saltair na Rann, so this great compilation was named the Saltair of Tara. This, as O'Curry remarks, disposes of Petrie's objection that its name would rather indicate the Christian origin of the book. The answer is simple--Cormac never called the book by this name, as surely the compilers of the great works known as the Book of Ballymote or the Book of Leinster never called those famous compilations by their present names.
Cormac was also a distinguished jurist--of that we have conclusive evidence in the Book of Aicill, which has been published in the third volume of the Brehon Law publications. The book itself is most explicit as to its authorship, and everything in the text goes to confirm the statements in the introduction, part of which is worth reproducing here.
"The place of this book is Aicill close to Temhair [Tara], and its time is the time of Coirpri Lifechair, son of Cormac, and its author is Cormac, and the cause of its having been composed was the blinding of the eye of Cormac by Ængus Gabhuaidech, after the abduction of the daughter of Sorar, son of Art Corb, by Cellach, son of Cormac."
The author then tells us how the spear of Aengus grazed the eye of Cormac and blinded him.
"Then Cormac was sent out to be cured at Aicill [the Hill of Skreen] ... and the sovereignty of Erin was given to Coirpri Lifechair, son of Cormac, for it was prohibited that anyone with a blemish should be king at Tara, and in every difficult case of judgment that came to him he [Coirpri] used to go to ask his father about it, and his father used to say to him, 'my son that thou mayest know' [the law], and 'the exemptions;' and these words are at the beginning of all his explanations. And it was there, at Aicill, that this book was thus composed, and wherever the words 'exemptions,' and 'my son that thou mayest know,' occur was Cormac's part of the book, and Cennfaeladh's part is the rest."
This proves beyond doubt that the greatest portion of this Book of Aicill was written by Cormac at Skreen, near Tara, when disqualified for holding the sovereignty on account of his wound. It was a treatise written for the benefit of his son unexpectedly called to fill the monarch's place at Tara. The text, too, bears out this account. Cormac, apparently furnished the groundwork of the present volume by writing for his son's use a series of maxims or principles on the criminal law of Erin, which were afterwards developed by Cormac himself, and by subsequent commentators. That the archaic legal maxims so enunciated in the Book of Aicill were once written by Cormac himself there can be no reasonable doubt; although it is now quite impossible to ascertain how far the development of the text was the work of Cormac or of subsequent legal authorities, who doubtless added to and modified the commentary, whilst they left Cormac's text itself unchanged.
This Book of Aicill, the authenticity of which cannot, we think, be reasonably questioned, proves to a certainty that in the third century of the Christian era there was a considerable amount of literary culture in Celtic Ireland. These works are still extant in the most archaic form of the Irish language; they have been universally attributed to Cormac Mac Art for the last ten centuries by all our Irish scholars; the intrinsic evidence of their authorship and antiquity is equally striking--why then should we reject this mass of evidence, and accept the crude theories of certain modern pretenders in the antiquities of Ireland, who without even knowing the language undertake to tell us that there was no knowledge of the use of writing in Ireland before St. Patrick?
And is not such an assertion a priori highly improbable? The Romans had conquered Britain in the time of Agricola--the first century of the Christian era. The Britons themselves had very generally become Christians during the second and third centuries, and had, to some extent at least, been imbued with Roman civilization. Frequent intercourse, sometimes friendly and sometimes hostile, existed between the Irish and Welsh tribes especially. A British king was killed at the battle of Magh Mucruimhe in Galway, where Cormac's own father was slain. The allies of Mac Con on that occasion were British. He himself had spent the years of his exile in Wales. Captives from Ireland were carried to Britain, and captives from Britain were carried to Ireland. Is it likely then that when the use of letters was quite common in Britain for three centuries no knowledge of their use would have come to Ireland until the advent of St. Patrick in the fifth century of the Christian era?
There is an ancient and well founded tradition that Cormac Mac Art died a Christian, or as the Four Masters say, "turned from the religion of the Druids to the worship of the true God." It is in itself highly probable. Some knowledge of Christianity must have penetrated into Ireland even so early as the reign of Cormac Mac Art. It is quite a popular error to suppose that there were no Christians in Ireland before the time of St. Patrick. Palladius had been sent from Rome before Patrick "to the Scots," that is the Irish, "who believed in Christ." Besides that intimate connection between Ireland and Britain, of which we have spoken, must have carried some knowledge of Christianity, as well as of letters, from one country to the other. King Lucius, the first Christian King of the British, flourished quite half a century before the time of King Cormac. Tertullian speaks of the Isles of the Britains as subject to Christ about the time that Cormac's father, Art, was slain at Magh Mucruimhe. There was a regularly organised hierarchy in England during the third century; and three of its bishops were present at the Council of Arles in A.D. 314.
Nothing is more likely, then, than that the message of the Gospel was brought from England to the ears of King Cormac; and that a prince, so learned and so wise, gave up the old religion of the Druids, and embraced the new religion of peace and love.
But it was a dangerous thing to do even for a king. The Druids were very popular and very influential, and moreover possessed, it was said, dreadful magical powers. They showed it afterwards in the time of St. Patrick, and now they showed it when they heard Cormac had given up the old religion of Erin, and become a convert to the new worship from the East. The king's death was caused by the bone of a salmon sticking in his throat, and it was universally believed that this painful death was brought about by the magical power of Maelgenn, the chief of the Druids.
"They loosed their curse against the king, They cursed him in his flesh and bones; And daily in their mystic ring They turned the maledictive stones.
"Till where at meat the monarch sate, Amid the revel and the wine, He choked upon the food he ate At Sletty, southward of the Boyne."[33]
So perished A.D. 267, the wisest and best of the ancient kings of Erin. Cormac, when dying, told his people not to bury him in the pagan cemetery of Brugh on the Boyne, but at Rossnaree, where he first believed, and with his face to the rising sun. But when the king was dead, his captains declared they would bury their king with his royal sires in Brugh:--
"Dead Cormac on his bier they laid; He reigned a king for forty years, And shame it were, his captains said, He lay not with his royal peers.
"What though a dying man should rave Of changes o'er the eastern sea; In Brugh of Boyne shall be his grave And not in noteless Rossnaree."
So they prepared to cross the fords of Boyne and bury the king at Brugh. But royal Boyne was loyal to its dead king; "the deep full-hearted river rose" to bar the way; and when the bearers attempted to cross the ford, the swelling flood swept them from their feet, caught up the bier, and "proudly bore away the king" on its own heaving bosom. Next morning the corpse was found on the bank of the river at Rossnaree, and was duly interred within the hearing of its murmuring waters. There great Cormac was left to his rest with his face to the rising sun, awaiting the dawning of that Glory which was soon to lighten over the hills and valleys of his native land.
Cormac Mac Art was not only himself a lover of letters, but seems to have transmitted his own talents to his family. There is a very ancient poem in the Book of Leinster, which has been published by O'Curry, and has been attributed to Ailbhe, daughter of Cormac Mac Art. The language is of the most archaic character, and the sentiments expressed are not inconsistent with the origin ascribed to the poem in the Book of Leinster. Still critics will be naturally sceptical as to the authenticity of the poem. Meave (Meadhbh), step-mother of Cormac, who has given her name to Rath Meave at Tara, is credited with being the author of a poem in praise of Cuchorb, in which his martial prowess and numerous battles are duly celebrated. This lady seems to have been decidedly 'blue' in her tastes, for she built a choice house within her Rath, where the chief master of every art used to assemble. She was amorous too, and "would not permit any king to reign in Tara who did not first take herself as wife." Perhaps there is some truth in the ancient and romantic story recorded in the same Book of Leinster, that when Cuchorb was killed, she was sorrowful in heart, and after they set up the grave stone of the fallen hero, she chanted his death song in presence of the assembled warriors, who stood around his grave.
Another pre-Patrician, if not pre-Christian poet, to whom some extant poems have been attributed, was Torna Eigas, the bard of Niall of the Nine Hostages. Niall died in A.D. 405, twenty-seven years before St. Patrick came to preach in Erin; so that even if Torna Eigas, as Colgan thinks, became a Christian, his training and inspiration must belong to the pre-Christian times. If the works attributed to him are even substantially genuine, they must have been interpolated by later copyists with Christian references and Christian sentiments. O'Reilly mentions four poems as passing under his name. The first is addressed to King Niall his patron, and foster son. The second was designed to effect a reconciliation between Niall and the foster child of the poet, King Corc of Munster, who, as we shall see hereafter, certainly lived to become a Christian. In the third the poet describes the pleasant life which he spent with these two kings, his foster children, who lavished upon him alternately during his visits their friendship and their favours. But the fourth is by far the most interesting, for it describes the famous burying place of the Pagan kings of Erin, Relig na Riogh, at Rath Cruachan in Connaught. It consists of twenty-eight stanzas, and enumerates the great kings and warriors who sleep on the hill of Royal Cruachan, ending with the valiant Dathi, whose grave is marked by a red pillar stone, which stands there to-day, even as it stood before St. Patrick crossed the Shannon to preach the Gospel to Laeghaire's daughters on that famous hill. This poem has been published by Petrie in his Essay on the Antiquities of Tara Hill.
The history of the valiant King Dathi is full of charm for our Celtic poets, and several of them have sought, not unsuccessfully, to reproduce the spirit of the original poem by Torna Eigas. Better than all others poor Clarence Mangan tells in quite Homeric style:--
"How Dathi sailed away--away-- Over the deep resounding sea; Sailed with his hosts in armour gray, Over the deep resounding sea, Many a night and many a day; And many an islet conquered he, Till one bright morn, at the base Of the Alps in rich Ausonian regions, His men stood marshalled face to face With the mighty Roman legions....
But:-- Thunder crashes, Lightning flashes, And in an instant Dathi lies On the earth a mass of blackened ashes. Then mournfully and dolefully The Irish warriors sailed away Over the deep resounding sea."
Reference is made in our ancient extant manuscripts to several 'Books' now lost, which are said to have been written before the arrival of St. Patrick in Ireland. It is unnecessary, however, to refer to those in detail; because any statements about their character and origin can be little better than mere conjecture. O'Curry names several of them, and tells all that can possibly be known about them. The "Cuilmen" appears to have been one of the oldest and most celebrated, because it contained the great epic of ancient Erin known as the "Tain Bo Chuailnge." Another famous ancient 'Book,' now lost, was the "Cin Droma Snechta," or the Vellum Stave Book of Drom Snechta, as O'Curry translates it. It is quoted in the Book of Ballymote, and in the Book of Lecan.
Another lost work, to which we have already referred, was the Book of Ua Chongbhail. It was extant in the time of Keating, who quotes it as one of his authorities, but it has since been unfortunately lost, and nothing is now known of its contents.
II.--SEDULIUS.
It is said, however, that there were not only pagan writers and scholars, like Cormac Mac Art, in Ireland before the time of St. Patrick, but that several celebrated Christian writers, who flourished before the advent of our national Apostle, were of Irish birth or parentage. And this is the opinion, not merely of superficial writers, but of grave and learned men like Colgan, Usher, and Lanigan; and what is more, it has been admitted by foreigners as well as by our native authorities. These authorities have claimed for Ireland the great glory of having given birth to the celebrated Sedulius, the Christian Virgil, as he has been most appropriately called. The more doubtful honour of producing Caelestius, the associate of the heresiarch Pelagius, has been also claimed for Ireland; and according to others Pelagius himself was at least of Irish extraction. We propose to examine at some length the history of these writers, and especially to examine the evidence in favour of their alleged Irish origin. In the first place we shall give a full account, so far as it is now possible to ascertain his history, of the celebrated poet Sedulius.
In the best MSS. the name given is always "Caelius Sedulius," and although the praenomen savours of Latin origin, and the nomen itself was not quite unknown in Rome,[34] still the name Sedulius gives decided indications of his Irish birth. At least two other distinguished Irishmen bore the same name. The first is that Sedulius of Irish origin, the Bishop of Britain, as he describes himself,[35] who subscribed the Acts of the Council of Rome held under Gregory II., in A.D. 721. The other, known as Sedulius the Younger, flourished in the first quarter of the ninth century, wrote a Commentary on St. Paul's Epistles, and, as we shall see, has been frequently confounded with his more celebrated namesake, the poet. The old form of the name in Irish was Siadhal, or Siadhel, now pronounced Shiel. But in these older forms of the language the letters were not mortified in pronunciation; and thus Sedulius is naturally the latinized form of the Irish name. From the dawn of our history it was a name celebrated in Irish literature, especially in the department of medicine. Colgan refers to eight distinguished Irishmen who bore the family name of Siadhal, amongst others to Siadhal, son of Luath, Bishop of Dubhlinn, whose death on the 12th of February, 785, is recorded in the Martyrology of Donegal. The Danes, indeed, had not arrived in Dublin so early as A.D. 785, nor is there any satisfactory evidence of a diocese of Dublin at that time. He may, however, have been an abbot in the place, with episcopal orders.
The oldest writer[36] who distinctly asserts that the poet Sedulius was an Irishman is John of Tritenheim, or Trithemius, as he is more generally called.[37] This Trithemius, Benedictine abbot of Spanheim, flourished towards the end of the fifteenth century, and was certainly a very learned man. In some of the statements, however, made in this paragraph, he is not supported by any ancient authority that we know of. It is, moreover, evident from the list of the writings of Sedulius which he gives, that he confounds the poet with the commentator on St. Paul and St. Matthew, who, as all admit, was an Irishman, but flourished nearly four centuries later than the poet. Colgan, Usher, Ware, and a host of other writers at home and abroad, have followed Trithemius, and made the poet an Irishman.
It is, however, certain that, although there is some evidence that he was of Irish birth, there is absolutely no evidence that he was a native of any other country. It was, indeed, said that the poet was a Spaniard, and Bishop of the Oretani, but Faustinus Arevalus, himself a Spaniard, and author of a very able dissertation on Sedulius, prefixed to his splendid edition of the Christian Poets of the Fourth Century, published at Rome in A.D. 1794, declares that love of truth compels him to admit that the story of his preaching at Toledo, and of his Spanish episcopacy, is fabulous.[38]
Let us now try to ascertain what is known with certainty of this great Christian poet, whether Irishman or not.
In the "Palatine" Codex of the Vatican Library, No. 242, there is a paragraph which states that "Sedulius was a Gentile, but learned philosophy in Italy, was afterwards converted to the Lord, and baptized by the priest Macedonius, then came to Arcadia, or according to other MSS., Achaia, where he composed this book," that is his Carmen Paschale.
In the Vatican Codex, No. 333, probably of the eleventh century, it is added that "St. Jerome, in his Catalogue of Ecclesiastical Writers, says that Sedulius was at first a layman, learned philosophy in Italy, and afterwards, by the advice of Macedonius, taught heroic and other kinds of metre in Achaia; he wrote his books in the time of Valentinian and Theodosius," etc. Substantially the same statement is found in nearly all the twelve MSS. in the Vatican.
The scribe attributes to St. Jerome, who died in A.D. 420, that continuation of Jerome's great Catalogue of Ecclesiastical Writers, which was really the work of Gennadius of Marseilles, who flourished in A.D. 495--the very time, as we shall see, that the writings of Sedulius were published. We find no statement of this kind about Sedulius in Gennadius' Catalogue, as actually published, but Sirmond declares that he himself saw in some copies of Gennadius, that Sedulius died during the reign of Valentinian and Theodosius the Younger, to the latter of whom, as he alleges, he had dedicated his work.
We may then take it as certain that Sedulius flourished during their joint reigns, that is, at some period from A.D. 423 to 450, when Theodosius died; and in all probability Sedulius himself had died some years previously--that is, between A.D. 445 and 449. He is described as at first a layman and a Gentile, which is not at all unnatural, especially if he were a native of Ireland. There were indeed some Christians in Ireland before the time of St. Patrick, for Palladius was sent in A.D. 431, the year before the mission of St. Patrick "to the Scots who believed in Christ;"[39] but these Christians were not numerous. At the beginning of the fifth century, however, considerable intercourse, sometimes friendly, and sometimes hostile, existed between the Scots of Ireland and the natives of Roman Britain as well as of Roman Gaul. It would be very easy, therefore, for a young Irishman to join a band of his roving countrymen, and after learning Latin in the provincial schools of France or England, he would naturally in his search after philosophy, migrate to Italy, and there find the double treasure of faith and wisdom.
Sedulius is said to have penetrated from Italy to Achaia, where he became the pupil and intimate friend of the priest Macedonius. This much is manifest from his own writings, for in the dedication of his Carmen Paschale,[40] he touchingly alludes to the progress in Christian wisdom which he had made under the guidance "of his most holy father." He adds that previously he had devoted to secular studies the energies of that restless mind--vim impatientis ingenii--which Providence had given him; and had made his literary training subservient, not to the profit of his soul and the glory of his Maker, but to the fruitless tasks of this fleeting life. Arevalus justly observes that if Sedulius had been baptized by Macedonius, he would not have omitted all reference to it in this dedication, whence we may fairly conclude that although he received most of his religious training from the venerable Macedonius, he must have been already a Christian when he came to Greece.
The same dedication leads us to infer that at this time he was a member of some kind of religious institute, which was under the guidance of Macedonius, and in which he himself taught rhetoric and poetry by the advice of his spiritual father. He gives, too, a very pleasing picture of the members of that religious association--of the Venerable Ursinus--a prelate full of priestly dignity--who had been once a soldier of Cæsar, and was then a soldier of Christ; of Laurence, the incomparable priest, who gave up his patrimony to the Church and the poor; of Gallicanus, likewise a priest, well read in secular books, yet meekest of the meek, teaching the rule of Catholic discipline by word, but still more by example; of Ursicinus, also a priest, and a man "of hoary patience and youthful old age;" of Felix, the truly happy; and of many others equally worthy of the dedication of his book. He makes special reference to the virgin Syncletice, who seems to have been a deaconess of the Church, noble by blood, but still more illustrious by her virtues, chastened by fasts, nourished by prayer, and spotless in purity.[41] Moreover, he adds, she drank so deeply of Scriptural lore, that had not her sex forbidden it, she was in every way qualified to become the teacher of others. Her sister, too, the young Perpetua, though her junior in years, was her rival in virtue, the chaste spouse of an honourable marriage. Such was the society of which Sedulius was a member during his sojourn at Achaia--holy, learned, and loving.
It seems very probable that it was during these happy years that Sedulius composed his great poem in some sweet valley under the shadow of the steep Arcadian Mountains, whose bold spurs are washed by the glancing waters of the Corinthian Gulf. Although the work was formally dedicated to Macedonius, and copies were doubtless multiplied for the benefit of his familiar associates, it does not appear that it was published for the literary world in general during the lifetime of the author. That publication seems to have taken place some years later, as we shall presently see, and under the direction of one who was eminently well qualified for the task.
How or where Sedulius ended his life, we have no means of ascertaining. Some say he returned to Rome, where he died about A.D. 449; others make him a bishop, but the see which he ruled cannot be ascertained; while many think he ended his life in Greece, amongst those dear associates of whom he speaks so tenderly in the dedication.
But although the poet himself seems to have been during his lifetime somewhat indifferent to worldly fame, his friends did not forget him.[42] There is a considerable variety of readings, but in substance all the MSS. agree that Sedulius left his poems scattered amongst his papers, and that the scattered portions of the Carmen Paschale especially were collected, arranged, and elegantly published by the ex-consul, Turcius Ruffus Asterius. We find two consuls of this name in the Fasti of the fifth century, one in A.D. 449, whose colleague was Protogenes, and the other in A.D. 494, whose colleague was Praesidius. Very many writers think that the publisher of Sedulius was that Asterius, whose consulate is fixed for A.D. 449. But as his praenomen was Flavius, it is much more probable that the consul of A.D. 494, who was also the editor of the splendid Medicean Codex of Virgil, must get the credit of collecting and preserving the poems of the great Christian poet who was perhaps Virgil's closest imitator.
Asterius prefixed to his edition an epigram,[43] which, according to some authorities, is addressed to Macedonius, the spiritual father of Sedulius; but as Macedonius was at this time, in all probability, some forty or fifty years dead, it is much more natural to suppose that the dedication of Asterius is addressed to the Pontiff Gelasius (A.D. 492-496), especially as the Pope, about that very time, had passed a signal eulogy on Sedulius, to which we shall immediately refer. In the year A.D. 494, or as others think in A.D. 495, that Pontiff held a council of seventy bishops, most learned men, in which he published his famous decree, "De recipiendis et abjiciendis Libris," which may be regarded as the first formal publication of an Index Expurgatorius. In this decree the Pontiff, after reciting the canonical books of the Old and New Testament, gives a list of the Fathers of the Church whose writings he particularly recommends to the perusal of the faithful. In this document emanating from the supreme teaching authority in the Church, we find the following honourable mention of Sedulius:--
"ITEM VENERANDI VIRI SEDULII PASCHALE OPUS, QUOD HEROICIS DESCRIPSIT VERSIBUS, INSIGNI LAUDE PRAEFERIMUS."
After this formal and emphatic approbation of the writings of Sedulius by the Pope, his works speedily became popular in all the monastic schools. Cassiodorus (A.D. 470-562), the senator, statesman, and monk, closely studied the Christian poet in his far-famed retreat on the Calabrian shore, and proclaims him by excellence the "Poet of Truth."[44] Fortunatus, the laureate of the royal and saintly Radegonde, himself the author of the Vexilla Regis and the Pange lingua, ranks the "sweet Sedulius" with Ambrose, Jerome, and Augustine.[45] The cruel Chilperic, an unworthy grandson of the great Clovis, instead of trying to govern his people like a king, spent his time in vain attempts to imitate the stately muse of Sedulius, and of course failed miserably in the attempt. Gregory of Tours tells us that his verses had no feet to stand on, and were composed in defiance of all the laws of metre.
The Irish monks of Bobbio carefully copied the poems of their great countryman, and the oldest existing MS. of the poet, which is still to be seen in the Library of the Royal Academy of Turin, is inscribed with the words--Liber Sancti Columbani de Bobbio.
Isidore of Seville, the greatest scholar of his age, compares Sedulius with his own great countryman, Juvencus, and recommends the study of their works in preference to those of the Gentile poets.[46]
Ildelfonsus describes him as the 'excellent' Sedulius, the poet of the Gospel, an eloquent orator, and truly Catholic writer; and another author declares that Sedulius left nothing unlearnt necessary to make him a perfect theologian, as well as a brilliant poet.[47] And in a somewhat similar strain Sedulius has been eulogised by all subsequent critics, from Bede to the present time.
Our remarks on the writings of Sedulius must necessarily be very brief, and for convenience sake we shall follow the order of the excellent edition by Arevalus as given in Migne's Patrology.[48]
His great work was the Carmen Paschale, as he himself calls it, which is preceded by that dedicatory epistle to which we have already referred. It is accompanied with a prose version which he furnished at the special request of Macedonius, and which he calls the Opus Paschale. The prose only serves to make the poetry more intelligible for half-educated scholars, like the similar prose translations in the Delphin editions of the Latin poets. The style, too, of the explanation is wordy and laboured, quite unlike the limpid elegance of the poetry. The Carmen Paschale in the MSS. is divided into five books. The first treats of the creation and fall of man as well as of the principal miracles recorded in the Old Testament; the second gives a beautiful account of the incarnation and birth of our Lord and the wonders of the Holy Childhood; the third and fourth deal with the miracles and noteworthy events of our Saviour's public mission; whilst the fifth details the passion, death, and resurrection of Christ. It is thus a poetic history of the wonders of the divine revelation as contained in the Old and New Testament. Each of the books contains from three to four hundred lines of heroic metre, in which the style and language of Virgil are as closely imitated as the nature of the subject will permit. The language is chaste, elegant, and harmonious; the verse is sweet and flowing, with scarcely a single rugged line, although sometimes one meets with a harsh or limping foot. The prosody, however, is on the whole wonderfully accurate, and the sentences are constructed with true Virgilian simplicity. The author had to deal with very many delicate topics, and he was of course greatly restricted in his choice of language by the necessities of the metre; yet in no single instance that we are aware of, has any fault been found with the poet on the score of any want of theological accuracy. The tone is generally elevated, imparting dignity by choice language even to commonplace topics, as Virgil does in the Georgics; but we cannot say that he often reaches the sublime. His muse takes few bold and daring flights, but, on the other hand, she never descends to what is mean or trivial. We would take the liberty of strongly recommending the careful perusal of this beautiful poem to priests who are anxious to read the great events of sacred history, clothed in elegant language and adorned with becoming imagery.
We have next the "Elegia," containing 110 lines in elegiac metre, which form a collection of moral maxims and examples borrowed from the personages and facts of sacred history.[49] Every second line is made to begin and end with the same clause, but used in different senses. The reader will probably agree with us in thinking that this style of composition is more likely to develop ingenuity than inspiration.
After the "Elegia" is the truly beautiful hymn beginning with the words, "A solis ortus cardine," some portions of which are familiar to most of our readers. It is an abecedarian poem, the first stanza commencing with the first letter of the alphabet, A, the second with B, and so on through the letters. It contains 92 lines, or 23 stanzas, and details the leading facts of the life of Christ in language that is very terse and striking. The first seven stanzas are read by the Church in the Lauds of her greatest festival on Christmas Day; and the next four at first Vespers of the Epiphany, but in the first line for the latter feast the words--
Hostis Herodes impie Christum,
are changed into--
Crudelis Herodes Deum Regem.
It is noteworthy, too, that the Introit of the Mass of the Blessed Virgin--"Salve Sancta Parens enixa puerpera Regem," as well as several other expressions in the Divine Office, are borrowed from the Carmen Paschale of Sedulius.[50] At the end of his poems the author adds a short epigrammatic prayer, in which he asks that the doctrines of the life of Christ, which he has written, may remain engraven in his heart, and so by doing the divine will he may secure a share in the joys of heaven.[51]
We have two double acrostic poems, eloquent with the praises of the great Sedulius, one attributed to a certain Liberius, of whom nothing further is known, and the other to Belisarius, if that be the true reading, who in some MSS. is described as a scholastic--that is, master or professor of a school of rhetoric. According to other critics this Belisarius, who so highly eulogises our Sedulius, was no other than the great general, the saviour of the Roman Empire, who was driven by the ungrateful master whom he had served to beg his bread.
What is most remarkable in these two poems, is that in both the acrostic represents our author as SEDULIUS ANTISTES. The latter term is usually applied, at least by Christian writers, only to bishops, and certainly goes to show that the poet was elevated to the episcopal dignity. Alcuin also attributes the hymn, "A solis ortus cardine" to the "Blessed Bishop Sedulius," and Sigebert of Gembloux (died A.D. 1112), seems to have been of the same opinion. Yet, in several MSS. he is spoken of simply as a priest, and even of those authors who describe him as a bishop none has determined his see.
It is very doubtful, too, whether our poet has any claim to be venerated as a saint. Our latest Irish hagiologist,[52] following Colgan, gives a very full account of the venerable Sedulius, under date of the 12th of February. But the name does not occur in any Martyrology at home or abroad, for the "Siatal bishop" on the 12th February, of the Martyrology of Tallaght, is evidently the same as Siadhal, son of Luath, Bishop of Dublin, who, according to the Donegal Martyrology, died in A.D. 785. That the poet was, however, a holy and venerable man, is abundantly evident from his writings as well as from the high estimation in which he was held both by contemporary and subsequent writers. Asterius, his editor, calls him the "Just;" Alcuin calls him the "Blessed;" another ancient writer describes him as "Sanctus;" and our own Colgan justly designates him "the Venerable Sedulius." That his fame as a Christian poet has been wide and enduring is sufficiently evident from the fact that no less than forty-one different editions of his works have been published at various times and places for the last four hundred years; and we cannot help endorsing the indignant exclamation of a German critic--"It is a shame that the Christian poets should be so much neglected, that the youth of our schools should know nothing even of the name of a writer like Sedulius, who with equal piety and learning transferred from profane to sacred subjects the style and sweetness of the Mantuan bard."[53]
III.--CAELESTIUS AND PELAGIUS.
Ireland has also been credited with the doubtful honour of having given birth to Caelestius, the friend and associate of the celebrated heresiarch Pelagius. We believe that notwithstanding the authority of many eminent Irish scholars, we can show that Caelestius was not an Irishman, and that the idea of his being a 'Scot' arose from misunderstanding a passage in the writings of St. Jerome, which passage was the only authority ever alleged in favour of his Irish origin. This celebrated passage is contained in the Preface to the Saint's Commentaries on Jeremias. Here it is--"He (Grunnius), though silent now himself, barks by the mouth of the Alban dog, a corpulent and unwieldy brute, better able to kick than to bite, who derives his origin from the Scottish nation in the neighbourhood of Britain."[54] Now so far as we know, this solitary sentence is the only original authority for the Irish birth of Caelestius; yet as a matter of fact it does not appear to refer to Caelestius at all, but to Pelagius himself. Grunnius, to whom the context clearly shows that St. Jerome refers, was a nickname often given by the saint to Rufinus of Aquileia. Rufinus was then (mutus) silent, most probably in death, but still barks through his disciple Pelagius--not Caelestius--who in the vigorous controversial language of the saint is described as an Alban or Scottish dog, filled with the porridge of his native country in the neighbourhood of Britain. As a matter of fact, however, Jerome does not say that the person of whom he is speaking was a Scot (whether of Erin or Alba), but that he was of Scottish origin, which is a very different thing. His Words are--"Habet progeniem Scotticæ gentis." He is of Scottish extraction, which might be very well said of Pelagius, even though he were a Briton by birth.
The great difficulty in the way of this explanation is that Pelagius is always described as a Briton, not as an Irishman or Scotchman. As a fact, however, at that time Scotland was included under the name of Britain; but whether it was or not, St. Jerome does not say that Pelagius was a Scot, but that he was of Scottish race, which is altogether different, and which is perfectly compatible with his British birth. The authorities indeed in favour of his being in some sense a Briton, are quite conclusive. St. Augustine, his greatest opponent, frequently speaks of Pelagius as a Briton.[55] St. Prosper of Aquitaine, who continued to assail him after the death of Augustine, describes him as a 'British snake;'[56] and in another passage he speaks of him as nurtured amongst the 'sea-girt Britons.' Elsewhere he describes Britain as the native land (patria) of the Pelagian heresy, which can be true only in so far as it produced Pelagius himself. Marius Mercator says,[57] like St. Jerome, that the first author of the heresy was the Syrian Rufinus, but being too cunning to expose himself to danger, he propagated his doctrines through the agency of the 'British monk' Pelagius. Everything, therefore, points to the fact that Pelagius was of British birth, but of Scottish origin. St. Jerome's expression--per Albinum canem--seems to point to a Scot of Alba rather than of Erin; but in any case the Scots of both countries, especially at this early period (A.D. 420), were of the same race. If Britain be taken to include Scotland, as it certainly did at that period, then 'de vicinia Brittanorum' must refer to Ireland; but it should be borne in mind that St. Jerome speaks not of Britain, but of the Britons--quite another thing.
But whether of Irish or Scotch descent, Pelagius was an able man. He appeared in Rome about the year A.D. 400. St. Augustine says he lived there for a long time and taught a school in that city. About the year A.D. 405 St. Chrysostom complained of the defection from his own supporters of the monk Pelagius, which would seem to imply that at that time he was known and esteemed at Constantinople, where he probably went to learn the Greek language, with which we know for certain that he was familiar. Before his departure from Rome, at the approach of Alaric in A.D. 410, he had published commentaries on the Pauline Epistles in which for the first time in expounding Rom. chap. v. verse 12, he gave expression to his heretical views. He had already acquired great influence in the imperial city, for Augustine says that he was learned and acute, and that his letters were read by many persons for the sake of their eloquence and pungency.[58] We have a very favourable specimen of his composition still extant in his Epistle to the noble lady Demetrias, who was quite as remarkable for her virtues as for her wealth and learning. Augustine found it necessary to caution her against the snares of Pelagius, and whoever reads this letter will readily admit that the caution was by no means unnecessary, for in graceful and elegant language he conveys excellent rules for the guidance of devout souls, just barely flavoured with the poison of his dangerous and subtle heresy, so flattering to the instincts of noble and generous natures.
On the other hand there is nothing known in connection with the history of Caelestius that could lead us to suppose that he was either a Briton or a Scot. He was, it is said, of noble birth--most likely a Gaul or Italian--but being from infancy a eunuch he spent his youth in a monastery which at that time (before A.D. 400) he certainly could not find in Ireland. From this monastery he wrote three letters to his relations, which as Gennadius tells us were of great utility for the guidance of all persons really anxious to serve God.[59] He afterwards became an advocate (auditorialis scholasticus) and was doubtless practising in the Roman Courts when, about the year A.D. 400, he first met Pelagius in the imperial city. The latter was very anxious to secure such an ally for his own purposes, for Caelestius was a man of great eloquence and courage, as well as of much keeness in disputation--acerrimi ingenii--just the very thing the ruder British Provincial wanted in his associate. Thus it came to pass that Pelagius succeeded in alluring to his own views the young and brilliant advocate, through whom he hoped to disseminate his own doctrines throughout the chief cities of the empire. But to suppose that such a man as Caelestius, born of noble Christian parents, whose youth was spent in a monastery, and who was able to write a spiritual treatise in Latin before he left it, and afterwards became an advocate in Rome--to suppose that he was born in Ireland some fifty years before the advent of St. Patrick is altogether out of the question. As a matter of fact there is not a shadow of ancient authority for any such assumption.
III. LEARNING IN IRELAND IN THE TIME OF ST. PATRICK
"'Tis morn on the hills of Innisfail." --M'Gee.
We now come to discuss the state of learning in Ireland during the sixty years commonly assigned to St. Patrick's preaching, that is from A.D. 432 to 492. We have seen that when the Saint landed on our shores, he did not, as is sometimes ignorantly asserted, find the Irish tribes utterly savage and barbarous. He found an organized pagan priesthood, which had a learning and philosophy of its own, similar to that of Gaul and Britain, when those countries were conquered by the Romans. He found the customary laws of the tribes reduced to a definite legal system, and administered by a body of Brehons, or judges, who had been specially trained for that office; and he also found that the annals of the nation were carefully preserved, and that the territories, rights, and privileges of the sub-kings were definitely ascertained and faithfully recorded in a great national register. The leading men of the tribes were certainly acquainted not only with the primitive Ogham Alphabet, but also with the letters, if not with the language, used in Britain and in Gaul by the Romans.
If St. Patrick himself could learn the Irish language during his captivity in Antrim, there was nothing to prevent Irish captives learning something of the Roman customs and Roman letters in Britain, and bringing that knowledge back with them to Ireland. Our ports were more frequented[60] by foreign merchants than the ports of Britain; our chieftains frequently harried their coasts and carried off both Gaulish and British Christians as captives; Irish princes were sometimes refugees in Britain, and British princes were sometimes allies and sometimes refugees in Ireland. It was, therefore, quite impossible that some knowledge of the language, and of the arts of the British provincials should not, during a period of three centuries, cross the British seas into Ireland. All our annals testify to the fact of this intercourse. Ireland was not surrounded by a wall of brass, or by a trackless sea, cutting off all communication with other lands. The wonder is not that something of Roman letters and civilization should penetrate to Erin--but the great wonder would be if the thing were otherwise.
The great defect in the Irish social system, as we have already observed, was the want of a strong central government. It is true that the Gaedhlic tribes in Erin recognised the supremacy of the High King of Tara; but that recognition was merely nominal. There was no really effective central government, strong enough to cause its authority to be enforced and respected throughout all the land. Able princes, like Cormac Mac Art, arose from time to time, who sought to correct this great evil. In proportion as they were successful in reducing the sub-kings to obedience, they were also able to extend the blessings of a yet imperfect civilization, which, however, could never come to perfection without an organized and settled government.
I.--ST. PATRICK'S EDUCATION.
But now a great change came over all the land. St. Patrick not only introduced the Christian religion into Ireland, but profoundly modified the laws, customs, and literature of the nation. To his influence in these respects we wish to call attention at present; but first of all, it is necessary to understand the sources of his own intellectual training, and the literary as well as the religious influences that moulded his own mind. We do not propose to enter at all into any of the manifold controversies that surround the facts and dates of the life of our great Apostle, but merely to reflect on those acts which his biographers generally admit.
It is agreed upon all hands that the Saint derived his literary aquirements, such as they were, from Gaul.[61] Reference is made to three distinct sources whence he derived his education--to St. Martin, to St. Germanus, and to Saints of some islands in the Mediterranean. His biographers are not agreed either as to the order in which our Saint visited those masters of a spiritual life, or the number of years he spent under each, but all unite in pointing to these three sources whence St. Patrick derived his learning and his holiness.
It must be borne in mind that Patrick was made a captive at the age of sixteen, and that he spent six years in captivity on the slopes of Slieve Mish, in the county Antrim. His education in his youth seems to have been much neglected, for he tells us himself that although born of noble parents according to the flesh--his father, Calphurnius, was a decurio, that is the head of a local municipium, most probably on the banks of the Clyde, in North Britain--still he had little or no knowledge of God, and could scarcely discern between good and evil. The years of his captivity served to open his mind to a higher spiritual life, but could afford him no opportunity of adding to his purely literary knowledge.[62] So when he succeeded under divine guidance in making his escape at the age of twenty-two, he was indeed a holy but certainly not a learned young man.
Escaping to France according to the generally received opinion, he first seems to have made his way to Tours, towards the closing years of the fourth century, for the date cannot be accurately fixed. At that time St. Martin, the soldier Saint, was Bishop of Tours, and led a life of extraordinary holiness and mortification at the monastery of Marmoutier, on the banks of the Loire, in the neighbourhood of that city. Many writers say that Patrick's mother, Conchessa, was a niece of St. Martin, and this fact would easily explain why St. Patrick fled for refuge and guidance to his venerable relative, whose fame at that time was spread over all France. The story of the relationship is strange enough, seeing that St. Martin was a native of Sabaria, in Pannonia, where he was born about A.D. 316. But though strange, it is not incredible, and goes far to explain the great veneration in which St. Martin of Tours has always been held in Ireland. The authors of the Third and Fifth Lives of St. Patrick, as printed by Colgan, tells us that the young Patrick spent four years under the guidance of St. Martin, who gave him, according to Probus, the tonsure and religious habit in his monastery of Marmoutier. It is not easy to fix the exact period. According to the common opinion, Martin died in A.D. 397, so that Patrick must have made his escape to Gaul in A.D. 393. Others, however, fix the date of St. Martin's death in A.D. 400 or 402, so that we shall not be far wrong if we suppose these years which Patrick spent under the guidance of St. Martin to have been the closing years of the fourth century.
They were certainly fruitful years for the young Apostle. In some respects the career of the soldier Saint was not unlike that of Patrick himself hitherto. His parents were gentiles, but Martin, in his youth, fled to the Church to become a catechumen and prepare himself for a life of holiness in the desert. Being, however, the son of a veteran--his father was a tribune in the imperial armies--they forced him at the age of fifteen to join the cavalry, and serve some twenty campaigns under Constantius and Julian the Apostate, before he recovered his freedom. He could, therefore, understand the dangers and difficulties that beset the path of his young relative, who was carried off a captive at the same age at which he himself had been forced to become a soldier. No one, too, was better qualified to guide the steps of Patrick up the steep ascent of virtue, and prepare him for his future apostolate than the aged soldier Saint.
The life of Martin and his monks at Marmoutier was the marvel of all the West. We have the picture drawn by one who witnessed it--by the eloquent, nobly-born, high-souled Sulpicius Severus, whose life of St. Martin is one of the most charming biographies ever penned.
He was indeed, the greatest example of saintly mortification hitherto seen in the West. When the people of Tours clamoured for Martin to become their Bishop, several prelates objected to his elevation, because his person was contemptible, his looks lowly, his clothes filthy, and his hair unkempt. The young soldier, it seems, had long before put off the mien and garb of a warrior, and put on that true nobility of soul, which so rarely accompanies gaudy apparel and lofty deportment. But in A.D. 371 they made him bishop all the same in spite of his mean appearance; yet Martin in no way changed his manner of life in consequence. He built himself a little cell close by his church, and there he spent his days, when he was not preaching to the people or traversing his diocese on foot.
But too many crowded round his cell in the great city, and then he betook himself to Marmoutier. It was at that time a lonely valley, less than two miles from Tours, on the right or north bank of the Loire, shut in on one side by a line of steep cliffs, and enclosed on the other by a sweep of the river, which at either extremity of the valley rushed close under the rocks and thus completely isolated the valley on both sides. Here Martin built himself a wooden cell, and was soon surrounded by a crowd of monks anxious to place themselves under his guidance. They lived for the most part in the damp caverns between the cliffs that overhung the stream. At one period he had eighty monks under his control in this desert valley. They had no property of their own, says S. Severus, but lived in common, neither buying nor selling anything. The younger members spent most of their time in writing and sacred study; the older gave themselves up to prayer. They seldom left their cells except to go to the Church, or to take their solitary meal in the evening, it would seem--post horam jejunii--and they never tasted wine except in sickness. They were clad in hair cloth--anything else they regarded as a criminal indulgence. Yet many of them were amongst the noblest in the land, and several of them afterwards became bishops of various cities.
Such was the society at Marmoutier of which our St. Patrick became a member. There is no doubt, that as one of the juniors, he gave himself up to prayer, penance, and sacred study in order to prepare himself for that high mission of which God as yet had only given him a dim vision. Many writers say that Martin must have been dead before Patrick's arrival in Gaul, and that our saint did not come to Tours until several years later, probably about the year A.D. 409 or 410. It matters little for our argument whether Martin was himself alive or not--his spirit reigned in Marmoutier, his rule and his disciples were there:--
"Dead was the lion; but his lair was warm; In it I laid me and a conquering glow Rushed up into my heart. Discourse I heard Of Martin still--his valour in the Lord, His rugged warrior zeal, his passionate love For Hilary, his vigils and his fasts, And all his pitiless warfare on the Powers Of Darkness."[63]
When Patrick had learned the discipline and divine wisdom of Marmoutier he seems to have spent some years with his friends in Britain,[64] and then in order to perfect himself in sacred studies, he put himself under the guidance of the great St. Germanus of Auxerre, who at that time enlightened all the Gauls.
Germanus was of noble birth, and completed his studies in Rome, where he adopted the profession of the law and practised for some time in the Courts with great applause. He was eagerly sought after by the first society in the capital, and having married a rich and noble lady he settled at Auxerre, where he was made governor of the province. He was passionately devoted to the chase, and used to hang the spoils of his hunting expeditions on a stately pear tree that grew in the centre of the city, where they were eagerly scanned by an admiring crowd. The Bishop, St. Amator, not relishing this vain display, had the tree cut down in the absence of Germanus, who, hearing of this outrage on the chief magistrate of the city, sought out the prelate, breathing vengeance. But the Bishop seems to have disarmed his resentment, and shortly after, sensible of his own approaching end, and finding Germanus in the church, he ordered the doors to be closed, and the people crowding round the magistrate took off his fine clothes, while Amator tonsured him on the spot, cutting clean away all his flowing hair. The event proved that it was done by a divine inspiration.
After the death of Amator, Germanus became Bishop of Auxerre, and led a life of extraordinary virtue and austerity, as we know from his biography written by an almost contemporary author, Constantius.
From the moment he was tonsured, his wife became to him as a sister; he sold his property which was considerable, and gave the proceeds to the poor and to the Church. His food was the coarsest and scantiest; he never ate wheaten bread, nor used any wine, or oil, or even vinegar, or vegetables. Barley bread and water, or a little milk, was his only refection. Twice a year, at Christmas and Easter, he took a little wine with water. He tasted ashes before his food; and threshed and ground with his own hands the barley of which his bread was made. A tunic and hood over a hair shirt were his only clothing in winter and summer; his bed was made of planks strewn with ashes, which soon became as hard as the board itself. He slept in his clothes, seldom removing anything but his belt and sandals, and his only covering at night was a piece of coarse cloth. He had no pillow for his head, and spent a great part of the night in tears and prayers for the sins of his life. Such was the episcopal life of the brilliant Germanus, the statesman and orator, the delight of Roman society, the keen huntsman in the field, the accomplished magistrate in the court; and such was the second teacher of St. Patrick. The Irish Lives call him the 'tutor' of our apostle, and all our ancient authorities are agreed that Patrick spent several years under the guidance of this holy and learned man. Some think he spent thirty years under Germanus; this, however, is an impossibility, for Germanus became bishop in A.D. 418, and went to Britain with St. Lupus of Troyes to extirpate the Pelagian heresy in A.D. 429--three years before the date of St. Patrick's own mission. Others say he spent fourteen years with Germanus, and this is more like the truth. One thing is certain, that our apostle owes to Germanus most of his sacred learning, which was very considerable as we shall see; and he learned not only "Queenly Science, and the forest huge of Doctrine," but what is more, he learned the wisdom that rules, the prudence that moderates, the patience that spares, and above all and beyond all the life hidden with Christ in God.
Germanus had built a monastery beyond the river in view of his episcopal city, but completely cut off from its noise and bustle. Every day he was wont to cross the stream in his little skiff to visit and instruct his beloved monks, of whom St. Patrick was one for many years. Thus slowly and surely, under the guidance of the holiest and most learned men in the West, did God prepare His servant Patrick for the work before him.
The Scholiast on St. Fiacc's Life of St. Patrick, which was written in the early part of the sixth century, tells us that Patrick accompanied Germanus on his journey to Britain in A.D. 429. If so, and the statement is highly probable, Patrick must have learned much during that memorable journey, and witnessed the famous 'Alleluia Victory' over the Saxons and Picts. These barbarians were just then making one of their usual incursions on the helpless Christians of Wales, when Germanus hearing of the approaching tumult, and learning the cause, led out on Easter Sunday his newly baptized catechumens, and having posted the mighty multitude amongst the steep hills that overlooked the valley through which the enemy had to pass, he calmly waited their approach. When they entered the valley, suddenly the mighty shout of the 'Alleluia' re-echoed through the mountains, and the affrighted barbarians thinking themselves surrounded by an immense army, fled in confusion without striking a blow. Germanus seems to have returned to France in A.D. 430 or 431.
It is said by most of our ancient authorities that it was Germanus who sent St. Patrick to Celestine to receive episcopacy and authority for the Irish mission.[65] Celestine at first refused, as he had already in A.D. 431 sent Palladius with authority to preach to the Scots, who believed in Christ--"Ad Scotos in Christum credentes." But when news was brought to Rome by his disciples, Augustine and Benedict, of the failure of that mission and the death of Palladius, Germanus sent Patrick again to Rome accompanied by a priest called Segetius, who gave testimony of his merits and desires. Perhaps it was in the interval between these two journeys that St. Patrick went to the Island of Lerins, near Cannes, on the coast of the department, now called the Alpes Maritimes.
Very many of our ancient authorities mention this visit to Lerins, or some other of the rocky islets that abound in that part of the Mediterranean, and several of which were then inhabited by holy men. It is said expressly in the Hymn of St. Fiacc, the oldest of St. Patrick's lives, that he studied the canons with Germanus, that the angel sent him across the Alps, and that he stayed in the islands of the Tyrrhene Sea. It is not easy to fix the date of this visit nor its duration; it is, however, in itself extremely probable, independently of the high authority of Fiacc's Metrical Life as well as of the Third Life, and Probus' Fifth Life. The Third Life represents our saint as spending several years in an island called Tamerencis, or, as Probus puts it, with the barefooted hermits in a certain island of the sea. This island in all probability was Lerins, and the barefooted hermits were the monks of St. Honoratus, who was thus the third teacher of St. Patrick.
When Honoratus, flying fame and friends, came to Lerins in A.D. 410, it was covered with dense shrubberies, through whose tangled masses innumerable serpents glided and scared away the fishermen, who chanced to land on the barren and inhospitable rock. But Honoratus was not to be daunted. With a few faithful companions he set to work, and soon cleared a space for their cells, and for such patches of agriculture, as would supply their scanty needs. The monks were patient and laborious; the soil was naturally not ungrateful. The serpents were banished, the brakes were all cut down, and fruit trees planted in their stead. There was a bright sky above, and glittering seas around; snow-capped mountains arose in the blue distance; orange groves wafted their delicious fragrance over the waters so that Lerins became an Eden, where the sights of nature were as fair, and the hearts of the men as pure, as they were in Paradise. There, too, St. Honoratus, afterwards raised in A.D. 429 to the See of Arles, founded a famous school which was long celebrated in the south of Europe, and produced some of the most distinguished scholars of the fifth century. Such were their piety and learning that all the cities round about strove emulously to have monks from Lerins for their bishops.
This was the last school in which St. Patrick made his final preparation before presenting himself to St. Celestine, and receiving his commission to preach the Gospel in Ireland. Not rashly surely, nor without due preparation in the greatest and holiest schools of the Continent, did Patrick undertake the work of God. Letters, borne by angels containing the voice of the Irish, had long been calling him; the wailings of the children from the wood of Focluth, by the shore of the western sea, whence he had escaped to France, were ringing in his ears night and day imploring Patrick to come and walk once more amongst them. He had prepared himself most carefully for his great mission; he was duly commissioned by St. Celestine, as both the Tripartite and the Scholiast on Fiacc's hymn expressly inform us; he received the blessing of the beloved teachers under whose guidance he had lived so long; and thus full of courage and trust in God, he set out for the difficult and dangerous task of converting the Irish nation to the faith of Christ.
II.--ST. PATRICK'S LITERARY LABOUR IN IRELAND.
St. Patrick not only converted the Irish, but purified their laws, gave new inspiration to their Bards, and laid the foundations of that system of education which for the next three centuries made Ireland the light and glory of all western Europe. We propose briefly to sketch his labours in these respects.
When Patrick arrived in Ireland in A.D. 432, after a fruitless attempt to convert his old master Milcho, he went straight to Tara, where King Laeghaire was then holding his court, and as might be expected, he at once came into collision with the Druids. They had already, according to the Tripartite, foretold his advent, for they were mighty magicians, and the two chief Druids of Erin, Lochru and Luchat the Bald, were then at Tara, as it was the time of the great Feast, and Tara was "the head of the idolatry and druidism of Erin."[66] Patrick lit his paschal fire at Slane on Holy Saturday, and when the two Druids beheld from the green slopes of Tara the strange fire, they at once told the king that the flame must be extinguished before morning, or it could never be extinguished in Erin. The angry monarch ordered his horses to be yoked, and set out to meet the bold stranger, who had dared to kindle the forbidden flame in sight of the royal palace. The Druid Lochru fiercely and enviously assailed Patrick in presence of the king at Slane, but at Patrick's prayer the impious man was first raised high in the air, and falling down his brains were dashed out on the ground before the king. Now although the monarch and his attendants feared much, and in their fear dared not touch the Apostle, yet we find that next day when Patrick suddenly appeared at Tara, the second Druid, Luchat the Bald, tried to poison him, but that attempt failing, he challenged the Saint to contend with him in miracles before all the people. Patrick readily accepted the challenge, and of course defeated the Druid, who was consumed to ashes in an attempt to save himself from the flames, while the youthful Benignus escaped the fiery ordeal unhurt.
These miraculous stories at least express one undoubted truth, that the conflict between Christianity and druidism was a conflict to the death. One or the other must be utterly routed; there could be no league between light and darkness, between Christ and Belial. The victory gained over druidism at Tara was conclusive; all the nation felt and recognised the might of the man who had conquered the royal Druids; for it was their proud boast that they held dominion over the elements and could make them work their will. But now there appeared a mightier man than they, who utterly vanquished them, and bound in strong bonds the Princes of Darkness, the real authors of their wondrous deeds. Elsewhere indeed they strove to renew the conflict, as when Patrick crossed the Shannon, the Druids of Cruachan, Moel and Caplait, brought a thick darkness over all the plain of Magh Aei. But, again, the power of Patrick's God vanquished them--the darkness was miraculously dissipated by Patrick, and they themselves were converted to the faith of Christ.
Yet when Patrick had proved the might of the God whom he adored, although he burnt the idolatrous books at Tara, and overturned the idols of Magh Slecht in Leitrim, and gave no toleration to heathen rites, still, in other respects he dealt tenderly with the failings and even with the superstitions of the people. Their sacred places were, in many cases, consecrated and utilized for Christian worship; the Druids themselves, when truly converted, were not deemed unworthy of a place in the Christian ministry; the wells and streams where pagan rites had been often celebrated, were blessed by the Apostle, and the ancient festivals of the Druids were now made to do honour to the Christian saints. Thus it came to pass that the mid-summer festival of paganism became henceforward a festival in honour of John the Baptist, and November Eve of the Druids was made the Vigil of All Saints.
III.--ST. PATRICK REFORMS THE BREHON LAWS.
One of St. Patrick's greatest works was his reform and ratification of the ancient Brehon Laws as embodied in the great compilation known as the Senchus Mor, or Great Antiquity. His labours in this respect claim special attention, for the Brehon Code prevailed in the greater part of Ireland down to the year A.D. 1600, and even still its influence is felt in the feelings and habits of the people. The laws of a nation necessarily exercise a great and permanent influence in forming the mind and character of the people; nor can the provisions of the Brehon Code be safely ignored by those whose duty it is even now to legislate for Ireland.
As explained before, the Brehon Code, which St. Patrick found in Ireland, owed its existence mainly to three sources, first to decisions of the ancient judges (of whom the most distinguished was Sen, son of Aighe), given in accordance with the principles of natural justice, and handed down by tradition; secondly, to the enactments of the Triennial Parliaments, known as the Great Feis of Tara; thirdly, to the customary laws, which grew up in the course of ages and regulated the social relations of the people, according to the principles of a patriarchal society, of which the hereditary chief was the head. This great Code naturally contained many provisions that regulated the druidical rights, privileges, and worship, all of which had to be expunged. The Irish, too, were a passionate and warlike race, who rarely forgave injuries or insults, until they were atoned for according to a strict law of retaliation, which was by no means in accordance with the mild and forgiving spirit of the Gospel. In so far as the Brehon Code was founded on this principle, it was necessary for St. Patrick to abolish or amend its provisions. Moreover, the new Church claimed its own rights and privileges, for which it was important to secure formal legal sanction, and to have embodied in the great Code of the Nation. This was of itself a difficult and important task.
The Senchus Mor explains the motives that prompted the revision of the Brehon Code with great clearness. Dubhthach Mac Ua Lugair, the Chief Poet and Brehon of Erin, was one of the first to believe in Patrick's Gospel at Tara; and it happened to be his duty to pronounce judgment on the man who slew Odhran, Patrick's Charioteer. Thereupon Patrick and Dubhthach convoked the men of Erin to a conference at Tara, as it would seem, and Dubhthach explained all that Patrick had achieved since his arrival in Erin, and how he had overcome Laeghaire and his Druids, by the great signs and wonders which he had wrought. "Then all the men of Erin bowed down in obedience to the will of God and St. Patrick. It was then that all the professors of the sciences in Erin were assembled, and each of them exhibited his art before Patrick in the presence of every chief in Erin. It was then too that Dubhthach was ordered to exhibit the judgments, and all the poetry of Erin, and every law which prevailed amongst the men of Erin, through the law of nature, and the law of the seers, and in the judgments of the island of Erin, and in the poets," who were at first the judges.
"Now the judgments of true nature which the Holy Ghost[67] had spoken through the mouths of the Brehons and just poets of the men of Erin from the first occupation of this island down to the reception of the faith, were all exhibited by Dubhthach to Patrick. Whatever did not clash with the Word of God, in the written Law, and in the New Testament, and with the consciences of the believers, was confirmed in the laws of the Brehons by Patrick, and by the ecclesiastics and chieftains of Erin, for the law of nature had been quite right except the faith and its obligations, and the harmony of the Church and the people. And this is the Senchus."
This great conference took place in the year A.D. 438. Of course the work thus briefly summarised was not done in a day. A regular Commission was appointed consisting of nine learned men representing the various classes and interests of the entire nation.
This Commission of Nine--from whom the Senchus was called the Nofis, or Knowledge of Nine--consisted of three Kings, three Bishops, and three men of Science. The Kings were Laeghaire, Corc, and Daire; the Bishops were Patrick, Benignus, and Cairnech; the men of Science, or antiquaries as they are called by the Four Masters, were Dubhthach himself, Chief Poet and Brehon of all Erin, Rossa, a Doctor of the Berla Feini, or legal dialect, which was very abstruse, and Fergus, a Poet, who represented the most learned and influential class in the country. Evidently Patrick had studied under Germanus to some purpose; no one can help admiring the skill which he displayed in organizing and selecting this great Commission.
It has been said that some members of this Commission, especially Corc and Cairnech, could not have been present from A.D. 438 to 441, that the former was dead, and the latter not yet born, seeing that he died, according to Colgan, in A.D. 534--nearly a hundred years later. This is not the place to enter into details; the answer, however, is very simple. King Corc was, it is true, grandfather of Aenghus Mac Nadfraich, who when a youth was baptized by Patrick at Cashel, in A.D. 445. But the latter had not then commenced his reign, and his grandfather may have been alive in A.D. 441, and for several years later, for we know, both from the Book of Rights, and the poems of Dubhthach, that he was a contemporary of St. Patrick.
As to the alleged death of Cairnech in A.D. 530, that Cairnech, whose festival day is set down on the 28th of May, was quite different from St. Cairnech of Tuilen (now Tulane in Meath), whose festival is the 16th of May, and who is said to have been one of the British saints, probably from Cornwall, that accompanied St. Patrick to Ireland. He it was who was chosen to act on the Commission which produced the Senchus Mor.
Benignus was a mere boy of some sixteen years of age when Patrick stayed for a night at the mouth of the Nanny River near Duleek, and being weary from his journey the Saint fell asleep on the green sward. Then the boy gathered sweet-smelling flowers and tenderly laid them in the Saint's bosom as he slept. "Stop doing that lest thou awake Patrick," said the others; and thereupon Patrick awoke, and blessed the boy, and foretold that he was to be the heir of his kingdom. So the boy was baptized and ever afterwards followed the Saint, who appointed him his Coadjutor Bishop in the See of Armagh, so early as A.D. 450. Benignus being young and carefully trained by St. Patrick, and also learned in the Irish tongue, in all probability acted as Secretary to the Commission, and drafted with his own hands the laws that were sanctioned by the Seniors. According to O'Donovan he was also the original author of the famous Chronicle called the Psalter of Cashel, which gives a full account of the laws, rights and prerogatives of the Monarchs of Ireland, and especially of the Kings of Cashel. He seems also to have been the original author of the Book of Rights, although in its present form it gives manifest proof of considerable changes, and much later emendations.
Daire, the only remaining member of whom it is necessary to make any remark, seems to have been the same who granted Armagh to St. Patrick as a site for his Cathedral, and whose daughter was one of the first, if not the very first of the Irish maidens, who took the veil from the hands of St. Patrick, and with her companions, some the daughters of kings, spent her life of utter purity in working vestments for the priests, and altar-cloths for the service of the Cathedral. Yet romance was mingled with her name, for she:--
"The best and fairest, King Daire's daughter, Erenait by name, Had loved Benignus in her Pagan years. He knew it not; full sweet to her his voice, Chanting in choir. One day through grief of love The maiden lay as dead; Benignus shook Dews from the font above her, and she woke, With heart emancipate that out-soared the lark, Lost in the blue heavens. She loved the Spouse of Souls."[68]
Such was the Commission of Nine selected by St. Patrick to purify the ancient pagan Code. We have still in existence the fruit of their labours substantially unchanged, although as we might expect, a vast mass of accretions, in the shape of commentaries and glosses, has gathered round the original text. The Nine were, however, the real authors of the Senchus Mor, which still furnishes the most abundant and authentic materials for the study of our national history. It is a very large work, and the archaic text was so obscure that even O'Donovan and O'Curry were sometimes unable to explain its meaning. It is certainly the greatest monument in existence of the learning and civilization of the ancient Gaedhlic race in Erin.
St. Patrick not only reformed the State Organization, he also established a Church Organization in Ireland. He knew well that it was not enough to preach, and baptize, and build churches; it was necessary, if his work was to endure, to train a native ministry, and organize the native Church in harmony with the institutions and character of the Celtic tribes in Ireland. It was a very difficult task; for the tribes were still very simple and primitive in their habits, and were moreover devotedly attached to the tribal institutions, which had come down to them from a remote antiquity.
In accomplishing this task, which he did with perfect success, Patrick displayed singular firmness and prudence. Whenever there was question of principle, that is, of the truths of the Gospel and the teaching of the Church, he was, as might be expected, unyielding as the rock. But, on the other hand, he was no root-and-branch reformer; he dealt most tenderly with the usages and with the prejudices of the people. He utilized whatever was good in their existing habits and institutions, reformed what was imperfect, and lopped off what was evil. With druidism, for instance, he could make no terms. There could be no alliance between Christ and Belial; it must be utterly rooted out of the land. Not so with the Brehons, and the Brehon Code. He made no attempt to introduce the Roman Civil Law into Ireland; it would have been utterly unsuited to the tribal system. But he reformed the Brehon Code, and retained "all the judgments of a true nature, which the Holy Ghost had spoken through the mouths of the Brehons, and the just Poets of the men of Erin," thus winning over to his side that influential Order, who might otherwise have been arrayed against the propagation of the Gospel.
In like manner he dealt with the Bards. In a spirit of consummate prudence, he sought to secure the aid of that powerful corporation for his infant Church, and succeeded in establishing a friendly alliance with the Arch-Poet of Erin. Dubthach Mac Ua Lugair held the twofold office of Chief Poet and Chief Brehon of Ireland, and St. Patrick utilized his influence and his services in both capacities. He was the working head of the Commission for the reformation of the Brehon Laws; but St. Patrick seems also to have secured his influence as Chief Poet in procuring eligible candidates for the sacred ministry from the schools of the Bards--the most lettered class in the community. It was thus the young poet, Fiacc of Sletty, was ordained by Patrick on the advice and at the suggestion of Dubthach. St. Patrick indeed had every reason to be grateful to the Arch-Poet; he was the first to believe in the Saint's teaching at Tara, and rose up to do him honour even against the king's command; he aided in reforming the laws; he gave his most promising young pupils for the service of the altar, including several of his own sons, who otherwise would doubtless have followed the profession of their father.
This friendly alliance between St. Patrick and the Bardic Order is personified in the story of Ossian's relations with the Saint. According to the legend the venerable old man had long survived the fall of his house, and the destruction of the Fenian chivalry on the fatal field of Gabhra, yet lived on to find himself friendless and helpless under a new and strange order of things in Christian Erin. But Patrick in the true spirit of the Gospel took the homeless old man under his own protection, and, treating him with the greatest generosity and forbearance, sought to console him for the vanished glories of the heroic past, and fill his mind with brighter visions of a more glorious and immortal future beyond the grave:--
"Patrick, this other boon I crave,[69] That I to thee in heaven may sing Full loud the glories of the brave, And Fionn, my sire and king."
"Oisin, in heaven the praises swell To God alone from soul and saint;" "Then Patrick, I their deeds will tell In little whisper faint."
"Prince of thy country's tuneful choir, Thou wert her golden tongue. Sing thou the new strain, 'I believe,' Give thou to God her song."
It was in this spirit Patrick dealt with the Bards of Erin. They might keep their harps, and sing the songs of Erin's heroic youth, as in the days of old. But the great Saint taught them how to tune their harps to loftier strains than those of the banquet-hall or the battle-march. He sought to drive out from their songs the evil spirit of undying hate and rancorous vengeance, to impress the poet's mind with something of the divine spirit of Christian charity, and to soften the fierce melody of his war-songs with cadences of pity for a fallen foe. He taught the sons of the Bards how to chant the psalms of David, and sing together the sweet music of the Church's hymns. Thus by slow degrees their wild ways were tamed, their fierce hearts were softened, and the evil spirit of Discord gave place to the heavenly spirit of brotherly Love.
The Irish people[70] have been always passionately fond of music, and this was especially so in those early times when other strong attractions were entirely wanting. There can be no doubt that the Church music exercised a great influence in attracting the new converts to the services of the clergy both in the monastic and secular Churches--a fact of which St. Patrick was fully sensible. Hence we find that from the very beginning he made provision to have his new converts trained in psalmody.
St. Benignus, of whom we have already spoken, the sweet and gentle boy, who strewed the flowers in Patrick's bosom, and would not be taken from his side, is called "Patrick's Psalm-Singer" in the Lives of the Saint, as well as in the Annals of the Four Masters.
This plainly signifies that Patrick selected Benignus, doubtless on account of his sweet voice and skill in music, to be what should be now called his choir-master. Whenever a new Church and new congregation was founded, it would be the duty of Benignus from such materials as were at hand, to try and organize a Church choir, and conduct the musical service. He seems to have accompanied St. Patrick in all his earlier missionary journeys, and doubtless this would be the principal duty of the gentle youth who so well deserved his name.
This brings us to consider what provision St. Patrick made for training up a native ministry in the Irish Church, which would be competent to continue and perfect his work. The question is a very interesting one, and intimately connected with our subject; but the means of furnishing an answer are exceedingly scanty, and can only be gleaned with difficulty from isolated passages recorded in the Acts of the Apostle of Ireland.
The earliest instance on record is that of St. Benignus himself, which shows that from the very beginning of his missionary career, St. Patrick had this purpose of training up a native ministry to continue his work strongly before his mind. When the Saint was on the point of starting on his journey from the house of the father of Benignus, he had one foot on the ground and the other in his chariot, when the boy rushed up, and caught hold of Patrick's foot with his two hands, crying out, "Oh, let me go with Patrick, my father."[71] And when they were going to take him away Patrick said--"Baptize him, and put him with me in my car, for he will yet be the heir of my kingdom." This was done, and Benignus never afterwards left Patrick. He accompanied him on his missionary journeys; he conducted the musical services of the Church for Patrick, and he died the heir of his kingdom, that is, Coadjutor Archbishop of Armagh, about the year A.D. 468--long before St. Patrick himself went to his rest. It is evident, therefore, that St. Benignus was trained for the sacred ministry under the personal care of St. Patrick. And, as we shall presently see, this was the usual course before the monastic schools were yet established in Erin, to train the young levites under the personal care of some other ecclesiastic, priest or bishop, as the case might be. In nearly the same way Patrick happened about the same time to meet Mochae of Noendrum, while he was yet a boy, herding swine, and "Patrick preached to him, and baptized him, and tonsured him," thus selecting him as a candidate for the ecclesiastical state. Of this Mochae, one of the earliest disciples of St. Patrick, we shall see more hereafter, when we come to speak of the school of Noendrum.
Yet it must not be supposed that St. Patrick came single-handed to preach the Gospel in Erin, and that he had no assistance until these boys were old enough to become themselves priests and bishops. We know that the contrary was the fact.
We are told by a very ancient authority[72] that the Saint was accompanied to Ireland by a great number of holy bishops and priests and deacons, and other youths in minor orders whom he had himself ordained for the Irish Mission. They were Britons, Franks, and Romans, the latter term simply meaning that some amongst them enjoyed the rights of Roman citizenship. Many of them were his own blood relations, like Sechnall or Secundinus, the son of Patrick's sister, Darerca. Others, like Auxilius and Iserninus, are said to have been sent by Germanus of Auxerre to aid St. Patrick in preaching to the Irish. These two prelates, however, though ordained with St. Patrick, did not come to Ireland for some time after the arrival of St. Patrick. Iserninus founded his church at Kilcullen in the co. Kildare, and Auxilius founded Killossy, in the barony of Naas, which takes its name Cill-Usailli (Gen. of Ausaille) from that Saint.
The names of these two bishops are chiefly memorable in connection with a celebrated Synod--the first held in Ireland--which is commonly called the Synod of Patrick, Auxilius, and Iserninus. Having been ordained Priests, if not Bishops, on the same day with St. Patrick himself, these two prelates seem to have enjoyed a certain kind of co-ordinate authority with Patrick, but still in subjection to his primatial jurisdiction. The name of Secundinus is not mentioned in connection with this Synod, which was held A.D. 447 or 448, either because he was already dead, or did not possess independent jurisdiction as one of the original episcopal founders of the Irish Church. We cannot now enter into the question how far all the Canons attributed to St. Patrick in the great collections published by several writers are genuine, or merely circulated under his name with a view to lend them greater authority.[73] Those attributed, however, to the Synod of Patrick, Auxilius, and Iserninus are commonly regarded as authentic,[74] and indeed bear intrinsic evidence that they were framed at a time when paganism was yet common in Ireland.
The most celebrated of these Canons is that which formally recognises the supremacy of the Holy See as the Supreme Judge of Controversies--Si quae quaestiones (difficiles) in hac insula oriantur ad Sedem Apostolicam referantur.[75] A Canon to the same purport is contained in the Book of Armagh (fol. 21, b. 2) and is there expressly recorded as the decree of Auxilius, Patrick, Secundinus, and Benignus. After reciting that if any difficult case arose in the nations of the Scots it should be referred to the See of Patrick, the Archbishop of the Scots, for decision, it is added: "But if the aforesaid cause cannot easily be decided in it (Armagh), we decree that it be transmitted to the Apostolic See, that is, to the See of the Apostle Peter, which has authority over the city of Rome."[76] Another Canon (Lib. xxxiv. c. 2) orders that if a cleric go security for a gentile--that is, a pagan--and that the gentile fail to keep his engagement, the cleric must make good the loss from his own goods, and not contend with the adversary in armed strife. This Canon shows that a portion of the population was still unconverted, though living on terms of familiar intercourse with the Christians, both clergy and people.
This ecclesiastical legislation of Patrick and his assistant prelates must have exercised a most beneficial influence in restraining crime and superstition amongst all classes. The first element of civilization is the recognition of the reign of law instead of brute force; and that was a lesson which it was especially necessary to inculcate on the Irish tribes.
Hence the Apostle inculcates at some length, and in very beautiful language, the duties of the ecclesiastical judges and of good kings, while he does not spare to draw the sword of excommunication against the crimes and excesses of all, both rulers and subjects.
The judges of the Church, he says, must have the fear of God, not of man; and the wisdom of God, not the wisdom of the world, which is folly in His sight. They must not accept any gifts, for gifts blind the judgment; they must have before their minds, not secular cunning, but the precedents of the divine law (exempla divina). They should be sparing in their words, and slow to pronounce sentence, and above all never utter a falsehood, judging in all things justly, because as they judge others, by the same standard shall they themselves be judged. Principles like these thus solemnly enunciated must have exercised a very great influence in teaching all classes that respect for law and the rights of others, which is the foundation of all civilization.
Then the kings--a numerous class in Erin--were also taught their duties, and by one who was able to give a sanction to his teaching. The duty of the king is to judge no one unjustly; to be the protector of the stranger, the widow, and the orphan; to punish thefts and adulteries; not to encourage unchaste buffoons, nor exalt the wicked, but root them out of the land; to put to death parricides and perjurers; to defend the Church and give alms to the poor; to select just and wise ministers, and prudent counsellors; to give no countenance to druids, or pythonesses, or augurers; to defend his country in strength and in justice; to put his confidence in God, not being elated by prosperity nor cast down by adversity; to profess the Catholic faith and restrain his sons from evil deeds; to give time to prayer, and not to spend it unduly in unseasonable banquets. This, he says, is the justice of a king, which secures the peace of the people, the defence of the country, the rights of the poor, and all other blessings spiritual and temporal, including fruitful trees, abundant crops, genial weather, and universal happiness. Such were the noble principles inculcated by St. Patrick in his preaching, formulated in his laws, and enforced by all the power of his authority.[77]
Although St. Patrick was accompanied to Ireland by a very considerable number of clerics of every order to aid him in his great task of the conversion of Ireland, still he must have found it difficult, as new churches were founded and the foreign clergy died out, to supply labourers for the ripening vineyard. As yet there were no Christian Schools in Erin. Armagh was probably the first, but Armagh was not founded until A.D. 445, when the site of a cathedral was granted by Daire to Patrick on Macha's Height. The school could not be organized for some years later, perhaps about the year A.D. 450.
But meantime Patrick had organized a kind of peripatetic school, which accompanied the Saint in his frequent missionary journeys through the various parts of the country. He himself spent his time in preaching, baptizing, founding churches, and making such provision, as he could, for the administration of the sacraments and the celebration of Mass. The clerical students, his disciples, accompanied him, and in this way were able to obtain both theoretical and practical instruction in the work of missionary life. The instruction which the Bards, Brehons, and Druids communicated to their disciples was mainly, if not exclusively, of an oral character. The memory was highly trained by exercise, and the art of recitation was carried to a wonderful degree of perfection. The disciples too accompanied the master on his rounds from one chieftain's dun to another, and were sharers in the hospitality and rewards, which were freely bestowed on all.
Oral instruction of a similar character was doubtless also communicated by St. Patrick to his disciples during their missionary journeys, as well as in those places where he and his household remained for any considerable time. Books were scarce, but were not unknown. The British and French clergy no doubt brought with them to Ireland such books as were indispensable for a missionary priest or bishop. These would be a Mass-book, a ritual, and a copy of the psalms, and of the Gospels. They were carried in leathern wallets slung from the girdle, and sometimes in covers, or cases of wood, strengthened and adorned with metallic rims and clasps. Such were the book-covers (leborchometa), which St. Asicus of Elphin used to make for Patrick.[78] Once also when Patrick was journeying from Rome he met six young clerics with 'their books at their girdles,' who were going to the holy city on their pilgrimage. And Patrick gave them a hide of seal-skin, or cow skin--it is doubtful which, says the narrator--to make a wallet, as it would seem, for their books, for they had it adorned with gold and white bronze.[79] Palladius left books (libru) after him in Leinster, and both Patrick and the Druids had books at Tara, and Patrick's books (libair) once fell into one of the streams that flow into the Suir and were 'drowned.' Probably these were some of the books which Celestine gave to Patrick, 'in plenty,' when he was about to come to Ireland.[80] Patrick gave Deacon Justus of Fuerty in the co. Roscommon, his own book of ritual and of baptism (lebar nuird ocus baptismi.)[81] He also carried across the Shannon the books of the Law and of the Gospel, and left them in the new Churches which he founded.[82] Lebar n-uird is the same as Liber ordinis, and means a missal, or Ordo Missae, and the Liber baptismi would be what we now call a 'ritual,' containing the forms for the administration of the sacraments. In Tyrawley the Saint gave Bishop Mucknoi, whom he there ordained, "seven Books of the Law," in order that Mucknoi himself might ordain other bishops and priests, and deacons in that country, and as it would seem, have copies of the Books of the Law to give them. (Book of Armagh, f. 14.)
These books St. Patrick and his companions in all probability carried with them from the Continent. But there was one kind of smaller book corresponding to our smallest and simplest form of catechism, which the Saint usually wrote for his favourite disciples with his own hand. It is sometimes described as the 'Elements,' and sometimes as an 'Alphabet,' or brief outline of the essential truths of Christianity. It was the first book put into the hands of the educated converts, who knew how to read and write, which was always an indispensable qualification for admission into the ranks of the clergy. Of course the common people could be duly taught the essential truths of religion by oral instruction. It was for those whom he destined to be themselves teachers that he wrote the 'Elements' or 'Alphabets' of the Christian Doctrine. The phrase in Latin is scripsit elementa, corresponding to the Irish scribais aipgiter, and sometimes scripsit abigitorium (as in the Book of Armagh, f. 13).
The word aipgiter or abgitir has been frequently used in this sense in ancient Irish manuscripts, not to express the letters of the alphabet, but a simple compendium of the art or other subject in question. Thus abgitir crabaith means the alphabet of faith, that is, the simple and fundamental truths of faith; abigiter in crabaid is the 'alphabet of piety,' and so in similar cases. Patrick had no suitable work for this purpose, and, hence, he himself frequently wrote a catechism or outline of these elementary truths of the Christian doctrine suited to the capacity of the learners.
So we find that the equipment of a young priest beginning his missionary work was very simple. He got in the way of books his abigitorium, or catechism, his Mass-book (or Liber ordinis), his ritual, his psaltery, and when it could be spared a copy of the Gospels; and then if he were a bishop Patrick gave him also, as he did to Fiaac of Sletty, a case (cumtach[83]) containing a bell, a chalice, a crozier, and book-satchel with the necessary books. We have distinct evidence too, from the Epistle to Coroticus, that he himself taught these students. He describes the messenger who carried that letter to the tyrant as a holy priest, whom he (Patrick) had taught from his childhood (infantia). The reference can scarcely be to St. Benignus, his coadjutor in Armagh, for Benignus died A.D. 457 or 458, many years in all probability before the Epistle to Coroticus was written. It is more likely the apostle refers to Mochae of Noendrum, who was a tender youth when the Saint first met him in A.D. 432, when he baptized the boy and gave him a gospel and a menistir, which means a chalice and paten. Dr. Whitley Stokes translates it 'credence-table,' which is unlikely, as it was sometimes made of creduma or bronze,[84] and in low Latin ministerium[85] was frequently used to designate the utensils for the Holy Sacrifice.
St. Patrick, coming as he did, into a pagan country altogether outside the pale of Roman civilization, had many difficulties to overcome, and exercised great ingenuity in overcoming them. He sought to procure everything required for public worship of native manufacture, and indeed he had no other means for the most part of procuring them. Whatever was necessary in the public worship of God, with the exception of some books and the relics of the saints, was made in Ireland, and by artificers, who though otherwise well skilled in their various crafts, were quite new to this kind of work. But the apostle met this difficulty by having artificers, who gave their exclusive attention to the manufacture of these necessaries of divine worship, and he promoted them as a reward for their labours even to the highest offices in the Church. His family or household included persons so trained in every branch of technical knowledge necessary for the due equipment of a Church, and they were all in holy orders.
This household, which numbered twenty-four persons generally accompanied him in his missionary journeys from place to place in order to provide all things necessary for the young Churches which he founded. The list of their names and functions is given in the Tripartite. Sechnall, his nephew, was his 'bishop,' that is his coadjutor[86] in spirituals and temporals, especially in his episcopal functions, in consecrations, ordinations, and so forth. Benen was his psalm-singer to lead and teach the Church choirs. Mochta of Louth was his priest, or as we now say, his 'assistant priest,' and attendant in the public functions of the church. Bishop Erc, a Brehon by profession, was his judge, and no doubt a very necessary official in dealing not only with the clergy, but also with the frequent controversies that arose amongst the chiefs and were referred to Patrick's arbitration. Bishop Mac Cairthinn was his champion, or rather strong man, to bear him over the floods, and perhaps defend him against rude assaults in an age of lawless violence. Colman of Cell Riada was his chamberlain or personal attendant. Sinell of Cell Dareis was his bell-ringer, an officer whose duty it was to carry with him the famous hand-bell of the Saint, and no doubt also to ring it at appropriate times, especially during Divine Service, for the purpose of securing due attention to the sacred mysteries. He had also a cook, brewer, chaplain at the table, two waiters, and other officers necessary for providing food and accommodation for himself and his household. It must be borne in mind that in those days there were no hotels; frequently the apostle with his attendants had to camp out, and procure their own food--often too, in face of an unfriendly, or even hostile population. Hence, he was sometimes reduced to great straits for food, and more than once we find him begging the fishermen to try and procure a fish for his refection when nothing else was forthcoming.
We are also told that Patrick had three smiths, and three artificers, and three embroideresses in his company. The smiths, like St. Asicus of Elphin, made altars, and square tables, and book-covers, and bells for the churches, which were founded by St. Patrick. His artificers were Essa, Bite, and Tassach. They may be described as artificers both in wood and metal, and church builders, who erected the primitive churches mostly of wood founded by the apostle. Bite was a son of Asicus, and hence a skilled workman like his father, both as a smith and carpenter. Tassach is spoken of as making patens and credence-tables, and altar-chalices; he also made a case for St. Patrick's crozier--the celebrated staff of Jesus. He was Bishop of Raholp, not far from Downpatrick, and was privileged to administer the Body of Christ to his dying master. The three embroideresses, Lupait, sister of Patrick, and Erc, daughter of Daire, and Cruimtheris, made with their own pure hands the vestments and altar linens used during the Holy Sacrifice in the churches of Erin.
"Beneath a pine three vestals sat close veiled: A song these childless sang of Bethlehem's Child, Low-toned and worked their altar cloth, a Lamb All white on golden blazon; near it bled The bird that with her own blood feeds her young. Red drops her holy breast affused. These three Were daughters of three kings."--Aubrey de Vere.
Although St. Patrick did not in the ordinary sense of the word establish schools such as are frequently mentioned in the next century, he not only trained candidates for the sacred ministry during the earliest years of his mission, but also seems to have established in his own city of Armagh a school for carrying on that work in a more regular and efficient manner. Having the care of all the Churches of Ireland on his own shoulders, he could not govern this school in person. But we are told that he placed over it his best beloved disciple Benignus, who was, so far as we can judge, eminently qualified to discharge that high office. Before, however, we proceed to give an account of this celebrated school of Armagh, it will be necessary to give a short account of the writings of St. Patrick himself and of those attributed to the more eminent amongst his disciples and contemporaries.