CHAPTER V
Advent of St. Patrick—His Wonderful Apostolic Career in Ireland—A Captive and a Swineherd for Years, he Escapes and becomes the Regenerator of the Irish Nation
A MAJORITY of learned historians claim that Christianity was introduced into Ireland by Catholic missionaries from the continent of Europe long before the advent of the accepted national apostle, St. Patrick, who, in his boyhood, was captured on the northern coast of Ireland, while engaged in a predatory expedition with the Gauls, or some other foreign adventurers. In regard to this period of the future apostle’s career, we are mainly guided by tradition, as the saint left no memoirs that would throw light on his first Irish experience. Such expeditions were not uncommon in the age in which he lived, nor were they for ages that followed. It seems certain that his captors offered him no bodily harm, and he was sent to herd swine amid the hills of Down. This inspired boy, destined to be one of the greatest among men and the saints of God, remained a prisoner in the hands of the pagan Irish—whom he found to be a generous, and naturally devotional, people—for many years, and thus acquired a thorough knowledge of their laws, language, and character. Whether he was finally released by them, or managed to escape, is a question of some dispute, but it is certain that he made his way back to Gaul—now known as France—which, according to many accounts, was his native land, although Scotland claims him also, and thence proceeded to Rome, where, having been ordained a priest, he obtained audience of Pope Celestine, and was by him encouraged and commissioned to convert the distant Irish nation to Christianity. Filled with a holy zeal, Patrick repaired as rapidly as possible to his field of labor, and, after suffering many checks and rude repulses, at last, about the year 432, found himself back in Ulster, where he fearlessly preached the Gospel to those among whom he had formerly lived as a serf, with miraculous success. Afterward, he proceeded to the royal province of Meath, and on the storied hill of Slane, “over against” that of Tara, where the Irish monarch, Leary, was holding court, lighted the sacred fire in defiance of the edict of the Druid high-priest, who worshiped the fires of Baal and forbade all others to be kindled, and, by its quenchless flame, flung the sacred symbol of the Cross against the midnight skies of pagan Ireland. The pagan king summoned the daring apostle to his presence, and asked him concerning his sacred mission. Patrick explained it, and, having obtained the royal consent, proceeded to preach with an eloquence that dazzled king, princes, chiefs, and warriors. He even captivated some of the Druid priests, but the high-priest, who dreaded the apostle’s power of words, would have stopped him at the outset, had not King Leary extended to him his favor and protection, although he himself remained a pagan to the end of his life. The saint, having made a deep impression and converted many of high and low degree, took to baptizing the multitude, and tradition says that the beautiful river Boyne was the Jordan of Ireland’s great apostle. It was while preaching at Tara that St. Patrick’s presentation of the mystery of the Blessed Trinity was challenged by the Druid priests. He immediately stooped to the emerald sod, plucked therefrom a small trefoil plant called the shamrock—some say it was the wood sorrel—and, holding it up before the inquisitive and interested pagans, proved how possible it was to an infinite Power to combine three in one and one in three. Since that far-distant day, the shamrock has been recognized as the premier national symbol of Ireland, although the “sunburst” flag, emblematic of the Druidic worship, it is presumed, precedes it in point of antiquity. The harp, which is another of Ireland’s symbols, was adopted at a later period, in recognition of her Bardic genius.
St. Patrick, or rather Patricius, his Roman name, which signifies a nobleman, lived and labored for many, many years after he preached at Tara, and made many circuits of the island, adding tribe after tribe to the great army of his converts. So deep was the impression he made in the country that now, after the lapse of fourteen hundred years, which were perioded by devastating wars and fearful religious and social persecutions, his memory is as green and as hallowed as if he had died but yesterday. Mountains, rivers, lakes, islands, and plains are associated with his name, and thousands of churches, in Ireland and throughout the world, are called after him, while millions of Ireland’s sons are proud to answer to the glorious name of Patrick. He died at a patriarchal age, in the abbey of Saul, County Down, founded by himself, A.D. 493, and the anniversary of his departure from this life is celebrated by Irishmen of all creeds, and in every land, on each 17th day of March, which is called, in his honor, St. Patrick’s Day.
It is no wonder that the Irish apostle is so well remembered and highly honored. Since the disciples preached by the shores of the Galilee, there has been no such conversion of almost an entire people from one form of belief to another. The Druid priests, with some exceptions, struggled long and bitterly against the rising tide of Christianity in Ireland, but, within the century following the death of the great missionary, the Druidic rites disappeared forever from the land, and “Green Erin” became known thenceforth, for centuries, as the Island of Saints. Romantic tradition attributes to St. Patrick the miracle of driving all venomous reptiles out of Ireland. It is certain, however, that neither snakes nor toads exist upon her soil, although both are found in the neighboring island of Great Britain.
According to Nennius, a British writer quoted by Dr. Geoffrey Keating, St. Patrick founded in Ireland “three hundred and fifty-five churches, and consecrated an equal number of bishops; and of priests, he ordained three thousand.” “Let whomsoever may be surprised,” says Dr. Keating, “at this great number of bishops in Ireland, contemporary with St. Patrick, read what St. Bernard says in his Life of St. Malachias, as to the practice in Ireland with regard to its bishops. He there says that ‘the bishops are changed and multiplied at the will of the metropolitan, or archbishop, so that no single diocese is trusting to one, but almost every church has its own proper bishop.’” After this statement of St. Bernard no one can be astonished at the number of prelates mentioned above, for the Church was then in its young bloom. The number of bishops there mentioned will appear less wonderful on reading her domestic records. In them we find that every deaconry in Ireland was, formerly, presided over by a bishop. Irish annals show, also, that St. Patrick consecrated in Ireland two archbishops, namely, an archbishop of Armagh, as Primate of Ireland, and an archbishop of Cashel. After the great apostle’s death, a long and illustrious line of native Irish missionaries took up his sacred work and completed his moral conquest of the Irish nation. Nor did their labors terminate with the needs of their own country. They penetrated to the remotest corners of Britain, which it is said they first converted to the Christian faith, and made holy pilgrimages to the continent of Europe, founding in every district they visited abbeys, monasteries, and universities. Ireland herself became for a long period the centre of knowledge and piety in insular Europe, and the ecclesiastical seminaries at Lismore, Bangor, Armagh, Clonmacnois, and other places attracted thousands of students, both native and alien, to her shores. Gaelic, the most ancient, it is claimed by many savants, of the Aryan tongues, was the national language, and continued so to be for more than a thousand years after the era of Patrick; but Latin, Greek, and Hebrew formed important parts of the collegiate curriculum, and the first-named tongue was the ordinary means of communication with the learned men of other countries.
The art of illuminated writing on vellum was carried to unrivaled perfection in the Irish colleges and monasteries, and the manuscripts of this class preserved in Dublin and London, facsimilies of which are now placed in many American public libraries, as well as in those of European universities, bear witness to the high state of civilization attained by the Irish people during the peaceful and prosperous centuries that followed the coming of St. Patrick and continued until the demoralizing Danish invasion of the eighth century.
The roll of the Irish saints of the early Christian period is a large one, and contains, among others, the names of St. Columba, or Columbkill, St. Finn Barr, St. Brendan, the Navigator; St. Kieran, of Ossory; St. Kevin, of Glendalough; St. Colman, of Dromore; St. Canice, of Kilkenny; St. Jarlath, of Tuam; St. Moling, of Ferns; St. Comgall, of Bangor; St. Carthage, of Lismore; St. Finian, of Moville; St. Kieran, of Clonmacnois; St. Laserian, of Leighlin; St. Fintan; St. Gall, the Apostle of the Swiss; St. Columbanus, the Apostle of Burgundy; St. Aidan, Apostle of Northumbria; St. Adamnan, Abbot of Iona; St. Rumold, Apostle of Brabant; St. Feargal, Bishop of Salzburg. These are only a few stars out of the almost countless galaxy of the holy men of ancient Ireland. Of her holy women, also numerous, the chief were St. Bridget, Brighid, or Bride, of Kildare; St. Monina, St. Ita, St. Syra, St. Dympna, and St. Samthan. The premier female saint was, undoubtedly, St. Bridget, which signifies, in old Gaelic, “a fiery dart.” Modern slang often degrades the noble old name into “Biddy.” Although thought to be a purely Irish appellation, it has been borne by, at least, two English women of note. The Lady Bridget Plantagenet, youngest daughter of King Edward IV, and “Mistress,” or Miss, Bridget Cromwell, daughter of the Lord Protector of the English Commonwealth. Lady Plantagenet, who, in addition to being the daughter of a monarch, was the sister of Edward V and Elizabeth, Queen of Henry VII; the niece of Richard III and the aunt of Henry VIII, died a nun in the convent of Dartford, England, long after the House of York had ceased to reign. “Mistress” Cromwell became the wife of one of her father’s ablest partisans, and lived to see the end of the Protectorate, from which her brother, Richard, was deposed, and the restoration of the House of Stuart to the English throne.