Part 13 (1/2)

Hence, according to Probus, the magicians to whom the arrival of Patrick had been foretold, prepared themselves for the contest, and several chieftains supported them. Prestiges were, therefore, tried in antagonism to miracles; but, as Moses prevailed over the power of the Egyptian priests, so did Patrick over the Celtic magicians. It is even said that five Druids perished in one of the contests.

The princes were sometimes also punished with death. Recraid, head of a clan, came with his Druids and with words of incantation written under his white garments; he fell dead.

Laeghaire himself, the Ard-Righ of all Ireland, whose family became Christian, but who refused to abandon his superst.i.tions, perished with his numerous attendants.

But a more singular phenomenon was, that death, which was often the punishment of unbelief, became as often a boon to be desired by the new Christian converts, so completely were they under the influence of the supernatural. Thus Ruis found it hard to believe. To strengthen his faith, Patrick restored to him his youth, and then gave him the choice between this sweet blessing of life and the happiness of heaven; Ruis preferred to die, like Ethne and Felimia.

Sechnall, the bard, told St. Patrick, one day, that he wished to sing the praises of a saint whom the earth still possessed.

”Hasten, then,” said Patrick, ”for thou art at the gates of death.” Sechnall, not only undisturbed, but full of joy, sang a glorious hymn in honor of Patrick, and immediately after died.

Kynrecha came to the convent-door of St. Senan. ”What have women in common with monks?” said the holy abbot. ”We will not receive thee.” ”Before I leave this place,” responded Kynrecha, ”I offer this prayer to G.o.d, that my soul may leave the body.” And she sank down and expired.

The various lives of the apostle of Ireland and his successors are full of facts of this nature. Supposing that a high coloring was given to some of these by the writers, one thing is certain: the people who lived during that apostles.h.i.+p believed in them firmly, and handed down their belief to their children. Moreover, nothing was better calculated to give to a primitive people, like the Irish, a strong supernatural spirit and character, than to make them despise the joys of this earth and yearn for a better country.

There are, indeed, too many facts of a similar kind related in the lives of St. Patrick and his fellow-workers, to bear the imputation, not of imposition, but even of delusion. The desire of dying, to be united with Christ; the indifference, at least, as to the prolongation of existence; the readiness, if not the joy, with which the announcement of death was received, are of such frequent mention in those old legends, as matters of ordinary occurrence, surprising no one, that they must be conceded as facts often taking place in those early ages.

And, more striking still, this feeling of accepting death, either as a boon or as a matter of course, and with perfect resignation to the will of G.o.d, seems to have been throughout, since the introduction of Christianity, a characteristic of the Irish people. It is often witnessed in our own days, and manifested, equally by the young, the middle-aged, or the old.

The young, closing their eyes to that bright life whose sweetness they have as yet scarcely tasted, never murmur at being deprived of it, though hope is to them so alluring; the middle-aged, called away in the midst of projects yet unaccomplished, see the sudden end of all that before interested them, with no other concern than for the children they leave behind them; the old, among other races generally so tenacious of life, are, as a rule, glad that their last hour has come, and speak only of their joy that at last they ”go home” to that country whither so many of their friends and kindred have gone before them.

This in itself would stamp the Celtic character with an indelible mark, distinguis.h.i.+ng it from all other, even most Christian, peoples.

The second sign we find of the firm hold the supernatural had taken of the Irish from the very beginning is their strong belief in the power of the priesthood. This is so striking among them that they have been called by their enemies and those of the Church ”a priest-ridden people.” Let us consider if this is a reproach.

If Christianity be true, what is the priesthood? Even among the Greeks, from whom so many heresies formerly sprang before they were smitten into insignificance by schism and its punishment-- Turkish slavery--when the great doctors sent them by Providence spoke on the subject, what were their words, and what impression did they make on their supercilious hearers? St. John Chrysostom will answer. His long treatise, written to his friend Basil, is but a glowing description of the great privileges given to the Christian priest by the High-Priest himself--Christ our Lord.

When the great preacher of Antioch, though not yet a priest, describes the awful moment of sacrifice, the altar surrounded by angels descended from heaven, the man consecrated to an office higher than any on earth, and as high as that of the incarnate Son of G.o.d--G.o.d himself coming down from above and bringing down heaven with him--who can believe in Christianity and fail to be struck with awe?

Who can read the words of Christ, declaring that any one invested with that dignity is sent by him as he was himself sent by his Father, and not feel the innate respect due to such divine honors? Who can read the details of those privileges with respect to the remission of sin, the conferring of grace by the sacraments, the infallible teaching of truth, the power even granted to them sometimes over Nature and disease, without feeling himself transported into a world far above this, and without placing his confidence in what G.o.d himself has declared so powerful and preeminent in the regions beyond?

Such, in a few words, is the Christian priesthood, if Christianity possesses any reality and is not an imposture.

Among all nations, therefore, where sound faith exists, the greatest respect is shown to the ministers of G.o.d; but the Irish have at all times been most persistent in their veneration and trust. And if we would ascertain the cause of their standing in this regard, we shall find that other nations, while firmly believing the words of Christ, keep their eyes open to human frailty, and look more keenly and with more suspicion on the conduct of men invested with so high a dignity, but subject at the same time to earthly pa.s.sions and sins; while the Irish, on the contrary, abandon themselves with all the impulsiveness of their nature to the feeling uppermost in their hearts, which is ever one of trust and ready reliance.

But this statement, whatever may be its intrinsic value, itself needs a further explanation, which is only to be found in the greater attraction the supernatural always possessed for the Irish nature, when developed by grace. They accept fully and unsuspiciously what is heavenly, because they, more than others, feel that they are made for heaven, and the earth, consequently, has for them fewer attractions. They cling to a world far above this, and whatever belongs to it is dear to them.

Hence, from the first preaching of Christianity among them, all earthly dignities have paled before the heavenly honors of the priesthood. They have been taught by St. Patrick that even the supreme duties of a real Christian king fall far below those of a Christian bishop.

The king, according to the apostle of Ireland - and his words have become a canon of the Irish Church - ”has to judge no man unjustly; to be the protector of the stranger, of the widow, and the orphan; to repress theft, punish adultery, not to keep buffoons or unchaste persons; not to exalt iniquity, but to sweep away the impious from the land, exterminate parricides and perjurers; to defend the poor, to appoint just men over the affairs of the kingdom, to consult wise and temperate elders, to defend his native land against its enemies rightfully and stoutly; in all things to put his trust in G.o.d.”

All this evidently refers only to the exterior polity and administration. But ”the bishop must be the hand which supports, the pilot who directs, the anchor that stays, the hammer that strikes, the sun that enlightens, the dew which moistens, the tablet to be written on, the book to be read, the mirror to be seen in, the terror that terrifies, the image of all that is good; and let him be all for all.”

Under this metaphorical style we here discern all the interior qualities of a spiritual Christian guide, teaching no less by authority than example.

And, in the opinion of the converts of Patrick, were not the bishops, abbots, and priests, supported by an invisible power, stronger than all visible armies and guards of kings and princes?

”When the King of Cashel dared to contend against the holy abbot Mochoemoc, the first night after the dispute an old man took the king by the hand and led him to the northern city-walls; there he opened the king's eyes, and he beheld all the Irish saints of his own s.e.x in white garments, with Patrick at their head; they were there to protect Mochoemoc, and they filled the plain of Femyn.

”The second night the old man came again and took the king to the southern wall, and there he saw the white-robed glorious army of Ireland's virgins, led by Bridget: they too had come to defend Mochoemoc, and they filled the plain of Monael.” 1

(1 Many quotations in this chapter are from the ”Legend. Hist.”

by J. G. Shea.)

In the annals of no other Christian nation do we see so many examples of the power of the ministers of G.o.d to punish the wicked and help and succor the good, as we do in the hagiography of Ireland. Bad kings and chieftains reproved, cursed, punished; the poor a.s.sisted, the oppressed delivered from their enemies, the sick restored to health, the dead even raised to life, are occurrences which the reader meets in almost every page of the lives of Irish saints. The Bollandists, accustomed as they were to meet with miracles of that kind, in the lives they published, found in Irish hagiography such a superabundance of them, that they refused to admit into their admirable compilation a great number already published or in ma.n.u.script. Nevertheless, the critics of our days, finding nothing impossible to or unworthy of G.o.d in the large collection of Colgan and other Irish antiquarians, express their surprise at their exclusion from that of Bollandus.