Free Ebooks - THE IRISH RACE IN THE PAST AND THE PRESENT

THE IRISH RACE IN THE PAST AND THE PRESENT

by Rev. Aug. J. Thebaud, S.J.

PREFACE

COUNT JOSEPH DE MAISTRE, in his "Principe Generateur des Constitutions
Politiques" (Par. LXI.), says: "All nations manifest a particular
and distinctive character, which deserves to be attentively considered."

This thought of the great Catholic writer requires some development.

It is not by a succession of periods of progress and decay only
That nations manifest their life and individuality. Taking any
one of them at any period of its existence, and comparing it with
others, peculiarities immediately show themselves which give it a
particular physiognomy whereby it may be at once distinguished
from any other; so that, in those agglomerations of men which we
call nations or races, we see the variety everywhere observable
in Nature, the variety by which God manifests the infinite activity
of his creative power.

When we take two extreme types of the human species--the Ashantee
of Guinea, for instance, and any individual of one of the great
civilized communities of Europe-the phenomenon of which we speak
strikes us at once. But it may be remarked also, in comparing
nations which have lived for ages in contiguity, and held constant
intercourse one with the other from the time they began their
national life, whose only boundary-line has been a mountain-chain
or the banks of a broad river. They have each striking peculiarities
which individualize and stamp them with a character of their own.

How different are the peoples divided by the Rhine or by the
Pyrenees! How unlike those which the Straits of Dover run between!
And in Asia, what have the conterminous Chinese and Hindoos in
common beyond the general characteristics of the human species
which belong to all the children of Adam?

But what we must chiefly insist upon in the investigation we are
Now undertaking is, that the life of each is manifested by a
special physiognomy deeply imprinted in their whole history,
which we here call character. What each of them is their history
shows; and there is no better means of judging of them than by
reviewing the various events which compose their life.

For the various events which go to form what is called the
history of a nation are its individual actions, the spontaneous
energy of its life; and, as a man shows what he is by his acts,
so does a nation or a race by the facts of its history.

When we compare the vast despotisms of Asia, crystallized into
forms which have scarcely changed since the first settlement of
man in those immense plains, with the active and ever-moving
smaller groups of Europeans settled in the west of the Old World
since the dispersion of mankind, we see at a glance how the
characters of both may be read in their respective annals. And,
coming down gradually to less extreme cases, we recognize the
same phenomenon manifested even in contiguous tribes, springing
long ago, perhaps, from the same stock, but which have been
formed into distinct nations by distinct ancestors, although they
acknowledge a common origin. The antagonism in their character is
immediately brought out by what historians or annalists have to
say of them.

Are not the cruelty and rapacity of the old Scandinavian race
Still visible in their descendants? And the spirit of organization
displayed by them from the beginning in the seizure, survey, and
distribution of land--in the building of cities and castles--in
the wise speculations of an extensive commerce--may not all these
characteristics be read everywhere in the annals of the nations
sprung from that original stock, grouped thousands of years ago
around the Baltic and the Northern Seas?

How different appear the pastoral and agricultural tribes which
have, for the same length of time, inhabited the Swiss valleys and
mountains! With a multitude of usages, differing all, more or less,
from each other; with, perhaps, a wretched administration of
internal affairs; with frequent complaints of individuals, and
partial conflicts among the rulers of those small communities--with
all these defects, their simple and ever-uniform chronicles reveal
to us at once the simplicity and peaceful disposition of their
character; and, looking at them through the long ages of an obscure
life, we at once recognize the cause of their general happiness in
their constant want of ambition.

And if, in the course of centuries, the character of a nation has
changed--an event which seldom takes place, and when it does is
due always to radical causes--its history will immediately make
known to us the cause of the change, and point out unmistakably
its origin and source.

Why is it, for instance, that the French nation, after having lived
for near a thousand years under a single dynasty, cannot now find
a government agreeable to its modern aspirations? It is insufficient
to ascribe the fact to the fickleness of the French temper. During
ten centuries no European nation has been more uniform and more
attached to its government. If to-day the case is altogether
reversed, the fact cannot be explained except by a radical change
in the character of the nation. Firmly fixed by its own national
determination of purpose and by the deep studies of the Middle
Ages--nowhere more remarkable than in Paris, which was at that
time the centre of the activity of Catholic Europe--the French
mind, first thrown by Protestantism into the vortex of controversy,
gradually declined to the consideration of mere philosophical
utopias, until, rejecting at last its long-received convictions,
it abandoned itself to the ever-shifting delusions of opinions and
theories, which led finally to skepticism and unbelief in every
branch of knowledge, even the most necessary to the happiness of
any community of men. Other causes, no doubt, might also be assigned
for the remarkable change now under our consideration. The one we
have pointed out was the chief.

To the same causes, acting now on a larger scale throughout Europe,
we ascribe the same radical changes which we see taking place in
the various nations composing it: every thing brought everywhere
in question; the mind of all unsettled; a real anarchy of intellect
spreading wider and wider even in countries which until now had
stood firm against it. Hence constant revolutions unheard of
hitherto; nothing stable; and men expecting with awe a more
frightful and radical overturning still of every thing that makes
life valuable and dear.

Are not these tragic convulsions the black and spotted types
wherein we read the altered character of modern nations; are they
not the natural expression of their fitful and delirious life?

These considerations, which might be indefinitely prolonged, show
the truth of the phrase of Joseph de Maistre that "all nations
manifest a particular and distinctive character, which deserves
to be attentively considered."

The fact is, in this kind of study is contained the only possible
philosophy of history for modern times.

With respect to ages that have passed away, to nations which have
run their full course, a nobler study is possible--the more so
because inspired writers have traced the way. Thus Bossuet wrote
his celebrated "Discours." But he stopped wisely at the coming of
our Lord. As to the events anterior to that great epoch, he spoke
often like a prophet of ancient times; he seemed at times to be
initiated in the designs of God himself. And, in truth, he had
them traced by the very Spirit of God; and, lifted by his elevated
mind to the level of those sublime thoughts, he had only to touch
them with the magic of his style.

But of subsequent times he did not speak, except to rehearse
the well-known facts of modern history, whose secret is not yet
revealed, because their development is still being worked out,
and no conclusion has been reached which might furnish the key
to the whole.

There remains, therefore, but one thing to do: to consider
each nation apart, and read its character in its history. Should
this be done for all, the only practical philosophy of modern
history would be written. For then we should have accomplished
morally for men what, in the physical order, zoologists accomplish
for the immense number of living beings which God has spread
over the surface of the earth. They might be classified according
to a certain order of the ascending or descending moral scale.
We could judge them rightly, conformably with the standard of
right or wrong, which is in the absolute possession of the Christian
conscience. Brilliant but baneful qualities would no longer
impose on the credulity of mankind, and men would not be led
astray in their judgments by the rule of expediency or success
which generally dictates to historians the estimate they form and
inculcate on their readers of the worth of some nations, and the
insignificance or even odiousness of others.

In the impossibility under which we labor of penetrating, at
the present time, the real designs of Providence with respect to
the various races of men, so great an undertaking, embracing the
principal, if not all, modern races, would be one of the most
useful efforts of human genius for the spread of truth and virtue
among men.

Our purport is not of such vast import. We shall take in
these pages for the object of our study one of the smallest and,
apparently, most insignificant nations of modern Europe--the
Irish. For several ages they have lost even what generally
constitutes the basis of nationality, self-government; yet they have
preserved their individuality as strongly marked as though they
were still ruled by the O'Neill dynasty.

And we may here remark that the number of a people and the
size of its territory have absolutely no bearing on the estimate
which we ought to form of its character. Who would say that
the Chinese are the most interesting and commendable nation
on the surface of the globe? They are certainly the most ancient
and most populous; their code of precise and formal morality is
the most exact and clear that philosophers could ever dictate,
and succeed in giving as law to a great people. That code
has been followed during a long series of ages. Most discoveries
of modern European science were known to them long before
they were found out among us; agriculture, that first of arts,
which most economists consider as the great test whereby to
judge of the worth of a nation, is and always has been carried by
them to a perfection unknown to us. Yet, the smallest European
nationality is, in truth, more interesting and instructive than
the vast Celestial Empire can ever be--whose long annals
are all compassed within a few hundred pages of a frigid
narrative, void of life, and altogether void of soul.

But why do we select, among so many others, the Irish nation,
which is so little known, of such little influence, whose history
occupies only a few lines in the general annals of the world,
and whose very ownership has rested in the hands of foreigners
for centuries?

We select it, first, because it is and always has been thoroughly
Catholic, from the day when it first embraced Christianity;
and this, under the circumstances, we take to be the best proof,
not only of supreme good sense, but, moreover, of an elevated,
even a sublime character. In their martyrdom of three centuries,
the Irish have displayed the greatness of soul of a Polycarp,
and the simplicity of an Agnes. And the Catholicity which
they have always professed has been, from the beginning, of a
thorough and uncompromising character. All modern European
nations, it is true, have had their birth in the bosom of the
Church. She had nursed them all, educated them all, made
them all what they were, when they began to think of emancipating
themselves from her; and the Catholic, that is, the Christian
religion, in its essence, is supernatural; the creed of the
apostles, the sacramental system; the very history of Christianity,
transport man directly into a region far beyond the earth.

Wherever the Christian religion has been preached, nations
have awakened to this new sense of faith in the supernatural,
and it is there they have tasted of that strong food which made
and which makes them still so superior to all other races of men.
But, as we shall see, in no country has this been the case so
thoroughly as in Ireland. Whatever may have been the cause, the
Irish were at once, and have ever since continued, thoroughly
impregnated with supernatural ideas. For several centuries after
St. Patrick the island was "the Isle of Saints," a place midway
between heaven and earth, where angels and the saints of heaven
came to dwell with mere mortals. The Christian belief was
adopted by them to the letter; and, if Christianity is truth,
ought it not to be so? Such a nation, then, which received such
a thorough Christian education--an education never repudiated
one iota during the ages following its reception--deserves a
thorough examination at our hands.

We select it, secondly, because the Irish have successfully
refused ever since to enter into the various currents of European
opinion, although, by position and still more by religion, they
formed a part of Europe. They have thus retained a character of
their own, unlike that of any other nation. To this day, they
stand firm in their admirable stubbornness; and thus, when Europe
shall be shaken and tottering, they will still stand firm. In
the words of Moore, addressed to his own country:

"The nations have fallen and thou still art young;
Thy sun is just rising when others are set;
And though slavery's cloud o'er thy morning hath hung,
The full noon of freedom shall beam round thee yet."

That constant refusal of the Irish to fall in with the rapid torrent
of European thought and progress, as it is called, is the strangest
phenomenon in their history, and gives them at first an outlandish
look, which many have not hesitated to call barbarism. We hope
thoroughly to vindicate their character from such a foul aspersion,
and to show this phenomenon as the secret cause of their final
success, which is now all but secured; and this feature alone of
their national life adds to their character an interest which we
find in no other Christian nation.

We select it, thirdly, because there is no doubt that the Irish
is the most ancient nationality of Western Europe; and although,
as in the case of the Chinese, the advantage of going up to the
very cradle of mankind is not sufficient to impart interest to
frigid annals, when that prerogative is united to a vivid life
and an exuberant individuality, nothing contributes more to render
a nation worthy of study than hoariness of age, and its derivation
from a certain and definite primitive stock.

It is true that, in reading the first chapters of all the various
histories of Ireland, the foreign reader is struck and almost
shocked by the dogmatism of the writers, who invariably, and with
a truly Irish assurance, begin with one of the sons of Japhet, and,
following the Hebrew or Septuagint chronology, describe without
flinching the various colonizations of Erin, not omitting the
synchronism of Assyrian, Persian, Greek, and Roman history. A
smile is at first the natural consequence of such assertions; and,
indeed, there is no obligation whatever to believe that every thing
happened exactly as they relate.

But when the large quartos and octavos which are now published from
time to time by the students of Irish antiquarian lore are opened,
read, and pondered over, at least one consequence is drawn from
them which strikes the reader with astonishment. "There can be no
doubt," every candid mind says to itself, "that this nation has
preceded in time all those which have flourished on the earth, with
the exception, perhaps, of the Chinese, and that it remains the same
to-day." At least, many years before Christ, a race of men inhabited
Ireland exactly identical with its present population (except that
it did not enjoy the light of the true religion), yet very superior
to it in point of material well-being. Not a race of cannibals, as
the credulous Diodorus Siculus, on the strength of some vague
tradition, was pleased to delineate; but a people acquainted with
the use of the precious metals, with the manufacture of fine tissues,
fond of music and of song, enjoying its literature and its books;
often disturbed, it is true, by feuds and contentions, but, on the
whole, living happily under the patriarchal rule of the clan system.

The ruins which are now explored, the relics of antiquity which
are often exhumed, the very implements and utensils preserved by
the careful hand of the antiquarian--every thing, so different
from the rude flint arrows and barbarous weapons of our North
American Indians and of the European savages of the Stone period,
denotes a state of civilization, astonishing indeed, when we reflect
that real objects of art embellished the dwellings of Irishmen
probably before the foundation of Rome, and perhaps when Greece
was as yet in a state of heroic barbarism.

And this high antiquity is proved by literature as well as by art.
"The ancient Irish," says one of their latest historians, M.
Haverty, "attributed the utmost importance to the accuracy of their
Historic compositions for social reasons. Their whole system of
society--every question as to right of property--turned upon the
descent of families and the principle of clanship; so that it cannot
be supposed that mere fables would be tolerated instead of facts,
where every social claim was to be decided on their authority. A
man's name is scarcely mentioned in our annals without the addition
of his forefathers for several generations--a thing which rarely
occurs in those of other countries.

"Again, when we arrive at the era of Christianity in Ireland, we
find that our ancient annals stand the test of verification by
science with a success which not only establishes their character
for truthfulness at that period, but vindicates the records of
preceding dates involved in it."

The most confirmed skeptic cannot refuse to believe that at the
introduction of Christianity into Ireland, in 432, the whole island
was governed by institutions exactly similar to those of Gaul when
Julius Caesar entered it 400 years before; that this state must
have existed for a long time anterior to that date; and that the
reception of the new religion, with all the circumstances which
attended it, introduced the nation at once into a happy and social
state, which other European countries, at that time convulsed by
barbarian invasions, did not attain till several centuries later.

These various considerations would alone suffice to show the real
importance of the study we undertake; but a much more powerful
incentive to it exists in the very nature of the annals of the
nation itself.

Ireland is a country which, during the last thousand years, has
maintained a constant struggle against three powerful enemies,
and has finally conquered them all.

The first stage of the conflict was that against the Northmen.
It lasted three centuries, and ended in the almost complete
disappearance of this foe.

The second act of the great drama occupied a period of four Hundred
years, during which all the resources of the Irish clans were arrayed
against Anglo-Norman feudalism, which had finally to succumb; so
that Erin remained the only spot in Europe where feudal institutions
never prevailed.

The last part of this fearful trilogy was a conflict of three centuries
with Protestantism; and the final victory is no longer doubtful.

Can any other modern people offer to the meditation, and, we must
say, to the admiration of the Christian reader, a more interesting
spectacle? The only European nation which can almost compete with
the constancy and never-dying energy of Ireland is the Spanish in
its struggle of seven centuries with the Moors.

We have thought, therefore, that there might be some real interest
and profit to be derived from the study of this eventful national
life--an interest and a profit which will appear as we study it
more in detail.

It may be said that the threefold conflict which we have outlined
might be condensed into the surprising fact that all efforts to
drag Ireland into the current of European affairs and influence
have invariably failed. This is the key to the understanding of
her whole history.

Even originally, when it formed but a small portion of the great
Celtic race, here existed in the Irish branch a peculiarity of its
own, which stamped it with features easy to be distinguished. The
gross idolatry of the Gauls never prevailed among the Irish; the
Bardic system was more fully developed among them than among any
other Celtic nation. Song, festivity, humor, ruled there much more
universally than elsewhere. There were among them more harpers and
poets than even genealogists and antiquarians, although the branches
of study represented by these last were certainly as well cultivated
among them as among the Celts of Gaul, Spain, or Italy.

But it is chiefly after the introduction of Christianity among
them, when it appeared finally decreed that they should belong
morally and socially to Europe, it is chiefly then that their
purpose, however unconscious they may have been of its tendency,
seems more defined of opening up for themselves a path of their
own. And in this they followed only the promptings of Nature.

The only people in Europe which remained untouched by what is
called Roman civilization--never having seen a Roman soldier on
their shores; never having been blessed by the construction of
Roman baths and amphitheatres; never having listened to the
declamations of Roman rhetoricians and sophists, nor received the
decrees of Roman praetors, nor been subject to the exactions of
the Roman fisc--they never saw among them, in halls and basilicas
erected under the direction of Roman architects, Roman judges,
governors, proconsuls, enforcing the decrees of the Caesars
against the introduction or propagation of the Christian religion.
Hence it entered in to them without opposition and bloodshed.

But the new religion, far from depriving them of their characteristics,
consecrated and made them lasting. They had their primitive traditions
and tastes, their patriarchal government and manners, their ideas of
true freedom and honor, reaching back almost to the cradle of mankind.
They resolved to hold these against all comers, and they have been
faithful to their resolve down to our own times. Fourteen hundred years
of history since Patrick preached to them proves it clearly enough.

First, then, although the Germanic tribes of the first invasion,
as it is called, did not reach their shore, for the reason that
the Germans, as little as the Celts, never possessed a navy--although
neither Frank, nor Vandal, nor Hun, renewed among them the horrors
witnessed in Gaul, Spain, Italy, and Africa--they could not remain
safe from the Scandinavian pirates, whose vessels scoured all the
northern seas before they could enter the Mediterranean through
the Straits of Gibraltar.

The Northmen, the Danes, came and tried to establish themselves
among them and inculcate their northern manners, system, and
municipal life. They succeeded in England, Holland, the north of
France, and the south of Italy; in a word, wherever the wind had
driven their hide-bound boats. The Irish was the only nation of
Western Europe which beat them back, and refused to receive the
boon of their higher civilization.

As soon as the glories of the reign of Charlemagne had gone down
in a sunset of splendor, the Northmen entered unopposed all the
great rivers of France and Spain. They speedily conquered England.
On all sides they ravaged the country and destroyed the population,
whose only defence consisted in prayers to Heaven, with here and
there an heroic bishop or count. In Ireland alone the Danes found
to their cost that the Irish spear was thrust with a steady and
firm hand; and after two hundred years of struggle not only had
they not arrived at the survey and division of the soil, as wherever
else they had set foot, but, after Clontarf, the few cities they
still occupied were compelled to pay tribute to the Irish Ard-Righ.
Hence all attempts to substitute the Scandinavian social system
for that of the Irish septs and clans were forever frustrated.
City life and maritime enterprises, together with commerce and trade,
were as scornfully rejected as the worship of Thor and Odin.

Soon after this first victory of Ireland over Northern Europe, the
Anglo-Norman invasion originated a second struggle of longer
duration and mightier import. The English Strongbow replaced the
Danes with Norman freebooters, who occupied the precise spots
which the new owners had reconquered from the Northmen, and never
an inch more. Then a great spectacle was offered to the world,
which has too much escaped the observation of historians, and
to which we intend to draw the attention of our readers.

The primitive, simple, patriarchal system of clanship was
Confronted by the stern, young, ferocious feudal system, which
was then beginning to prevail all over Europe. The question was,
Would Ireland consent to become European as Europe was then
organizing herself? The struggle, as we shall see, between the
Irish and the English in the twelfth century and later on, was
merely a contest between the sept system and feudalism, involving,
it is true, the possession of land. And, at the end of a contest
lasting four hundred years, feudalism was so thoroughly defeated
that the English of the Pale adopted the Irish manners, customs,
and even language, and formed only new septs among the old ones.

Hence Ireland escaped all the commotions produced in Europe by
the consequences of the feudal system:

I. Serfdom, which was generally substituted for slavery, never
existed in Ireland, slavery having disappeared before the entry
of the Anglo-Normans.

II. The universal oppression of the lower classes, which caused
the simultaneous rising of the communes all over Europe, never
having existed in Ireland, we shall not be surprised to find no
mention in Irish history of that wide-spread institution of the
eleventh and following centuries.

III. An immense advantage which Ireland derived from her isolation,
on which she always insisted, was her being altogether freed from
the fearful mediaeval heresies which convulsed France particularly
for a long period, and which invariably came from the East.

For Erin remained so completely shut off from the rest of Europe,
that, in spite of its ardent Catholicism, the Crusades were never
preached to its inhabitants; and, if some individual Irishman
joined the ranks of the warriors led to Palestine by Richard Coeur
de Lion, the nation was in no way affected by the good or bad
results which everywhere ensued from the marching of the Christian
armies against the Moslem.

The sects which sprang from Manicheism were certainly an evil
consequence of the holy wars; and it would be a great error to
think that those heresies were short-lived and affected only for
a brief space of time the social and moral state of Europe. It may
be said that their fearfully disorganizing influence lasts to this
day. If modern secret societies do not, in point of fact, derive
their existence directly from the Bulgarism and Manicheism of the
Middle Ages, there is no doubt that those dark errors, which Imposed
on all their adepts a stern secrecy, paved the way for the conspiracies
of our times. Hence Ireland, not having felt the effect of the former
heresies, is in our days almost free from the universal contagion now
decomposing the social fabric on all sides.

But it is chiefly in modern times that the successful resistance
offered by Ireland to many wide-spread European evils, and its
strong attachment to its old customs, will evoke our wonder.

Clanship reigned still over more than four-fifths of the island
when the Portuguese were conquering a great part of India, and
the Spaniards making Central and South America a province of
their almost universal monarchy.

The poets, harpers, antiquarians, genealogists, and students of
Brehon law, still held full sway over almost the whole island,
when the revival of pagan learning was, we may say, convulsing
Italy, giving a new direction to the ideas of Germany, and
penetrating France, Holland, and Switzerland. Happy were the
Irish to escape that brilliant but fatal invasion of mythology
and Grecian art and literature! Had they not received enough of
Greek and Latin lore at the hands of their first apostles and
missionaries, and through the instrumentality of the numerous
amanuenses and miniaturists in their monasteries and convents?
Those holy men had brought them what Christian Rome had purified
of the old pagan dross, and sanctified by the new Divine Spirit.

Virgin Ireland having thus remained undefiled, and never having
even been agitated by all those earlier causes of succeeding
revolutions, Protestantism, the final explosion of them all, could
make no impression on her--a fact which remains to this day the
brightest proof of her strength and vigor.

But, before speaking of this last conflict, we must meet an objection
which will naturally present itself.

To steadily refuse to enter into the current of European thought,
and object to submit in any way to its influence, is, pretend many,
really to reject the claims of civilization, and persist in refusing
to enter upon the path of progress. The North American savage has
always been most persistent in this stubborn opposition to civilized
life, and no one has as yet considered this a praiseworthy attribute.
The more barbarous a tribe, the more firmly it adheres to its
traditions, the more pertinaciously it follows the customs of its
ancestors. They are immovable, and cannot be brought to adopt
usages new to them, even when they see the immense advantages
they would reap from their adoption. Hence the greater number of
writers, chiefly English, who have treated of Irish affairs,
unhesitatingly call them barbarians, precisely on account of their
stubbornness in rejecting the advances of the Anglo-Norman invaders.
Sir John Davies, the attorney-general of James I., could scarcely
write a page on the subject without reverting to this idea.

We answer that the Irish, even before their conversion to
Christianity, but chiefly after, were not barbarians; they never
opposed true progress; and they became, in fact, in the sixth,
seventh, and eighth centuries, the moral and scientific educators
of the greater part of Europe. What they refused to adopt they
were right in rejecting. But, as there are still many men who,
without ever having studied the question, do not hesitate, even
in our days, to throw barbarism in their teeth, and attribute to
it the pitiable condition which the Irish to-day present to the
world, we add a few further considerations on this point.

First, then, we say, barbarians have no history; and the Irish
certainly had a history long before St. Patrick converted them.
Until lately, it is true, the common opinion of writers on Ireland
was adverse to this assertion of ours; but, after the labors of
modern antiquarians--of such men as O'Donovan, Todd, E. O'Curry,
and others--there can no longer be any doubt on the subject. If
Julius Caesar was right in stating that the Druids of Gaul
confined themselves to oral teaching--and the statement may very
well be questioned, with the light of present information on the
subject--it is now proved that the Ollamhs of Erin kept written
annals which went back to a very remote age of the world. The
numerous histories and chronicles written by monks of the sixth
and following centuries, the authenticity of which cannot be denied,
evidently presuppose anterior compositions dating much farther back
than the introduction of our holy religion into Ireland, which the
Christian annalists had in their hands when they wrote their books,
sometimes in Latin, sometimes in old Irish, sometimes in a strange
medley of both languages. It is now known that St. Patrick brought
to Ireland the Roman alphabet only, and that it was thenceforth
used not merely for the ritual of the Church, and the dissemination
of the Bible and of the works of the Holy Fathers, but likewise
for the transcription, in these newly-consecrated symbols of thought,
of the old manuscripts of the island; which soon disappeared, in
the far greater number of instances at least, owing to the favor
in which the Roman characters were held by the people and their
instructors the bishops and monks. Let those precious old symbols
be called Ogham, or by any other name--there must have been something
of the kind.

If any one insists that such was not the case, he must of necessity
admit that the oral teaching of the Ollamhs was so perfect and so
universally current in the same formulas all over the island, that
such oral teaching really took the place of writing; and in this
case, also, which is scarcely possible, however, Ireland had an
authentic history. This last supposition, certainly, can hardly
be credited; and yet, if the first be rejected, it must be admitted,
since it cannot be imagined that subsequent Irish historians,
numerous as they became in time, could have agreed so well
together, and remained so consistent with themselves, and so
perfectly accurate in their descriptions of places and things in
general, without anterior authentic documents of some kind or other,
on which they could rely. Any person who has merely glanced at
the astonishing production called the "Annals of the Four Masters,"
must necessarily be of this opinion.

In no nation in the world are there found so many old histories,
annals, chronicles, etc., as among the Irish; and that fact alone
suffices to prove that in periods most ancient they were truly a
civilized nation, since they attached such importance to the
records of events then taking place among them.

But the Irish were, moreover, a branch of the great Celtic race,
whose renown for wisdom, science, and valor, was spread through
all parts, particularly among the Greeks. The few details we
purpose giving on the subject will convince the reader that among
the nations of antiquity they held a prominent position; and not
only were they possessed of a civilization of their own, not
despicable even in the eyes of a Roman--of the great Julius
himself--but they were ever most susceptible of every kind of
progress, and consequently eager to adopt all the social benefits
which their intercourse with Rome brought them. At least, they
did so as soon as, acknowledging the superior power of the enemy,
they had the good sense to feel that it was all-important to
imitate him. Hence sprang that Gallo-Roman civilization which
obtained during the first five or six centuries of the Christian
era--a civilization which the barbarians of the North endeavored
to destroy, but to which they themselves finally yielded, by
embracing Christianity, and gradually changing their language
and customs.

Everywhere--in Gaul, Italy, Britain, and Ireland--did the Celts
manifest that susceptibility to progress which is the invariable
mark of a state antagonistic to barbarism. In this they totally
differed from the Vandals and Huns, whom it took the Church such
a dreary period to conquer, and whom no other power save the
religion of Christ could have subdued.

These few words are sufficient for our present purpose. We proceed
to show that, in their stubborn opposition to many a current of
European opinion, they acted rightly.

They acted rightly, first of all, in excluding from their course
of studies at Bangor, Clonfert, Armagh, Clonmacnoise, and other
places, the subtleties of Greek philosophy, which occasioned
heresies in Europe and Asia during the first ages of the Church,
and were the cause of so many social and political convulsions.
By adhering strictly---a little too strictly, perhaps--to their
traditional method of developing thought, they kept error far from
their universities, and presented, in the sixth, seventh, and eighth
centuries, the remarkable spectacle in Ireland, France, Germany,
Switzerland, and even Northern Italy, of numerous schools wherein
no wrangling found a place, and whence never issued a single
proposition which Rome found reason to censure. They were at that
time the educators of Christian Europe, and not even a breath of
suspicion was ever raised against any one of their innumerable
teachers. If their mind, in general, did not on that account
attain the acuteness of the French, Italians, or Germans, it was
at all times safer and more guarded. Even their later hostility
to the English Pale, after the eleventh century, was most useful,
from its warning against the teachings of prelates sent from the
English Universities of Oxford and Cambridge; and Rome seems to
have approved of that opposition, by using all her power in
appointing to Irish sees, even within the Pale, prelates chosen
from the Augustinian, Dominican, Franciscan, and Carmelite orders,
in preference to secular ecclesiastics educated in the great seats
of English learning.

Thus the Irish, by opening their schools gratuitously to all Europe,
but chiefly to Anglo-Saxon England, were not only of immense service
to the Church, but showed how fully they appreciated the benefits
of true civilization, and how ready they were to extend it by their
traditional teaching. Nor did they confine themselves to receiving
scholars in their midst: they sent abroad, during those ages, armies
of zealous missionaries and learned men to Christianize the heathen,
or educate the newly-converted Germanic tribes in Merovingian and
Carlovingian Gaul, in Anglo-Saxon and Scandinavian England, in
Lombardian Italy, in the very hives of those ferocious tribes
which peopled the ever-moving and at that time convulsed Germany.

II. They were right in refusing to submit to the Scandinavian yoke,
and accept from those who would impose it their taste for city life,
and the spirit of maritime enterprise and extensive commerce. We
shall see that this was at the bottom of their two centuries of
struggle with the Danes; that they were animated throughout that
conflict by their ardent zeal for the Christian religion, which
the Northmen came to destroy. There is no need of dwelling on this
point, as we are not aware that any one, even their bitterest
enemies, has found fault with them here.

III. They were right in opposing feudalism, and steadily refusing
to admit it on their soil. Feudal Europe beheld with surprise the
inhabitants of a small island on the verge of the Western Continent
level to the ground the feudal castles as soon as they were built;
reject with scorn the invaders' claim to their soil, after they
had signed papers which they could not understand; hold fast to
their patriarchal usages in opposition to the new-born European
notions of paramount kings, of dukes, earls, counts, and viscounts;
fight for four hundred years against what the whole of Europe had
everywhere else accepted, and conquer in the end; so that the Irish
of to-day can say with just pride, "Our island has never submitted
to mediaeval feudalism."

And hence the island has escaped the modern results of the system,
which we all witness to-day in the terrible hostility of class
arrayed against class, the poor against the rich, the lower orders
against the higher. The opposition in Ireland between the oppressed
and the oppressor is of a very different character, is we shall see
later. But the fact is, that the clan system, with all its striking
defects, had at least this immense advantage, that the clansmen did
not look upon their chieftains as "lords and masters," but as men
of the same blood, true relations, and friends; neither did the
heads of the clans look on their men as villeins, serfs, or chattels,
but as companions-in-arms, foster-brothers, supporters, and allies.
Hence the opposition which exists in our days throughout Europe
between class and class, has never existed in Ireland. Let a son
of their old chiefs, if one can yet be found, go back to them,
even but for a few days, after centuries of estrangement, and
they are ready to welcome him yet, as a loyal nation would welcome
her long-absent king, as a family would receive a father it esteemed
lost. We knowing what manner a son of a French McMahon was lately
received among them.

All hostility is reserved for the foreigner, the invader, the
oppressor of centuries, because, in the opinion of the natives,
these have no real right to dwell on a soil they have impoverished,
and which they tried in vain to enslave. This, at least, is their
feeling. But the sons of the soil, whether rich or poor, high or
low, are all united in a holy brotherhood. This state of things
they have preserved by the exclusion of feudalism.

IV. The Irish were right in not accepting from Europe what is
known as the "revival of learning;" at least, as carried almost
to the excess of modern paganism by its first promoters.

This "revival" did not reach Ireland. Many will, doubtless,
attribute this fact to the almost total exclusion then supposed
to exist of Ireland from all European intercourse. It would be
a great error to imagine such to have been the cause. Indeed, at
that very time, Ireland was more in daily contact with Italy,
France, and Spain, than had been the case since the eighth century.

If the Irish were right in holding steadfast to the line of their
traditional studies, in rejecting the city life and commercial
spirit of the Danes, in opposing Anglo-Norman feudalism, and,
finally, in not accepting the more than doubtful advantages flowing
from the literary revival of the fifteenth century; if, in all
this, they did not oppose true progress, but merely wished to
advance in the peculiar path opened up to them by the Christianity
which they had received more fully, with more earnestness, and
with a view to a greater development of the supernatural idea,
than any other European nation--then, beyond all other modes, did
they display their strength of will and their undying national
vitality in their resistance to Protestantism--a resistance which
has been called opposition to progress, but the success of which
to-day proves beyond question that they were right.

It was, the reader may remark, a resistance to the whole of
Northern Europe, wherein their island was included. For, the
whole of Northern Europe rebelled against the Church at the
beginning of the sixteenth century, to enter upon a new road of
progress and civilization, as it has been called, ending finally
in the frightful abyss of materialism and atheism which now gapes
under the feet of modern nations--an abyss in whose yawning womb
nullus ordo, sed sempiternus horror habitat. The end of that
progress is now plain enough: political and social convulsions,
without any other probable issue than final anarchy, unless nations
consent at last to retrace their steps and reorganize Christendom.

But this was not apparent to the eyes of ordinary thinkers in the
sixteenth and seventeenth centuries. Only a few great minds saw
the logical consequences of the premises laid down by Protestantism,
and predicted something of what we now see.

The Irish was the only northern nation which, to a man, opposed
the terrible delusion, and, at the cost of all that is dear, waged
against it a relentless war.

"To a man;" for, in spite of all the wiles of Henry VIII., who
brought every resource of his political talent into play, in order
to win over to his side the great chieftains of the nation--in
spite of all the efforts of Elizabeth, who either tried to overcome
their resistance by her numerous armies, or, by the allurements
of her court, strove her best, like her father, to woo to her
allegiance the great leaders of the chief clans, particularly O'Neill
of Tyrone--at the end of her long reign, after nearly a hundred
years of Protestantism, only sixty Irishmen of all classes had
received the new religion.

At first, the struggle assumed a character more political than
religious, and Queen Elizabeth did her best to give it, apparently,
that character. But for her, religion meant politics; and, had the
Irish consented to accept the religious changes introduced by her
father and herself, there would have been no question of
"rebellion," and no army would have been sent to crush it. The
Irish chieftains knew this well; hence, whenever the queen came
to terms with them, the first article on which they invariably
insisted was the freedom of their religion.

But, under the Stuarts, and later on, the mask was entirely thrown
aside, and the question between England and Ireland reduced itself,
we may say, to one of religion merely. All the political
entanglements in which the Irish found themselves involved by their
loyalty to the Stuarts and their opposition to the Roundheads, never
constituted the chief difficulty of their position. They were
"Papists:" this was their great crime in the eyes of their enemies.
Cromwell would certainly never have endeavored to exterminate them
as he did, had they apostatized and become ranting Puritans. One of
our main points in the following pages will be to give prominence to
this view of the question. If it had been understood from the first,
the army of heroes who died for their God and their country would
long ere this have been enrolled in the number of Christian martyrs.

The subsequent policy of England, chiefly after the English
Revolution of 1688 and the defeat of James II., clearly shows the
soundness of our interpretation of history. The "penal code," under
Queen Anne, and later on, at least has the merit of being free from
hypocrisy and cant. It is an open religious persecution, as, in
fact, it had been from the beginning.

We shall have, therefore, before our eyes the great spectacle of
a nation suffering a martyrdom of three centuries. All the
persecutions of the Christians under the Roman emperors pale
before this long era of penalty and blood. The Irish, by numerous
decrees of English kings and parliaments, were deprived of every
thing which a man not guilty of crime has a right to enjoy. Land,
citizenship, the right of education, of acquiring property, of
living on their own soil--every thing was denied them, and death
in every form was decreed, in every line of the new Protestant
code, to men, women, and even children, whose only crime consisted
in remaining faithful to their religion.

But chiefly during the Cromwellian war and the nine years of the
Protector's reign were they doomed to absolute, unrelenting
destruction. Never has any thing in the whole history of mankind
equalled it in horror, unless the devastation of Asia and Eastern
Europe under Zengis and Timour.

There is, therefore, at the bottom of the Irish character, hidden
under an appearance of light-headedness, mutability of feeling--nay,
at times, futility and even childishness--a depth of according to
the eternal laws which God gave to mankind. Nothing else is in
their mind; they are pursuing no guilty and shadowy Utopia. Who
knows, then, whether their small island may not yet become the
beacon-light which, guiding other nations, shall at a future day
save Europe from the universal shipwreck which threatens her?
The providential mission of Ireland is far from being accomplished,
and men may yet see that not in vain has she been tried so long in
the crucible of affliction.

Another part of the providential plan as affecting her will show
itself, and excite our admiration, in the latter portion of the
work we undertake.

The Irish are no longer confined to the small island which gave
them birth. From the beginning of their great woes, they have
known the bitterness of exile. Their nobility were the first to
leave in a body a land wherein they could no longer exist; and,
during the seventeenth and eighteenth centuries, they made the
Irish name illustrious on all the battle-fields of Europe. At the
same time, many of their priests and monks, unable longer to labor
among their countrymen, spent their lives in the libraries, of
Italy, Belgium, and Spain, and gave to the world those immense
works so precious now to the antiquarian and historian. Every one
knows what Montalembert, in particular, found in them. They may be
said to have preserved the annals of their nation from total ruin;
and the names of the O'Clearys, of Ward and Wadding, of Colgan and
Lynch, are becoming better known and appreciated every day, as
their voluminous works are more studied and better understood.

But much more remarkable still is the immense spread of the people
itself during the present age, so fruitful in happy results for
the Church of Christ and the good of mankind. We may say that the
labors of the Irish missionaries during the seventh and eighth
centuries are to-day eclipsed by the truly missionary work of a
whole nation spread now over North America, the West India Islands,
the East Indies, and the wilds of Australia; in a word, wherever
the English language is spoken. Whatever may have been the visible
causes of that strange "exodus," there is an invisible cause clear
enough to any one who meditates on the designs of God over his
Church. There is no presumption in attributing to God himself what
could only come from Him. The catholicity of the Church was to be
spread and preserved through and in all those vast regions colonized
now by the adventurous English nation; and no better, no more
simple way of effecting this could be conceived than the one whose
workings we see in those colonies so distant from the mother-country.

This, for the time being, is the chief providential mission of
Ireland, and it is truly a noble one, undertaken and executed in
a noble manner by so many thousands, nay millions, of men and
women--poor, indeed, in worldly goods when they start on their
career, but rich in faith; and it is as true now as it has ever
been from the beginning of Christianity, that haec est victoria
nostra, fides vestra.

These few words of our Preface would not suffice to prepare the
reader for the high importance of this stupendous phenomenon. We
We purpose, therefore, devoting our second chapter to the subject,
as a preparation for the very interesting details we shall furnish
subsequently, as it is proper that, from the very threshold, an
idea may be formed of the edifice, and of the entire proportions
it is destined to assume.

We have so far sketched, as briefly as possible, what the following
pages will develop; and the reader may now begin to understand
what we said at starting, that no other nation in Europe offers so
interesting an object of study and reflection.

Plato has said that the most meritorious spectacle in the eyes of
God was that of "a just man struggling with adversity." What must
it be when a whole nation, during nine long ages, offers to Heaven
the most sublime virtues in the midst of the extremest trials? Are
not the great lessons which such a contest presents worthy of study
and admiration?

We purpose studying them, although we cannot pretend to render
full justice to such a theme. And, returning for a moment to the
considerations with which we started, we can truly say that, in
the whole range of modern history, it would be difficult, if not
impossible, to find a national life to compare with that of poor,
despised Ireland. Neither do we pretend to write the history itself;
our object is more humble: we merely pen some considerations
suggested naturally by the facts which we suppose to be already
known, with the purpose of arriving at a true appreciation of the
character of the people. For it is the people itself we study;
the reader will meet with comparatively few individual names.

We shall find, moreover, that the nation has never varied. Its
history is an unbroken series of the same heroic facts, the same
terrible misfortunes. The actors change continually; the outward
circumstances at every moment present new aspects, so that the
interest never flags; but the spirit of the struggle is ever the
same, and the latest descendants of the first O'Neills and
O'Donnells burn with the same sacred fire, and are inspired by
the same heroic aspirations, as their fathers.

Happily, the gloom is at length lighted up by returning day. The
contest has lost its ferocity, and we are no longer surrounded
by the deadly shade which obscured the sky a hundred years ago.
Then it was hard to believe that the nation could ever rise; her
final success seemed almost an impossibility. We now see that
those who then despaired sinned against Providence, which waited
for its own time to arrive and vindicate its ways. And it is
chiefly on account of the bright hope which begins to dawn that
our subject should possess for all a lively interest, and fill the
Catholic heart with glowing sympathy and ardent thankfulness to God.

CONTENTS

I The Celtic Race

II The World Under The Lead Of European Races.--Mission Of The
Irish Race In The Movement

III The Irish Better Prepared To Receive Christianity Than Other Nations

IV How the Irish received Christianity

V The Christian Irish and the Pagan Danes

VI The Irish Free-Clans and Anglo-Norman Feudalism

VII Ireland separated from Europe.--A Triple Episode

VIII The Irish and the Tudors.--Henry VIII.

IX The Irish and the Tudors.--Elizabeth.--The Undaunted Nobility.--The
Suffering Church

X England prepared for the Reception of Protestantism--Ireland not

XI The Irish and the Stuarts.--Loyalty and Confiscation

XII A Century of Gloom.--The Penal Laws

XIII Resurrection.--Delusive Hopes

XIV Resurrection.--Emigration

XV The "Exodus" and its Effects

XVI Moral Force all-sufficient for the Resurrection of Ireland

CHAPTER I

The Celtic Race.

Nations which preserve, as it were, a perpetual youth, should be
studied from their origin. Never having totally changed, some of
their present features may be recognized at the very cradle of
their existence, and the strangeness of the fact sets out in bolder
relief their actual peculiarities. Hence we consider it to our
purpose to examine the Celtic race first, as we may know it from
ancient records: What it was; what it did; what were its distinctive
features; what its manners and chief characteristics. A strong light
will thus be thrown even on the Irish of our own days. Our words
must necessarily be few on so extensive a subject; but, few as
they are, they will not be unimportant in our investigations.

In all the works of God, side by side with the general order
resulting from seemingly symmetric laws, an astonishing variety
of details everywhere shows itself, producing on the mind of man
the idea of infinity, as effectually as the wonderful aspect of a
seemingly boundless universe. This variety is visible, first in
the heavenly bodies, as they are called; star differing from star,
planet from planet; even the most minute asteroids never showing
themselves to us two alike, but always offering differences in
size, of form, of composition.

This variety is visible to us chiefly on our globe; in the infinite
multiplicity of its animal forms, in the wonderful insect tribes,
and in the brilliant shells floating in the ocean; visible also
in the incredible number of trees, shrubs, herbs, down to the most
minute vegetable organisms, spread with such reckless abundance
on the surface of our dwelling; visible, finally, in the infinity
of different shapes assumed by inorganic matter.

But what is yet more wonderful and seemingly unaccountable is that,
taking every species of being in particular, and looking at any two
individuals of the same species, we would consider it an astonishing
effect of chance, were we to meet with two objects of our study
perfectly alike. The mineralogist notices it, if he finds in the same
group of crystals two altogether similar; the botanist would express
his astonishment if, on comparing two specimens of the same plant,
he found no difference between them. The same may be said of birds,
of reptiles, of mammalia, of the same kind. A close observer will
even easily detect dissimilarities between the double organs of the
same person, between the two eyes of his neighbor, the two hands
of a friend, the two feet of a stranger whom he meets.

It is therefore but consistent with general analogy that in the moral
as well as in the physical faculties of man, the same ever-recurring
variety should appear, in the features of the face, in the shape of
the limbs, in the moving of the muscles, as well as in the activity
of thought, in the mobility of humor, in the combination of passions,
propensities, sympathies, and aversions.

But, at the same time, with all these peculiarities perceptible in
individuals, men, when studied attentively, show themselves in
groups, as it were, distinguished from other groups by peculiarities
of their own, which are generally called characteristics of race;
and although, according to various systems, these characteristics
are made to expand or contract at will, to serve an _a priori_
purpose, and sustain a preconcerted theory, yet there are, with
respect to them, startling facts which no one can gainsay, and
which are worthy of serious attention.

Two of these facts may be stated in the following propositions:

I. At the cradle of a race or nation there must have been a type
imprinted on its progenitor, and passing from him to all his
posterity, which distinguishes it from all others.

II. The character of a race once established, cannot be eradicated
without an almost total disappearance of the people.

The proofs of these propositions would require long details altogether
foreign to our present purpose, as we are not writing on ethnology.
We will take them for granted, as otherwise we may say that the
whole history of man would be unintelligible. If, however, writers
are found who apply to their notion of race all the inflexibility
of physical laws, and who represent history as a rigid system of
facts chained together by a kind of fatality; if a school has
sprung up among historians to do away with the moral responsibility
of individuals and of nations, it is scarcely necessary to tell
the reader that nothing is so far from our mind as to adopt ideas
destructive, in fact, to all morality.

It is our belief that there is no more "necessity" in the leanings
of race with respect to nations, than there is in the corrupt
instincts of our fallen nature with respect to individuals. The
teachings of faith have clearly decided this in the latter case,
and the consequence of this authoritative decision carries with
it the determination of the former.

According to the doctrine of St. Augustine, nations are rewarded
or punished in this world, because there is no future existence
for them; but the fact of rewards and punishments awarded them
shows that their life is not a series of necessary sequences such
as prevail in physics, and that the manifestations or phenomena
of history, past, present, or future, cannot resolve themselves
into the workings of absolute laws.

Race, in our opinion, is only one of those mysterious forces which
play upon the individual from the cradle to the grave, which affect
alike all the members of the same family, and give it a peculiarity
of its own, without, however, interfering in the least with the moral
freedom of the individual; and as in him there is free-will, so also
in the family itself to which he belongs may God find cause for
approval or disapproval. The heart of a Christian ought to be too
full of gratitude and respect for Divine Providence to take any
other view of history.

It would be presumptuous on our part to attempt an explanation of
the object God proposed to himself in originating such a diversity
in human society. We can only say that it appears He did not wish
all mankind to be ever subject to the same rule, the same government
and institutions. His Church alone was to bear the character of
universality. Outside of her, variety was to be the rule in human
affairs as in all things else. A universal despotism was never
to become possible.

This at once explains why the posterity of Japhet is so different
from that of Sem and of Cham.

In each of those great primitive stocks, an all-wise Providence
introduced a large number of sub-races, if we may be allowed to
call them so, out of which are sprung the various nations whose
intermingling forms the web of human history. Our object is to
consider only the Celtic branch. For, whatever may be the various
theories propounded on the subject of the colonization of Ireland,
from whatever part of the globe the primitive inhabitants may be
supposed to have come, one thing is certain, to-day the race is
yet one, in spite of the foreign blood infused into it by so many
men of other stocks. Although the race was at one time on the verge
of extinction by Cromwell, it has finally absorbed all the others;
it has conquered; and, whoever has to deal with true Irishmen, feels
at once that he deals with a primitive people, whose ancestors dwelt
on the island thousands of years ago. Some slight differences may
be observed in the people of the various provinces of the island;
there maybe various dialects in their language, different appearance
in their looks, some slight divergence in their disposition or manners;
it cannot be other wise, since, as we have seen, no two individuals
of the human family can be found perfectly alike. But, in spite
of all this, they remain Celts to this day; they belong undoubtedly,
to that stock formerly wide-spread throughout Europe, and now almost
confined to their island; for the character of the same race in
Wales, Scotland, and Brittany, has not been, and could not be,
kept so pure as in Erin; so that in our age the inhabitants of
those countries have become more and more fused with their British
and Gallic neighbors.

We must, therefore, at the beginning of this investigation, state
briefly what we know of the Celtic race in ancient times, and examine
whether the Irish of to-day do not reproduce its chief characteristics.

We do not propose, however, in the present study, referring to
the physical peculiarities of the Celtic tribes; we do not know
what those were two or three thousand years ago. We must confine
ourselves to moral propensities and to manners, and for this view
of the subject we have sufficient materials whereon to draw.

We first remark in this race an immense power of expansion, when
not checked by truly insurmountable obstacles; a power of expansion
which did not necessitate for its workings an uninhabited and wild
territory, but which could show its energy and make its force felt
in the midst of already thickly-settled regions, and among adverse
and warlike nations.

As far as history can carry us back, the whole of Western Europe,
namely, Gaul, a part of Spain, Northern Italy, and what we call
to-day the British Isles, are found to be peopled by a race
apparently of the same origin, divided into an immense number of
small republics; governed patriarchally in the form of clans,
called by Julius Caesar, "Civitates." The Greeks called them Celts,
"Keltai." They do not appear to have adopted a common name for
themselves, as the idea of what we call nationality would never
seem to have occurred to them. Yet the name of Gaels in the British
Isles, and of Gauls in France and Northern Italy, seems identical.
Not only did they fill the large expanse of territory we have
mentioned, but they multiplied so fast, that they were compelled
to send out armed colonies in every direction, set as they were
in the midst of thickly-peopled regions.

We possess few details of their first invasion of Spain; but Roman
history has made us all acquainted with their valor. It was in the
first days of the Republic that an army of Gauls took possession
of Rome, and the names of Manlius and Camillus are no better known
in history than that of Brenn, called by Livy, Brennus. His celebrated
answer, "Vae victis," will live as long as the world.

Later on, in the second century before Christ, we see another army
of Celts starting from Pannonia, on the Danube, where they had
previously settled, to invade Greece. Another Brenn is at the head
of it. Macedonia and Albania were soon conquered; and, it is said,
some of the peculiarities of the race may still be remarked in many
Albanians. Thessaly could not resist the impetuosity of the invaders;
the Thermopylae were occupied by Gallic battalions, and that
celebrated defile, where three hundred Spartans once detained the
whole army of Xerxes, could offer no obstacle to Celtic bravery.
Hellas, sacred Hellas, came then under the power of the Gauls, and
the Temple of Delphi was already in sight of Brenn and his warriors,
when, according to Greek historians, a violent earthquake, the work
of the offended gods, threw confusion into the Celtic ranks, which
were subsequently easily defeated and destroyed by the Greeks.

A branch of this army of the Delphic Brenn had separated from
the main body on the frontiers of Thrace, taken possession of
Byzantium, the future Constantinople, and, crossing the straits,
established itself in the Heart of Asia Minor, and there founded
the state of Galatia, or Gallo-Greece, which so long bore their
name, and for several centuries influenced the affairs of Asia
and of the whole Orient, where they established a social state
congenial to their tastes and customs. But the Romans soon after
invading Asia Minor, the twelve clannish republics formerly
founded were, according to Strabo, first reduced to three, then
to two, until finally Julius Caesar made Dejotar king of the
whole country.

The Celts could not easily brook such a change of social relations;
but, unable to cope against Roman power, they came, as usual, to
wrangle among themselves. The majority pronounced for another
chieftain, named Bogitar, and succeeded in forming a party in
Rome in his favor. Clodius, in an assembly of the Roman people,
obtained a decree confirmatory of his authority, and he took
possession of Pessinuntum, and of the celebrated Temple of Cybele.

The history of this branch of the Celts, nevertheless, did not
close with the evil fortunes of their last king. According to
Justinus, they swarmed all over Asia. Having lost their autonomy
as a nation, they became, as it were, the Swiss mercenaries of
the whole Orient. Egypt, Syria, Pontus, called them to their defence.
"Such," says Justinus, "was the terror excited by their name, and
the constant success of their undertakings, that no king on his
throne thought himself secure, and no fallen prince imagined himself
able to recover his power, except with the help of the ever-ready
Celts of those countries."

This short sketch suffices to show their power of expansion in
ancient times among thickly-settled populations. When we have
shown, farther on, how to-day they are spreading all over the
world, not looking to wild and desert countries, but to large
centres of population in the English colonies, we shall be able
to convince ourselves that they still present the same characteristic.
If they do not bear arms in their hands, it is owing to altered
circumstances; but their actual expansion bears a close resemblance
to that of ancient times, and the similarity of effect shows
the similarity of character.

We pass now to a new feature in the race, which has not, to our
knowledge, been sufficiently dwelt upon. All their migrations in
old times were across continents; and if, occasionally, they crossed
the Mediterranean Sea, they did so always in foreign vessels.

The Celtic race, as we have seen, occupied the whole of Western
Europe. They had, therefore, numerous harbors on the Atlantic,
and some excellent ones on the Mediterranean. Many passed the
greater portion of their lives on the sea, supporting themselves
by fishing; yet they never thought of constructing and arming
large fleets; they never fought at sea in vessels of their own,
with the single exception of the naval battle between Julius
Caesar and the Veneti, off the coast of Armorica, where, in one
day, the Roman general destroyed the only maritime armament which
the Celts ever possessed.

And even this fact is not an exception to the general rule; for
M. de Penhouet, the greatest antiquarian, perhaps, in Celtic lore
in Brittany, has proved that the Veneti of Western Gaul were not
really Celts, but rather a colony of Carthaginians, the only one
probably remaining, in the time of Caesar, of those once numerous
foreign colonies of the old enemies of Rome.

Still this strange anomaly, an anomaly which is observable in no
other people living on an extensive coast, was not produced by
ignorance of the uses and importance of large fleets. From the
first they held constant intercourse with the great navigators of
antiquity. The Celtic harbors teemed with the craft of hardy seamen,
who came from Phoenicia, Carthage, and finally from Rome. Heeren,
in his researches on the Phoenicians, proves it for that very early
age, and mentions the strange fact that the name of Ireland with
them was the "Holy Isle." For several centuries, the Carthaginians,
in particular, used the harbors of Spain, of Gaul, even of Erin
and Britain, as their own. The Celtic inhabitants of those countries
allowed them to settle peaceably among them, to trade with them,
to use their cities as emporiums, to call them, in fact,
Carthaginian harbors, although that African nation never really
colonized the country, does not appear to have made war on the
inhabitants in order to occupy it, except in a few instances, when
thwarted, probably, in their commercial enterprises; but they always
lived on peaceful terms with the aborigines, whom they benefited by
their trade, and, doubtless, enlightened by the narrative of their
expeditions in distant lands.

Is it not a strikingly strange fact that, under such circumstances,
the Celts should never have thought of possessing vessels of their
own, if not to push the enterprises of an extensive commerce, for
which they never showed the slightest inclination, at least for
the purpose of shipping their colonies abroad, and crossing directly
to Greece from Celtiberia, for instance, or from their Italian colony
of the Veneti, replaced in modern times by maritime Venice? Yet
so it was; and the great classic scholar, Heeren, in his learned
researches on the Phoenicians and Carthaginians, remarks it with
surprise. The chief reason which he assigns for the success of
those southern navigators from Carthage in establishing their colonies
everywhere, is the fact of no people in Spain, Gaul, or the British
Isles, possessing at the time a navy of their own; and, finding it so
surprising, he does not attempt to explain it, as indeed it really
remains without any possible explanation, save the lack of inclination
springing from the natural promptings of the race.

What renders it more surprising still is, that individually they
had no aversion to a seafaring life; not only many of them
subsisted by fishing, but their _curraghs_ covered the sea all
along their extensive coasts. They could pass from island to
island in their small craft. Thus the Celts of Erin frequently
crossed over to Scotland, to the Hebrides, from rock to rock, and
in Christian times they went as far as the Faroe group, even as
far as Iceland, which some of them appear to have attempted to
colonize long before the Norwegian outlaws went there; and some
even say that from Erin came the first Europeans who landed on
frozen Greenland years before the Icelandic Northmen planted
establishments in that dreary country. The Celts, therefore, and
those of Erin chiefly, were a seafaring race.

But to construct a fleet, to provision and arm it, to fill it with
the flower of their youth, and send them over the ocean to plunder
and slay the inhabitants for the purpose of colonizing the countries
they had previously devastated, such was never the character of
the Celts. They never engaged extensively in trade, or what is
often synonymous, piracy. Before becoming christianized, the Celts
of Ireland crossed over the narrow channel which divided them from
Britain, and frequently carried home slaves; they also passed
occasionally to Armorica, and their annals speak of warlike
expeditions to that country; but their efforts at navigation were
always on an extremely limited scale, in spite of the many inducements
offered by their geographical position. The fact is striking when
we compare them in that particular with the Scandinavian free-rovers
of the Northern Ocean.

It is, therefore, very remarkable that, whenever they got on board
a boat, it was always a single and open vessel. They did so in pagan
times, when the largest portion of Western Europe was theirs; they
continued to do so after they became Christians. The race has always
appeared opposed to the operations of an extensive commerce, and
to the spreading of their power by large fleets.

The ancient annals of Ireland speak, indeed, of naval expeditions;
but these expeditions were always undertaken by a few persons in
one, two, or, at most, three boats, as that of the sons of Ua Corra;
and such facts consequently strengthen our view. The only fact
which seems contradictory is supposed to have occurred during
the Danish wars, when Callaghan, King of Cashel, is said to have
been caught in an ambush, and conveyed a captive by the Danes,
first to Dublin, then to Armagh, and finally to Dundalk.

The troops of Kennedy, son of Lorcan, are said to have been
supported by a fleet of fifty sail, commanded by Falvey Finn, a
Kerry chieftain. We need not repeat the story so well known to
all readers of Irish history. But this fact is found only in the
work of Keating, and the best critics accept it merely as an
historical romance, which Keating thought proper to insert in his
history. Still, even supposing the truth of the story, all that we
may conclude from it is that the seafaring Danes, at the end of
their long wars, had taught the Irish to use the sea as a battlefield,
to the extent of undertaking a small expedition in order to
liberate a beloved chieftain.

It is very remarkable, also, that according to the annals of Ireland,
the naval expeditions nearly always bore a religious character, never
one of trade or barter, with the exception of the tale of Brescan,
who was swallowed up with his fifty curraghs, in which he traded
between Ireland and Scotland.

Nearly all the other maritime excursions are voyages undertaken
with a Christian or Godlike object. Thus our holy religion was
carried over to Scotland and the Hebrides by Columbkill and his
brother monks, who evangelized those numerous groups of small
islands. Crossing in their skiffs, and planting the cross on
some far-seen rock or promontory, they perched their monastic
cells on the bold bluffs overlooking the ocean.

No more was the warrior on carnage bent to be seen on the seaboards
of Ulster or the western coast of Albania, as Scotland was then
called; only unarmed men dressed in humble monastic garb trod those
wave-beaten shores. At early morning they left the cove of their
convent; they spread their single sail, and plied their well-worn
oars, crossing from Colombsay to Iona, or from the harbor of Bangor
to the nearest shore of the Isle of Man.

At noon they may have met a brother in the middle of the strait
in his shell of a boat, bouncing over the water toward the point
they had left. And the holy sign of the cross passed from one
monk to the other, and the word of benison was carried through
the air, forward and back, and the heaven above was propitious,
and the wave below was obedient, while the hearts of the two
brothers were softened by holy feelings; and nothing in the air
around, on the dimly-visible shores, on the surface of the heaving
waves, was seen or heard save what might raise the soul to heaven
and the heart to God.

In concluding this portion of our subject, we will merely refer
to the fact that neither the Celts of Gaul or Britain, nor those
of Ireland, ever opposed an organized fleet to the numerous hostile
naval armaments by which their country was invaded. When the Roman
fleet, commanded by Caesar, landed in Great Britain, when the
innumerable Danish expeditions attacked Ireland, whenever the
Anglo-Normans arrived in the island during the four hundred years
of the colony of the Pale, we never hear of a Celtic fleet opposed
to the invaders. Italian, Spanish, and French fleets came in
oftentimes to the help of the Irish; yet never do we read that the
island had a single vessel to join the friendly expedition. We
may safely conclude, then, that the race has never felt any
inclination for sending large expeditions to sea, whether for
extensive trading, or for political and warlike purposes. They
have always used the vessels of other nations, and it is no
surprise, therefore, to find them now crowding English ships
in their migrations to colonize other countries. It is one of
the propensities of the race.

A third feature of Celtic character and mind now attracts our
attention, namely, a peculiar literature, art, music, and poetry,
wherein their very soul is portrayed, and which belongs exclusively
to them. Some very interesting considerations will naturally flow
from this short investigation. It is the study of the constitution
of the Celtic mind.

In Celtic countries literature was the perfect expression of the
social state of the people. Literature must naturally be so
everywhere, but it was most emphatically so among the Celts. With
them it became a state institution, totally unknown to other
nations. Literature and art sprang naturally from the clan system,
and consequently adopted a form not to be found elsewhere. Being,
moreover, of an entirely traditional cast, those pursuits imparted
to their minds a steady, conservative, traditional spirit, which
has resulted in the happiest consequences for the race, preserving
it from theoretical vagaries, and holding it aloof, even in our days,
from the aberrations which all men now deplore in other European
nations, and whose effects we behold in the anarchy of thought.
This last consideration adds to this portion of our subject a
peculiar and absorbing interest.

The knowledge which Julius Caesar possessed of the Druids and of
their literary system was very incomplete; yet he presents to his
readers a truly grand spectacle, when he speaks of their numerous
schools, frequented by an immense number of the youths of the
country, so different from those of Rome, in which his own mind
had been trained--"Ad has magnus adolescentium numerus disciplinae
causa concurrit:" when he mentions the political and civil subjects
submitted to the judgment of literary men--"de omnibus controversiis
publicis privatisque constituunt. ... Si de hereditate, si de
finibus controversia est, iidem decernunt:" when he states the
length of their studies--"annos nonnulli vicenos in disciplina
permanent:" when he finally draws a short sketch of their course
of instruction-- "multa de sideribus atque eorum motu, de mundi
ac terrarum magnitudine, .... disputant juventutique tradunt."

But, unfortunately, the great author of the "Commentaries" had
not sufficiently studied the social state of the Celts in Gaul
and Britain; he never mentions the clan institution, even when
he speaks of the feuds--factiones--which invariably split their
septs--civitates--into hostile parties. In his eleventh chapter,
when describing the contentions which were constantly rife in
the cities, villages, even single houses, when remarking the
continual shifting of the supreme authority from the Edui to the
Sequani, and reciprocally, he seems to be giving in a few phrases
the long history of the Irish Celts; yet he does not appear to
be aware of the cause of this universal agitation, namely, the
clan system, of which he does not say a single world. How could
he have perceived the effect of that system on their literature
and art?

To understand it at once it suffices to describe in a few words
the various branches of studies pursued by their learned men;
and, as we are best acquainted with that portion of the subject
which concerns Ireland, we will confine ourselves to it. There
is no doubt the other agglomerations of Celtic tribes, the Gauls
chiefly, enjoyed institutions very similar, if not perfectly alike.

The highest generic name for a learned man or doctor was "ollamh."
These ollamhs formed a kind of order in the race, and the
privileges bestowed on them were most extensive. "Each one of
them was allowed a standing income of twenty-one cows and their
grasses," in the chieftain's territory, besides ample refections
for himself and his attendants, to the number of twenty-four,
including his subordinate tutors, his advanced pupils, and his
retinue of servants. He was entitled to have two hounds and six
horses, . . . and the privilege of conferring a temporary sanctuary
from injury or arrest by carrying his wand, or having it carried
around or over the person or place to be protected. His wife also
enjoyed certain other valuable privileges.--(Prof. E. Curry, Lecture I.)

But to reach that degree he was to prove for himself, purity of
learning, purity of mouth (from satire), purity of hand (from
bloodshed), purity of union (in marriage), purity of honesty (from
theft), and purity of body (having but one wife).

With the Celts, therefore, learning constituted a kind of priesthood.
These were his moral qualifications. His scientific attainments
require a little longer consideration, as they form the chief
object we have in view.

They may at the outset be stated in a few words. The ollamh was
"a man who had arrived at the highest degree of historical
learning, and of general literary attainments. He should be an
adept in royal synchronisms, should know the boundaries of all
the provinces and chieftaincies, and should be able to trace the
genealogies of all the tribes of Erin up to the first man.--(Prof. Curry,
Lecture X.)

Caesar had already told us of the Druids, "Si de hereditate, si de
finibus controversia est iidem decernunt." In this passage he gives
us a glimpse of a system which he had not studied sufficiently to
embrace in its entirety.

The qualifications of an ollamh which we have just enumerated, that
is to say, of the highest doctor in Celtic countries, already prove
how their literature grew out of the clan system.

The clan system, of which we shall subsequently speak more at
length, rested entirely on history, genealogy, and topography. The
authority and rights of the monarch of the whole country, of the
so-called kings of the various provinces, of the other chieftains in
their several degrees, finally, of all the individuals who composed
the nation connected by blood with the chieftains and kings,
depended entirely on their various genealogies, out of which grew
a complete system of general and personal history. The conflicting
rights of the septs demanded also a thorough knowledge of topography
for the adjustment of their difficulties. Hence the importance to
the whole nation of accuracy in these matters, and of a competent
authority to decide on all such questions.

But in Celtic countries, more than in all others, topography was
connected with general history, as each river or lake, mountain
or hill, tower or hamlet, had received a name from some historical
fact recorded in the public annals; so that even now the geographical
etymologies frequently throw a sudden and decisive light on disputed
points of ancient history. So far, this cannot be called a literature;
it might be classed under the name of statistics, or antiquarian lore;
and if their history consisted merely of what is contained in the old
annals of the race, it would be presumptuous to make a particular
alllusion to their literature, and make it one of the chief
characteristics of the race. The annals, in fact, were mere
chronological and synchronic tables of previous events.

But an immense number of books were written by many of their authors
on each particular event interesting to each Celtic tribe: and even
now many of those special facts recorded in these books owe their
origin to some assertion or hint given in the annals. There is no
doubt that long ago their learned men were fully acquainted with
all the points of reference which escape the modern antiquarian.
History for them, therefore, was very different from what the Greeks
and Romans have made it in the models they left us, which we have
copied or imitated.

It is only in their detached "historical tales" that they display
any skill in description or narration, any remarkable pictures of
character, manners, and local traditions; and it seems that in many
points they show themselves masters of this beautiful art.

Thus they had stories of battles, of voyages, of invasions, of
destructions, of slaughters, of sieges, of tragedies and deaths, of
courtships, of military expeditions; and all this strictly historical.
For we do not here speak of their "imaginative tales," which give
still freer scope to fancy; such as the Fenian and Ossianic poems,
which are also founded on facts, but can no more claim the title of
history than the novels of Scott or Cooper.

The number of those books was so great that the authentic list of
them far surpasses in length what has been preserved of the old
Greek and Latin writers. It is true that they have all been saved
and transmitted to us by Christian Irishmen of the centuries
intervening between the sixth and sixteenth; but it is also
perfectly true that whatever was handed down to us by Irish monks
and friars came to them from the genuine source, the primitive
authors, as our own monks of the West have preserved to us all
we know of Greek and Latin authors.

So that the question so long decided in the negative, whether
the Irish knew handwriting prior to the Christian era and the
coming of St. Patrick, is no longer a question, now that so much
is known of their early literature. St. Patrick and his brother
monks brought with them the Roman characters and the knowledge of
numerous Christian writers who had preceded him; but he could not
teach them what had happened in the country before his time, events
which form the subject-matter of their annals, historical and
imaginative tales and poems. For the Christian authors of Ireland
subsequently to transmit those facts to us, they must evidently
have copied them from older books, which have since perished.

Prof. E. Curry thinks that the Ogham characters, so often mentioned
in the most ancient Irish books, were used in Erin long before the
introduction of Christianity there. And he strengthens his opinion
by proofs which it is difficult to contradict. Those characters are
even now to be seen in some of the oldest books which have been
preserved, as well as on many stone monuments, the remote antiquity
of which cannot be denied. One well-authenticated fact suffices,
however, to set the question at rest: "It is quite certain," says
E. Curry, "that the Irish Druids and poets had written books before
the coming of St. Patrick in 432; since we find THAT VERY STATEMENT
in the ancient Gaelic Tripartite life of the Saint, as well as in
the "Annotations of Tirechan" preserved in the Book of Armagh, which
were taken by him (Tirechan) from the lips and books of his tutor,
St. Mochta, who was the pupil and disciple of St. Patrick himself."

What Caesar, then, states of the Druids, that they committed every
thing to memory and used no books, is not strictly true. It must
have been true only with regard to their mode of teaching, in that
they gave no books to their pupils, but confined themselves to
oral instruction.

The order of Ollamh comprised various sub-orders of learned men.
And the first of these deserving our attention is the class of
"Seanchaidhe," pronounced Shanachy. The ollamh seems to have been
the historian of the monarch of the whole country; the shanachy
had the care of provincial records. Each chieftain, in fact, down
to the humblest, had an officer of this description, who enjoyed
privileges inferior only to those of the ollamh, and partook of
emoluments graduated according to his usefulness in the state; so
that we can already obtain some idea of the honor and respect paid
to the national literature and traditions in the person of those
who were looked upon in ancient times as their guardians from age
to age.

The shanachies were also bound to prove for themselves the
moral qualifications of the ollamhs.1

(1 "Purity of hand, bright without wounding,
Purity of mouth, without poisonous satire,
Purity of learning, without reproach,
Purity of husbandship, in marriage."
Many of these details and the following are chiefly derived from
Prof. E. Curry
--(Early Irish Manuscripts.) )

A shanachy of any degree, who did not preserve these "purities,"
lost half his income and dignity, according to law, and was
subject to heavy penalties besides.

According to McFirbis, in his book of genealogies, "the historians
were so anxious and ardent to preserve the history of Erin, that
the description they have left us of the nobleness and dignified
manners of the people, should not be wondered at, since they did
not refrain from writing even of the undignified artisans, and of
the professors of the healing and building arts of ancient times
--as shall be shown below, to prove the fidelity of the historians,
and the errors of those who make such assertions, as, for instance,
that there were no stone buildings in Erin before the coming of the
Danes and Anglo-Normans.

"Thus saith an ancient authority: `The first doctor, the first
builder, and the first fisherman, that were ever in Erin were--

Capa, for the healing of the sick,
In his time was all-powerful;
And Luasad, the cunning builder,
And Laighne, the fisherman.'"

So speaks McFirbis in his quaint and picturesque style.

The literature of the Celts was, therefore, impressed with the
character of realistic universality, which has been the great boast
of the romantic school. It did not concern itself merely with the
great and powerful, but comprised all classes of people, and tried
to elevate what is of itself undignified and common in human
society. This is no doubt the meaning of the quotation just cited.

Among the Celts, then, each clan had his historian to record the
most minute details of every-day history, as well as every fact
of importance to the whole clan, and even to the nation at large;
and thus we may see how literature with them grew naturally out
of their social system. The same may not appear to hold good at
first sight with the other classes of literary men; yet it would
be easy to discover the link connecting them all, and which was
always traditional or matter-of-fact, if we may use that expression.

The next SUB-ORDER was that of File, which is generally translated
poet, but its meaning also involves the idea of philosophy or
wisdom added to that of poetry.

The File among the Celts was, after all, only an historian writing
in verse; for all their poetry resolved itself into annals, "poetic
narratives" of great events, or finally "ballads."

It is well known that among all nations poetry has preceded prose;
and the first writers that appeared anywhere always wrote in verse.
It seems, therefore, that in Celtic tribes the order of File was
anterior in point of time to that of Shanachy, and that both must
have sprung naturally from the same social system. Hence the
monarch of the whole nation had his poets, as also the provincial
kings and every minor chieftain.

In course of time their number increased to such an extent in
Ireland, that at last they became a nuisance to be abated.

"It is said that in the days of Connor McNassa--several centuries
before Christ--there met once 1,200 poets in one company; another
time 1,000, and another 700, namely, in the days of Aedh McAinmire
and Columcille, in the sixth century after our Saviour. And
between these periods Erin always thought that she had more of
learned men than she wanted; so that from their numbers and the
tax their support imposed upon the public, it was attempted to
banish them out of Erin on three different occasions; but they
were detained by the Ultonians for hospitality's sake. This is
evident from the Amhra Columcille (panegyric of St. Columba). He
was the last that kept them in Ireland, and distributed a poet to
every territory, and a poet to every king, in order to lighten the
burden of the people in general. So that there were people in their
following, contemporary with every generation to preserve the
history and events of the country at this time. Not these alone,
but the kings, and, saints, and churches of Erin preserved their
history in like manner."

From this curious passage of McFirbis, it is clear that the Celtic
poets proposed to themselves the same object as the historians did;
only that they wrote in verse, and no doubt allowed themselves more
freedom of fancy, without altering the facts which were to them of
paramount importance.

McFirbis, in the previous passage, gives us a succinct account
of the action of Columbkill in regard to the poets or bards of
his time. But we know many other interesting facts connected
with this event, which must be considered as one of the most
important in Ireland during the sixth century. The order of poets
or bards was a social and political institution, reaching back in
point of time to the birth of the nation, enjoying extensive
privileges, and without which Celtic life would have been deprived
of its warmth and buoyancy. Yet Aed, the monarch of all Ireland,
was inclined to abolish the whole order, and banish, or even outlaw,
all its members. Being unable to do it of his own authority, he
thought of having the measure carried in the assembly of Drumceit,
convened for the chief purpose of settling peacefully the relations
of Ireland with the Dalriadan colony established in Western
Scotland a hundred years before. Columba came from Iona in behalf
of Aidan, whom he had crowned a short time previously as King
of Albania or Scotland. It seems that the bards or poets were
accused of insolence, rapacity, and of selling their services
to princes and nobles, instead of calling them to account for
their misdeeds.

Columba openly undertook their defence in the general assembly of
the nation. Himself a poet, he loved their art, and could not
consent to see his native country deprived of it. Such a deprivation
in his eyes would almost have seemed a sacrilege.

"He represented," says Montalembert, "that care must be taken not
to pull up the good corn with the tares, that the general exile
of the poets would be the death of a venerable antiquity, and of
that poetry so dear to the country, and so useful to those who
knew how to employ it. The king and assembly yielded at length,
under condition that the number should be limited, and their
profession laid under certain rules."

Dallan Fergall, the chief of the corporation, composed his "Amhra,"
or Praise of Columbkill, as a mark of gratitude from the whole
order. That the works of Celtic poets possessed real literary merit,
we have the authority of Spenser for believing. The author of the
"Faerie Queene" was not the friend of the Irish, whom he assisted
in plundering and destroying under Elizabeth. He could only judge
of their books from English translations, not being sufficiently
acquainted with the language to understand its niceties. Yet he
had to acknowledge that their poems "savoured of sweet wit and
good invention, but skilled not of the goodly ornaments of poetry;
yet were they sprinkled with some pretty flowers of their natural
device, which gave good grace and comeliness to them."

He objected, it is true, to the patriotism of their verse, and
pretended that they "seldom choose the doings of good men for the
argument of their poems," and became "dangerous and desperate in
disobedience and rebellious daring." But this accusation is high
praise in our eyes, as showing that the Irish bards of Spenser's
time praised and glorified those who proved most courageous in
resisting English invasion, and stood firmly on the side of their
race against the power of a great queen.

A poet, it seems, required twelve years of study to be master of
his art. One-third of that time was devoted to practising the
"Teinim Laegha," by which he obtained the power of understanding
every thing that it was proper for him to speak of or to say. The
next third was employed in learning the "Imas Forosnadh," by which
he was enabled to communicate thoroughly his knowledge to other
pupils. Finally, the last three years were occupied in "Dichedal,"
or improvisation, so as to be able to speak in verse on all subjects
of his study at a moment's notice.

There were, it appears, seven kinds of verse; and the poet was
bound to possess a critical knowledge of them, so as to be a judge
of his art, and to pronounce on the compositions submitted to him.

If called upon by any king or chieftain, he was required to relate
instantly, seven times fifty stories, namely, five times fifty
prime stories, and twice fifty secondary stories.

The prime stories were destructions and preyings, courtships,
battles, navigations, tragedies or deaths, expeditions, elopements,
and conflagrations.

All those literary compositions were historic tales; and they
were not composed for mere amusement, but possessed in the eyes
of learned men a real authority in point of fact. If fancy was
permitted to adorn them, the facts themselves were to remain
unaltered with their chief circumstances. Hence the writers of the
various annals of Ireland do not scruple to quote many poems or
other tales as authority for the facts of history which they relate.

And such also was heroic poetry among the Greeks. The Hellenic
philosophers, historians, and geographers of later times always
quoted Homer and Hesiod as authorities for the facts they related
in their scientific works. The whole first book of the geography
of Strabo, one of the most statistical and positive works of
antiquity, has for its object the vindication of the geography
of Homer, whom Strabo seems to have considered as a reliable
authority on almost every possible subject.

Our limits forbid us to speak more in detail of Celtic historians
and poets. We have said enough to show that both had important
state duties to perform in the social system of the country, and,
while keeping within due bounds, they were esteemed by all as men
of great weight and use to the nation. Besides the field of genealogy
and history allotted to them to cultivate, their very office tended
to promote the love of virtue, and to check immorality and vice.
They were careful to watch over the acts and inclinations of their
princes and chieftains, seldom failing to brand them with infamy
if guilty of crimes, or crown them with honor when they had deserved
well of the nation. In ancient Egypt the priests judged the kings
after their demise; in Celtic countries they dared to tell them
the truth during their lifetime. And this exercised a most salutary
effect on the people; for perhaps never in any other country did
the admiration for learning, elevation of feeling, and ardent love
of justice and right, prevail as in Ireland, at least while enjoying
its native institutions and government.

From many of the previous details, the reader will easily see
That the literature of the Celts presented features peculiar to
Their race, and which supposed a mental constitution seldom found
among others. If, in general, the world of letters gives expression
In some degree to social wants and habits, among the Celts this
expression was complete, and argued a peculiar bent of mind given
entirely to traditional lore, and never to philosophical speculations
and subtlety. We see in it two elements remarkable for their
distinctness. First, an extraordinary fondness for facts and
traditions, growing out of the patriarchal origin of society
among them; and from this fondness their mind received a particular
tendency which was averse to theories and utopias. All things
resolved themselves into facts, and they seldom wandered away into
the fields of conjectural conclusions. Hence their extraordinary
adaptation to the truths of the Christian religion, whose dogmas
are all supernatural facts, at once human and divine. Hence have
they ever been kept free from that strange mental activity of other
European races, which has led them into doubt, unbelief, skepticism,
until, in our days, there seem to be no longer any fixed principles
as a substratum for religious and social doctrines.

Secondly, we see in the Celtic race a rare and unique outburst
of fancy, so well expressed in the "_Senchus Mor_," their great law
compilation, wherein it is related, that when St. Patrick had
completed the digest of the laws of the Gael in Ireland, Dubtach,
who was a bard as well as a brehon, "put a thread of poetry
round it." Poetry everywhere, even in a law-book; poetry
inseparable from their thoughts, their speech, their every-day
actions; poetry became for them a reality, an indispensable necessity
of life. This feature is also certainly characteristic of the
Celtic nature.

Hence their literature was inseparable from art; and music and
design gushed naturally from the deepest springs of their souls.

Music has always been the handmaid of Poetry; and in our modern
languages, even, which are so artificial and removed from primitive
enthusiasm and naturalness, no composer of opera would consent to
adapt his inspirations to a prose _libretto_. It was far more so
in primitive times; and it maybe said that in those days poetry
was never composed unless to be sung or played on instruments. But
what has never been seen elsewhere, what Plato dreamed, without
ever hoping to see realized, music in Celtic countries became
really a state institution, and singers and harpers were necessary
officers of princes and kings.

That all Celtic tribes were fond of it and cultivated it thoroughly
we have the assertion of all ancient writers who spoke of them.
According to Strabo, the Third order of Druids was composed of
those whom he calls _Umnetai_. What were their instruments is not
mentioned; and we can now form no opinion of their former musical
taste from the rude melodies of the Armoricans, Welsh, and Scotch.

From time immemorial the Irish Celts possessed the harp. Some
authors have denied this; and from the fact that the harp was
unknown to the Greeks and Romans, and that the Gauls of the time
of Julius Caesar do not seem to have been acquainted with it, they
conclude that it was not purely native to any of the British islands.

But modern researches have proved that it was certainly used in
Erin under the first successors of Ugaine Mor, who was monarch.
--Ard-Righ--about the year 633 before Christ, according to the
annals of the Four Masters. The story of Labhraid, which seems
perfectly authentic, turns altogether on the perfection with
which Craftine played on the harp. From that time, at least, the
instrument became among the Celts of Ireland a perpetual source
of melody.

To judge of their proficiency in its use, it is enough to know to
what degree of perfection they had raised it. Mr. Beauford, in
his ingenious and learned treatise on the music of Ireland, as
cultivated by its bards, creates genuine astonishment by the
discoveries into which his researches have led him.

The extraordinary attention which they paid to expression and
effect brought about successive improvements in the harp, which
at last made it far superior to the Grecian lyre. To make it
capable of supporting the human voice in their symphonies, they
filled up the intervals of the fifths and thirds in each scale,
and increased the number of strings from eighteen to twenty-eight,
retaining all the original chromatic tones, but reducing the
capacity of the instrument; for, instead of commencing in the lower
E in the bass, it commenced in C, a sixth above, and terminated
in G in the octave below; and, in consequence, the instrument
became much more melodious and capable of accompanying the human
voice. Malachi O'Morgair, Archbishop of Armagh, introduced other
improvements in it in the twelfth century. Finally, in later times,
its capacity was increased from twenty-eight strings to thirty-three,
in which state it still remains.

As long as the nation retained its autonomy, the harp was a universal
instrument among the inhabitants of Erin. It was found in every house;
it was heard wherever you met a few people gathered together. Studied
so universally, so completely and perfectly, it gave Irish music in
the middle ages a superiority over that of all other nations. It is
Cambrensis who remarks that "the attention of these people to musical
instruments is worthy of praise, in which their skill is, beyond
comparison, superior to any other people; for in these the modulation
is not slow and solemn, as in the instruments of Britain, but the
sounds are rapid and precipitate, yet sweet and pleasing. It is
extraordinary, in such rapidity of the fingers, how the musical
proportions are preserved, and the art everywhere inherent among
their complicated modulations, and the multitude of intricate notes
so sweetly swift, so irregular in their composition, so disorderly
in their concords, yet returning to unison and completing the melody."

Giraldus could not express himself better, never before having
heard any other music than that of the Anglo-Normans; but it is
clear, from the foregoing passage, that Irish art surpassed all
his conceptions.

The universality of song among the Irish Celts grew out of their
nature, and in time brought out all the refinements of art. Long
before Cambrensis's time the whole island resounded with music
and mirth, and the king-archbishop, Cormac McCullinan, could not
better express his gratitude to his Thomond subjects than by
exclaiming--

"May our truest fidelity ever be given
To the brave and generous clansmen of Tal;
And forever royalty rest with their tribe,
And virtue and valor, and music and song!"

Long before Cormac, we find the same mirthful glee in the Celtic
character expressed by a beautiful and well-known passage in the
life of St. Bridget: Being yet an unknown girl, she entered, by
chance, the dwelling of some provincial king, who was at the time
absent, and, getting hold of a harp, her fingers ran over the
chords, and her voice rose in song and glee, and the whole family
of the royal children, excited by the joyful harmony, surrounded
her, immediately grew familiar with her, and treated her as an
elder sister whom they might have known all their life; so that
the king, coming back, found all his house in an uproar, filled
as it was with music and mirth.

Thus the whole island remained during long ages. Never in the
whole history of man has the same been the case with any other
nation. Plato, no doubt, in his dream of a republic, had something
of the kind in his mind, when he wished to constitute harmony as
a social and political institution. But he little thought that,
when he thus dreamed and wrote, or very shortly after, the very
object of his speculation was already, or was soon to be, in
actual existence in the most western isle of Europe.

Before Columba's time even the Church had become reconciled to
the bards and harpers; and, according to a beautiful legend,
Patrick himself had allowed Oisin, or Ossian, and his followers,
to sing the praises of ancient heroes. But Columbkill completed
the reconciliation of the religious spirit with the bardic
influence. Music and poetry were thenceforth identified with
ecclesiastical life. Monks and grave bishops played on the harp
in the churches, and it is said that this strange spectacle
surprised the first Norman invaders of Ireland. To use the words
of Montalembert, so well adapted to our subject: "Irish poetry,
which was in the days of Patrick and Columba so powerful and so
popular, has long undergone, in the country of Ossian, the same
fate as the religion of which these great saints were the apostles.
Rooted, like it, in the heart of a conquered people, and like it
proscribed and persecuted with an unwearying vehemence, it has
come ever forth anew from the bloody furrow in which it was
supposed to be buried. The bards became the most powerful allies
of patriotism, the most dauntless prophets of independence, and
also the favorite victims of the cruelty of spoilers and conquerors.
They made music and poetry weapons and bulwarks against foreign
oppression; and the oppressors used them as they had used the
priests and the nobles. A price was set upon their heads. But
while the last scions of the royal and noble races, decimated
or ruined in Ireland, departed to die out under a foreign sky,
amid the miseries of exile, the successor of the bards, the
minstrel, whom nothing could tear from his native soil, was pursued,
tracked, and taken like a wild beast, or chained and slaughtered
like the most dangerous of rebels.

"In the annals of the atrocious legislation, directed by the
English against the Irish people, as well before as after the
Reformation, special penalties against the minstrels, bards, and
rhymers, who sustained the lords and gentlemen, . . . are to be
met with at every step.

"Nevertheless, the harp has remained the emblem of Ireland, even
in the official arms of the British Empire, and during all last
century, the travelling harper, last and pitiful successor of the
bards, protected by Columba, was always to be found at the side of
the priest, to celebrate the holy mysteries of the proscribed worship.
He never ceased to be received with tender respect under the thatched
roof of the poor Irish peasant, whom he consoled in his misery and
oppression by the plaintive tenderness and solemn sweetness of the
music of his fathers."

Could any expression of ours set forth in stronger light the Celtic
mind and heart as portrayed in those native elements of music and
literature? Could any thing more forcibly depict the real character
of the race, materialized, as it were, in its exterior institutions?
We were right in saying that among no other race was what is
generally a mere adornment to a nation, raised to the dignity of
a social and political instrument as it was among the Celts. Hence
it was impossible for persecution and oppression to destroy it,
and the Celtic nature to-day is still traditional, full of faith,
and at the same time poetical and impulsive as when those great
features of the race held full sway.

Besides music, several other branches of art, particularly
architecture, design, and calligraphy, are worthy our attention,
presenting, as they do, features unseen anywhere else; and would
enable us still better to understand the character of the Celtic
race. But our limits require us to refrain from what might be
thought redundant and unnecessary.

We hasten, therefore, to consider another branch of our
investigation, one which might be esteemed paramount to all others,
and by the consideration of which we might have begun this chapter,
only that its importance will be better understood after what has
been already said. It is a chief characteristic which grew so
perfectly out of the Celtic mind and aptitudes, that long centuries
of most adverse circumstances, we may say, a whole host of contrary
influences were unable to make the Celts entirely abandon it. We
mean the clan system, which, as a system, indeed, has disappeared
these three centuries ago, but which may be said to subsist still
in the clan spirit, as ardent almost among them as ever.

It is beyond doubt that the patriarchal government was the first
established among men. The father ruled the family. As long as he
lived he was lawgiver, priest, master; his power was acknowledged
as absolute. Hiis children, even after their marriage, remained
to a certain extent subject to him. Yet each became in turn the
head of a small state, ruled with the primitive simplicity of
the first family.

In the East, history shows us that the patriarchal government
was succeeded immediately by an extensive and complete despotism.
Millions of men soon became the abject slaves of an irresponsible
monarch. Assyria, Babylonia, Egypt, appear at once in history as
powerful states at the mercy of a despot whose will was law.

But in other more favored lands the family was succeeded by the
tribe, a simple development of the former, an agglomeration of
men of the same blood, who could all trace their pedigree to the
acknowledged head; possessing, consequently, a chief of the same
race, either hereditary or elective, according to variable rules
always based on tradition. This was the case among the Jews, among
the Arabs, with whom the system yet prevails; even it seems
primitively in Hindostan, where modern research has brought to
light modes of holding property which suppose the same system.

But especially was this the case among the Celts, where the system
having subsisted up to recently, it can be better known in all its
details. Indeed, their adherence to it, in spite of every obstacle
that could oppose it, shows that it was natural to them, congenial
to all their inclinations, the only system that could satisfy and
make them happy; consequently, a characteristic of the race.

There was a time when the system we speak of ruled many a land,
from the Western Irish Sea to the foot of the Caucasus. Everywhere
within those limits it presented the same general features; in
Ireland alone has it been preserved in all its vigor until the
beginning of the seventeenth century, so rooted was it in the
Irish blood. Consequently, it can be studied better there. What
we say, therefore, will be chiefly derived from the study of
Irish customs, although other Gaelic tribes will also furnish
us with data for our observations.

In countries ruled by the clan system, the territory was divided
among the clans, each of them occupying a particular district,
which was seldom enlarged or diminished. This is seen particularly
in Palestine, in ancient Gaul, in the British islands. Hence their
hostile encounters had always for object movable plunder of any
kind, chiefly cattle; never conquest nor annexation of territory.
The word "preying," which is generally used for their expeditions,
explains their nature at once. It was only in the event of the
extinction of a clan that the topography was altered, and frequently
a general repartition of land among neighboring tribes took place.

It is true, when a surplus population compelled them to send abroad
swarms of their youth, that the conquest of a foreign country became
an absolute necessity. But, on such occasions it was outside of Celtic
limits that they spread themselves, taking possession of a territory
not their own. They almost invariably respected the land of other
clans of the same race, even when most hostile to them; exceptions
to this rule are extremely rare. It was thus that they sent large
armies of their young men into Northern Italy, along the Danube,
into Grecian Albania and Thrace, and finally into the very centre
of Asia Minor. The fixing of the geographical position of each tribe
was, therefore, a rule among them; and in this they differed from
nomadic nations, such as the Tartars in Asia and even the North
American Indians, whose hold on the land was too slight to offer any
prolonged resistance to invaders. Hence the position of the Gallic
_civitates_ was definite, and, so to speak, immovable, as we may see
by consulting the maps of ancient Gaul at any time anterior to its
thorough conquest by the Romans; not so among the German tribes,
whose positions on the maps must differ according to time.

We have already seen that so sacred were the limits of the clan
districts, that one of the chief duties of ollamhs and shanachies
was to know them and see them preserved.

But if territory was defined in Celtic nations, the right of
holding land differed in the case of the chieftain and the
clansman. The head of the tribe had a certain well-defined portion
assigned to him in virtue of his office, and as long only as he
held it; the clansmen held the remainder in common, no particular
spot being assigned to any one of them.

As far, therefore, as the holding of land was concerned, there
were neither rich nor poor among the Celts; the wealth of the
best of them consisted of cattle, house furniture, money, jewelry,
and other movable property. In the time of St. Columba, the
owner of five cows was thought to be a very poor man, although
he could send them to graze on any free land of his tribe. There
is no doubt that the almost insurmountable difficulty of the land
question at this time originated in the attachment of the people
to the old system, which had not yet perished in their affections;
and certainly many "agrarian outrages," as they are called, have
had their source in the traditions of a people once accustomed
to move and act freely in a free territory.

It is needless to call the attention of the reader to another
consequence of that state of things, namely, the persistence of
territorial possessions. As no individual among them could alienate
his portion, no individual or family could absorb the territory to
the exclusion of others; no great landed aristocracy consequently
could exist, and no part of the land could pass by purchase or in
any other way to a different tribe or to an alien race. The force
of arms sometimes produced temporary changes, nothing more. It is
the same principle which has preserved the small Indian tribes
still existing in Canada. Their "reservations," as they are called,
having been legalized by the British Government at the time of
the conquest from the French, the territory assigned to them would
have remained in their occupancy forever in the midst of the
ever-shifting possessions of the white race, had not the Ottawa
Parliament lately "allowed" those reservations to be divided
among the families of the tribes, with power for each to dispose
of its portion, a power which will soon banish them from the
country of their ancestors.

The preceding observations do not conflict in the least with what
is generally said of inheritance by "gavel kind," whereby the
property was equally divided among the sons to the exclusion of
the daughters; as it is clear that the property to be thus divided
was only movable and personal property.

But after the _land_ we must consider the _persons_ under the
clan-system. Under this head we shall examine briefly:

I. The political offices, such as the dignities of Ard-Righ or
supreme monarch, of the provincial kings, and of the subordinate
chieftains.

II. The state of the common people.

III. The bondsmen or slaves.

All literary or civil offices, not political, were hereditary.
Hence the professions of ollamh, shanachy, bard, brehon, physician,
passed from father to son--a very injudicious arrangement apparently,
but it seems nevertheless to have worked well in Ireland. Strange
to say, however, these various classes formed no castes as in
Egypt or in India, because no one was prevented from embracing
those professions, even when not born to them; and, in the end,
success in study was the only requisite for reaching the highest
round of the literary or professional ladder, as in China.

But a stranger and more dangerous feature of the system was that
in political offices the dignities were hereditary as to the
family, elective as to the person. Hence the title of Ard-Righ
or supreme monarch did not necessarily pass to the eldest son of
the former king, but another member of the same family might be
elected to the office, and was even designated to it during the
lifetime of the actual holder, thus becoming _Tanist_ or heir-apparent.
Every one sees at a glance the numberless disadvantages resulting
from such an institution, and it must be said that most of the
bloody crimes recorded in Irish history sprang from it.

At first sight, the dignity of supreme monarch would almost seem
to be a sinecure under the clan system, as the authority attached
to it was extremely limited, and is generally compared in its
relations to the subordinate kings, as that of metropolitan to
suffragan bishops in the Church. Nevertheless, all Celtic nations
appear to have attached a great importance to it, and the real
misfortunes of Ireland began when contention ran so high for the
office that the people were divided in their supreme allegiance,
and no Ard-Righ was acknowledged at the same time by all; which
happened precisely at the period of the invasion under Strongbow.

Some few facts lately brought to light in the vicissitudes of
various branches of the Celtic family show at once how highly all
Celts, wherever they might be settled, esteemed the dignity of
supreme monarch. It existed, as we have said, in all Celtic
countries, and consequently in Gaul; and the passage in the
"Commentaries" of Julius Caesar on the subject is too important
to be entirely passed over.

After having remarked in the eleventh chapter, "De Bello Gallico,"
lib. vi., that in Gaul the whole country, each city or clan, and
every subdivision of it, even to single houses, presented the
strange spectacle of two parties, "factiones," always in presence
of and opposed to each other, he says in Chapter XII.: --at the
arrival of Caesar in Gaul the _Eduans_ and the _Sequanians_ were
contending for the supreme authority--"The latter civitas--clan--
namely, the Sequanians, being inferior in power--because from
time immemorial the supreme authority had been vested in the
Eduans--had called to its aid the Germans under Ariovist by the
inducement of great advantages and promises. After many successful
battles, in which the entire nobility of the Eduan clan perished,
the Sequanians acquired so much power that they rallied to
themselves the greatest number of the allies of their rivals,
obliged the Eduans to give as hostages the children of their
nobles who had perished, to swear that they would not attempt
any thing against their conquerors, and even took possession of
a part of their territory, and thus obtained the supreme command
of all Gaul."

We see by this passage that there was a supremacy resting in the
hands of some one, over the whole nation. The successful tribe
had a chief to whom that supremacy belonged. Caesar, it is true,
does not speak of a monarch as of a person, but attributes the
power to the "civitas," the tribe. It is well known, however,
that each tribe had a head, and that in Celtic countries the
power was never vested in a body of men, assembly, committee, or
board, as we say in modern times, but in the chieftain, whatever
may have been his degree.

The author of the "Commentaries" was a Roman in whose eyes the
state was every thing, the actual office-holder, dictator, consul,
or praetor, a mere instrument for a short time; and he was too apt,
like most of his countrymen, to judge of other nations by his own.

We may conclude from the passage quoted that there was a supreme
monarch in Gaul as well as in Ireland, and modern historians of
Gaul have acknowledged it.

But there is yet a stranger fact, which absolutely cannot be
explained, save on the supposition that the Celts everywhere held
the supreme dignity of extreme if not absolute importance in their
political system.

To give it the preeminence it deserves, we must refer to a subsequent
event in the history of the Celts in Britain, since it happened
there several centuries after Caesar, and we will quote the words
of Augustin Thierry, who relates it:

"After the retreat of the legions, recalled to Italy to protect
the centre of the empire and Rome itself against the invasion
of the Goths, the Britons ceased to acknowledge the power of the
foreign governors set over their provinces and cities. The forms,
the offices, the very spirit and language of the Roman administration
disappeared; in their place was reconstituted the traditional
authority of the clannish chieftains formerly abolished by Roman
power. Ancient genealogies carefully preserved by the poets,
called in the British language _bairdd_ - bards - helped to discover
those who could pretend to the dignity of chieftains of tribes
or families, tribe and family being synonymous in their language;
and the ties of relationship formed the basis of their social
state. Men of the lowest class, among that people, preserved in
memory the long line of their ancestry with a care scarcely known
to other nations, among the highest lords and princes. All the
British Celts, poor or rich, had to establish their genealogy in
order fully to enjoy their civil rights and secure their claim of
property in the territory of the tribe. The whole belonging to a
primitive family, no one could lay any claim to the soil, unless his
relationship was well established.

"At the top of this social order, composing a federation of small
hereditary sovereignties, the Britons, freed from Roman power,
constituted a high national sovereignty; they created a chieftain
of chieftains, in their tongue called _Penteyrn_, that is to say,
a _king of the whole_, in the language of their old annals. And
they made him elective.--It was also formerly the custom in Gaul.
--The object was to introduce into their system a kind of
centralization, which, however, was always loose among Celtic
tribes."--(_Conquete de l'Angleterre_, liv. i.)

It is evident to us that if the Britons _constituted_ a supreme
power, when freed from the Roman yoke, it was only because they
had possessed it before they became subject to that yoke. It is,
therefore, safe to conclude that there was a supreme monarch in
Britain and in Gaul as well as in Ireland; and since the Britons,
after having lost for several centuries their autonomy of government,
thought of reestablishing this supreme authority as soon as they
were free to do so, it is clear that they attached a real
importance to it, and that it entered as an essential element
into the social fabric.

But what in reality was the authority of the Ard-Righ in Ireland,
of the Penteyrn in Britain, of the supreme chief in Gaul, whose
name, as usual, is not mentioned by Caesar?

First, it is to be remarked that a certain extent of territory was
always under his immediate authority. Then, as far as we can gather
from history, there was a reciprocity of obligations between the
high power and the subordinate kings or chieftains, the former
granting subsidies to the latter, who in turn paid tribute to
support the munificence or military power of the former.

We know from the Irish annals that the dignity of Ard-Righ was
always sustained by alliances with some of the provincial kings,
to secure the submission of others, and we have a hint of the
same nature in the passage, already quoted, from Caesar, as also
taking place in Gaul.

We know also from the "Book of Rights" that the tributes and stipends
consisted of bondsmen, silver shields, embroidered cloaks, cattle,
weapons, corn, victuals, or any other contribution.

The Ard-Righ, moreover, convened the _Feis_, or general assembly
of the nation, every third year; first at Tara, and after Tara
was left to go to ruin in consequence of the curse of St. Ruadhan
in the sixth century, wherever the supreme monarch established
his residence.

The order of succession to the supreme power was the weakest point
of the Irish constitution, and became the cause of by far the
greatest portion of the nation's calamities. Theoretically the
eldest son--some say the eldest relative--of the monarch succeeded
him, when he had no blemish constituting a radical defect: the
supreme power, however, alternating in two families. To secure
the succession, the heir-apparent was always declared during the
life of the supreme king; but this constitutional arrangement
caused, perhaps, more crimes and wars than any other social
institution among the Celts. The truth is that, after the
heir-apparent, sustained by some provincial king, supplanted the
reigning monarch, one of the provincial chieftains claimed the
crown and succeeded to it by violence.

Yet the general rule that the monarch was to belong to the race
of Miledh was adhered to almost without exception. One hundred
and eighteen sovereigns, according to the moat accredited annals,
governed the whole island from the Milesian conquest to St. Patrick
in 432. Of these, sixty were of the family of Heremon, settled
in the northern part of the island; twenty-nine of the posterity
of Heber, settled in the south; twenty-four of that of Ir; three
issued from Lugaid, the son of Ith. All these were of the race of
Miledh; one only was a _firbolg_, or plebeian, and one a woman.

It is certainly very remarkable that for so long a time--nearly
two thousand years, according to the best chronologists--Ireland
was ruled by princes of the same family. The fact is unparalleled
in history, and shows that the people were firmly attached to their
constitution, such as it was. It extorted the admiration of Sir
John Davies, the attorney-general of James I, and later of Lord Coke.

The functions of the provincial kings of Ulster, Munster,
Leinster, and Connaught, were in their several districts the same
as those which the Ard-Righ exercised over the whole country. They
also had their feuds and alliances with the inferior chieftains,
and in peaceful times there was also a reciprocity of obligations
between them. Presents were given by the superiors, tributes by
the inferiors; deliberations in assembly, mutual agreement for
public defence, wars against a common enemy, produced among them
traditional rules which were generally followed, or occasional
dissensions.

Sometimes a province had two kings, chiefly Munster, which
was often divided into north and south. Each king had his
heir-apparent, the same as the monarch. Indeed, every hereditary
office had, besides its actual holder, its Tanist, with right of
succession. Hence causes of division and feuds were needlessly
multiplied; yet all the Celtic tribes adhered tenaciously to all
those institutions which appeared rooted in their very nature, and
which contributed to foster the traditional spirit among them.

For these various offices and their inherent rights were all
derived from the universally prevailing family or clannish
disposition. Genealogies and traditions ruled the whole, and gave,
as we have seen, to their learned men a most important part and
function in the social state; and thus what the Greek and Latin
authors, Julius Caesar principally, have told us of the Celtic
Druids, is literally true of the ollamhs in their various degrees.

But the clannish spirit chiefly showed itself in the authority and
rights of every chieftain in his own territory. He was truly the
patriarch of all under him, acknowledged as he was to be the head
of the family, elected by all to that office at the death of his
predecessor, after due consultation with the files and shanachies,
to whom were intrusted the guardianship of the laws which governed
the clan, and the preservation of the rights of all according to
the strict order of their genealogies and the traditional rules
to be observed.

The power of the chieftain was immense, although limited on every
side by laws and customs. It was based on the deep affection of
relationship which is so ardent in the Celtic nature. For all the
clansmen were related by blood to the head of the tribe, and each
one took a personal pride in the success of his undertakings. No
feudal lord could ever expect from his vassals the like self-devotion;
for, in feudalism, the sense of honor, in clanship, family affection,
was the chief moving power.

In clanship the type was not an army, as in feudalism, but a
family. Such a system, doubtless, gave rise to many inconveniences.
"The breaking up of all general authority," says the Very Rev. Dean
Butler (Introduction to Clyn's "Annals"), "and the multiplication
of petty independent principalities, was an abuse _incident_ on
feudalism; it was _inherent_ in the very essence of the patriarchal
or family system. It began, as feudalism ended, with small independent
societies, each with its own separate centre of attraction, each
clustering round the lord or the chief, and each rather repelling
than attracting all similar societies. Yet it was not without its
advantages. If feudalism gave more strength to attack an enemy,
clanship secured more happiness at home. The first implied only
equality for the few, serfdom or even slavery for the many; the
other gave a feeling of equality to all."

It was, no doubt, this feeling of equality, joined to that of
relationship, which not only secured more happiness for the Celt,
but which so closely bound the nobility of the land to the inferior
classes, and gave these latter so ardent an affection for their
chieftains. Clanship, therefore, imparted a peculiar character
to the whole race, and its effect was so lasting and seemingly
ineradicable as to be seen in the nation to-day.

Wherever feudalism previously prevailed, we remark at this time
a fearful hatred existing between the two classes of the same
nation; and the great majority of modern revolutions had their
origin in that terrible antagonism. The same never existed, and
could not exist, in Celtic Countries; and if England, after a
conflict of many centuries, had not finally succeeded in destroying
or exiling the entire nobility of Ireland, we should, doubtless,
see to this very day that tender attachment between high and low,
rich and poor, which existed in the island in former ages.

This, therefore, not only imparted a peculiar character to the
people, but also gave to each subordinate chieftain an immense
power over his clan; and it is doubtful if the whole history of
the country can afford a single example of the clansmen refusing
obedience to their chief, unless in the case of great criminals
placed by their atrocities under the ban of society in former
times, and under the ban of the Church, since the establishment
of the Christian religion among them.

The previous observations give us an insight into the state of
the people in Celtic countries. Since, however, we know that
slavery existed among them, we must consider a moment what kind
of slavery it was, and how soon it disappeared without passing,
as in the rest of Europe, through the ordeal of serfdom.

At the outset, we cannot, as some have done, call slaves the
conquered races and poor Milesians, who, according to the ancient
annals of Ireland, rose in insurrection and established a king of
their own during what is supposed to be the first century of the
Christian era. The _attacotts_, as they were called, were not
slaves, but poor agriculturists obliged to pay heavy rents: their
very name in the Celtic language means "rent-paying tribes or
people." Their oppression never reached the degree of suffering
under which the Irish small farmers of our days are groaning. For,
according to history, they could in three years prepare from their
surplus productions a great feast, to which the monarch and all
his chieftains, with their retinue, were invited, to be treacherously
assassinated at the end of the banquet. The great plain of Magh Cro,
now Moy Cru, near Knockma, in the county of Galway, was required
for such a monster feast; profusion of meats, delicacies, and
drinks was, of course, a necessity for the entertainment of such
a number of high-born and athletic guests, and the feast lasted
nine days. Who can suppose that in our times the free cottiers
of a whole province in Ireland, after supporting their families
and paying their rent, could spare even in three years the money
and means requisite to meet the demands of such an occasion? But
the simple enunciation of the fact proves at least that the attacotts
were no slaves, but at most merely an inferior caste, deprived of
many civil rights, and compelled to pay taxes on land, contrary
to the universal custom of Celtic countries.

Caesar, it is true, pretends that real slavery existed among the
Celts in Gaul. But a close examination of that short passage in
his "Commentaries," upon which this opinion is based, will prove
to us that the slavery he mentions was a very different thing from
that existing among all other nations of antiquity.

"All over Gaul," he says, "there are two classes of men who enjoy
all the honors and social standing in the state--the Druids and
the knights. The plebeians are looked upon almost as slaves, having
no share in public affairs. Many among them, loaded with debt,
heavily taxed, or oppressed by the higher class, give themselves
in servitude to the nobility, and then, _in hos eadem omnia sunt
jura quoe dominis in servos_, the nobles lord it over them as, with
us, masters over their slaves."

It is clear from this very passage that among the Celts no such
servile class existed as among the Romans and other nations of
antiquity. The plebeians, as Caesar calls them, that is to say,
the simple clansmen, held no office in the state, were not summoned
to the councils of the nation, and, on that account, were nobodies
in the opinion of the writer. But the very name he gives them -
_plebs_ - shows that they were no more real slaves than the Roman
plebs. They exercised their functions in the state by the elections,
and Caesar did not know they could reach public office by application
to study, and by being _ordained_ to the rank of file, or shanachy,
or brehon, in Ireland, at least: and this gave them a direct share
in public affairs.

He adds that debt, taxation, and oppression, obliged a great many
to give themselves in servitude, and that then they were among
the Celts what slaves were among the Romans.

This assertion of Caesar requires some examination. That there
were slaves among the Gaels, and particularly in Ireland, we know
from several passages of old writers preserved in the various
annals of the country. St. Patrick himself was a slave there in
his youth, and we learn from his history and other sources how
slaves were generally procured, namely, by piratical expeditions
to the coast of Britain or Gaul. The Irish _curraghs_, in pagan
times, started from the eastern or southern shores of the island,
and, landing on the continent or on some British isle, they captured
women, children, and even men, when the crew of the craft was strong
enough to overcome them; the captives were then taken to Ireland
and sold there. They lost their rights, were reduced to the state
of "chattels," and thus became real slaves. Among the presents
made by a superior to an inferior chieftain are mentioned bondsmen
and bondsmaids. We cannot be surprised at this, since the same
thing took place among the most ancient patriarchal tribes of the
East, and the Bible has made us all acquainted with the male and
female servants of Abraham, Isaac, and Jacob, who are also called
bondsmen and bondswomen. Among the Celts, therefore, slaves were
of two kinds: those stolen from foreign tribes, and those who
had, as it were, sold themselves, in order to escape a heavier
oppression: these latter are the ones mentioned by Caesar.

The number of the first class must always have been very small,
at least in Ireland and Britain, since the piratical excursions
of the Celtic tribes inhabiting those countries were almost
invariably undertaken in curraghs, which could only bring a
few of these unfortunate individuals from a foreign country.

As to the other class, whatever Caesar may say of their number
in Gaul, making it composed of the greatest part of the plebeians
or common clansmen, we have no doubt but that he was mistaken,
and that the number of real slaves reduced to that state by
their own act must have always been remarkably small.

How could we otherwise account for the numerous armies levied by
the Gaulish chieftains against the power of Rome, or by the British
and Irish lords in their continual internecine wars? The clansmen
engaged in both cases were certainly freemen, fighting with the
determination which freedom alone can give, and this consideration
of itself suffices to show that the great mass of the Celtic tribes
was never reduced to slavery or even to serfdom.

Moreover, the whole drift of the Irish annals goes to prove that
slavery never included any perceptible class of the Celtic population;
it always remained individual and domestic, never endangering the
safety of the state, never tending to insurrection and civil disorder,
never requiring the vigilance nor even the care of the masters
and lords.

The story of Libran, recorded in the life of St. Columbkill, is
so pertinent to our present purpose, and so well adapted to give
us a true idea of what voluntary slavery was among the Celtic
tribes, that we will give it entire in the words of Montalembert:

"It was one day announced to Columba in Iona that a stranger
had just landed from Ireland, and Columba went to meet him in
the house reserved for guests, to talk with him in private and
question him as to his dwelliing-place, his family, and the cause
of his journey. The stranger told him that he had undertaken this
painful voyage in order, under the monastic habit and in exile,
to expiate his sins. Columba, desirous of trying the reality of
his repentance, drew a most repulsive picture of the hardships
and difficult obligations of the new life. 'I am ready,' said the
stranger, 'to submit to the most cruel and humiliating conditions
that thou canst command me.' And, after having made confession,
he swore, still upon his knees, to accomplish all the requirements
of penitence. 'It is well,' said the abbot: 'now rise from thy
knees, seat thyself, and listen. You must first do penance for
seven years in the neighboring island of Tirce, after which I
will see you again.' 'But,' said the penitent, still agitated by
remorse, 'how can I expiate a perjury of which I have not yet
spoken? Before I left my country I killed a poor man. I was about
to suffer the punishment of death for that crime, and I was already
in irons, when one of my relatives, who is very rich, delivered me
by paying the composition demanded. I swore that I would serve
him all my life; but, after some days of service, I abandoned him,
and here I am notwithstanding my oath.' Upon this the saint added
that he would only be admitted to the paschal communion after his
seven years of penitence.

"When these were completed, Columba, after having given him the
communion with his own hand, sent him back to Ireland to his patron,
carrying a sword with an ivory handle for his ransom. The patron,
however, moved by the entreaties of his wife, gave the penitent
his pardon without ransom. 'Why should we accept the price sent
us by the holy Columba? We are not worthy of it. The request of
such an intercessor should be granted freely. His blessing will
do more for us than any ransom.' And immediately he detached the
girdle from his waist, which was the ordinary form in Ireland for
the manumission of captives or slaves. Columba had, besides,
ordered his penitent to remain with his old father and mother
until he had rendered to them the last services. This accomplished,
his brothers let him go, saying, 'Far be it from us to detain a
man who has labored seven years for the salvation of his soul with
the holy Columba!' He then returned to Iona, bringing with him the
sword which was to have been his ransom. 'Henceforward thou shaft be
called Libran, for thou art free and emancipated from all ties,' said
Columba; and he immediately admitted him to take the monastic vows."

Servitude, therefore, continued in Ireland after the establishment
of Christianity; but how different from the slavery of other
European countries, which it took so many ages to destroy, and
which had to pass through so many different stages! Although we
cannot know precisely when servitude was completely abolished
among the Celts, the total silence of the contemporary annals on
the subject justifies the belief that the Danes, on their first
landing, found no real slaves in the country; and, if the Danes
themselves oppressed the people wherever they established their
power, they could not make a social institution of slavery. It
had never been more than a domestic arrangement; it could not
become a state affair, as among the nations of antiquity.

In clannish tribes, therefore, and particularly among the Celts,
the personal freedom of the lowest clansman was the rule, deprivation
of individual liberty the exception. Hence the manners of the people
were altogether free from the abject deportment of slaves and
villeins in other nations--a cringing disposition of the lower
class toward their superiors, which continues even to this day
among the peasantry of Europe, and which patriarchal nations have
never known. The Norman invaders of Ireland, in the twelfth century,
were struck with the easy freedom of manner and speech of the
people, so different from that of the lower orders in feudal
countries. They soon even came to like it; and the supercilious
followers of Strongbow readily adopted the dress, the habits, the
language, and the good-humor of the Celts, in the midst of whom
they found themselves settled.

And it is proper here to show what social dispositions and habits
were the natural result of the clan system, so as to become
characteristic of the race, and to endure forever, as long at least
as the race itself. The artless family state of the sept naturally
developed a peculiarly social feeling, much less complicated than
in nations more artificially constituted, but of a much deeper and
more lasting character. In the very nature of the mind of those
tribes there must have been a great simplicity of ideas, and on
that account an extraordinary tenacity of belief and will. There
is no complication and systematic combination of political, moral,
and social views, but a few axioms of life adhered to with a most
admirable energy; and we therefore find a singleness of purpose,
a unity of national and religious feeling, among all the individuals
of the tribe.

As nothing is complicated and systematized among them, the political
system must be extremely simple, and based entirely on the family.
And family ideas being as absolute as they are simple, the political
system also becomes absolute and lasting; without improving, it is
true, but also without the constant changes which bring misery
with revolution to thoughtful, reflective, and systematic nations.
What a frightful amount of misfortunes has not logic, as it is
called, brought upon the French! It was in the name of logical
and metaphysical principles that the fabric of society was destroyed
a hundred years ago, to make room for what was then called a more
rationally-constituted edifice; but the new building is not yet
finished, and God only knows when it will be!

The few axioms lying at the base of the Celtic mind with respect
to government are much preferable, because much more conducive
to stability, and consequently to peace and order, whatever may
have been the local agitation and temporary feuds and divisions.
Hence we see the permanence of the supreme authority resting in
one family among the Celts through so many ages, in spite of
continual wrangling for that supreme power. Hence the permanence
of territorial limits in spite of lasting feuds, although territory
was not invested in any particular inheriting family, but in a
purely moral being called the clan or sept.

As for the moral and social feelings in those tribes, they are
not drawn coldly from the mind, and sternly imposed by the external
law, in the form of axioms and enactments, as was the case chiefly
in Sparta, and as is still the case in the Chinese Empire to-day;
but they gush forth impetuously from impulsive and loving hearts,
and spread like living waters which no artificially-cut stones
can bank and confine, but which must expand freely in the land
they fertilize.

Deep affection, then, is with them at the root of all moral and
social feelings; and as all those feelings, even the national and
patriotic, are merged in real domestic sentiment, a great purity
of morals must exist among them, nothing being so conducive
thereto as family affections.

Above all, when those purely-natural dispositions are raised to
the level of the supernatural ones by a divinely-inspired code, by
the sublime elevation of Christian purity, then can there be found
nothing on earth more lovely and admirable. Chastity is always
attractive to a pure heart; patriarchal guilelessness becomes
sacred even to the corrupt, if not altogether hardened, man.

Of course we do not pretend that this happy state of things is
without its exceptions; that the light has no shadow, the beauty
no occasional blemish. We speak of the generality, or at least of
the majority, of cases; for perfection cannot belong to this world.

Yet mysticism is entirely absent from such a moral and religious
state, on account, perhaps, of the paucity of ideas by which the
heart is ruled, and perhaps also on account of the artless
simplicity which characterizes every thing in primitively-constituted
nations. And, wonderful to say, without any mysticism there is
often among them a perfect holiness of life, adapting itself to
all circumstances, climates, and associations. The same heart of
a young maiden is capable of embracing a married life or of
devoting itself to religious celibacy; and in either case the
duties of each are performed with the most perfect simplicity and
the highest sanctity. Hence, how often does a trifling circumstance

determine for her her whole subsequent life, and make her either
the mother of a family or the devoted spouse of Christ! Yet, the
final determination once taken, the whole after-life seems to
have been predetermined from infancy as though no other course
could have been possible.

There is no doubt that sensual corruption is particularly engendered
by an artificial state of society, which necessarily fosters
morbidity of imagination and nervous excitability. A primitive
and patriarchal life, on the contrary, leads to moderation in all
things, and repose of the senses.

Herein is found the explanation of the eagerness with which the
Celts everywhere, but particularly in Ireland, as soon as
Christianity was preached to them, rushed to a life of perfection
and continence. St. Patrick himself expressed his surprise, and
showed, by several words in his "Confessio," that he was scarcely
prepared for it. "The sons of Irishmen," he says, "and the daughters
of their chieftains, want to become monks and virgins of Christ."
We know what a multitude of monasteries and nunneries sprang up
all over the island in the very days of the first apostle and of
his immediate successors. Montalembert remarks that, according to
the most reliable and oldest documents, a religious house is
scarcely mentioned which contained less than three thousand monks
or nuns. It appeared to be a consecrated number; and this took
place immediately after the conversion of the island to Christianity,
while even still a great number were pagans.

"There was particularly," says St. Patrick, "one blessed Irish girl,
gentle born, most beautiful, already of a marriageable age, whom I
had baptized. After a few days she came back and told me that a
messenger of God had appeared to her, advising her to become a virgin
of Christ, and live united to God. Thanks be to the Almighty! Six
days after, she obtained, with the greatest joy and avidity, what
she wished. The same must be said of all the virgins of God; their
parents--those remaining pagans, no doubt--instead of approving of
it, persecute them, and load them with obloquy; yet their number
increases constantly; and, indeed, of all those that have been
thus born to Christ, _I cannot give the number_, besides those
living in holy widowhood, and keeping continency in the midst of
the world.

"But those girls chiefly suffer most who are bound to service;
they are often subjected to terrors and threats--from pagan
masters surely--yet they persevere. The Lord has given his holy
grace of purity to those servant-girls; the more they are tempted
against chastity, the more able they show themselves to keep it."

Does not this passage, written by St. Patrick, describe precisely
what is now of every-day occurrence wherever the Irish emigrate?
The Celts, therefore, were evidently at the time of their conversion
what they are now; and it has been justly remarked that, of all
nations whose records have been kept in the history of the Catholic
Church, they have been the only ones whose chieftains, princes, even
kings, have shown themselves almost as eager to become, not only
Christians, but even monks and priests, as the last of their clansmen
and vassals. Every where else the lower orders chiefly have furnished
the first followers of Christ, the rich and the great being few at
the beginning, and forming only the exception.

The evident consequence of this well-attested fact is that the
pagan Celts, even of the highest rank, generally led pure lives,
and admired chastity. But there is something more. Morality rests
on the sense of duty; the deeper that sense is imprinted in the
heart of man, the more man becomes truly moral and holy. It can
be almost demonstrated that scarcely any thing gives more solidity
to the sense of duty than a simple and patriarchal life. Their
views of morals being no more complicated than their views of
any thing else; being accustomed to reduce every thing of a
spiritual, moral nature to a few feelings and axioms, as it were,
but at the same time becoming strongly attached to them on account
of the importance which every man naturally bestows on matters of
that sort; what among other nations forms a complicated code of
morality more or less pure, more or less corrupt, for the nations
of which we speak becomes compressed, so to speak, in a nutshell,
and, the essence remaining always at the bottom, the idea of duty
grows paramount in their minds and hearts, and every thing they
do is illumined by that light of the human conscience, which,
after all, is for each one of us the voice of God. False issues
do not distract their minds, and give a wrong bias to the
conscience. Hence Celtic tribes, by their very nature, were
strictly conscientious.

So preeminently was this the case with them that spiritual things
in their eyes became, as they truly are, real and substantial.
Hence their religion was not an exterior thing only. On the contrary,
exterior rites were in their eyes only symbolical, and mere emblems
of the reality which they covered.

It should, therefore, be no matter of surprise to us to find that
for them religion has always been above all things; that they have
always sacrificed to it whatever is dear to man on earth. They all
seem to feel as instinctively and deeply as the thoroughly cultivated
and superior mind of Thomas More did, that eternal things are
infinitely superior to whatever is temporal, and that a wise man
ought to give up every thing rather than be faithless to his religion.

From the previous remarks, we map conclude, with Mr. Matthew
Arnold, who has applied his critical and appreciative mind to the
study of the Celtic character, that "the Celtic genius has sentiment
as its main basis, with love of beauty, charm, and spirituality
for its excellence," but, he adds, "ineffectualness and self-will
for its defects." On these last words we may be allowed to make a
few concluding observations.

If by "ineffectualness" is understood that, owing to their impulsive
nature, the Celts often attempted more than they could accomplish,
and thus failed; or that on many occasions of less import they
changed their mind, and, after a slight effort, did not persevere
in an undertaking just begun, there is no doubt of the truth of
the observation. But, if the celebrated writer meant to say that
this defect of character always accompanied the Celts in whatever
they attempted, and that thus they were constantly foiled and
never successful in any thing; or, still worse, that, owing to
want of perseverance and of energy, they too soon relaxed in their
efforts, and that every enterprise and determination on their
part became "ineffectual"--we so far disagree with him that the
main object of the following pages will be to contradict these
positions, and to show by the history of the race, in Ireland at
least, that, owing precisely to their "self-will," they were never
_ultimately unsuccessful_ in their aspirations; but that, on the
contrary, they have always in the end _effected_ what with their
accustomed perseverance and self-will they have at all times stood
for. At least this we hope will become evident, whenever they had a
great object in view, and with respect to things to which they
attached a real and paramount importance.

CHAPTER II.

THE WORLD UNDER THE LEAD OF THE EUROPEAN RACES.--MISSION OF THE
IRISH RACE IN THE MOVEMENT.

"The old prophecies are being fulfilled; Japhet takes possession
of the tents of Sem."--(De Maistre, _Lettre au Comte d'Avaray_.)

The following considerations will at once demonstrate the importance
and reality of the subject which we have undertaken to treat upon:

It was at the second birth of mankind, when the family of Noah,
left alone after the flood, was to originate a new state of things,
and in its posterity to take possession of all the continents
and islands of the globe, that the prophecy alluded to at the
head of this chapter was uttered, to be afterward recorded by
Moses, and preserved by the Hebrews and the Christians till the
end of time.

Never before has it been so near its accomplishment as we see it
now; and the great Joseph de Maistre was the first to point this
out distinctly. Yet he did not intend to say that it is only in
our times that Europe has been placed by Providence at the head
of human affairs; he only meant that what the prophet saw and
announced six thousand years ago seems now to be on the point
of complete realization.

It will be interesting to examine, first, in a general way, how
the race of Japhet, to whom Europe was given as a dwelling place,
gradually crept more and more into prominence after having at the
outset been cast into the shade by the posterity of the two other
sons of Noah.

The Asiatic and African races, the posterity of Sem and Cham,
appear in our days destitute of all energy, and incapable not
only of ruling over foreign races, but even of standing alone and
escaping a foreign yoke. It has not been so from the beginning.
There was a period of wonderful activity for them. Asia and Africa
for many ages were in turn the respective centres of civilization
and of human history; and the material relics of their former
energy still astonish all European travellers who visit the Pyramids
of Egypt, the obelisks and temples of Nubia and Ethiopia, the
immense stone structures of Arabia, Petraea and Persia, as well
as the stupendous pagodas of Hindostan. How, under a burning sun,
men of those now-despised races could raise structures so mighty
and so vast in number; how the ancestors of the now-wretched Copt,
of the wandering Bedouin, of the effete Persian, of the dreamy
Hindoo, could display such mental vigor and such physical endurance
as the remains of their architectural skill and even of their
literature plainly show, is a mystery which no one has hitherto
attempted to solve. Nothing in modern Europe, where such activity
now prevails, can compare with what the Eastern and Southern races
accomplished thousands of years ago. Ethiopia, now buried in sand
and in sleep, was, according to Heeren, the most reliable observer
of antiquity in our days, a land of immense commercial enterprise,
and wonderful architectural skill and energy. In all probability
Egypt received her civilization from this country; and Homer sings
of the renowned prosperity of the long-lived and happy Ethiopians.
It is useless to repeat here what we have all learned in our youth
of Babylon and Nineveh, in Mesopotamia; of Persepolis, in fertile
and blooming Iran; of the now ruined mountain-cities of Idumaea
and Northern Arabia; of Thebes and Memphis; of Thadmor, in Syria;
of Balk and Samarcand, in Central Asia; of the wonderful cities
on the banks of the Ganges and in the southern districts of the
peninsula of Hindostan.

That the ancestors of the miserable men who continue to exist in
all those countries were able to raise fabrics which time seems
powerless to destroy, while their descendants can scarcely erect
huts for their habitation, which are buried under the sand at the
first breath of the storm, is inexplicable, especially when we take
into consideration the principles of the modern doctrine of human
progress and the indefinite perfectibility of man.

At the time when those Eastern and Southern nations flourished,
the sons of Japhet had not yet taken a place in history. Silently
and unnoticed they wandered from the cradle of mankind; and, if
scripture had not recorded their names, we should be at a loss
to-day to reach back to the origin of European nations. Yet were
they destined, according to prophecy, to be the future rulers of
the world; and their education for that high destiny was a rude
and painful one, receiving as they did for their share of the
globe its roughest portion: an uninterrupted forest covering all
their domain from the central plateau which they had left to the
shores of the northern and western ocean, their utmost limit.
Many branches of that bold race--_audax Japeti genus_--fell into
a state of barbarism, but a barbarism very different from that of
the tribes of Oriental or Southern origin. With them degradation
was not final, as it seems to have been with some branches at
least of the other stems. They were always reclaimable, always
apt to receive education, and, after having existed for centuries
in an almost savage state, they were capable of once more attaining
the highest civilization. This the Scandinavian and German tribes
have satisfactorily demonstrated.

It may even be said that all the branches of the stock of Japhet
first fell from their original elevation and passed through real
barbarism, to rise again by their own efforts and occupy a prominent
position on the stage of history; and this fact has, no doubt, given
rise to the fable of the primitive savage state of all men.

That the theory is false is proved at once by the sudden emergence
of all Eastern nations into splendor and strength without ever
having had barbarous ancestors. But, when they fall, it seems to
be forever; and it looks at least problematical whether Western
intercourse, and even the intermixture of Western blood, can
reinvigorate the apathetic races of Asia. As to their rising of
their own accord and assuming once again the lead of the world,
no one can for a moment give a second thought to the realization
of such a dream.

But how and when did the races of Japhet appear first in history?
How and when did the Eastern races begin to fall behind their
younger brethren?

A great deal has been written, and with a vast amount of dogmatism,
concerning the Pelasgians and their colonizations and conquests on
the shore and over the islands of the Mediterranean Sea. But nothing
can be proved with certainty in regard to their origin and manners,
their rise and fall. In fact, European history begins with that of
Greece; and the struggle between Hellas and Persia is at once the
brilliant introduction of the sons of Japhet on the stage of the
world--the Trojan War being more than half fabulous.

The campaigns of Alexander established the supremacy of the West;
and from that epoch the Oriental races begin to fall into that
profound slumber wherein they still lie buried, and which the
brilliant activity of the Saracens and Moslems broke for a time--now,
we must hope, passed away forever.

The downfall of the far Orient was not, however, contemporaneous
with the supremacy of Greece over the East. The great peninsula
of India was still to show for many ages an astonishing activity
under the successive sway of the Hindoos, the Patans, the Moguls,
and the Sikhs. China also was to continue for a long time an immense
and prosperous empire; but the existence of both these countries
was concentrated in themselves, so that the rest of the world felt
no result from their internal agitations. Life was gradually ebbing
away in the great Mongolian family, and the silent beatings of
the pulse that indicated the slow freezing of their blood could
neither be heard nor felt beyond their own territorial limits.

Nothing new in literature and the arts is visible among them after
the appearance, on their western frontiers, of the sons of Japhet,
led by the Macedonian hero. It now seems established that Sanscrit
literature, the only, but really surprising proof of intellectual
life in Hindostan, is anterior to that epoch.

As to China, the great discoveries which in the hands of the
European races have led to such wonderful results, the mariner's
compass, the printing-press, gunpowder, paper, bank-notes, remained
for the Chinese mere toys or without further improvements after
their first discovery. It is not known when those great inventions
first appeared among them. They had been in operation for ages
before Marco Polo saw them in use, and scarcely understood them
himself. Europeans were at that time so little prepared for the
reception of those material instruments of civilization, that the
publication of his travels only produced incredulity with regard
to those mighty engines of good or evil.

But those very proofs of Oriental ingenuity establish the fact of
a point of suspension in mental activity among the nations which
discovered them. Its exact date is unknown; but every thing tends
to prove that it took place long ages ago, and nothing is so well
calculated to bring home to our minds the great fact which we are
now trying to establish as the simple mention of the two following
phenomena in the life of the most remote Eastern nations:

The genius of the East was at one time able to produce literary
works of a philosophical and poetical character unsurpassed by
those of any other nation. The most learned men of modern times
in Europe, when they are in the position to become practically
acquainted with them, and peruse them in their original dialects,
can scarcely find words to express their astonishment, intimately
conversant as they are with the masterpieces of Greece and Rome
and of the most polite Christian nations. They find in Sanscrit
poems and religious books models of every description; but they
chiefly find in them an abundance, a freshness, a mental energy,
which fill them with wonder; yet all those high intellectual
endowments have disappeared ages ago, no one knows how nor precisely
when. It is clear that the nation which produced them has fallen
into a kind of unconscious stupor, which has been its mental
condition ever since, and which to-day raises puny Europe to the
stature of a giant before the fallen colossus.

Again: many ages ago the Mongolian family in China invented many
material processes which have been mainly the clause of the rise
of Europe in our days. They were really the invention of the Chinese,
who neither received them from nor communicated them to any other
nation. Ages ago they became known to us accidentally through their
instrumentality; but, as we were not at that time prepared for the
adoption of such useful discoveries, their mention in a book then
read all over Europe excited only ridicule and unbelief. As soon
as the Western mind mastered them of itself, they became straightway
of immense importance, and gave rise, we may say, to all that we
call modern civilization. But in the hands of the Chinese they
remained useless and unproductive, as they are to this day, although
they may now see what we have done with them. Their mind, therefore,
once active enough to invent mighty instruments of material progress,
long ago became perfectly incapable of improving on its own invention,
so that European vessels convey to their astonished sight what was
originally theirs, but so improved and altered as to render the
original utterly contemptible and ridiculous. And, what is stranger
still, though they can compare their own rude implements with ours,
and possess a most acute mind in what is materially useful, they
cannot be brought to confess Western superiority. The advantage
which they really possessed over us a thousand years ago is still
a reality to their blind pride.

But it is time to return to the epoch when the race of Japhet began
to put forth its power.

Roman intellectual and physical vigor was the first great force
which gave Europe that preeminence she has never since lost; and
there was a moment in history when it seemed likely that a nation,
or a city rather, was on the point of realizing the prophetic
promise made to the sons of Noah.

But an idolatrous nation could not receive that boon; and the
Roman sway affected very slightly the African and Asiatic nations,
whatever its pretensions may have been.

For, when Rome had subdued what she called Europe, Asia, and Africa
--the whole globe--whenever she found that her empire did not reach
the sea, she established there posts of armed men; colonies were
sent out and legions distributed along the line; even in some places,
as in Britain, walls were constructed, stretching across islands, if
not along continents. Whatever country had the happiness of being
included between those limits belonged to "the city and the world"
-_urbi et orbi_; beyond was Cimmerian darkness in the North, or
burning deserts in the South. Mankind had no right to exist outside
of her sway; and, if some roaming barbarians strayed over the
inhospitable confines, they could not complain at having their
existence swept off from the field of history, so unworthy were
they of the name of men. Science itself, the science of those
times, had to admit such ideas and dictate them to polished writers.
Hence, according to the greatest geographers, mankind could exist
neither in tropical nor in arctic regions; and Strabo, dividing the
globe into five zones, declared that only two of them were habitable.

We now know how false were those assertions, and indeed how
circumscribed was the power of ancient Rome. She pretended to
universal as well as to eternal dominion; but she deceived herself
in both cases. Under her sway the races of Japhet were not "to
dwell in the tents of Sem." She was not worthy of accomplishing
the great prophecy which is now under our consideration.

It is, however, undoubtedly due to her that the children of Japhet
became the dominant race of the globe, and the Eastern nations,
once so active and so powerful, were overshadowed by her glory,
and had already fallen into that slumber which seems eternal.

Egypt was reduced so low that a victorious Roman general had only
to appear on her borders to insure immediate submission.

Syria and Mesopotamia were fast becoming the frightful deserts they
are to-day. Persia dared not move in the awful presence of a few
legions scattered along the Tigris; and, if, later on, the Parthian
kings made a successful resistance against Rome, it was only owing
to the abominable corruption of Roman society at the time; but,
in fact, Iran had fallen to rise no more, save spasmodically
under Mohammedan rule.

The fact is, that, in the subsequent flood of barbarians which for
centuries overwhelmed and destroyed the whole of Europe, we behold,
on all sides, streams of Northern European races, members of the
same family of Japhet. It was the Goths that ruined Palestine even
in the time of St. Jerome. If side by side with Northern nations
the Huns appeared, no one knows precisely whence they came. Attila
called himself King of the Scythians and the Goths, as well as
grandson of Nimrod. He came with his mighty hosts from beyond the
Danube; this is all that can be said with certainty of his origin.

The East, therefore, was already dead, and could furnish no powerful
foe against that Rome which it detested. It is even in this Oriental
supineness that we can find a reason for the duration of the
inglorious empire of Constantinople. Rome and the West, though far
more vigorous, were overwhelmed by barbarians of the same original
stock sent by Providence to "renew its youth like that of the eagle."
Constantinople and the East continued for a thousand years longer to
drag out their feeble existence, because the far Orient could not
send a few of its tribes to touch their walls and cause them to
crumble into dust. It is even remarkable that the armies of Mohammed
and his successors, in the flush of their new fanaticism, did not
dare for a long time to attack the race of Japhet settled on the
Bosporus. From their native Arabia they easily overran Egypt and
Northern Africa, Syria and Palestine, Mesopotamia and Persia. But
Asia Minor and Thrace remained for centuries proof against their
fury, and, whenever their fleets appeared in the Bosporus, they
were easily defeated by the unworthy successors of Constantine
and Theodosius. This fact, which has not been sufficiently noticed,
shows conclusively that the energy imparted by Mohammedanism
to Oriental nations would have lasted but a short time, and
encountered in the West a successful resistance, had not the
Turks appeared on the scene, destroyed the Saracen dynasties,
and, by infusing the blood of Central Asia into the veins of
Eastern and Southern fanatics, prolonged for so many ages the
sway of the Crescent over a large portion of the globe.

This was the turning-point in human affairs between the East and
the West. We do not write history, and cannot, consequently, enter
into details. It is enough to say that a new element, strengthened
by a long struggle with Moslemism, was to give to the West a lasting
preponderance which ancient Rome could not possess, and whose
developments we see in our days. This new element was the Christian
religion, solidly established on the ruins of idolatry and heresy;
far more solidly established, consequently, than under the Christian
emperors of Rome, while paganism still existed in the capital itself.

The Christian religion, which was to make one society of all the
children of Adam; which, at its birth, took the name of universal
or catholic (whereas previously all religions had been merely
national, and therefore very limited in their effects upon mankind
at large); which alone was destined to establish and maintain,
through all ages, spite of innumerable obstacles, a real universal
sway over all nations and tribes--the Christian religion alone
could give one race preponderance over others until all should
become, as it were, merged into _one_.

At first it seemed that Providence destined that high calling for
the Semitic branch of the human family. The Hebrew people, trained
by God himself, through so many ages, for the highest purposes,
finally gave birth to the great Leader who, by redeeming all men,
was to gather them all into one family. This Leader, our divine
Lord, himself a Hebrew, chose twelve men of the same nation to
be the founders of the great edifice. We know how, the divine
plan was frustrated by the stubbornness of the Jews, who
_rejected the corner-stone of the building_, to be themselves
dashed against its walls and destroyed. The sons of Japhet were
substituted for the sons of Sem, Europe for Asia, Rome for
Jerusalem; and the real commencement of the lasting preponderance
of the West dates from the establishment of the Christian Church
in Rome.

See how, from Christianity, the Caucasian race, as we call it,
came to be the rulers of the world. A mighty revolution, wherein
all the branches of that great race become intermingled and
confused, sweeps over the Roman Empire. Every thing seems
destroyed by the onset of the barbarians, in order that they, by
receiving the only true religion which they found without seeking
among those whom they conquered, might become worthy of fulfilling
the designs of Providence. All the barriers are overthrown that one
institution, called Christendom, may take form and harmony. There
are to be no more Romans, nor Gauls, nor Iberians, nor Germans, nor
Scandinavians--only Christians. It is a renewed and reinvigorated
race of Japhet, imbued with true doctrine, clothed with solid
virtues, animated with an overwhelming energy. It is a colossal
statue, moulded by popes, chiselled by bishops, set on its feet by
Christian emperors and kings, chiefly by Charlemagne, Alfred, Louis
IX, and Otho. Is there not perfect unity between those great men
divided by such intervals of space and time? Is not their work a
universal republic, whose foundations they laid with their own hands?

The rest of the world, still prostrate at the feet of foolish idols,
or carried away by human errors and delusions, sinks deeper and
deeper into apathy and corruption, while Europe is reserved for
mighty purposes in centuries to come. A stream is gathering in the
West, which is destined to sweep down and bear away all obstacles,
and to cover every continent with its regenerating waters.

That stream is modern European history. It has been recorded in
thousands of volumes, many of which, however, are totally unreliable
fables of those mighty events. Those only have had the key to its
right interpretation who have followed the Christian light given from
above, as a star, to guide the wonderful giant in his course. The
chief among them were: of old, Augustine, the author of the "City
of God;" Orosius, the first to condense the annals of the world
into the formula, "_divina providentia regitur mundus et homo;_"
Otho of Freysinguen, in his work "_De mutatione rerum;_" and the
author of "_Gesta Dei per Francos;_" in modern times, Bossuet and
his followers.

The destruction of idolatry was of such vital importance in the
regeneration of the world that it sufficed as a dogma to imbue a
great branch of the Semitic family with a strong life for several
centuries. Moslemism has no other truth to support it than the
assertion of God's unity; but, by waging war against the Trinity
and, consequently, against the very foundation of Christian belief,
it became, for a long time, the greatest obstacle to the dissemination
of truth. It prevented the early triumph of the Caucasian race,
and galvanized, for a time, the nations of the East and South into
a false life.

The ravages of the Tartar hordes under Genghis Khan and his
successors were in no sense life, but only a fitful madness.

The European stream was thus impeded in its flood by the new
activity of Arabia and Turkomania. It was a struggle in which
victory, for a long time, hung in the balance: it required many
crusades of the whole of Western Europe; the long heroism of the
Spanish and Portuguese nations; the incessant attack and defence
of the Templars and the Knights of Malta over the whole surface
of the Mediterranean Sea, to secure the preponderance of the West.
It was finally decided at Lepanto. Since that great day,
Mohammedanism has gradually declined, and there now seems no
insurmountable obstacle to the free flowing of the European stream.

This stream, however, is not homogeneous: far from it. Had the
Christian element always remained alone in it, or at least supreme,
long ere this the victory would have been secure forever, and the
Catholic missions alone would have fulfilled the old prophecies
and given to the sons of Japhet possession of the tents of Sem--a
glorious work so well begun in the East, in India and Japan; in
the West, in the whole of America!

But, unfortunately, the policy of the papacy, which was also that
of Charlemagne, and of other great Christian sovereigns, was not
continued. The Norman feudalism of England and Northern France;
the Caesarism of Germany and the Capetian kings; the heresies
brought from the East by the Crusaders; the paganism and neo-Platonism
of the revival of learning; above all, the fearful upheaval of the
whole of Europe by the Protestant schism and heresy, troubled the
purity of that great Japhetic stream, and has retarded to our days
its momentous and overwhelming impetuosity.

Wonderful, indeed, that in the whole of Europe one small island
alone was forever stubbornly opposed to all these aberrations,
which has stood her ground firmly, and, we may now say, successfully.
The reader already knows that the demonstration of this stupendous
fact is the object of the present volume.

Having stood aloof so long from all those wanderings from the
right path, she has scarcely appeared in the field of European
history save as the victim of Scandinavia and of England. But
there is a time in the series of ages for the appearance of all
those called by Providence to enact a part. What is a myriad of
years for man is not a moment for God; and it would seem that we
had reached at last the epoch wherein Ireland is to be rewarded
for her steadfastness and fidelity.

The impetus now imparted to European power becomes each day more
clearly defined, and, to judge by recent appearances, Irishmen are
about to play no inglorious part in it. The power of expansion, so
characteristic of them from the beginning, has of late years assumed
gigantic proportions. The very hatred of their enemies, the measures
adopted by their oppressors to annihilate them, have only served to
give them a larger field of operations and a much stronger force.
It is not without purpose that God has spread them in such numbers
over so many different islands and continents. It is theirs to give
to the spread of Japhetism among the sons of Sem its right direction
and results. The other races of Western Europe would, had they been
left to themselves alone, have converted that great event into a
curse for mankind, and perhaps the forerunner of the last calamities;
but the Irish, having kept themselves pure, are the true instruments
in the hands of God for righting what is wrong and purifying what
is corrupt.

Had Europe remained in its entirety as steadfast to the true
Christian spirit as the small island which dots the sea on its
western border, what an incalculable happiness it would have proved
to the whole globe, resting as it does to-day under the lead of
the race of Japhet !

But where now are the pure waters which should vivify and
fertilize it? Innumerable elements are floating in their midst
which can but destroy life and spread barrenness everywhere.

Let us see what Europeans believe; what are the motives which
actuate them; what they propose to themselves in disseminating
their influence and establishing their dominion; what the real,
openly-avowed purposes of the leaders are in the vast scheme
which embraces the whole earth; what becomes of foreign races
as soon as they come in contact with them.

The bare idea causes the blood of the Christian to curdle in
his veins, and he thanks God that his life shall not be
prolonged to witness the successful termination of the vast
conspiracy against God and humanity.

For, in our days, spite of so many deviations in the course of
the great European stream, it is truly a matter of wonder what
power it has obtained over the globe in its mastery, its control,
its unification. What, then, would have been the result had its
course remained constantly under Christian guidance!

It is only a short time since the whole earth has become known
to us; and we may say that, for Europe, it has been enough only
to know it in order to become at once the mistress of it; such
power has the Christian religion given her! The first circumnavigation
of the globe under Magellan took place but yesterday, and to-day
European ships cover the oceans and seas of the world, bearing
in every sail the breath and the spirit of Japhetism. The stubborn
ice-fields of the pole can scarcely retard their course, and hardy
navigators and adventurous travellers jeopardize their lives in
the pursuit of merely theoretical notions, void almost of any
practical utility.

The most remote and, up to recently, inaccessible parts of the
earth are as open to us, owing to steam, as were the countries
bordering on the Mediterranean to the ancients. The Argonautic
expedition along the southern coast of the Black Sea was in its
day an heroic undertaking. The Phoenician colonies established
in Africa and Spain by a race trying for the first time in the
history of man to launch their ships on the ocean in order
to trade with Northern tribes as far as Ireland and the Baltic,
though never losing sight of the coast; the attempts of the
Carthaginians to circumnavigate Africa; the three years' voyages
of the ships of Solomon in the Red Sea and the Persian Gulf,
were one and all far more hazardous undertakings than the long
voyages of our steamships across the Indian Ocean to Australia,
or around Cape Horn to California and the South Sea Islands,
through the Southern and Northern Pacifics.

From all large seaboard cities in any part of the globe, lines
of steamers now bear men to every point of the compass, so that
the very boards at the entrances of offices, to be found everywhere
for the accommodation of travellers, are as indices of works on
universal geography.

And the European, still unsatisfied with all he has achieved
in speed and comfort, looks to more rapid and easier modes of
conveyance. Scientific men have been for many years engaged
in experiments by means of which they hope to replace the ocean
by the atmosphere as a public highway for nations; and the currents
of air rushing in every direction with the velocity of the
most rapid winds may yet be used by our children instead of
rivers, thenceforth deserted, and of ocean-streams at last left
empty and waste as before the voyages of Columbus and De Gama.

All this constitutes a positive and stern fact staring us in the
face, and giving to the Caucasian race a power of which our ancestors
would never have dreamed. And if all this is to be the only result
of man's activity--the attainment of merely worldly purposes--God,
whose world this is, may look down on it from heaven as on the work
of Titans preparing to attack his rights, and He will know how to
turn all these mighty efforts of the sons of Japhet to his own
holy designs. He may use a small branch of that great race,
preserved purposely from the beginning unsullied by mere thrift,
and prepared for his work by long persecution, a consideration
which we shall examine later on.

Meanwhile the great mass of the European family is allowed to go
on in its wonderful undertaking; and we turn to it yet a short while.

As if to favor still more directly this work of the unification
of the globe, Providence has placed at the disposal of the prime
movers in the enterprise pecuniary means which no one could have
foreseen a few years ago.

In 1846, on a small branch of one of the great rivers of California,
a colonist discovers gold carried as dust with the sand, and soon
a great part of the country is found to be immensely rich in the
precious metal. That first discovery is followed by others equally
important, and after a few years gold is found in abundance on both
sides of a long range of the Rocky Mountains; again in the north,
nearly as high up as the arctic circle. North America, in fact,
is found to be a vast gold deposit. Australia soon follows, and
that new continent, whose exploration has scarcely begun, is said
to be dotted all over by large oases of auriferous rock and gravel.
In due time the same news comes from South Africa, where it has
been lately reported that diamonds, in addition to gold, enrich
the explorer and the workman.

It is needless to speak of mines of silver and mercury after gold
and diamonds; but the result is that the European race is straightway
provided with an enormous wealth commensurate with the immense
commercial and manufacturing enterprises required for the establishment
of its supremacy all over the globe.

There is work, therefore, for all the ships afloat; others and
larger ones have to be constructed; and modern engineering skill
places on the bosom of the deep sea vessels which few, indeed, of
the greatest rivers can accommodate in their channels and bays.

All these means of dominion and dissemination once procured,
the great work clearly assigned to the race of Japhet may proceed.

Intercourse with the most savage and uncivilized tribes is eagerly
cultivated even at the risk of life. New avenues to trade are
opened up in places where men, still living in the most primitive
state, have few if any wants; and it is considered as part of the
keen merchant's skill to fill the minds of these uncouth and
unsophisticated barbarians with the desire of every possible
luxury. Have we not lately heard that the savages of the Feejee
Islands, who were a few years ago cannibals, have now a king
seeking the protection of England, if not the annexation of his
kingdom to the British empire?

Yes, the material civilization of Europe, the new discoveries
of steam and magnetism, the untiring energy of men aiming at
universal dominion, give to the Caucasian race such a superiority
over the rest of mankind that the time seems to be fast approaching
when the manners, the dress, the look even of Europeans, will
supersede all other types, and spread everywhere the dead level
of our habits.

This fact has already been realized in America, North and South.
Geographers may give lengthened descriptions of the original tribes
which still possess a shadow of existence; foreign readers may
perhaps imagine that the continent is still in the quiet
possession of rude and uncivilized races roaming at will over its
surface, and allowing some Europeans to occupy certain cities and
harbors for the purposes of trade and barter. We know that nothing
could be more erroneous. The Europeans are the real possessors,
north and south; the Indians are permitted to exist on a few spots
contracting year by year into narrower limits. The northern and
larger half of the continent is chiefly the dwelling-place of the
most active branch of the bold race of Japhet. The first of the
iron lines which are to connect its Atlantic and Pacific coasts
has recently been laid. Cities spring up all along its track: the
harbors of California, Oregon, and Alaska, will soon swarm much
more than now with hardy navigators ready to europeanize the various
groups of islands scattered over the Pacific. Already in the Sandwich
and Tahiti groups the number of Europeans is greatly in excess of
that of the natives. Those natives who, in the Philippine Islands,
have been preserved by the Catholic Church, will too soon disappear
from the surface of the largest ocean of the globe.

Then Eastern Asia will be attacked much more seriously than ever
before. Since its discovery, Europeans could only reach it
through the long distances which divide Western Europe from China
and Japan. But within a short time numerous lines of steamships,
starting from San Francisco, Portland, Honolulu, and many other
harbors yet nameless, will land travellers in Yokohama, Hakodadi,
Yeddo, Shanghai, Canton, and other emporiums of Asia.

Nor will the Americans of the United States be alone in the race.
Several governments are preparing to cut a canal through the Isthmus
of Panama, or Darien, or Tehuantepec, as has already been done
with that of Suez; and soon ships starting from Western Europe
will, with the aid of steam, traverse the Atlantic and Pacific
Oceans successively as two large lakes to land their passengers
and cargoes on the frontiers of China and India.

The Japanese, those Englishmen of the East, are ready to adopt
European inventions. They are indeed already expert in many of
them, and seem on the alert to conform to European manners. It
is said that the nation is divided into two parties on that very
question of conformity; before long they will all be of one mind.
What an impulse will thus be given to the europeanization of China
and Tartary!

In Hindostan, England has fairly begun the work; but the climate
of the peninsula offering an obstacle to the introduction of a
large number of men of the Caucasian race, it will be more probably
from the foot of the Himalaya Mountains that the spread of the race
will commence. Already the English and the Russians are concentrating
their forces on the Upper Indus. The question merely is, Which
nation will be the first to inoculate the dreamy sons of Sem with
the spirit and blood of Japhet? It seems that Central Asia will form
the rallying-ground for the last efforts of the Titans to unify their
power, as it was thence that the power of God first dispersed them.

A glance at the rest of the world as witnessing the same astonishing
spectacle, and we pass on. Australia is clearly destined to be entirely
European; the number of natives, already insignificant compared to that
of the colonists, will soon disappear utterly. Turkey, the Caucasus,
Bokhara, are rapidly taking a new shape and adopting Western manners.

The African triangle offers the greatest resistance, owing to its
deserts, its terrible climate, and the savage or childish disposition
of its inhabitants. Yet the attempt to europeanize it is at this
moment in earnest action at its southernmost cape, all along its
northern line skirting the Mediterranean, in Egypt chiefly, and
also through the Erythrean Gulf in the east; finally, on many
points of its western shore, which, strange to say, lags behind,
although it formed the first point of discovery by the Portuguese.

To condense all we have just said to a few lines: it looks as
though all races of men, except the Caucasian, were undergoing
a rapid process of unification or disappearance.

In America certainly the phenomenon is most striking.

In Asia all the native races seem palsied and unable to hold
together in the presence of the Russians and the English.

In Africa, Mohammedanism still preserves to the natives a certain
activity of life, but even that is fast on the wane.

Finally, in Australia and the Pacific Ocean the disappearance of
the natives is still more striking and more sudden in its action
than even in America.

This state of things did not exist two hundred years ago; and
when the Crusades began the reverse was the case.

We cannot believe that this immense, universal fact is merely an
exterior one resulting from new appliances, new comforts, new
outward habits; what is called material civilization. We cannot
believe that it is merely the dress, houses, culinary regime, the
popular customs of those numerous foreign tribes or nations which
are undergoing such a wonderful change. This outward phenomenon
supposes a _substratum_, an interior reality of ideas and principles
worthy our chief attention as the real cause of all those exterior
changes; a cause, nevertheless, which is scarcely thought of in
the public estimate of this mighty revolution.

It is the mind of Europe: it is the belief or want of belief,
the religious or irreligious views, the grasping ambition, the
headlong desire of an impossible or unholy happiness, the reckless
sway of unbridled passions, which try to spread themselves among
all nations, and bring them all up, or rather down, to the level
of intoxicated, tottering, maddened Europe.

If the monstrous scheme succeeds, there will be no more prayer in
the villages of the devout Maronites, no more submission to God in
the mountains of Armenia, no more simplicity of faith among the
shepherds of Chaldea, no more purity of life among the wandering
children of Asiatic deserts.

Side by side with truth and virtue many errors and monstrosities
will doubtless disappear, but not to be replaced with what is
much better.

The muezzin of the mosques will no longer raise his voice from the
minarets at noon and nightfall; the simple Lama will no longer
believe in the successive incarnations of Buddha; no longer will
the superstitious Hindoo cast himself beneath the car of Juggernaut;
many another such absurdity and crime will, let us hope, disappear
forever. But with what benefit to mankind? After all, is not
superstition even better for men than total unbelief? And, when
the whole world is reduced to the state of Europe, when what we
daily witness there shall be reproduced in all continents and
islands, will men really be more virtuous and happy?

We must not think, however, that there is nothing truly good in
the stupendous transformation which we have endeavored to sketch.
If it really be the accomplishment of the great prophecy mentioned
by us at the beginning of this chapter, it is a noble and a
glorious event. God will know how to turn it to good account, and
it is for us to hail its coming with thankfulness.

There is no doubt that the actual superiority of the race of Japhet,
by force of which this wonderful revolution is being accomplished,
is the result of Christianity, that is, of Catholicity. It is
because Europe, or the agglomeration of the various branches of
the race of Japhet, was for fifteen hundred years overshadowed
by the true temple of God, his glorious and infallible Church;
it is because the education of Europeans is mainly due to the
true messengers of God, the Popes and the bishops; it is because
the mind of Europe was really formed by the great Catholic thinkers,
nurtured in the monasteries and convents of the Church; it is,
finally, because Europeans are truly the sons of martyrs and
crusaders, that on them devolves the great mission of regenerating
and blending into one the whole world.

But, unfortunately, the work is spoiled by adjuncts in the movement
which have grown up in the centuries preceding us. In fact, the
whole European movement has been thrown on a wrong track, which
we have already pointed out as mere material civilization.

Still, in spite of all the dross, there is a great deal of pure
metal in the Japhetic movement. Underlying it all runs the
doctrine that all men are sprung from the same father, and that
all have had the same Redeemer; that, consequently, all are
brethren, and that there should be no place among them for castes
and classes, as of superior and inferior beings; that the God the
Christians adore is alone omnipotent; that idolatry of all kinds
ought to disappear, and that ultimately there should be but one
flock and one shepherd.

These are saving truths, still held to in the main by the race
of Japhet, in spite of some harsh and opposing false assertions,
truths which the Catholic Church alone teaches in their purity,
and which are yet destined, we hope, to make one of all mankind.

But her claims are yet far from being acknowledged by the
leaders in the movement. And who are those leaders? A question
all-important.

England is certainly the first and foremost. Endowed with all the
characteristics of the Scandinavian race, which we shall touch upon
after, deeply infused with the blood of the Danes and Northmen, she
has all the indomitable energy, all the systematic grasp of mind and
sternness of purpose joined to the wise spirit of compromise and
conservatism of the men of the far North; she, of all nations, has
inherited their great power of expansion at sea, possessing all
the roving propensities of the old Vikings, and the spirit of
trade, enterprise, and colonization, of those old Phoenicians of
the arctic circle.

The Catholic south of Europe, Spain and Portugal, having, through
causes which it is not the place to investigate here, lost their
power on the ocean; the temporary maritime supremacy of Holland
having passed away, because the people of that flat country were
too close and narrow-minded to grasp the world for any length of
time; France, the only modern rival of England as a naval power,
having been compelled, owing to the revolutions of the last and
the present centuries, to concentrate her whole strength on the
Continent of Europe; the young giant of the West, America, being
yet unable to grasp at once a vast continent and universal sway
over the pathways of the ocean, England had free scope for her
maritime enterprises, and she threw herself headlong into this
career. Out of Europe she is incontestably the first power of the
whole world. To give a better idea of the extent of her dominion,
we subjoin an abridged sketch from the "History of a Hundred Years,"
by Cesare Cantu:

"In Europe she has colonies at Heligoland, Gibraltar, Malta, and
the Ionian Isles.

"In Africa, Bathurst, Sierra Leone, many establishments on the
coast of Guinea, the islands of Mauritius, Rodrigo, Sechelles,
Socotora, Ascension, St. Helena, and, most important of all,
the Cape Colony.

"In Asia, where she replaced the French and Dutch, she has,
besides Ceylon, an empire of 150,000,000 of people in India,
the islands of Singapore and Sumatra, part of Malacca, and many
establishments in China.

"In America, she is mistress of Canada, New Brunswick, and other
eastern provinces; the Lucayes, Bermudas, most of the Antilles,
part of Guiana, and the Falkland Isles.

"In the Southern Ocean, the greater part of Australia, Tasmania,
Norfolk, Van Diemen's Land, New Zealand, and many other groups
of Oceanica are hers.

"What other state can compete with her in the management of
colonies, and in the selection of situations from which she
could command the sea? Jersey and Guernsey are her keys of the
Straits of Dover; from Heligoland she can open or shut the mouths
of the Elbe and Weser; from Gibraltar she keeps her eye on Spain
and the States of Barbary, and holds the gates of the Mediterranean.
With Malta and Corfu she has a like advantage over the Levant.
Socotora is for her the key of the Red Sea, whence she commands
Eastern Africa and Abyssinia. Ormuz, Chesmi, and Buschir, give
her the mastery over the Persian Gulf, and the large rivers which
flow into it. Aden secures the communication of Bombay with Suez.
Pulo Pinang makes her mistress of the Straits of Malacca, and
Singapore, of the passage between China and India. At the Cape
of Good Hope her troops form an advanced guard over the Indian
Ocean; and from Jamaica she rules the Antilles and trades securely
with the rest of Central and South America.

"Englishmen have made a careful survey of the whole of the
Mediterranean Sea, of the course of the Indus, the Ganges, the
Bramaputra, the Godavery, and other rivers of India; of the
whole littoral between Cape Colony and China; England has steamships
on the Amazon and Niger, and her vessels are found everywhere on
the coast of Chili and Peru."

Other European families try to follow in her footsteps; at their
head the United States now stand. Primitively an offshoot of the
English stock, the blood of all other Japhetic races has given the
latter country an activity and boldness which will render it in
time superior in those respects to the mother-country herself.

Yet at this time, even in the presence of the United States, in
the presence of all other maritime powers, England stands at the
head of the Japhetic movement.

Unfortunately, her first aim, after acquiring wealth and securing
her power, is, to exclude the Roman Catholic Church as far as is
practicable from the benefit of the system, to oppose her whenever
she would follow in the wake of her progress, and either to allow
paganism or Mohammedanism to continue in quiet possession wherever
they exist, or to substitute for them as far as possible her
Protestantism. At all events, the Catholicity of the Church is
to be crushed, or at least thwarted, to make room for the
catholicity of the English nation.

And it looks as though such, in truth, would have been the result,
had not the stubbornness of the Irish character stood in the way;
if the Celt of Erin, after centuries of oppression and opposition
to the false wanderings of the European stream, had not insisted
on following the English lord in his travels, dogging his steps
everywhere, entering his ships welcome or unwelcome, rushing on
shore with him wherever he thought fit to land, and there planted
his shanty and his frame church in the very sight of stately
palaces lately erected, and gorgeous temples with storied windows
and softly-carpeted floors.

And after a few years the Irish Celt would show himself as active
and industrious in his new country as oppression had made him
indolent and careless on his own soil; the shanty would be replaced
by a house worthy of a man; above all, the humble dwelling which he
first raised to his God would disappear to make room for an edifice
not altogether unworthy of divine majesty; at least, far above the
pretentious structures of the oppressors of his religion. The eyes
of men would be again turned to "the city built upon a mountain;" and
the character of universality, instead of being wrested from the true
Church, would become more resplendent than ever through the steadfast
Irish Celt.

Thus the spreading of the Gospel in distant regions would be
accomplished without a navy of their own. As their ancestors did
in pagan times, they would use the vessels of nations born for
thrift and trade; the stately ships of the "Egyptians" would be
used by the true "people of God."

For them hath Stephenson perfected the steam-engine, so as to
enable vessels to undertake long voyages at sea without the necessary
help of sails; for them Brunel and others had spent long years in
planning and constructing novel Noah's arks capable of containing
all clean and unclean animals; for them the Barings and other
wealthy capitalists had embraced the five continents and the isles
of the ocean in their financial schemes; the Jews of England,
Germany, and France, the Rothschilds and Mendelssohns, had
accumulated large amounts of money to lend to ship-building
companies; for them, in fine, the long-hidden gold deposits
of California, Australia, and many other places, had been
discovered at the proper time to replenish the coffers of the godless,
that they might undertake to furnish the means of transportation
and settlement for the missionaries of God!

And, to prove that this is no exaggeration, it is enough to look
at the number of emigrants that were to be carried to foreign parts,
and that actually left England for her various colonies or for the
United States. For several years one thousand Irish people sailed
_daily_ from the ports of Great Britain; and for a great number
of years 200,000 at least did so every twelve months. When we come,
to contrast the Irish at home with the Irish abroad, we shall
give fuller details than are possible here. These few words suffice
to show the immense number of vessels and the vast sums that were
required for such an extraordinary operation.

This phenomenon is surely curious enough, universal enough, and
sufficiently portentous in its consequences, to deserve a thorough
inquiry into its causes and the way in which it was brought about.

It will be seen that it all came from the Irish having kept
themselves aloof from the other branches of the great Japhetic race
in order to join in the general movement at the right time and in
their own way, constantly opposed to all the evil that is in it,
but using it in the way Providence intended.

The chapters which follow will be devoted to the development of
this general idea; the few remarks with which we close the present
may tend to set the conclusion which we draw more distinctly before
our minds.

There is no doubt that, taking the Irish nation as a whole, we
find in it features which are visible in no other European nation;
and that, taking Europe as a whole, in all its complexity of
habits, manners, tendencies, and ways of life, we have a picture
wholly distinct from that of the Irish people. England has striven
during the last eight hundred years to shape it and make it the
creature of her thought, and England has utterly failed.

The same race of men and women inhabit the isle of Erin to-day as
that which held it a thousand years ago, with the distinction that
it is now far more wretched and deserving of pity than it was then.
The people possess the same primitive habits, simple thoughts,
ardent impulsiveness, stubborn spirit, and buoyant disposition,
in spite of ages of oppression. In the course of centuries they
have not furnished a single man to that army of rash minds which
have carried the rest of Europe headlong through lofty, perhaps,
but at bottom empty and idle theories, to the brink of that
bottomless abyss into which no one can peer without a shudder.

No heresiarch has found place among them; no fanciful philosopher,
no holder of fitful and lurid light to deceive nations and lead
them astray, no propounder of social theories opposed to those
of the Gospel, no inventor of new theogonies and cosmologies--new
in name, old in fact--rediscovered by modern students in the
Kings_ of China, the _Vedas_ of Hindostan, the _Zends_ of Persia,
or _Eddas_ of the North; no ardent explorer of Nature, seeking
in the bowels of the earth, or on the summits of mountains, or
in the depths of the ocean, or the motions of the stars, proofs
that God does not exist, or that matter has always existed, that
man has made himself, developing his own consciousness out of
the instinct of the brute, or even out of the material motions
of the zoophyte.

We would beg the reader to bear in mind those insane theories so
prevalent to-day, out of which society can hope for nothing but
convulsions and calamities, to see how all the nations of Europe
have contributed to the baneful result except the Irish; that
they alone have furnished no false leader in those wanderings
from the right path; that their community has been opposed all
through to the adoption of the theories which led to them, have
spurned them with contempt, and even refused to inquire into
them: with these thoughts and recollections in his mind, he may
understand what we mean when we assert that the Irish have
stubbornly refused to enter upon the European movement. Although,
by the reception of Christianity, they were admitted into the
European family, the Christianity which they received was so
thoroughly imbibed and so completely carried out that any thing
in the least opposed to it was sternly rejected by the whole
nation. Hence they became a people of peculiar habits. Rejecting
the harsh features of feudalism, not caring for the refinement of
the so-called revival of learning, sternly opposed at all times to
Protestantism, they would have naught to do with what was rejected
or even suspected by the Church, until in our days they offer to
the eyes of the world the spectacle we have sketched. Thus have
they, not the least by reason of their long martyrdom, become fit
instruments for the great work Providence asks of them to-day.

England, the great leader in the material part of the social
movement which has been the subject of this chapter, for a long
time hesitated to adopt principles altogether subversive to
society. In her worldly good sense she endeavored to follow what
she imagined a _via media_ in her wisdom, to avoid what seemed
to her extremes, but what is in reality the eternal antagonism
of truth and falsehood, of order and chaos. Twenty years back
there was a unanimity among English writers to speak the
language of moderation and good sense whenever a rash author of
foreign nations hazarded some dangerous novelties; and in their
reviews they immediately pointed out the poison which lay
concealed under the covering of science or imagination, and the
peril of these ever-increasing new discoveries. If any
Englishman sanctioned those theories, he could not form a school
among his countrymen, and remained almost alone of his party.

But at last England has given way to the universal spread of
temptation, and to-day she runs the race of disorganization as
ardent as any, striving to be a leader among other leaders to
ruin. Every one is astounded at the sudden and remarkable change.
It is truly inexplicable, save by the fearful axiom, _Quos Deus
vult perdere, dementat_. Hence not a few expect soon to see
storms sweep over the devoted island of Great Britain, which no
longer forms an exception to the universality of the evil we
have indicated.

Which, then, is the one safe spot in Europe, whither the tide
of folly, or madness rather, has not yet come?

Ireland alone is the answer.

CHAPTER III.

THE IRISH BETTER PREPARED TO RECEIVE CHRISTIANITY THAN
OTHER NATIONS.

The introduction of Christianity gave Europe a power over the
world which pagan Rome could not possess. All the branches of
the Japhetic family combined to form what was with justice and
propriety called Christendom. Ireland, by receiving the Gospel,
was really making her first entry into the European family; but
there were certain peculiarities in her performance of this
great act which gave her national life, already deviating from
that of other European nations, a unique impulse. The first of
those peculiarities consisted in her preparation for the great
reception of the faith, and the few obstacles she encountered in
her adoption of it, compared with those of the rest of the world.

Providence wisely decreed that redemption should be delayed
until a large portion of mankind had attained to the highest
civilization. It was not in a time of ignorance and barbarism
that the Saviour was born. The Augustan is, undoubtedly, the
most intellectual and refined age, in point of literary and
artistic taste, that the world has ever seen. A few centuries
before, Greece had reached the summit of science and art. No
country, in ancient or modern times, has surpassed the acumen of
her philosophical writers and the aesthetic perfection of her
poets and artists. Rome made use of her to embellish her cities,
and inherited her taste for science and literature.

But art and literature embody ideas only; and, as Ozanam says so
well: "Beneath the current of ideas which dispute the empire of
the world, lies that world itself such as labor has made it,
with that treasure of wealth and visible adornment which render
it worthy of being the transient sojourn-place of immortal souls.
Beneath the true, the good, and the beautiful, lies the useful,
which is brightened by their reflection. No people has more
keenly appreciated the idea of utility than that of Rome; none
has ever laid upon the earth a hand more full of power, or more
capable of transforming it; nor more profusely flung the
treasures of earth at the feet of humanity . . . .

"At the close of the second century . . the rhetorician
Aristides celebrated in the following terms the greatness of the
Roman Empire: 'Romans, the whole world beneath your dominion
seems to keep a day of festival. From time to time a sound of
battle comes to you from the ends of the earth, where you are
repelling the Goth, the Moor, or the Arab. But soon that sound
is dispersed like a dream. Other are the rivalries and different
the conflicts which you excite through the universe. They are
combats of glory, rivalries in magnificence between provinces
and cities. Through you, gymnasia, aqueducts, porticoes, temples,
and schools, are multiplied; the very soil revives, and the
earth is but one vast garden!'

"Similar, also, was the language of the stern Tertullian: `In
truth, the world becomes day after day richer and better
cultivated; even the islands are no longer solitudes; the rocks
have no more terrors for the navigator; everywhere there are
habitations, population, law, and life.'

"The legions of Rome had constructed the roads which furrowed
mountains, leaped over marshes, and crossed so many different
provinces with a like solidity, regularity, and uniformity; and
the various races of men were lost in admiration at the sight of
the mighty works which were attributed in after-times to Caesar,
to Brunehaud, to Abelard!"

It was in the midst of those worldly glories that Christ was
born, that he preached, and suffered, that his religion was
established and propagated. It found proselytes at once among
the most polished and the most learned of men, as well as among
slaves and artisans; and thus was it proved that Christianity
could satisfy the loftiest aspirations of the most civilized as
well as insure the happiness of the most numerous and miserable
classes.

But we must reflect that the advanced civilization of Greece and
Rome was in fact an immense obstacle to the propagation of truth,
and, what is more to be regretted, often gave an unnatural
aspect to the Christianity of the first ages in the Roman world--
a half-pagan look--so that the barbarian invasion was almost
necessary to destroy every thing of the natural order; that the
Church alone remaining face to face with those uncouth children
of the North, might begin her mission anew and mould them all
into the family called "Christendom." "Christianity," to
quote Ozanam again, "shrank from condemning a veneration of the
beautiful, although idolatry was contained in it; and as it
honored the human mind and the arts it produced, so the
persecution of the apostate Julian, in which the study of the
classics had been forbidden to the faithful, was the severest of
its trials. Literary history possesses no moment of greater
interest than that which saw the school with its profane
--that is to say pagan--traditions and texts received into the
Church. The Fathers, whose christian austerity is our wonder,
were passionate in their love of antiquity, which they covered,
as it were, with their sacred vestments. . . . By their favor,
Virgil traversed the ages of iron without losing a page, and, by
right of his Fourth Eclogue, took rank among the prophets and
the sibyls. St. Augustine would have blamed paganism less, if,
in place of a temple to Cybele, it had raised a shrine to Plato,
in which his works might have been publicly read. St. Jerome's
dream is well known, and the scourging inflicted upon him by
angels for having loved Cicero too well; yet his repentance was
but short-lived, since he caused the monks of the Mount of
Olives to pass their nights in copying the Ciceronian dialogues,
and did not shrink himself from expounding the comic and lyric
poets to the children of Bethlehem."

We know already that nothing of the kind existed in Ireland when
the Gospel reached her, and that there the new religion assumed
a peculiar aspect, which has never varied, and which made her at
once and forever a preeminently Christian nation.

Among the Greeks and Romans, literature and art, although
accepted by the Church, were nevertheless deeply impregnated
with paganism. All their chief acts of social life required a
profession of idolatry; even amusements, dramatic
representations, and simple games, were religious and
consequently pagan exhibitions.

We do not here speak of the attractions of an atheistic and
materialist philosophy, of a voluptuous, often, and demoralizing
literature and poetry, of an unimaginable prostitution of art to
the vilest passions, which the relics of Pompeii too abundantly
indicate.

But apart from those excesses of corruption and unbelief, which,
no doubt, virtuous pagans themselves abhorred, the approved,
correct, and so-called pure life of the best men of pagan Rome
necessitated the contamination of idolatrous worship. Apart from
the thousand duties, festivals, and the like, decreed or
sanctioned by the state, the most ordinary acts of life, the
enlisting of the soldier, the starting on a military expedition,
the assumption of any civil office or magistracy, the civil
oaths in the courts of law, the public bath, the public walk
almost, the current terms in conversation, the private reading
of the best books, the mere glancing at a multitude of exterior
objects, constituted almost as many professions of a false and
pagan worship.

How could any one become a Christian and at the same time remain
a Greek or a Roman? The gloomy views of the Montanist Tertullian
were, to many, frightful truths requiring constant care and self-
examen. For the Christian there were two courses open--both
excesses, yet either almost unavoidable: on the one side, a
terrible rigorism, making life unsupportable, next to impossible;
on the other, a laxity of thought and action leading to
lukewarmness and sometimes apostasy.

Bearing in mind what was written on the subject in the first
three ages of Christianity, not only by Tertullian, but by most
orthodox writers, St. Cyprian, Lactantius, Arnobius, and the
authors of many Acts of martyrs, we may easily understand how
the doctrines of Christianity stood in danger of never taking
deep root in the hearts of men surrounded by such temptations,
themselves born in paganism, and remaining, after their
conversion, exposed to seductions of such an alluring character.

Therefore this same "high civilization," as it is called, in the
midst of which Christianity was preached, was a real danger to
the inward life of the new disciple of Christ.

How could it be otherwise, when it is a fact now known to
all, that, even at the beginning of the fifth century, Rome was
almost entirely pagan, at least outwardly, and among her highest
classes; so that the poet Claudian, in addressing Honorius at the
beginning of his sixth consulship, pointed out to him the site of
the capitol still crowned with the Temple of Jove, surrounded by
numerous pagan edifices, supporting in air an army of gods; and
all around temples, chapels, statues, without number--in fact, the
whole Roman and Greek mythology, standing in the City of the
Catacombs and of the Popes!

The public calendars, preserved to this day, continued to note
the pagan festivals side by side with the feasts of the Saviour
and his apostles. Within the city and beyond, throughout Italy
and the most remote provinces, idols and their altars were still
surrounded by the thronging populace, prostrate at their feet.

If in the cities the new religion already dared display
something of its inherent splendor, the whole rural population
was still pagan, singing the praises of Ceres and of Bacchus,
trembling at Fauns and Satyrs and the numerous divinities of the
groves and fountains. Christianity then held the same standing
in Italy that in the United States Catholicity holds to-day in
the midst of innumerable religious sects.

This is not the place to show how far the paganism of Greece and
Rome had corrupted society, and how complete was its rottenness
at the time. It has been already shown by several great writers
of this century. Enough for our purpose to remark that even some
Christian writers, of the age immediately succeeding that of the
early martyrs, showed themselves more than half pagans in their
tastes and productions. Ausonius in the West, the preceptor of
St. Paulinus, is so obscene in some of his poems, so thoroughly
pagan in others, that critics have for a long time hesitated to
pronounce him a Christian. How many of his contemporaries
hovered like him on the confines of Christianity and paganism!
When Julian the apostate restored idolatry, many, who had only
disgraced the name of Christian, openly returned to the worship
of Jupiter and Venus, and their apostasy could scarcely be cause
for regret to sincere disciples of our Lord.

In the East the phenomenon is less striking. Strange to say,
idolatry did not remain so firmly rooted in the country, where
it first took such an alluring shape; and Constantinople was in
every sense of the word a Christian city when Rome, in her
senate, fought with such persistent tenacity for her altars of
Victory, her vestals, and her ancient worship.

Yet there, also, Christian writers were too apt to interfuse the
old ideas with the new, and to adopt doctrines placed, as it
were, midway between those of Plato and St. Paul. There were
bishops even who were a scandal to the Church and yet remained
in it. Synesius is the most striking example; whose doctrine was
certainly more philosophical than Christian, and whose life,
though decorous, was altogether worldly. The history of Arianism
shows that others besides Synesius were far removed from the
ideal of Christian bishops so worthily represented at the time
by many great doctors and holy pontiffs.

Such, in the East as well as in the West, were the perils
besetting the true Christian spirit at the very cradle of our
holy religion.

Nor was the danger confined to the mythology of paganism, its
literature and poetry. Philosophy itself became a real stumbling-
block to many, who would fain appear disciples of faith, when
they gave themselves up to the most unrestrained wanderings of
human reason.

The truth is, that Greek philosophy, divided into so many
schools in order to please all tastes, had become a wide-spread
institution throughout the Roman world. The mind of the East was
best adapted to it, and those who taught it were, consequently,
nearly all Greeks. Cicero had made it fashionable among many of
his countrymen; and although the Latin mind, always practical to
the verge of utilitarianism, was not congenial to utopian
speculations, still, as it was the fashion, all intellectual men
felt the need of becoming sufficiently acquainted with it to be
able to speak of it and even to embrace some particular school.
Those patricians, who remained attached to the stern principles
of the old republic, became Stoics; while the men of the corrupt
aristocracy called themselves, with Horace, members of the
"Epicurean herd." Hence the necessity for all to train their
minds to scientific speculation, converted the Western world
into a hot-bed of wild and dangerous doctrines.

In the opinion of some Eastern Fathers of the Church, Greek
philosophy had been a preparation for the Gospel, and could be
made subservient to the conversion of many. Thus we find St.
Justin, the martyr, all his life long glorying in the name of
philosopher, and continuing to wear, even after his conversion,
the philosopher's cloak so much derided by the scoffer, Lucian.

Still, despite this very respectable opinion, we can entertain
no doubt, in view of what happened at the time and of subsequent
events, that philosophy grew to be a stumbling-block in the path
of Christianity, and originated the worst and most dangerous
forms of heresy; that it sowed the seed, in the European mind,
of all errors, by creating that speculative tendency of
character so peculiar to most branches of the Japhetic race.

Persian Dualism, and, as many think, Pantheistic Buddhism, which
were then flourishing in Central and Eastern Asia, infected the
Alexandrian schools, and impressed philosophy with a new and
dreamy character, which became the source of subsequent and
frightful errors. The Neo-Platonism of Porphyry and Plotinus was
intended, in the minds of its originators, to lay a scientific
basis for polytheism; and, in Jamblichus finally, became an open
justification of the most absurd fables of mythology.

But, though this might satisfy Julian and those who followed him
in his apostasy, it could not come to be an inner danger to the
Church. With many, however, it assumed a form which at once
engendered the worst errors of Gnosticism; and Gnosticism was,
at first, considered a Christian heresy; so that a man might be
a pantheist, of the worst kind, and still call himself Christian.
St. John had foreseen the danger from the beginning, and it is
said that he wrote his gospel against it because the doctrine
openly denied the divinity of Christ. But the sect became much
more powerful after his death, and allured many Christians who
were disposed, from a misinterpretation of some texts of St.
Paul on the struggle between the flesh and the spirit, to
embrace a system which professed to explain the origin of that
struggle.

The Alexandrian Gnosticism failed to excite in the minds of the
holy monks of the East that aversion which we now feel for its
tenets, inasmuch as it did not openly anathematize the
Scriptures of the Old Law, nay, even preserved a certain outward
respect for them, on account of the multitude of Jews living in
Alexandria, and particularly because the open system of Dualism,
which afterward came from Syria and in the hands of Manes
established the existence of two equal and eternal principles of
good and evil, found no place in the teachings of Valentinus and
his school.

But even this frightful Syrian Gnosticism, which gave to the
principle of evil an origin as ancient and sacred as that of God
himself--Manicheism barefaced and radically immoral--so
repugnant to our feelings, so monstrous to our more correct
ideas, bore a semblance of truth for many minds, at that time
inclined toward every thing which came from the East. We know
what a firm hold those doctrines took on the great soul of
Augustine, who for a long time professed and cherished them.
Rome, under the pagan emperors, had received with open arms the
Oriental gods and the philosophy which endeavored to explain
their mythology; and many gifted minds of the third and fourth
centuries lost themselves in the contemplation of those
mysteries which from out Central Asia spread a lurid glare over
the Western world.

This first danger, however, was warded off by the writings of St.
Ignatius of Antioch, St. Irenaeus of Lyons, Clement of
Alexandria, Tertullian, Origen, St. Epiphanius, Theodoret, and
others, long before the time of St. Augustine, the last of them.
Gnosticism was prevented from any longer imparting a wrong
tendency to Christian doctrines, and it died out, until restored
during the Crusades to revive in the middle ages in its most
malignant form.

But at the very moment of its decline, philosophy entered the
Church; almost to wreck her by inspiring Arius and Pelagius. The
teachings of the first were clearly Neo-Platonic; of the second,
Stoic: and all the errors prevalent in the Church from the third
to the sixth century originated in Arianism and Pelagianism.

In Plato, as read in Alexandria, Arius found all the material
for his doctrine, which spread like wild-fire over the whole
Church. Many things conspired to swell the number of his
adherents: the ardent love for philosophy so inherent in the
Eastern Church, to the extent of many believing that Plato was
almost a Christian, and his doctrines therefore endowed with
real authority; the natural disposition of men to adopt the new
and a seeming rational explanation of unfathomable mysteries;
the apparent agreement of his doctrine with certain passages of
Scripture, where the Son is said to be inferior to the Father;
but chiefly the satisfaction it afforded to a number of new
Christians who had embraced the faith at the conversion of
Constantine on political rather than conscientious grounds, and
who were at once relieved of the supernatural burden of
believing in a God-man, born of a woman, and dying on a cross.
Faith reduced to an opinion; religion become a philosophy; a
mere man, let his endowments be what they might, recognized as
our guide, and not overwhelming us with the dread weight of a
divine nature; all this explains the historic phrase of St.
Jerome after the Council of Rimini, "The world groaned and
wondered to find itself Arian."

Any person acquainted with ecclesiastical history knows how the
Church of Christ would have surely become converted into a mere
rational school, under the pressure of these doctrines, were it
not for the promises of perpetuity which she had received.

We know also what a time it took to establish truth: how many
councils had to meet, how many books had to be written, the
efforts required from the rulers of the Church, chiefly from the
Roman pontiffs, to calm so many storms, to explain so many
difficult points of doctrine, to secure the final victory.

And, after all had been accomplished, there still remained the
root of the evil engrafted in what we call the philosophical
turn of mind of the Western nations--that is to say, in the
disposition to call every thing in question, to seek out strange
and novel difficulties, to start war-provoking theories in the
midst of peace, to aim at founding a new school, or at least to
stand forth as the brilliant and startling expounder of old
doctrines in a new form, in fine to add a last name to the list,
already over-long, of those who have disturbed the world by
their skill in dialectics and sophism.

Pelagius followed Arius, and his errors had the same object in
view in the long-run, to strip our holy religion of all that is
spiritual and divine.

In the time of St. Augustine and St. Jerome, there existed among
Christians an extraordinary tendency to embrace all possible
philosophical doctrines, even when directly opposed to the first
principles of revealed religion; and, within the Church, the
danger of subtilizing on every question connected with well-
known dogmas was much greater than many imagine.

From the previous reflections we may learn how difficult it was
to establish, in pagan Europe, a thoroughly Christian life and
doctrine; and that, after society had come to be apparently
imbued with the new spirit, it was still too easy to disturb the
flowing stream of the heavenly graces of the Gospel. This
resulted, we repeat, from causes anterior to Christianity, from
sources of evil which the divine religion had to overcome, and
which too often impeded its supernatural action. In fact, the
ecclesiastical history of those ages is comprised mainly in
depicting the almost continual deviations from the straight line
of pure doctrine and morality, and the strenuous efforts
assiduously made by the rulers of the Church against a never-
ceasing falling away.

Having taken this glance at the early workings of Christianity
through the rest of the world, we may now turn fairly to the
immediate subject we have in hand, and trace its course in
Ireland. From the very beginning we are struck by the
peculiarities--blessed, indeed--which show themselves, as in all
other matters, in its reception of the truth. The island,
compared with Europe, is small, it is true; but the heroism
displayed by its inhabitants during so many ages, in support of
the religion which they received so freely, so generously, and
at once, in mind as well as heart, marks it out as worthy of a
special account; and, from its unique reception and adherence to
the faith, as worthy of, if possible, a natural explanation of
such action beyond the promptings of Divine grace, since its
astonishing perseverance, its unswerving faith, form to-day as
great a characteristic of the nation as they did on the day of
its entry into the Christian Church.

We proceed to examine, then, the kind of idolatry which its
first apostle encountered on landing in the island, and the ease
with which it was destroyed, so as to leave behind no poisonous
shoots of the deadly root of evil.

In order to understand the religious system of Ireland previous
to the preaching of the Gospel, we must first take a general
survey of polytheism, if it can be so called, in all Celtic
countries, and of the peculiar character which it bore in
Ireland itself.

Of old, throughout all countries, religion possessed certain
things in common, which belonged to the rites and creeds of all
nations, and were evidently derived from the primitive
traditions of mankind, and, consequently, from a true and Divine
revelation. Such were the belief in a golden age, in the fall
from a happy beginning, in the penalty imposed on sin, which
gave a reason for great mundane calamities--the Deluge chiefly--
the memory of which lived in the traditions of almost every
nation; in the necessity of prayer and expiatory sacrifice; in
the transmission of guilt from father to son, expressed in all
primitive legislations, and to this day preserved in the Chinese
laws and customs; in the existence of good and bad spirits,
whence, most probably, arose polytheism; in the hope of the
future regeneration of man, represented in Greece by the
beautiful myth of Pandora's box; and, finally, in the doctrine
of eternal rewards and punishments.

Each one of these strictly true dogmas underwent more or less of
alteration in its passage through the various nations of
antiquity, but was, nevertheless, everywhere preserved in some
shape or form.

At what precise epoch did mankind begin wrongfully to interpret
these primitive traditions? When did the worship of idols arise
and become universal? No one can tell precisely. All we know for
certain is, that a thousand years before Christ idolatry
prevailed everywhere, and that even the Jewish people often fell
into this sin, and were only brought back by means of punishment
to the worship of the true God.

But if error tainted the whole system of worship among nations,
it differed in the various races of men according to the variety
of their character. Ferocity or mildness of manners, acuteness
or obtuseness of understanding, activity or indolence of
disposition, a burning, a cold, or a temperate climate, a
smiling or dreary country, but chiefly the thousand differences
of temper which are as marked among mankind as the almost in-
finite variety of forms visible in creation, gave to each
individual religion its proper and characteristic types, which
in after-times, when truth was brought down from heaven for all,
imparted to the universal Christian spirit a peculiar outward
form in each people, an interior adaptation to its peculiar
dispositions, destined in the Divine plan to introduce into the
future Catholic Church the beautiful variety requisite to make
its very universality possible among mankind.

To enter into details on the Celtic religion would carry us
beyond due limits. The question as to whether the ancient Celts
were idolaters or not still remains undecided, though in France
alone more than six hundred volumes have been written on the
subject. Julius Caesar believed that they were worshippers of
idols in the same sense as his own countrymen; but he probably
stood alone in his opinion. Aristotle, Pythagoras, Polyhistor,
Ammianus Marcellinus, considered the Druids as monotheist
philosophers. Most of the Greek writers agreed with them, as did
all the Alexandrian Fathers of the Church in the third and
fourth centuries.

Among the moderns the majority leans to a contrary opinion;
nevertheless, many authors of weight, distinguishing the public
worship of the common people from the doctrine of the Druids,
assert the monotheism of this sacerdotal caste. Samuel F. N.
Morus particularly, who, with J. A. Ernesti, was esteemed the
master of antiquarian scholarship in Europe during the last
century, maintains, in his edition of the "Commentaries" of
Caesar, that "human beings, as well as human affairs, fortunes,
travels, and wars, were thought by the Celts to be governed and
ruled by one supreme God, and that the system of apotheosis,
common to nearly all ancient nations, was totally unknown in
ancient Gaul, Britain, and the adjacent islands."

The ancient authorities concurring with these conclusions are so
numerous and clear spoken that the great historian of Gaul,
Amedee Thierry, thinks that such a pure and mystic religion,
joined to such a sublime philosophy, could not have been the
product of the soil. In his endeavor to investigate its origin,
he supposes that it was brought to the west of Europe by the
Eastern Cymris of the first invasion; that it was adopted by the
higher classes of society, and that the old idolatrous worship
remained in force among the lower orders.

The unity and omnipotence of the Godhead, metempsychosis, or the
doctrine and the transmigration of soul --not into the bodies of
animals, as it obtained and still obtains in the East, but into
those of other human beings--the eternal duration of existing
substances, material and spiritual, consequently the immortality
of the human soul, were the chief dogmas of the Druids,
according to the majority of antiquarians.

If this be true, then it can be said boldly that, with the
exception of revealed religion in Judea, which was always far
more explicit and pure, no system can be found in ancient times
superior to that of the Druids, more especially if we add that,
in addition to religious teaching, a whole system of physics was
also developed in their large academies. "They dispute," says
Caesar, "on the stars and their motions, on the size of the
universe and of this earth, on the nature of physical things, as
well as on the strength and power of the eternal God."

To bring our question home, what were the religious belief and
worship of the Irish Celts while still pagans? Very few positive
facts are known on the subject; but we have data enough to show
what they were not; and in such cases negative proofs are amply
sufficient.

It was for a long time the fashion with Irish historians to
attribute to their ancestors the wildest forms of ancient
idolatry. They appeared to consider it a point of national honor
to make the worship of Erin an exact reflex of Eastern, Grecian,
or Roman polytheism. They erected on the slightest foundations
grand structures of superstitious and abominable rites. Fire-
worship, Phoenician or African horrors, the rankest idol-worship,
even human sacrifices of the most revolting nature, were,
according to them, of almost daily occurrence in Ireland. But,
with the advancement of antiquarian knowledge, all those
phantoms have successively disappeared; and, the more the
ancient customs, literature, and history of the island are
studied, the more it becomes clear that the pretended proofs
adduced in support of those vagaries are really without
foundation.

In the first place, there is not the slightest reason to believe
that the human sacrifices customary in Gaul were ever practised
in Ireland. No really ancient book makes any mention of them.
They were certainly not in vogue at the time of St. Patrick, as
he could not have failed to give expression to his horror at
them in some shape or form, which expression would have been
recorded in one, at least, of the many lives of the saint,
written shortly after his death, and abounding in details of
every kind. If not, then, during his long apostleship, we may
safely conclude that they never took place before, as there was
no reason for their discontinuance prior to the propagation of
Christianity.

There was a time when all the large cromlechs which abound in
the island were believed to be sacrificial stones; and it is
highly probable that the opinion so prevalent during the last
century with respect to the reality of those cruel rites had its
origin in the existence of those rude monuments. After many
investigations and excavations around and under cromlechs of all
sizes, it is now admitted by all well-informed antiquarians that
they had no connection with sacrifices of any kind. They were
merely monuments raised over the buried bodies of chieftains or
heroes. Many sepulchres of that description have been opened,
either under cromlechs or under large mounds; great quantities
of ornaments of gold, silver, or precious stones, utensils of
various materials, beautiful works of great artistic merit, have
been discovered there, and now go to fill the museums of the
nation or private cabinets. Nothing connected with religious
rites of any description has met the eyes of the learned seekers
after truth. Thus it has been ascertained that the old race had
reached a high degree of material civilization; but no clew to
its religion has been furnished.

As to fire-worship, which not long ago was admitted by all as
certainly forming a part of the Celtic religion in Ireland, so
little of that opinion remains to-day that it is scarcely
deserving of mention. There now remains no doubt that the round
towers, formerly so numerous in Ireland, had nothing whatever to
do with fire-worship. For a long time they were believed to have
been constructed for no other object, and consequently long
prior to the coming of St. Patrick. But Dr. Petrie and other
antiquarians have all but demonstrated that the round towers
never had any connection with superstition or idolatry at all;
that they were of Christian origin, always built near some
Christian church, and of the same materials, and had for their
object to call the faithful to prayer, like the _campanile_ of
Italy, to be a place of refuge for the clergy in time of war,
and to give to distant villages intimation of any hostile
invasion.

The fact in the life of St. Patrick, when he appeared before the
court of King Laeghaire, upon which so much reliance is placed
as a proof of the existence of fire-worship, is now of
proportionate weakness. It seems, to judge by the most reliable
and ancient manuscripts, that, after all, the kindling of the
king's fire was scarcely a religious act.

McGeoghegan, whose history is compiled, from the best-
authenticated documents, says: "When the monarch convened an
assembly, or held a festival at Tara, it was customary to make a
bonfire on the preceding day, and it was forbidden to light
another fire in any other place at the same time, in the
territory of Breagh."

This is all; and the probable cause of the prohibition was to do
honor to the king. Had it been an act of worship, Patrick, in
lighting his own paschal-fire, would not only have shown
disrespect to the monarch, but in the eyes of the people
committed a sacrilege, which could scarcely have missed mention
by the careful historians of the time.

But the proof that we are right in our interpretation of the
ceremony is clear, from the following passage, taken from the
work of Prof. Curry on "Early Irish Manuscripts:" "We see, by
the book of military expeditions, that, when King Dathi-- the
immediate predecessor of Laeghaire on the throne of Ire- land--
thought of conquering Britain and Gaul, he invited the states of
the nation to meet him at Tara, at the approaching feast of
Baltaine (one of the great pagan festivals of ancient Erin) on
May-day.

"The feast of Tara this year was solemnized on a scale of
splendor never before equalled. The fires of Lailten (now called
Lelltown in the north of Ireland) were lighted, and the sports,
games, and ceremonies, were conducted with unusual magnificence
and solemnity.

"These games and solemnities are said to have been instituted
more than a thousand years previously by Lug, in honor of Lailte,
the daughter of the King of Spain, and wife of MacEire, the
last king of the Firbolg colony. It was at her court that Lug
had been fostered, and at her death he had her buried at this
place, where he raised an immense mound over her grave, and
instituted those annual games in her honor.

"These games were solemnized about the first day of August, and
they continued to be observed down to the ninth century"-
therefore, in Christian times-and consequently the lighting of
the fires had as little connection with fire-worship as the
games with pagan rites.

A more serious difficulty meets us in the destruction of Crom
Cruagh by St. Patrick, and it is important to consider how far
Crom Cruagh could really be called an idol.

With regard to the statues of Celtic gods, all the researches
and excavations which the most painstaking of antiquarians have
undertaken, especially of late years, have never resulted in the
discovery, not of the statue of a god, but of any pagan sign
whatever in Ireland. It is clear, from the numerous details of
the life of St. Patrick, that he never encountered either
temples or the statues of gods in any place, although occasional
mention is made of idols. The only fact which startles the
reader is the holy zeal which moved him to strike with his
"baculus Jesu" the monstrous Crom Cruagh, with its twelve "sub-gods."

In all his travels through Ireland-and there is scarcely a spot
which he did not visit and evangelize-St. Patrick meets with
only one idol, or rather group of idols, situated in the County
Cavan, which was an object of veneration to the people. Nowhere
else are idols to be found, or the saint would have thought it
his duty to destroy them also. This first fact certainly places
the Irish in a position, with regard to idolatry, far different
from that of all other polytheist nations. In all other
countries it is characteristic of polytheism to multiply the
statues of the gods, to expose them in all public places, in
their houses, but chiefly within or at the door of edifices
erected for the purpose. Yet in Ireland we find nothing of the
kind, with the exception of Crom Cruagh. The holy apostle of the
nation goes on preaching, baptizing, converting people, without
finding any worship of gods of stone or metal; he only hears
that there is something of the kind in a particular spot, and he
has to travel a great distance in order to see it, and show the
people their folly in venerating it.

But what was that idol? According to the majority of expounders
of Irish history, it was a golden sphere or ball representing
the sun, with twelve cones or pillars of brass, around it,
typifying, probably, astronomical signs. St. Patrick, in his
"Confessio," seems to allude to Crom Cruagh when he says: "That
sun which we behold by the favor of God rises for us every day;
but its splendor will not shine forever; nay, even all those who
adore it shall be miserably punished."

The Bollandists, in a note on this passage of the "Confessio,"
think that it might refer to Crom Cruagh, which possibly
represented the sun, surrounded by the signs of the twelve
months, through which it describes its orbit during the year.

We know that the Druids were, perhaps, better versed in the
science of astronomy than the scholars of any other nation at
the time. It was not in Gaul and Britain only that they pursued
their course of studies for a score of years; the same fact is
attested for Ireland by authorities whose testimony is beyond
question. May we not suppose that a representation of mere
heavenly phenomena, set in a conspicuous position, had in course
of time become the object of the superstitious veneration of the
people, and that St. Patrick thought it his duty to destroy it?
And the attitude of the people at the time of its destruction
shows that it could not have borne for them the same sacred
character as the statue of Minerva in the Parthenon did for the
Greeks or that of Capitoline Jove for the Romans. Can we suppose
that St. Paul or St. Peter would have dared to break either of
these? And let us remark that the event we discuss occurred at
the very beginning of St. Patrick's ministry, and before he had
yet acquired that great authority over the minds of all which
afterward enabled him fearlessly to accomplish whatever his zeal
prompted him to do.

Whatever explanation of the whole occurrence may be given, we
doubt if we shall find a better than that we advance, and the
considerations arising from it justify the opinion that the
Irish Celts were not idolaters like all other peoples of
antiquity. They possessed no mythology beyond harmless fairy-
tales, no poetical histories of gods and goddesses to please the
imagination and the senses, and invest paganism with such an
attractive garb as to cause it to become a real obstacle to the
spread of Christianity.

Moreover, what we have said concerning the belief in the
omnipotence of one supreme God, whatever might be his nature, as
the first dogma of Druidism, would seem to have lain deep in the
minds of the Irish Celts, and caused their immediate
comprehension and reception of monotheism, as preached by St.
Patrick, and the facility with which they accepted it. They were
certainly, even when pagans, a very religious people; otherwise
how could they have embraced the doctrines of Christianity with
that ardent eagerness which shall come under our consideration
in the next chapter? A nation utterly devoid of faith of any
kind is not apt to be moved, as were the Irish, perhaps beyond
all other nations, at the first sight of supernatural truths,
such as those of Christianity. And so little were they attached
to paganism, so visibly imbued with reverence for the supreme
God of the universe, that, as soon as announced, they accepted
the dogma.

The simple and touching story of the conversion of the two
daughters of King Laeghaire will give point and life to this
very important consideration. It is taken from the "Book of
Armagh," which Prof. O'Curry, who is certainly a competent
authority, believes older than the year 727, when the popular
Irish traditions regarding St. Patrick must have still been
almost as vivid as immediately after his death.

St. Patrick and his attendants being assembled at sunrise at the
fountain of Clebach, near Cruachan in Connaught, Ethne and
Felimia, daughters of King Laeghaire, came to bathe, and found
at the well the holy men.

"And they knew not whence they were, or in what form, or from
what people, or from what country; but they supposed them to be
fairies--_duine sidhe_--that is to say, gods of the earth, or a
phantasm.

"And the virgins said unto them: 'Who are ye, and whence are ye?'

"And Patrick said unto them: 'It were better for you to confess
to our true God, than to inquire concerning our race.'

"The first virgin said: `Who is God?

"'And where is God?

"'And where is his dwelling-place?

"'Has God sons and daughters, gold and silver?

"'Is he living?

"'Is he beautiful?

"'Did many foster his son?

"'Are his daughters dear and beauteous to men of this world?

"'Is he in heaven or on earth?

"'In the sea?--In rivers?--In mountainous places?--In valleys?

"'Declare unto us the knowledge of him?

"'How shall he be seen?-How shall he be loved?-How is he to be found?

"'Is it in youth?-Is it in old age that he is to be found?'

"But St. Patrick, full of the Holy Ghost, answered and said:

"'Our God is the God of all men-the God of heaven and earth-of
the sea and rivers. The God of the sun, and the moon, and all
stars. The God of the high mountains, and of the lowly valleys.
The God who is above heaven, and in heaven, and under heaven.

"'He has a habitation in the heavens, and the earth, and the sea,
and all that are thereon.

"'He inspireth all things. He quickeneth all things. He is over
all things.

"'He hath a Son coeternal and coequal with himself. The Son is
not younger than the Father, nor the Father older than the Son.
And the Holy Ghost breatheth in them. The Father, and the Son,
and the Holy Ghost, are not divided.

"'But I desire to unite you to a heavenly King inasmuch as you
are daughters of an earthly king. Do you believe?'

"And the virgins said, as of one mouth and one heart: Teach us
most diligently how we may believe in the heavenly King. Show us
how we may see him face to face, and whatsoever you shall say
unto us we will do.'

"And Patrick said: 'Believe ye that by baptism you put off the
sin of your father and your mother?'

"They answered him, 'We believe.'

"'Believe ye in repentance after sin? 'We believe . . .' etc.

"And they were baptized, and a white garment was put upon their
heads. And they asked to see the face of Christ. And the saint
said unto them: 'Ye cannot see the face of Christ except ye
taste of death, and except ye receive the sacrifice.'

"And they answered: 'Give us the sacrifice that we may behold
the Son our spouse.'

"And they received the eucharist of God, and they slept in death.

"And they were laid out on one bed-covered with garments -and
their friends made great lamentations and weeping for them."

This beautiful legend expresses to the letter the way in which
the Irish received the faith. Nor was it simple virgins only who
_understood_ and _believed_ so suddenly at the preaching of the
apostle. The great men of the nation were as eager almost as the
common people to receive baptism: the conversion of Dubtach is
enough to show this.

He was a Druid, being the chief poet of King Laeghaire--all
poets belonging to the order. After the wife, the brothers, and
the two daughters of the monarch, he was the most illustrious
convert gained by Patrick at the beginning of his apostleship.
He became a Christian at the first appearance of the saint at
Tara, and immediately began to sing in verse his new belief, as
he had formerly sung the heroes of his nation. To the end he
remained firm in his faith, and a dear friend to the holy man
who had converted him. How could he, and all the chief converts
of Patrick, have believed so suddenly and so constantly in the
God of the Christians, if their former life had not prepared
them for the adoption of the new doctrine, and if the doctrine
of monotheism had offered a real difficulty to their
understanding? There was, probably, nothing clear and definite
in their belief in an omnipotent God, which is said to have been
the leading dogma of Druidism; but their simple minds had
evidently a leaning toward the doctrine, which induced them to
approve of it, as soon as it was presented to them with a solemn
affirmation.

In order to elucidate this point, we add a short description of
the labors and success of this apostle.

In the year 432, Patrick lands on the island. By that time, some
few of the inhabitants may possibly have heard of the Christian
religion from the neighboring Britain or Gaul. Palladius had
preached the year before in the district known as the present
counties of Wexford and Wicklow, erected three churches, and
made some converts; but it may be said that Ireland continued in
the same state it had preserved for thousands of years: the
Druids in possession of religious and scientific supremacy; the
chieftains in contention, as in the time of Fingal and Ossian;
the people, though in the midst of constant strife, happy enough
on their rich soil, cheered by their bards and poets; very few,
or no slaves in the country; an abundance of food everywhere;
gold, silver, precious stones adorning profusely the persons of
their chiefs, their wives, their warriors; rich stuffs, dyed
with many colors, to distinguish the various orders of society;
a deep religious feeling in their hearts, preparing them for the
faith, by inspiring them with lively emotions at the sight of
divine power displayed in their mountains, their valleys, their
lakes and rivers, and on the swelling bosom of the all-
encircling ocean; superstitions of various kinds, indeed, but
none of a demoralizing character, none involving marks of
cruelty or lust; no revolting statues of Priapus, of Bacchus, of
Cybele; no obscene emblems of religion, as in all other lands,
to confront Christianity; but over all the island, song,
festivity, deep affection for kindred; and, as though blood-
relationship could not satisfy their heart, fosterage covering
the land with other brothers and sisters; all permeated with a
strong attachment to their clan-system and social customs. Such
is an exact picture of the Erin of the time, which the study of
antiquity brings clearer and clearer before the eyes of the
modern student.

Patrick appears among them, leaning on his staff, and bringing
them from Rome and Gaul new songs in a new language set to a new
melody. He comes to unveil for them what lies hidden, unknown to
themselves, in the depths of their hearts. He explains, by the
power of one Supreme God, why it is that their mountains are so
high, their valley so smiling, their rivers and lakes teeming
with life, their fountains so fresh and cool, and that sun of
theirs so temperate in its warmth, and the moon and stars,
lighted with a soft radiance, shimmering over the deep obscurity
of their groves.

He directs them to look into their own consciences, to admit
themselves to be sinners in need of redemption, and points out
to them in what manner that Supreme God, whom they half knew
already, condescended to save man.

Straightway, from all parts of the island, converts flock to him;
they come in crowds to be baptized, to embrace the new law by
which they may read their own hearts; they are ready to do
whatever he wishes; many, not content with the strict
commandments enjoined on all, wish to enter on the path of
perfection: the men become monks, the women and young girls nuns,
that is to say, spouses of Christ. In Munster alone "it would
be difficult," says a modern writer, Father Brenan, "to form an
estimate of the number of converts he made, and even of the
churches and religious establishments he founded."

And so with all the other provinces of the island. The proof's
still stand before our eyes. For, as Prof. Curry justly remarks:
"No one, who examines for himself, can doubt that at the first
preaching in Erin of the glad tidings of salvation, by Saints
Palladius and Patrick, those _countless_ Christian churches were
built, whose sites and ruins mark so thickly the surface of our
country even to this day, still bearing through all the
vicissitudes of time and conquest the _unchanged names of their
original founders_."

According to the commonly-received opinion, St. Patrick's
apostleship lasted thirty-three years; but, whatever may have
been its real duration, certain it is that his feet traversed
the whole island several times, and, at his passing, churches
and monasteries sprang up in great numbers, and remained to tell
the true story of his labors when their founder had passed away.

Nor was it with Ireland as with Rome, Carthage, Antioch, and
other great cities of Europe, Africa, and Asia. Not the slaves
and artisans alone filled these newly-erected Christian edifices.
Some of the first men of the nation received baptism. We have
already spoken of the family of Laeghaire. In Connaught, at the
first appearance of the man of God, all the inhabitants of that
portion of the province now represented by the County Mayo
became Christians; and the seven sons of the king of the
province were baptized, together with twelve thousand of their
clansmen. In Leinster, the Princes Illand and Alind were
baptized in a fountain near Naas. In Munster, Aengus, the King
of Cashel, with all the nobility of his clan, embraced the faith.
A number of chieftains in Thomond are also mentioned; and the
whole of the Dalcassian tribe, so celebrated before and after in
the annals of Ireland, received, with the waters of baptism,
that ardent faith which nothing has been able to tear from them
to this day.

Many Druids even, by renouncing their superstitions, abdicated
their power over the people. We have mentioned Dubtach ; his
example was followed by many others, among whom was Fingar, the
son of King Clito, who is said to have suffered martyrdom in
Brittany; Fiech, pupil of Dubtach, himself a poet, and belonging
to the noble house of Hy-Baircha in Leinster, was raised by St.
Patrick to the episcopacy, and was the first occupant of the See
of Sletty.

Fiech was a regular member of the bardic order of Druids, a poet
by profession, esteemed as a learned man even before he embraced
Christianity; and during his lifetime he was, as a Christian
bishop, consulted by numbers and regarded as an oracle of truth
and heavenly wisdom.

Nevertheless, Patrick encountered opposition. Some chieftains
declared themselves against him, without daring openly to attack
him. Many Druids, called in the old Irish annals _magi_, tried
their utmost to estrange the Irish people from him. But he stood
in danger of his life only once. It was, in fact, a war of
argument. Long discussions took place, with varied success,
ending generally, however, in a victory for truth.

The final result was that, in the second generation after St.
Patrick, there existed not a single pagan in the whole of
Ireland; the very remembrance of paganism even seemed to have
passed away from their minds ever after; hence arises the
difficulty of deciding now on the character of that paganism.

After its abolition, nothing remained in the literature of the
country, which was at that time much more copious than at
present--nothing was left in its monuments or in the
inclinations of the people--to imperil the existence of the
newly-established Christianity, or of a nature calculated to
give a wrong bias to the religious worship of the people, such
as we have seen was the case in the rest of Europe.

May we not conclude, then, that Ireland was much better prepared
for the new religion than any other country; that, when she was
thus admitted by baptism into the European family, she made her
entry in a way peculiar to herself, and which secured to her,
once for all, her firm and undeviating attachment to truth?

She had nothing to change in her manners after having renounced
the few disconnected superstitions to which she had been
addicted. Her songs, her bards, her festivities, her
patriarchal government, her fosterage, were left to her,
Christianized and consecrated by her great apostle; clanship
even penetrated into the monasteries, and gave rise later on to
some abuses. But, perhaps, the saint thought it better to allow
the existence of things which might lead to abuse than violently
and at once to subvert customs, rooted by age in the very nature
of the people, some of which it cost England, later on,
centuries of inconceivable barbarities to eradicate.

As to what exact form, if any, the paganism of the Irish Celts
assumed, we have so few data to build upon that it is now next
to impossible to shape a system out of them. From the passage
of the "Confessio" already quoted, we might infer that they
adored the sun; and this passage is very remarkable as the only
mention anywhere made by St. Patrick of idolatry among the
people. If it was only the emblem of the Supreme Being, then
would there have been nothing idolatrous in its worship; and the
strong terms in which the saint condemns it perhaps need only
express his fear lest the superstition of the ignorant people
might convert veneration into positive idolatry. At all events,
there was not a statue, or a temple, or a theological system,
erected to or connected with it in any shape.

The solemn forms of oaths taken and administered by the Irish
kings would also lead us to infer that they paid a superstitious
respect to the winds and the other elements. But why should
this feeling pass beyond that which even the Christian
experiences when confronted by mysteries in the natural as well
as the supernatural order? The awe-struck pagan saw the
lightning leap, the tempest gather and break over him in
majestic fury; heard the great voice of the mighty ocean which
laved or lashed his shores: he witnessed these wonderful effects;
he knew not whence the tempests or the lightnings came, or the
voice of the ocean; he trembled at the unseen power which moved
them --at his God.

So his imagination peopled his groves and hill-sides, his rivers
and lakes, with harmless fairies; but fairy land has never
become among any nation a pandemonium of cruel divinities; and
we doubt much if such innocuous superstition can be rightly
called even sinful error.

In fact, the only thing which could render paganism truly a
danger in Ireland, as opposed to the preaching of Christianity,
was the body of men intrusted with the care of religion--the
Druids, the _magi_ of the chronicles. But, as we find no traces
of bloody sacrifices in Ireland, the Druids there probably never
bore the character which they did in Gaul; they cannot be said
to have been sacrificing priests; their office consisted merely
in pretended divinations, or the workings of incantations or
spells. They also introduced superstition into the practice of
medicine, and taught the people to venerate the elements or
mysterious forces of this world.

Without mentioning any of the many instances which are found in
the histories of the workings of these Druidical incantations
and spells, the consulting of the clouds, and the ceremonies
with which they surrounded their healing art, we go straight to
our main point: the ease and suddenness with which all these
delusions vanished at the first preaching of the Gospel --a fact
very telling on the force which they exercised over the mind of
the nation. All natural customs, games, festivities, social
relationships, as we have seen, are preserved, many to this day;
what is esteemed as their religion, and its ceremonies and
superstitions, is dropped at once. The entire Irish mind
expanded freely and generously at the simple announcement of a
God, present everywhere in the universe, and accepted it. The
dogma of the Holy Spirit, not only filling all--_complens omnia_-
- but dwelling in their very souls by grace, and filling them
with love and fear, must have appeared natural to them. Their
very superstitions must have prepared the way for the truth, a
change --or may we not say a more direct and tangible object
taking the place of and filling their undefined yearnings--was
alone requisite. Otherwise it is a hard fact to explain how,
within a few years, all Druidism and magic, incantations, spells,
and divinations, were replaced by pure religion, by the
doctrine of celestial favors obtained through prayer, by the
intercession of a host of saints in heaven, and the belief in
Christian miracles and prophecies; whereas, scarcely any thing
of Roman or Grecian mythology could be replaced by corresponding
Christian practices, although popes did all they could in that
regard. Nearly all the errors of the Irish Celts had their
corresponding truths and holy practices in Christianity, which
could be readily substituted for them, and envelop them
immediately with distrust or just oblivion. Hence we do not see,
in the subsequent ecclesiastical history of Ireland, any thing
to resemble the short sketch we have given of the many dangers
arising within the young Christian Church, which had their
origin in the former religion of other European nations.

In regarding philosophy and its perils in Ireland, our task will
be an easy one, yet not unimportant in its bearings on
subsequent considerations. The minds of nations differ as
greatly as their physical characteristics; and to study the
Irish mind we have only to take into consideration the
institutions which swayed it from time immemorial. They were of
such a nature that they could but belong to a traditional people.
All patriarchal tribes partake of that general character; none,
perhaps, so strikingly as the Celts.

People thus disposed have nothing rationalistic in their nature;
they accept old facts; and, if they reason upon them, it is to
find proofs to support, not motives to doubt them. They never
refine their discussions to hair-splitting, synonymous almost
with rejection, as seems to be the delight of what we call
rationalistic races. It was among these that philosophy was born,
and among them it flourishes. They may, by their acute
reasoning, enlarge the human mind, open up new horizons, and, if
confined within just limits, actually enrich the understanding
of man. We are far from pretending that philosophy has only been
productive of harm, and that it were a blessed thing had the
human intellect always remained, as it were, in a dormant state,
without ever striving to grasp at philosophic truth and raise
itself above the common level; we hold the great names of
Augustine, Anselm, Thomas Aquinas, and so many others, in too
great respect to entertain such an opinion.

Yet it cannot be denied that the excessive study of philosophy
has produced many evils among men, has often been subservient to
error, has, at best, been for many minds the source of a cold
and desponding skepticism.

No race of men, perhaps, has been less inclined to follow those
intellectual aberrations than the Celtic, owing chiefly to its
eminently traditional dispositions.

Before Christianity reached them, the intellectual labors of the
Celts were chiefly confined to history and genealogy, medicine
and botany, law, song, music, and artistic workings in metals
and gems. This was the usual _curriculum_ of Druidic studies.
Astronomy and the physical sciences, as well as the knowledge of
"the nature of the eternal God," were, according to Caesar,
extensively studied in the Gallic schools. Some elements of
those intellectual pursuits may also have occupied the attention
of the Irish student during the twelve, fifteen, or twenty years
of his preparation for being _ordained_ to the highest degree of
ollamh. But the oldest and most reliable documents which have
been examined so far do not allow us to state positively that
such was the case to any great extent.

In Christian times, however, it seems certain that astronomy was
better studied in Ireland than anywhere else, as is proved by
the extraordinary impulse given to that science by Virgil of
Salzburg, who was undoubtedly an Irishman, and educated in his
native country.

It is from the Church alone, therefore, that they received their
highest intellectual training in the philosophy and theology of
the Scriptures and of the Fathers. It is known that, by the
introduction of the Latin and Greek tongues into their schools
in addition to the vernacular, the Bible in Latin and Greek, and
the writings of many Fathers in both languages, as also the most
celebrated works of Roman and Greek classical writers, became
most interesting subjects of study. They reproduced those works
for their own use in the _scriptoria_ of their numerous
monasteries. We still possess some of those manuscripts of the
sixth and following centuries, and none more beautiful or
correct can be found among those left by the English, French, or
Italian monastic institutions of the periods mentioned.

During the seventh, eighth, and ninth centuries, the Irish
schools became celebrated all over Europe. Young Anglo-Saxons of
the best families were sent to receive their education in
Innisfail, as the island was then often called; and, from their
celebrated institutions of learning, numerous teachers and
missionaries went forth to England, Germany (along the Rhine,
chiefly), France, and even Switzerland and Italy.

Yet, in the history of all those intellectual labors, we never
read of startling theories in philosophy or theology advanced by
any of them, unless we except the eccentric John Scotus Erigena,
whom Charles the Bald, at whose court he resided, protected even
against the just severity of the Church. Without ever having
studied theology, he undertook to dogmatize, and would perhaps
have originated some heresy, had he found a following in Germany
or France.

But he is the only Irishman who ever threatened the peace of the
Church, and, through her, of the world. Duns Scotus, if he were
Irish, never taught any error, and remained always an accepted
leader in Catholic schools. To the honor of Erin be it said, her
children have ever been afraid to deviate in the least from the
path of faith. And it would be wrong to imagine that the
preservation from heresy so peculiar to them, and by which they
are broadly distinguished from all other European nations, comes
from dulness of intellect and inability to follow out an
intricate argumentation. They show the acuteness of their
understanding in a thousand ways; in poetry, in romantic tales,
in narrative compositions, in legal acumen and extempore
arguments, in the study of medicine, chiefly in that masterly
eloquence by which so many of them are distinguished. Who shall
say that they might not also have reached a high degree of
eminence in philosophical discussions and ontological theories?
They have always abstained from such studies by reason of a
natural disinclination, which does them honor, and which has
saved them in modern times, as we shall see in a subsequent
chapter, from the innumerable evils which afflict society
everywhere else, and by which it is even threatened with
destruction.

Thus, among the numerous and versatile progeny of Japhet one
small branch has kept itself aloof from the universal movement
of the whole family; and, in the very act of accepting
Christianity and taking a place in the commonwealth of Western
nations, it has known how to do so in its own manner, and has
thus secured a firm hold of the saving doctrines imparted to the
whole race for a great purpose--the purpose, unfortunately often
defeated--of reducing to practice and reality the sublime ideal
of the Christian religion.

The details given in this chapter on the various circumstances
connected with the introduction of our holy faith into Ireland
were necessarily very limited, as our chief object was to speak
of the nation's preparation for it. In the following we treat
directly of what could only be touched upon in the latter part
of this.

CHAPTER IV.

HOW THE IRISH RECEIVED CHRISTIANITY.

For the conversion of pagans to Christianity, many exterior
proofs of revelation were vouchsafed by God to man in addition
to the interior impulse of his grace. Those exterior proofs are
generally termed "the evidences of religion." They produce their
chief effect on inquiring minds which are familiar with the
reasoning processes of philosophy, and attach great importance
to truth acquired by logical deduction. To this, many pagans of
Greece and Rome owed their conversion; by this, in our days,
many strangers are brought, on reflection, to the faith of
Christ, always presupposing the paramount influence of divine
grace on their minds and hearts.

But it is easy to remark that, except in rare cases, those who
are gained over to truth by such a process are with some
difficulty brought under the influence of the supernatural,
which forms the essential groundwork of Christianity. This
influence, it is true, is only the effect of the operation of
the Holy Ghost on the soul of the convert; but the Holy Ghost
acts in conformity with the disposition of the soul; and we know,
by what has been said on the character of religion among the
Romans and the Greeks in the earlier days of the Church, that it
took long ages, the infusion of Northern blood, and the
simplicity of new races uncontaminated by heathen mythology, to
inspire men with that deep supernatural feeling which in course
of time became the distinguishing character of the ages of faith.
Ireland imbibed this feeling at once, and thus she received
Christianity more thoroughly, at the very beginning, than did
any other Western nation.

The fact is--whatever may be thought or said--the Christian
religion, with all the loveliness it imparts to this world when
rightly understood, though never destroying Nature, but always
keeping it in mind, and consecrating it to God, truly endowed,
consequently, with the promises of earth as well as those of
heaven--the Christian religion is nevertheless fundamentally
supernatural, full of awe and mystery, heavenly and
incomprehensible, before being earthly and the grateful object
of sense.

Without examining the various formularies which heresy compelled
an infallible Church to proclaim and impose upon her children
from time to time, the Apostles' Creed alone transfers man at
once into regions supernatural, into heaven itself. The Trinity,
the Incarnation, the Redemption, the mission of the Hold Ghost
on earth, the communion of saints, the forgiveness of sins, and
the resurrection of the dead, are all mysteries necessitating a
revelation on the part of God himself to make them known to and
believed by man. Do they not place man, even while on earth, in
direct communication with heaven?

The firm believer in those mysteries is already a celestial
citizen by faith and hope. He has acquired a new life, new
senses, as it were, new faculties of mind and will--all things,
evidently, above Nature.

And it is clear, from many passages of the New Testament, that
our Lord wished the lives of his disciples to be wholly
penetrated with that supernatural essence. They were not to be
men of the earth, earthly, but citizens of another country which
is heavenly and eternal. Hence the holiness and perfection
required of them--a holiness, according to Christ, like that of
the celestial Father himself; hence contempt for the things of
this world, so strongly recommended by our Lord; hence the
assurance that men are called to be sons of God, the eternal Son
having become incarnate to acquire for us this glorious
privilege; hence, finally, that frequent recommendation in the
Gospel to rely on God for the things of this life, and to look
above all for spiritual blessings.

That reliance is set forth in such terms, in the Sermon on the
Mount, that, taken literally, man should neglect entirely his
temporal advantages, forget entirely _Nature_, and think only of
_grace_, or rather, expect that the things of Nature would be
given us by our heavenly Father "who knows that we need them."

Nature, consequently, assumes a new aspect in this system. It is
no longer a complexity of temporal goods within reach of the
efforts of man, and which it rests with man alone to procure for
himself. It is, indeed, a worldly treasure, belonging to God, as
all else, and which the hand of God scatters profusely among his
creatures. God will not fail to grant to every one what he needs,
if he have faith. Thus God is always visible in Nature; and
redeemed man, raised far above the beasts of the field, has
other eyes than those of the body, when he looks around him on
this world.

Had Christianity been literally understood by those who first
received it, it would have completely changed the moral, social,
and even natural aspect of the universe. The change produced
throughout by the new religion was indeed remarkable, but not
what it would have been, if the supernatural had taken complete
possession of human society. This it did in Ireland, and, it may
be said, in Ireland alone.

To begin with the preaching of St. Patrick, we note his care to
impart to his converts a sufficient knowledge of the Christian
mysteries, but, above all, to make those mysteries influence
their lives by acting more powerfully on the new Christian heart
than even on the mind.

Thus, in the beautiful legend of Ethne and Felimia, the saint,
not content with instructing them on the attributes of God, the
Trinity, and other supernatural truths, goes further still; he
requires a change in their whole being--that it be spiritualized:
by deeply exciting their feelings, by speaking of Christ as
their spouse, by making them wish to receive him in the holy
Eucharist, even at the expense of their temporal life, he so
raises them above Nature that they actually asked to die. "And
they received the Eucharist of God, and they slept in death."

Again, in the hymn of Tara, the heavenly spirit, which consists
in an intimate union with God and Christ, is so admirably
expressed, that we cannot refrain from presenting an extract
from it, remarking that this beautiful hymn has been the great
prayer of all Irishmen through all ages down even to our own
times, though, unfortunately, it is not now so generally known
and used by them as formerly:

"At Tara, to-day, may the strength of God pilot me, may the
power of God preserve me, may the wisdom of God instruct me, may
the eye of God view me, may the ear of God hear me, may the word
of God render me eloquent, may the hand of God protect me, may
the way of God direct me, may the shield of God defend me, etc.

"Christ be with me, Christ before me, Christ after me, Christ in
me, Christ under me, Christ over me, Christ at my right, Christ
at my left; . . . Christ be in the heart of each person whom I
speak to, Christ in the mouth of each person who speaks to me,
Christ in each eye which sees me, Christ in each ear which hears
me!"

Could any thing tend more powerfully to make of those whom he
converted, true supernatural Christians--forgetful of this world,
thinking only of another and a brighter one?

The island, at his coming, was a prey to preternatural
superstitions. The Druids possessed, in the opinion of the
people, a power beyond that of man; and history shows the same
phenomenon in all pagan countries, not excepting those of our
time. A real supernatural power was required to overcome that of
the _magi_.

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 superstitions,
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 God, 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 apostleship 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 God, 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, distinguishing 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 God--God 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 God 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 God; 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 passions 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 God."

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 sex 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 God 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 assisted, 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 manuscript. Nevertheless, the
critics of our days, finding nothing impossible to or unworthy
of God in the large collection of Colgan and other Irish
antiquarians, express their surprise at their exclusion from
that of Bollandus.

No one at least will refuse to concede that, true or not, the
facts related in those lives are always provocative of piety and
redolent of faith. They certainly prove that at all periods of
their existence the Irish have manifested a holy avidity for
every thing supernatural and miraculous. Do they not know that
our Lord has promised gifts of this description to his apostles
and their successors? And what the acts of the Apostles and many
acts of martyrs positively state as having happened at the very
beginning of the Church, is not a whit less extraordinary or
physically impossible than any thing related in the Irish
legends.

Every Christian soul naturally abhors the unbelief of a Strauss
or of a Renan as to the former; is it not unnatural, then, for
the same Christian soul to reject the latter because they fall
under the easy sneer of "an Irish legend," and are not contained
in Holy Writ?

At all events, the faith of the Irish has never wavered in such
matters, and to-day they hold the same confidence in the
priests' power that meets us everywhere in the pages of Colgan
and Ward. The reason is, that they admit Christianity without
reserve; and in its entirety it is supernatural. The criticisms
of human reason on holy things hold in their eyes something of
the sacrilegious and blasphemous; such criticisms are for them
open disrespect for divine things; and, inasmuch as divine
things are, in fact, more real than any phenomena under natural
laws can be, skepticism in the former case is always more
unreasonable than in the latter, supposing always that the
narrative of the Divine favors reposes on sufficient authority.

It is clear, therefore, that since the preaching of Christianity
in Ireland, the world showed itself to the inhabitants of that
country in a different light to that in which other men beheld
it. For them, Nature is never separated from its Maker; the hand
of God is ever visible in all mundane affairs, and the frightful
parting between the spiritual and material worlds, first
originated by the Baconian philosophy, which culminates in our
days in the almost open negation of the spiritual, and thus
materializes all things, is with justice viewed by the children
of St. Patrick with a holy horror as leading to atheism, if it
be not atheism itself.

Without going to such extremes as the avowed infidels of modern
times, all other Christian nations have seemed afraid to draw
the logical conclusions whose premises were laid down by
revelation. They have tried to follow a _via media_ between
truth and error; they have admitted to a certain extent the
separation of God and Nature, supposing the act of creation to
have passed long ages ago, and not continuing through all time;
and thus they are bound by their system to hold that miracles
are very extraordinary things, not to be believed _prima facie_,
requiring infinite precautions before admitting the supposition
of their having taken place; all which indicates a real
repugnance to their admission, and an innate fear of supposing
God all-powerful, just, and good. It is the first step to
Manicheism and the kindred errors; and most Christian nations
having, unfortunately, imbibed the principles of those errors in
the philosophy of modern times, have almost lost all faith in
the supernatural, and reduced revelation to a meagre and cold
system, unrealized and not to be realized in human life.

Not so the Irish Religion has entered deep into their life. It
is a thing of every moment and of every place. Nature, God's
handiwork, instead of repelling them from God himself, draws
them gently but forcibly toward Him, so that they feel
themselves to be truly recipients of the blessings of God by
being sharers in the blessings of Nature.

And must God's ministers, who have received such extraordinary
powers over the supernatural world, be entirely deprived of
power over the inferior part of creation? Who can say so, and
have true faith in the words of our Lord? Who can say so, and
truly call himself the follower and companion of the saints who
have all believed so firmly in the constant action of God in
this, the lesser part of his creation?

And this faith of the Irish in the power of the priesthood is
not a thing of yesterday. It dates from their adoption of
Christianity, to continue, we hope, forever. It ought, therefore,
to be carefully distinguished from that love for every priest
of God which beats so ardently in the hearts of them all, and
which was so strengthened by a long community of persecution and
suffering.

In Ireland, as in every other Christian country, the priesthood
has always sided with the people against their oppressors.
During the early ages of Christianity in the island, the bishops,
priests, and monks, were often called upon to exercise their
authority and power against princes and chiefs of clans,
accustomed to plunder, destroy, and kill, on the slightest
pretext, and unused to control their fierce passions, inflamed
by the rancor of feuds and the pride of strength and bravery.
Some of those chieftains even opposed the progress of religion;
and it is said that Eochad, King of Ulster, cast his two
daughters, whom Patrick had baptized and consecrated to God,
into the sea.

For several centuries the heads of clans were generally so
unruly and so hard to bring under the yoke of Christ, that the
saints, in taking the side of the poor, had to stand as a wall
of brass to stem the fury of the great and powerful.

Bridget even, the modest and tender virgin, often spoke harshly
of princes and rulers. "While she dwelt in the land of Bregia,
King Connal's daughter-in-law came to ask her prayers, for she
was barren. Bridget refused to go to receive her; but, leaving
her without, she sent one of her maidens. When the nun returned:
'Mother,' she asked, 'why would you not go and see the queen?
you pray for the wives of peasants.' 'Because,' said the servant
of God, 'the poor and the peasants are almost all good and pious,
while the sons of kings are serpents, children of blood and
fornication, except a small number of elect. But, after all, as
she had recourse to us, go back and tell her that she shall have
a son; he will be wicked, and his race shall be accursed, yet he
shall reign many years.'"

We might multiply examples such as this, wherein the saints and
the ministers of God always side with the poor and the helpless;
and their great number in the lives of the old saints at once
gives a reason for the deep love which the lower class of the
Irish people felt for the holy men who were at once the servants
of God and their helpers in every distress.

The same thing is to be found in the whole subsequent history of
the island, chiefly in the latter ages of persecution. But, as
we said before, this affection and love must be distinguished
from the feeling of reverence and awe resulting from the
supernatural character of their office. The first feeling is
merely a natural one, produced by deeds of benevolence and holy
charity fondly remembered by the individuals benefited. The
second was the effect of religious faith in the sacredness of
the priestly character, and remained in full force even when the
poor themselves fell under reproof or threat in consequence of
some misdeed or vicious habit.

Hence the universal respect which the whole race entertains for
their spiritual rulers, and their unutterable confidence in
their high prerogatives. In prosperity as in adversity, in
freedom or in subjection, they always preserve an instinctive
faith in the unseen power which Christ conferred on those whom
He chose to be his ministers. This feeling, which is undoubtedly
found among good Christians in all places, is as certainly only
found among particular individuals; but among the Irish Celts it
is the rule rather than the exception.

Well have they merited, then, in this sense, from the days of St.
Patrick down, the title of a "priest-ridden" people, which has
been fixed on them as a term of reproach by those for whom all
belief in the supernatural is belief in imposture.

Another and a stronger fact still, exemplifying the extent to
which the Irish have at all times carried their devotion to the
supernatural character of the Christian religion, is the
extraordinary ardor with which, from the very beginning, they
rushed into the high path of perfection, called the way of
"evangelical counsels." Nowhere else were such scenes ever
witnessed in Christian history.

For the great mass of people the common way of life is the
practice of the commandments of God; it is only the few who feel
themselves called on to enter upon another path, and who
experience interiorly the need of being "perfect."

In Ireland the case was altogether different from the outset. St.
Patrick, notwithstanding his intimate knowledge of the leanings
of the race, expresses in his "Confessio" the wonder and delight
he experienced when he saw in what manner and in what numbers
they begged to be consecrated to God the very first day after
their baptism. Yet were they conscious that this very eagerness
would excite the greater opposition on the part of their pagan
relatives and friends. Thus we read of the fate of Eochad's
daughters, and the story of Ethne and Felimia.

The whole nation, in fact, appeared suddenly transported with a
holy impetuosity, and lifted at once to the height of Christian
life. Monasteries and nunneries could not be constructed fast
enough, although they contented themselves with the lightest
fabrics--wattles being the ordinary materials for walls, and
slender laths for roofs.

Nor was this an ephemeral ardor, like a fire of stubble or straw,
flashing into a momentary blaze, to relapse into deeper gloom.
It lasted for several centuries; it was still in full flame at
the time of Columba, more than two hundred years after Patrick;
it grew into a vast conflagration in the seventh and eighth
centuries, when multitudes rushed forth from that burning island
of the blest to spread the sacred fire through Europe.

How the nation continued to multiply, when so many devoted
themselves to a holy celibacy, is only to be explained by the
large number of children with which God blessed those who
pursued an ordinary life, and who, from what is related in the
chronicles of the time, must have been in a minority.

Of the first monasteries and convents erected not a single
vestige now remains, because of the perishable materials of
which they were constructed; yet each of them contained hundreds,
nay thousands, of monks or nuns.

But, even in our days, we are furnished with an ocular
demonstration of what men could scarcely bring themselves to
believe, or at least would term an exaggeration, did not
standing proof remain. God inspired his children with the
thought of erecting more substantial structures, of building
walls of stone and roofing them in with tiles and metal; and the
island was literally covered, not with Gothic castles or
luxurious palaces and sumptuous edifices, but with large and
commodious buildings and churches, wherein the religious life of
the inmates might be carried on with greater comfort and
seclusion from the world.

At the time of the Reformation all those asylums of perfection
and asceticism were of course profaned, converted to vile or
slavish uses, many altogether destroyed to the very foundations;
a greater number were allowed to decay gradually and become
heaps of ruins.

And what happened when the English Government, unable any longer
to resist public opinion, was compelled to consent that a survey
be made of the poor and comparatively few remains still in
existence, in order to manifest a show of interest for the past
history of the island; when commissioners were appointed to
publish lists and diagrams of the former dwellings of the
"saints," which the "zeal" of the "reformers" had battered down
without mercy? To the astonishment of all, it was proved by the
ruins still in existence that the greater portion of the island
had been once occupied by monasteries and convents of every
description. And Prof. O'Curry has stated his conviction, based
on local traditions and geographical and topographical names,
that a great number of these can be traced back to Patrick and
his first companions.

It is clear enough, then, that, from the beginning, the Irish
were not only "priest-ridden," but also very attached to
"monkish superstitions."

Yet we could not form a complete idea of that attachment were we
to limit ourselves to an enumeration of the buildings actually
erected, supposing such an enumeration possible at this time.
For we know, by many facts related in Irish hagiology, that a
great number of those who devoted themselves to a life of
penance and austerity, did not dwell even in the humble
structures of the first monks, but, deeming themselves unworthy
of the society of their brethren, or condemned by a severe but
just "friend of their soul," as the confessor was then called,
hid themselves in mountain-caves, in the recesses of woods or
forests, or banished themselves to crags ever beaten by the
waves of the sea.

Yes, there was a time when those dreadful solitudes of the
Hebrides, which frighten the modern tourist in his summer
explorations, teemed with Christian life, and every rock, cave,
and sand-bar had its inhabitant, and that inhabitant an Irish
monk.

They sometimes spent seven years on a desert islet doing penance
for a single sin. They often passed a lifetime on a rock in the
midst of the ocean, alone with God, and enjoying no communion
but that of their conscience.

Who knows how many thousands of men have led such a life,
shocking, indeed, to the feelings of worldlings, but in reality
devoted to the contemplation of what is above Nature--a life,
consequently, exalted and holy?

Passing from the solitudes to the numerous hives where the bees
of primitive Christianity in Ireland were busy at work
constructing their combs and secreting their honey, what do we
see? People generally imagine that all monastic establishments
have been alike; that those of mediaeval times were simply the
reproduction of earlier ones. An abbot, the three vows,
austerity, psalmody, study--such are the general features common
to all; but those of Ireland had peculiarities which are worthy
of examination. We shall find in them a stronger expression of
the supernatural, perhaps; certainly a more heavenly cast, a
greater forgetfulness of the world, its manners and habits, its
passions and aims.

Patrick had learned all he knew of this holy life in the
establishment of Lerins, wherein the West reflected more truly
than it ever did subsequently the Oriental light of the great
founders of monasticism in Palestine and Egypt.

The first thing to be remarked is the want, to a great extent,
of a strict system. The Danes, when Christianized, and the Anglo-
Normans, introduced this afterwards; but the genius of the Irish
race is altogether opposed to it, and the Scandinavian races in
following ages could hardly ever bring them under the cold
uniformity of an iron rule.

Did St. Patrick establish a rule in the monasteries which he
founded? Did St. Columba two centuries later? Did any of the
great masters of spiritual life who are known to have exercised
an influence on the world of Irish convents? Not only has
nothing of the kind been transmitted to us, but no mention of it
is made in the lives of holy abbots which we possess.1 (1 The
"Irish Penitentials," quoted at length in Rev. Dr. Moran's
"Early Irish Church," are not monastic rules, although many
canons have reference to monks.) St. Columbanus's rule is the
only one which has come down to us; but the monasteries founded
by him were all situated in Burgundy, Switzerland, Germany, and
Italy--that is to say, out of Ireland, out of the island of
saints. He was compelled to furnish his monasteries with a
written rule, because they were surrounded by barbarous peoples,
some of whom his establishments often received as monks, and to
whom the holiness of Ireland was unfamiliar or utterly unknown.
But why should the people of God, living in his devoted island,
redeemed as soon as born by the waters of baptism, be shackled
by enactments which might serve as an obstacle to the action of
the Holy Ghost on their free souls?

According to the common opinion, each founder of a monastery had
his own rule, which he himself was the first to follow in all
its rigor; if disciples came, they were to observe it, or go
elsewhere; if, after having embraced it, they found themselves
unable to keep it to the letter, the abbot was indulgent, and
did not impose on them a burden which they could no longer bear,
after having first proved their willingness to practise it.

Thus, it is reported that St. Mochta was the only one who
practised his own rule exactly, his monks imitating him as well
as they could. St. Fintan, who was inclined to be severe,
received this warning in a vision: "Fight unto the end thyself;
but beware of being a cause of scandal to others, by requiring
all to fight as thou doest, for one clay is weaker than another."

Thus, every founder, every abbot even, left to the guidance of
the Holy Spirit, practised austerities which in our days of self-
indulgence seem absolutely incredible, and showed themselves
severe to those under their authority. But this severity was
tempered by such zeal for the good of souls, and consequently by
such an unmistakable charity, that the penitent monk carried his
burden not only with resignation, but with joy. This, in after-
ages, became a characteristic feature of Irish monasticism.

The life of Columba is full of examples of this holy severity.
In St. Patrick's life we read that Colman died of thirst rather
than quench it before the time appointed by his master.

How many facts of a similar nature might be mentioned! Enough to
say that, after so many ages, in which, thanks to barbarous
persecutions, all ecclesiastical and monastic traditions were
lost to Ireland, through the sheer impossibility of following
them up, the Irish still show a marked predilection for the holy
austerity of penance, though the rest of the Christian world
seems to have almost totally forgotten it.

But if the Irish convents lacked system, there was at the same
time in them an exuberance of feeling, an enthusiastic impulse,
which is to be found nowhere else to the same extent, and which
we call their second peculiar feature after they received
Christianity. This is beautifully expressed in a hymn of the
office of St. Finian: "Behold the day of gladness; the clerks
applaud and are in joy; the sun of justice, which had been
hidden in the clouds, shines forth again."

As soon as this primitive enthusiasm seemed to slacken in the
least, reformers appeared to enkindle it again. Such was Bridget,
such was Gildas, such were the disciples of St. David of
Menevia in Wales, such was any one whom the Spirit of God
inspired with love for Ireland. Thus the scenes enacted in the
time of Patrick were again and again repeated.

And when a monastery was built, it was not properly a monastery,
but a city rather; for the whole country round joined in the
goodly work. As some one has said, "it looked as if Ireland was
going to cease to be a nation, and become a church."

With regard to the question of ground and the appropriation of
landed property, what matters it who is the owner? If it be clan
territory, there is the clan with nothing but welcome, applause,
and assistance. If it be private, the owner is not consulted
even; how could he think of opposing the work of God? Thus, we
never read in Irish history - in the earlier stages at least -
of those long charters granted in other lands by kings, dukes,
and counts, and preserved with such care in the archives of the
monastery. It seems that the Danes, after they became Christians,
were the first to introduce the custom; after them, the Anglo-
Normans, in the true spirit of their race, made a flourishing
business of it. The Irish themselves never thought of such at
first. There was no fear of any one ever claiming the ground on
which God's house stood. The buildings were there: the ground
needed to support them: what Irishman could think of driving
away the holy inmates and pulling the walls about their ears?

The whole surrounding population is busy erecting them. Long
rows of wattles and tessel-work are set in right order; over
them a rough roof of boards; within small cells begin to appear,
as the slight partitions are erected between them. Symmetry or
no symmetery, the position of the ground decides the question;
for there is no need of the skill of a surveyor to establish the
grade. Does not the rain run its own way, once it begins?

How far and how wide will those long rows reach? They seem the
streets of a city; and in truth they are. The place is to
receive two, three thousand monks, over and above the students
committed to their care. And, in addition to the cells to dwell
in, there are the halls wherein to teach; the museums and
repositories of manuscripts, of sacred objects; the rooms to
write in, translate, compose; the sheds to hold provisions, to
prepare and cook them, ready for the meal.

For the most important edifice--the temple of God--alone stones
are cut, shaped, and fitted each to each with care and precision.
A holy simplicity surrounds the art; yet are there not wanting
carven crosses and other divine emblems sculptured out. Within,
the heavenly mysteries of religion will be performed. Should you
ask, "Why so small?" the answer is ready. That large space empty
around holds room enough for the worshippers, whose numbers
could be accommodated in no edifice. The minds of Irish
architects had not yet expanded to the conception of a St.
Peter's. Inside is room enough for the ministers of religion;
without, at the tinkling of the bell, in the round tower
adjoining, the faithful will join in the services.

Nor was it only in the erection of those edifices that a cheerful
impulse, which overlooked or overcame all difficulties, was
displayed. The monastic life was not all the time a life of
penance and gloomy austerity, but of active work also and
overflowing feeling, of true poetry and enthusiastic exultation.
We read in the fragments we still possess how, on the arid rock
of Iona, Columba remembered his former residence at Derry, with
its woods of oaks and the pure waters of its loughs. In all the
lives of Irish saints we read of the deep attachment they always
preserved for their country, relatives, and friends; what they
did and were ready to do for them. And though all this was at
bottom but a natural feeling, the extent to which it was carried
will make us better acquainted with the Irish character, and
explain more clearly that extraordinary expansion of soul which,
in the domains of the supernatural, surpassed every thing
witnessed elsewhere.

"In a monastery two brothers had lived from childhood. The elder
died, and while he was dying the other was laboring in the
forest. When he came back, he saw the brethren opening a grave
in the cemetery, and thus he learned that his brother was dead.
He hastened to the spot where the Abbot Fintan, with some of his
monks, were chanting psalms around the corpse, and asked him the
favor of dying with his brother, and entering with him into the
heavenly kingdom. 'Thy brother is already in heaven,' replied
Fintan, 'and you cannot enter together unless he rise again.'
Then he knelt in prayer, the angels who had received the holy
soul restored it, and the dead man, rising in his bier, called
his brother: 'Come,' said he, 'but come quickly; the angels
await us.' At the same time he made room beside him, and both,
lying down, slept together in death, and ascended together to
the kingdom of God."

This anecdote may tend better than any thing else to show us how
Nature and grace were united in the Irish soul, to warm it,
purify it, exalt it above ordinary feelings and earthly passions,
and keep it constantly in a state of energy and vitality
unknown to other peoples. For, in what page of the
ecclesiastical history of other nations do we read of things
such as these?

With regard to their country, also, grace came to the aid of
Nature; the supernatural was, therefore, seldom absent from the
natural in their minds, and something of this double union has,
remained in them in every sense, and has, no doubt, contributed
to render their nationality imperishable in spite of persecution.
How ardent and pure in the heart of Columba was the love of
Ireland, from which he was a voluntary exile! Patrick, also,
though not native born, yielded to none in that sacred feeling;
one of the three things he sought of God on dying was, that Erin
should not "remain forever under a foreign yoke:" Kieran offered
the same prayer, and their reason for thus praying was that she
was the "island of saints," destined to help out the salvation
of many.

Religion has been invariably connected with that acute sentiment
ever present in the minds of Irishmen for their country; and it
is, doubtless, that holy and supernatural feeling which has
preserved a country which enemies strove so strenuously to wrest
from them.

But it was not love of country alone, of relatives and friends,
which enkindled in their hearts a spirit of enthusiasm; their
whole monastic life was one of high-spirited devotedness, and
energy, and action, more than human.

We see them laboring in and around their monastic hive. How they
pray and chant the divine office; how they study and expound the
holy doctrine to their pupils; how they are ever travelling,
walking in procession by hundreds and by thousands through the
island, the interior spirit not allowing them to stand still.
There are so many pilgrimages to perform, so many shrines to
venerate, so many works of brotherly love to undertake. Other
monks in other countries, indeed, did the same, but seldom with
such universal ardor. The whole island, as we said, is one
church. On all sides you may meet bishops, and priests, and
monks, bearing revered relics, or proceeding to found a new
convent, plant another sacred edifice, or establish a house for
the needy. The people on the way fall in and follow their
footsteps, sharers of the burning enthusiasm. Many-how many!-
were thus attracted to this mode of life, wherein there was
scarce aught earthly, but all breathing holiness and heavenly
grace!

Thus the island was from the beginning a holy island. But zeal
for God in their own country alone not being enough for their
ardor, those men of God were early moved by the impulse of going
abroad to spread the faith. Volumes might be written of their
apostleship among barbarous tribes; we have room only for a few
words.

They first went to the islands north of them, to the Hebrides,
the Faroe Isles, and even Iceland, which they colonized before
the Norwegian pirates landed there. Then they evangelized
Scotland and the north of England; and, starting from
Lindisfarne, they completed the work of the conversion of the
Anglo-Saxons, which was begun by St. Augustin and his monks in
the south.

Finally, the whole continent of Western Europe offered itself to
their zeal, and at once they were ready to enter fully and
unreservedly into the current of new ideas and energies which at
that time began to renew the face of that portion of the world
overspread by barbarians from Germany. Under the Merovingian
kings in France, and later on, under the Carlovingian dynasty,
they became celebrated in the east of France, on the banks of
the Rhine, even in the north through Germany, in the heart of
Switzerland, and the north of Italy. This is not the place to
attempt even a sketch of their missionary labors, now known to
all the students of the history of those times. But we may here
mention that at that time the Irish monarchs and rulers became
acquainted with continental dynasties and affairs through the
necessary intercourse held by the Irish bishops and monks with
Rome, the centre of Catholicity. Thus we see that Malachi II
corresponded with Charles the Bald, with a view of making a
pilgrimage to Rome.

We learn from the yellow-book of Lecain that Conall, son of
Coelmuine, brought from Rome the law of Sunday, such as was
afterward practised in Ireland.

Over and above the Irish missionaries who kept up a constant
correspondence from the Continent of Europe with their native
land, it is known that many in those early ages went on
pilgrimages to Rome; among others, St. Degan, St. Kilian, the
apostle of Franconia; St. Sedulius the younger, who assisted at
a Roman council in 721, and was sent by the Pope on a mission to
Spain; St. Donatus, afterward Bishop of Fiesole, and his
disciple, Andrew. St. Cathald went from Rome to Jerusalem, and
on his return was made Bishop of Tarento. Donough, son of Brian
Boru, went to Rome in 1063, carrying, it is said, the crown of
his father, and there died.

It has been calculated that the ancient Irish monks held from
the sixth to the ninth century thirteen monasteries in Scotland,
seven in France, twelve in Armoric Gaul, seven in Lotharingia,
eleven in Burgundy, nine in Belgium, ten in Alsatia, sixteen in
Bavaria, fifteen in Rhaetia, Helvetia, and Suevia, besides
several in Thuringia and on the left bank of the Rhine. Ireland
was then not only included in, but at the head of, the European
movement; and yet that forms a period in her annals which as yet
has scarcely been studied.

The religious zeal which was then so manifest in the island
itself burned likewise among many Continental nations, and
lasted from the introduction of Christianity to the Danish
invasion. What contributed chiefly to make that ardor lasting
was, that every thing connected with religion made a part even
of their exterior life. Grace had taken entire possession of
the national soul. This world was looked upon as a shadow,
beautiful only in reflecting something of the beauty of heaven.

Hence were the Irish "the saints." So were they titled by all,
and they accepted the title with a genuine and holy simplicity
which betokened a truer modesty than the pretended denegation
which we might expect. Thus they seemed above temptation. The
virgins consecrated to God were as numerous at least as the
monks. These had also their processions and pilgrimages; they
went forth from houses over-full to found others, not knowing or
calculating beforehand the spot where they might rest and
"expect resurrection." Such was their language. Sometimes they
applied at the doors of monasteries, and if there was no spot in
the neighborhood suitable for the sisters, the monks abandoned
to them their abode, their buildings and cultivated fields where
the crops were growing, taking with them naught save the sacred
vessels and the books they might need in the new establishment
they went forth to found elsewhere.

Who could imagine, then, that even a thought could enter their
minds beyond those of charity and kindness? Were they not dead
utterly to worldly passions, and living only to God? It would
have been a sacrilege to have profaned the holy island, not only
with an unlawful act but even with a worldly imagination. Had
not many holy men and women seen angels constantly coming down
from heaven, and the souls of the just at their departure going
straight from Ireland to heaven? Both in perpetual communication!
Had the eyes of all been as pure as those of the best among
them, the truth would have been unveiled to all alike, and the
"isle of saints" would have shown itself to them as what it
really was-a bright country where redemption was a great fact;
where the souls of the great majority were truly and actually
redeemed in the full sense of the word; where people might enjoy
a foretaste of heaven-the very space above their heads being to
them at all times a road connecting the heavenly mansions with
this sublunary world.

True is it that there were ever in the island a number of great
sinners who desecrated the holy spot they dwelt on by their
deeds of blood. The Saviour predicted that there should be
"tares among the wheat" everywhere until the day of judgment.

It was among the chieftains principally, almost entirely, that
sin prevailed. The clan-system, unfortunately, favored deadly
feuds, which often drenched all parts of the island in blood.
Family quarrels, being in themselves unnatural, led to the most
atrocious crimes. The old Greek drama furnishes frightful
examples of it, and similar passions sometimes filled the
breasts of those leaders of Irish clans. Few of them died in
their beds. When carried away by passion, they respected nothing
which men generally respect.

It would, however, be an exaggeration to suppose on this account
a distinct and complete antagonism to have existed between the
clan and the Church, and to class all the princes on the side of
evil as opposed to the "saints," whom we have contemplated
leading a celestial life. We know from St. Aengus that one of
the glories of Ireland is that many of her saints were of
princely families, whereas among other nations generally the
Gospel was first accepted by the poor and lowly, and found its
enemies among the higher and educated classes. But in Ireland
the great, side by side with the least of their clansmen, bowed
to the yoke of Christ, and the bards and learned men became
monks and bishops from the very first preaching of the Word.

The fact is, a great number of kings and chieftains made their
station doubly renowned by their virtues, and find place in the
chronicle of Irish saints. Who can read, for instance, the story
of King Guaire without admiring his faith and true Christian
spirit?

It is reported that as St. Caimine and St. Cumain Fota were one
day conversing on spiritual things with that holy king of
Connaught, Caimine said to Guaire, "O king, could this church be
filled on a sudden with whatever thou shouldst wish, what would
thy desire be?" "I should wish," replied the king, "to have all
the treasures that the church could hold, to devote them to the
salvation of souls, the erection of churches, and the wants of
Christ's poor." "And what wouldst thou ask?" said the king to
Fota. "I would," he replied, "have as many holy books as the
church could contain, to give all who seek divine wisdom, to
spread among the people the saving doctrine of Christ, and
rescue souls from the bondage of Satan." Both then turned to
Caimine. "For my part," said he, "were this church filled with
men afflicted with every form of suffering and disease, I
should ask of God to vouchsafe to assemble in my wretched body
all their evils, all their pains, and give me strength to
support them patiently, for the love of the Saviour of the world.
"1 (1 This passage is given in Latin by Colgan (Acts SS.). In
the original Irish, translated and published by Dr. Todd--Liber
Hymn--there are more details.)

Thus the most sublime and supernatural spirit of Christianity
became natural to the Irish mind in the great as well as in the
lowly, in the rich as well as in the poor. Women rivalled men in
that respect.

"Daria was blind from birth. Once, whilst conversing with
Bridget, she said: 'Bless my eyes that I may see the world, and
gratify my longing.' The night was dark; it grew light for her,
and the world appeared to her gaze. But when she had beheld it,
she turned again to Bridget. 'Now close my eyes,' said she, 'for
the more one is absent from the world, the more present he is
before God.'"

Even though one may express doubt as to the reality of this
miracle, one thing, at least, is beyond doubt: that the spirit
of the words of Daria was congenial to the Irish mind at the
time, and that none but one who had first reached the highest
point of supernatural life could conceive or give utterance to
such a sentiment.

That more than human life and spirit elevated, ennobled, and, as
it were, divinized, even the ordinary human and natural feelings,
which not only ceased to become dangerous, but became,
doubtless, highly pleasing to God and meritorious in his sight.
An example may better explain our meaning:

"Ninnid was a young scholar, not over-reverent, whom the
influence of Bridget one day suddenly overcame, so that he
afterward appeared quite a different being. Bridget announced to
him that from his hand she should, for the last time, receive
the body and blood of our Lord. Ninnid resolved that his hand
should remain pure for so high and holy an office. He enclosed
it in an iron case, and wishing at the same time to postpone, as
far as lay in his power, the moment that was to take Bridget
from the world, he set out for Brittany, throwing the key of the
box into the sea. But the designs of God are immutable. When
Bridget's hour had come, Ninnid was driven by a storm on the
Irish coast, and the key was miraculously given up by the deep."

Where, except in Ireland, could such friendship continue for
long years, without giving cause not only for the least scandal,
but even for the remotest danger? In that island the natural
feelings of the human heart were wholly absorbed by heavenly
emotions, in which nothing earthly could be found? Hence the
celebrated division of the "three orders of the Irish saints,"
the first being so far above temptation that no regulation was
imposed on the Cenobites with respect to their intercourse with
women.

"Women were welcome and cared for; they were admitted, so to
speak, to the sanctuary; it was shared with them, occupied in
common. Double, or even mixed monasteries, so near to each other
as to form but one, brought the two sexes together for mutual
edification; men became instructors of women; women of men."

Nothing of the kind was ever witnessed elsewhere; nothing of the
kind was to be seen ever after. Robert of Arbrissel established
something similar in the order, of Fontevrault in France; but
there it was a strange and very uncommon exception; in Ireland
for two centuries it was the rule. This alone would show how
completely the Christian spirit had taken possession of the
whole race from the first.

It is this which gives to Irish hagiology a peculiar character,
making it appear strange even to the best men of other nations.
The elevation of human feeling to such a height of perfection is
so unusual that men cannot fail to be surprised wherever they
may meet it.

Yet far from appearing strange, almost inexplicable, it would
have been recognized as the natural result of the working of the
Christian religion, if the spirit brought on earth by our Lord
had been more thoroughly diffused among men, if all had been
penetrated by it to the same degree, if all had equally
understood the meaning of the Gospel preached to them.

But, unfortunately, so many and so great were the obstacles
opposed everywhere to the working of the Spirit of God in the
souls of men, that comparatively few were capable of being
altogether transformed into beings of another nature.

The great mass lagged far behind in the race of perfection. They
were admitted to the fold of Christ, and lived generally at
least in the practice of the commandments; but the object
proposed to himself by the Saviour of mankind was imperfectly
carried out on earth. The life of the world was far from being
impregnated by the spirit which he brought from heaven.

In the "island of saints" we certainly see a great number open
out at once to the fulness of that divine influence. Herein we
have the explanation of the deep faith which has ever since been
the characteristic of the people. "Centuries have perpetuated
the alliance of Catholicity and Ireland. Revolutions have failed
to shake it; persecution has not broken it; it has gained
strength in blood and tears, and we may believe, after thirteen
centuries of trial, that the Roman faith will disappear from
Ireland only with the name of Patrick and the last Irishman."

NOTE.-It is known that F. Colgan, a Franciscan, undertook to
publish the "Acta Sanctorum Hiberniae." He edited only two
volumes: the first under the title of "Trias thaumaturga "
containing the various lives of St. Patrick, St. Columba, and St.
Bridget:-the second under the general title of "Acta SS."-
Barnwall, an Irishman born and educated in France, published the
"Histoire Legendaire d'Irlande," in which he collected, without
much order, a number of passages of Colgan's "Acta," and Mr. J.
G. Shea translated and published it. We have taken from this
translation several facts contained in this chapter, the work of
the Franciscan being not accessible to us.

Dr. Todd, from Irish MSS., has given a few pages showing the
accuracy of Colgan, although the good father did not scruple
occasionally to condense and abridge, unless the MSS. he used
differed from those of Dr. Todd. The whole is a rich mine of
interesting anecdotes, and Montalembert has shown what a skilful
writer can find in those pages forgotten since the sixteenth
century. Mr. Froude himself has acknowledged that the eighth was
the golden age of Ireland.

CHAPTER V.

THE CHRISTIAN IRISH AND THE PAGAN DANES.

For several centuries the Irish continued in the happy state
described in the last chapter. While the whole European
Continent was convulsed by the irruptions of the Germanic tribes,
and of the Huns, more savage still, the island was at peace,
opened her schools to the youth of all countries--to Anglo-
Saxons chiefly--and spread her name abroad as the happy and holy
isle, the dwelling of the saints, the land of prodigies, the
most blessed spot on the earth. No invading host troubled her;
the various Teutonic nations knew less of the sea than the Celts
themselves, and no vessel neared the Irish coast save the
peaceful curraghs which carried her monks and missionaries
abroad, or her own sons in quest of food and adventure.

Providence would seem to have imposed upon the nation the lofty
mission of healing the wounds of other nations as they lay
helpless in the throes of death, of keeping the doctrines of the
Gospel alive in Europe, after those terrible invasions, and of
leading into the fold of Christ many a shepherdless flock. The
peaceful messengers who went forth from Ireland became as
celebrated as her home schools and monasteries; and well had it
been for the Irish could such a national life as this have
continued.

But God, who wished to prepare them for still greater things in
future ages, who proves by suffering all whom he wishes to use
as his best instruments, allowed the fury of the storm to burst
suddenly upon them. It was but the beginning of their woes, the
first step in that long road to Calvary, where they were to be
crucified with him, to be crucified wellnigh to the death before
their final and almost miraculous resurrection. The Danes were
to be the first torturers of that happy and holy people; the
hardy rovers of the northern seas were coming to inaugurate a
long era of woe.

The Scandinavian irruption which desolated Europe just as she
was beginning to recover from the effects of the first great
Germanic wave, may be said to have lasted from the eighth to the
twelfth century. Down from the North Sea came the shock; Ireland
was consequently one of the first to feel it, and we shall see
how she alone withstood and finally overcame it.

The better to understand the fierceness of the attack, let us
first consider its origin:

The Baltic Sea and the various gulfs connected with it penetrate
deeply the northern portion of the Continent of Europe. Its
indentations form two peninsulas: a large one, known under the
name of Norway and Sweden, and a lesser one on the southwest,
now called Denmark. The first was known to the Romans as Scania;
the second was called by them the Cimbric Chersonesus. From
Scania is derived the name Scandinavians, afterward given to the
inhabitants of the whole country. Besides these two peninsulas,
there are several islands scattered through the surrounding sea.

The frozen and barren land which this people inhabited obliged
them from time immemorial to depend on the ocean for their
sustenance: first, by fishing; later on, by piracy. They soon
became expert navigators, though their ships were merely small
boats made of a few pieces of timber joined together, and
covered with the hide of the walrus and the seal.

It seems, from the Irish annals, that they belonged to two
distinct races of men: the Norwegians, fair-haired and of large
stature; the Danes dark, and of smaller size. Hence the Irish
distinguished the first, whom they called Finn Galls, from the
second, whom they named Dubh Galls. By no other European nation
was this distinction drawn, the Irish being more exact in
observing their foes.

It is the general opinion of modern writers that they belonged
to the Teutonic family. The Goths, a Teutonic tribe, dwelt for a
long period on the larger peninsula. But whether the Goths were
of the same race as the Norwegians or Danes is a question.
Certain it is that the various German nations which first
overwhelmed the Roman Empire bore many characteristics different
from those of the Danes and Norwegians, though the language of
all indicated, to a certain extent, a common origin.

The Swedes, the inhabitants of the eastern coast of Scania, do
not appear to have taken an important part in the Scandinavian
invasions; nor, indeed, have they ever been so fond of maritime
enterprises as the two other nations. Moreover, they were at
that time in bloody conflict with the Goths, and too busy at
home to think of foreign conquest.

For a long time the Scandinavian pirates seem to have confined
themselves to scouring their own seas, and plundering the coasts
as far as the gulfs of Finland and Bothnia. At length,
emboldened by success, they ventured out into the ocean,
attacked the nations of Western and Southern Europe, and in the
west colonized the frozen shores of the Shetland and Faroe
Islands, and soon after Iceland and Greenland.

For several centuries the harbors of Denmark and Norway became
the storehouses of all the riches of Europe, and a large trade
was carried on between those northern peninsulas and the various
islands of the Northern and Arctic Seas, even with the coast of
America, of which Greenland seems to form a part.

Those stern and mountainous countries and the restless ocean
which divides them were for the Scandinavian pirates what the
Mediterranean and the coasts of Spain and Africa had long before
been for the Phoenicians and Carthaginians. These peoples were
clearly destined to introduce among modern nations the spirit of
commerce and enterprise.

But here it is well to consider their religious and social state
from which nations chiefly derive their noble or ignoble
qualities. We shall find both made up of the rankest idolatry,
of cruel manners and revolting customs.

Their system of worship, with its creed and rites, is much more
precise in character and better known to us than that of the
Celts. If we open the books which were written in Europe at the
time of the irruption of these Northmen, and the poems of those
savage tribes preserved to our own days, and comprised under the
name of Edda, besides the numerous sagas, or songs and ballads,
which we still possess, we find mention of three superior gods
and a number of inferior deities, which gave a peculiar
character to this Northern worship.

They were Thor, the god of the elements, of thunder chiefly;
Wodan or Odin, the god of war; and Frigga, the goddess of lust;
the long list of others it is unnecessary to give. Their
religion, therefore, consisted mainly: 1. In battling with the
elements, particularly on the sea, under the protection of Thor;
2. In slaying their enemies, or being themselves slain, as Odin
willed --the giving or receiving death being apparently the
great object of existence; 3. In abandoning themselves at the
time of victory to all the propensities of corrupt nature, which
they took to be the express will of Frigga manifested in their
unbridled passions.

Such was Scandinavian mythology in its reality.

Modern investigators, principally in Germany and France, find in
the Edda a complete system of cosmogony and of a religion almost
inspired, so beautiful do they make it. At least they have made
it appear as profound a philosophy as that of old Hindostan and
far-off Thibet. By grouping around those three great divinities,
which are supposed to be emblematical of the superior natural
forces, their numerous progeny, that of Odin especially,
together with an incredible number of malicious giants and good-
natured _ases_--a kind of fairy--any skilful theorist, gifted
with the requisite imagination, may extract from the whole an almost
perfect system of cosmogony and ethics. Then the disgusting legends
of the Edda and the sagas are straightway transformed into
interesting myths, offsprings of poetry and imagination, and
conveying to the mind a philosophy only less than sublime, derived,
as they say, from the religion of Zoroaster.

It is, as we said, in Germany and France chiefly that these
discoveries have been made. The English, a more sober people,
although of Scandinavian blood, do not set so high a value on
what is, in the literal sense, so low.

Pity that such pleasing speculations should be mere theoretical
bubbles, unable to retain their lightness and their vivid colors
in the rude atmosphere of the arctic regions, bursting at the
first breath of the north wind! How could sensible men, under
such a complicated system of religion and physics, account for
the uncouth pirates of the Baltic?

As useless is it to say that they brought it from the place of
their origin--Persia, as these theorists affirm. To a man
uninfluenced by a preconceived or pet system, it is evident at
first sight that no mythology of the East or of the South has
ever given rise to that of Scandinavia. There is not the
slightest resemblance between it and any other. It must have
originated with the Scandinavians themselves; and their long
_religious_ tales were only the bloody dreams of their fancy, when,
during their dreary winter evenings, they had nothing to do but
relate to each other what came uppermost in their gross minds.

Saxo Grammaticus, certainly a competent authority, and Snorry
Sturleson, the first to translate the Edda into Latin, who is
still considered one of the greatest antiquarians of the nation
--both of whom lived in the times we speak of, when this
religious system still flourished or was fresh in the minds of
all-- solved the question ages ago, and demonstrated beforehand
the falsehood of those future theories by stating with old-time
simplicity that the abominable stories of the Edda and the sagas
were founded on real facts in the previous history of those
nations, and were consequently never intended by the writers as
imaginative myths, representing, under a figurative and repulsive
exterior, some semblance of a spiritual and refined doctrine.

We must look to our own more enlightened times to find ingenious
interpreters of rude old songs first flung to the breeze nine
hundred years ago in the polar seas, and bellowed forth in
boisterous and drunken chorus during the ninth and tenth
centuries by ferocious, but to modern eyes romantic, pirates
reeking with the gore of their enemies.

Because it has pleased some modern pantheist to concoct systems
of religion in his cabinet, does it become at once clear that
the mythic explanation of those songs is the only one to be
admitted, and that the odious facts which those legends express
ought to be discarded altogether? At least we hope that, when
philosophers come to be the real rulers of the world, they will
not give to their subtle and abstract ideas of religion the same
pleasant turn and the same concrete expression in every-day life
that the worshippers of Odin, Thor, and Frigga, found it
agreeable to give when they were masters of the continent and
rulers of the seas.

No! The only true meaning of this Northern worship is conveyed
in the simple words of Adam of Bremen, when relating what still
existed in his own time. (_Descript. insularum Aquil._, lib. iv.)
He describes the solemn sacrifices of Upsala in Sweden thus:
"This is their sacrifice; of each and all animals they offer
nine heads of the male gender, by whose blood it is their custom
to appease the gods. The dead bodies of the victims are
suspended in a grove which surrounds the temple. The place is in
their eyes invested with such a sacred character that the trees
are believed to be divine on account of the blood and gore with
which they are besmeared. With the animals, dogs, horses, etc.,
they suspend likewise men; and a Christian of that country told
me that he had himself seen them with his own eyes mixed up
together in the grove. But the senseless rites which accompany
the sacrifice and the sprinkling of blood are so many, and of so
gross and immoral nature, that it is better not to speak of them."

We have here the naked truth, and no meaning whatever could be
attached to such ceremonies other than that of the rankest
idolatry. To complete the picture, it is proper to state that
Thor, Odin, and Frigga, were frightful idols, as represented in
the Upsala temple, and the small statues carried by the
Scandinavian sailors on their expeditions and set in the place
of honor on board their ships, were but diminutive copies of the
hideous originals. It is known, moreover, that Odin had existed
as a leader of some of their migrations, so that their idolatry
resolved itself into hero-worship.

Having spoken of their gods, we have only a word to add on their
belief in a future state, for every one is acquainted with their
brutal and shocking Walhalla. Yet, such as it was, admittance to
its halls could only be aspired to by the warriors and heroes,
the great among them; the common herd was not deemed worthy of
immortality. Thus aristocratic pride showed itself at the very
bottom of their religion.

Of their social state, their government, we know little. They
lived under a kind of rude monarchy, subject often to election,
when they chose the most savage and the bravest for their ruler.
But blood-relationship had little or nothing to do with their
system, so different from that of the Celts. The sons of a
chieftain could never form a sept, but at his death the eldest
replaced him; the younger brothers, deprived of their titles and
goods, were forced to separate and acquire a title to rank and
honor by piracy; and that right of primogeniture, which was the
primary cause of their sea invasions, stamped the feudal system
with one of its chief characteristics, a system which probably
originated with them. Some, however, entertain a contrary
opinion, and suppose that at the death of the father his
children shared his inheritance equally.

Of their moral habits we may best judge by their religion. All
we know of their history seems to prove that with them might was
right, and outlawry the only penalty of their laws.

A man guilty of murder was compelled to quit the country, unless
his superior daring and the number of his friends and followers
enabled him, by more atrocious and wholesale murders, still to
become a great chieftain and even aspire to supreme power.
Iceland was colonized by outlaws from Norway; and the frequent
changes of dynasty in pagan times prove that among them, as
among barbarous tribes generally, brute force was the chief
source of law and authority.

That outlawry was not esteemed a stain on the character is
sufficiently demonstrated by the fact that the mere accident of
birth made outlaws of all the children of chieftains with the
exception of the eldest born; the necessity for the younger sons
abandoning their home and native country, and roaming the ocean
in search of plunder, being exactly equivalent, according to
their opinion and customs, to criminal outlawry of whatever
character. This, at least, many authors assert without
hesitation.

Their domestic habits were fit consequences of such a state of
society. There could exist no real tie of kindred, no filial or
brotherly affection among men living under such a social system.
The gratification of brutal passions and the most utter
selfishness constituted the rule for all; and even the fear of
an inexorable judge after death could not restrain them during
life, as might have been the case among other pagan nations,
since the hope of reaching their Walhalla depended for its
fulfilment on murder or suicide.

With their system of warfare we are better acquainted than with
any thing else belonging to them, as the main burden of their
songs was the recital of their barbarous expeditions. It is,
indeed, difficult for a modern reader to wade through the whole
of their Edda poems, or even their long sagas, so full is their
literature of unimaginable cruelties. Yet a general view of it
is necessary in order to understand the horror spread throughout
Europe by their inhuman warfare.

As soon as the warm breeze of an early spring thaws the ice on
his rivers and lakes, the Scandinavian Viking unfurls his sail,
fills his rude boat with provisions, and trusts himself to the
mercy of the waves. Should he be alone, and not powerful enough
to have a fleet at his command, he looks out for a single boat
of his own nation--there being no other in those seas. Urged by
a mutual impulse, the two crews attack each other at sight; the
sea reddens with blood; the savage bravery is equal on both
sides; accident alone can decide the contest. One of the crews
conquers by the death of all its opponents; the plunder is
transferred to the victorious boat; the cup of strong drink
passes round, and victory is crowned by drunkenness.

But if the two chieftains have contended from morning till night
with equal valor and success, then, filled with admiration for
each other, they become friends, unite their forces, and,
falling on the first spot where they can land, they pillage,
slay, outrage women, and give full sway to their unbridled
passions. The more ferocious they are the braver they esteem
themselves. It is a positive fact, as we may gather from all
their poems and songs, that the Scandinavians alone, probably,
of all pagan nations, have had no measure of bravery and
military glory beyond the infliction of the most exquisite
torture and the most horrible of deaths.

Plunder, which was apparently the motive power of all their
expeditions, was to them less attractive than blood; blood,
therefore, is the chief burden of their poetry, if poetry it can
be called. It would seem as though they were destined by Nature
to shed human blood in torrents--the noblest occupation,
according to their ideas, in which a brave man could be engaged.

The figures of their rude literature consist for the most part
of monstrous warriors and gods, each possessed of many arms to
kill a greater number of enemies, or of giant stature to
overcome all obstacles, or of enchanted swords which shore steel
as easily as linen, and clave the body of an adversary as it
would the air.

Then, heated with blood, the Northman is also influenced with
lust, for he worships Frigga as well as Odin. But this is not
the place to give even an idea of manners too revolting to be
presented to the imagination of the reader.

Cantu's Universal History will furnish all the authorities from
which the details we have given and many others of the same kind
are derived.

We do not propose describing here the horrors of the
devastations committed by the Anglo-Saxons and Danes in England,
by the Normans in France, Spain, and Italy. All these nations,
even the first, were Scandinavians, and naturally fall under our
review. The story is already known to those who are acquainted
with the history of mediaeval Europe. The only thing which we do
not wish to omit is the invariable system of warfare adopted by
this people when acting on a large scale.

Arrived on the coast they had determined to ravage, they soon
found that in stormy weather they were in a more dangerous
position than at sea. Hence they looked for a deep bay, or,
better still, the mouth of a large river, and once on its placid
bosom they felt themselves masters of the whole country. The
terror of the people, the lack of organization for defence, so
characteristic of Celtic or purely Germano-Franco society, the
savage bravery and reckless impetuosity of the invaders
themselves, increased their rashness, and urged them to enter
fearlessly into the very heart of a country which lay prostrate
with fear before them. All the cities on the river-banks were
plundered as they passed, people of whatever age, sex, or
condition, were murdered; the churches especially were despoiled
of their riches, and the numerous and wealthy monasteries then
existing were given to the flames, after the monks and all the
inmates even to the schoolchildren, had been promiscuously
slaughtered, if they had not escaped by flight.

But, although all were slaughtered promiscuously, a special
ferocity was always displayed by the barbarous conqueror toward
the unarmed and defenceless ministers of religion. They took a
particular delight in their case in adding insult to cruelty;
and not without reason did the Church at that time consider as
martyrs the priests and monks who were slain by the pagan
Scandinavians. Their sanguinary and hideous idolatry showed its
hatred of truth and holiness in always manifesting a peculiar
atrocity when coming in contact with the Church of Christ and
her ministers. And, our chief object in speaking of the stand
made by the Irish against the pagan Danes is, to show how the
clan-system became in truth the avenger of God's altars and the
preserver of the sacred edifices and numerous temples with which,
as we have seen, the Island of Saints was so profusely studded,
from total annihilation.

Knowing that, when their march of destruction had taken them a
great distance from the mouth of the river, the inhabitants
might rise in sheer despair and cut them off on their return,
the Scandinavian pirates, to guard against such a contingency,
looked for some island or projecting rock, difficult of access,
which they fortified, and, placing there the plunder which
loaded their boats, they left a portion of their forces to guard
it, while the remainder continued their route of depredation. In
Ireland they found spots admirably adapted for their purpose in
the numerous loughs into which many of the rivers run.

This was their invariable system of warfare in the rivers of
England; in Germany along system Rhine; along the Seine, the
Loire, and the Garonne, in France, as well as on the Tagus and
Guadalquivir in Spain, where two at least of their large
expeditions penetrated. This continued for several centuries,
until at last they thought of occupying the country which they
had devastated and depopulated, and they began to form permanent
settlements in England, Flanders, France, and even Sicily and
Naples.

When that time had arrived, they showed that, hidden under their
ferocious exterior, lay a deep and systematic mind, capable of
great thoughts and profound designs. Already in their own rude
country they had organized commerce on an extensive scale, and
their harbors teemed with richly-laden ships, coming from far
distances or preparing to start on long voyages. They had become
a great colonizing race, and, after establishing their sway in
the Hebrides, the Orkneys, the Faroe Islands, Iceland, and
Greenland, they made England their own, first by the Jute and
Anglo-Saxon tribes, then by the arms of Denmark, which was at
that time so powerful that England actually became a colony of
Copenhagen; and finally they thought of extending their
conquests farther south to the Mediterranean Sea, where their
ships rode at anchor in the harbors of fair Sicily.

We know, from many chronicles written at the time, with what
care they surveyed all the countries they occupied, confiscating
the land after having destroyed or reduced its inhabitants to
slavery; dividing it among themselves and establishing their
barbarous laws and feudal customs wherever they went. Dudo of St.
Quentin, among other writers, describes at length in his rude
poem the army of surveyors intrusted by Rollo, the first Duke of
Normandy, with the care of drawing up a map of their conquests
in France, for the purpose of dividing the whole among his rough
followers and vassals.

Of this spirit of organization we intend to speak in the next
chapter, when we come to consider the Anglo-Norman invasion of
Ireland; but we are not to conclude that the Northmen became
straightway civilized, and that the spirit of refinement at once
shed its mild manners and gentle habits over their newly-
constructed towns and castles. For a long time they remained as
barbarous as ever, with only a system more perfect and a method
more scientific--if we may apply such expressions to the case--
in their plunderings and murderous expeditions.

Of Hastings, their last pagan sea-kong, Dudo, the great admirer
of Northmen and the sycophant of the first Norman dukes in
France, has left the following terrible character, on reading
which in full we scarcely know whether the poem was written in
reproach or praise. We translate from the Latin

According to Dudo, he was--

"A wretch accursed and fierce of heart,
Unmatched in dark iniquities;
A scowling pest of deadly hate,
He throve on savage cruelties.

Blood-thirsty, stained with every crime,
An artful, cunning, deadly foe,
Lawless, vaunting, rash, inconstant,
True well-spring of unending woe!"

Hastings never yielded to the new religion, which he always
hated and persecuted. But, even after their conversion to
Christianity, his countrymen for a long time retained their
inborn love of bloodshed and tyranny; they were in this respect,
as in many others, the very reverse of the Irish.

Of Rollo, the first Christian Duke of Normandy, Adhemar, a
contemporary writer, says:

"On becoming Christian, he caused many captives to be beheaded
in his presence, in honor of the gods whom he had worshipped.
And he also distributed a vast amount of money to the Christian
churches in honor of the true God in whose name he had received
baptism;" which would seem to imply that this transaction
occurred on the very day of his baptism.

We may now compare the success which attended the arms of these
terrible invaders throughout the rest of Europe with their
complete failure in Ireland. It will be seen that the deep
attachment of the Irish Celts for their religion, its altars,
shrines, and monuments, was the real cause of their final
victory. We shall behold a truly Christian people battling
against paganism in its most revolting and audacious form.

But, first, how stood the case in England?

"It is not a little extraordinary," says a sagacious writer in
the _Dublin Review_ (vol. xxxii., p. 203), "that the three
successive conquests of England by the Anglo-Saxons, Danes, and
Normans, were in fact conquests made by the same people, and, in
the last two instances, over those who were not only descended
from the same stock, but who had immigrated from the very same
localities. The Jutes, Angles, and Saxons, were for the most
part Danes or of Danish origin. Their invasion of England
commenced by plunder and ended by conquest. These were
overthrown by the Danes and Norwegians in precisely the same
manner.

"In the year 875, Roll or Rollo, having been expelled from
Norway by Harold Harfager, adopted the profession of a sea-kong,
and in the short space of sixteen years became Duke of Normandy
and son-in-law of the French king, after having previously
repudiated his wife. The sixth duke in succession from Rollo was
William, illegitimate son of Robert le Diable and Herleva, a
concubine. By the battle of Hastings, which William gained in
1066, over King Harold, who was slain in it, the former became
sovereign of England, and instead of the appellation of 'the
Bastard,' by which he had been hitherto known, he now obtained
the surname of 'the Conqueror.'

"Thus both the Saxon and Danish invaders were subdued by their
Norman brethren."

All the Scandinavian invasions of England were, therefore,
successful, each in turn giving way before a new one; and it is
not a little remarkable that the very year in which Brian Boru
dealt a death-blow to the Danes at Clontarf witnessed the
complete subjection of England by Canute.

The success of the Northmen in France is still more worthy of
attention. Their invasions began soon after the death of
Charlemagne. It is said that, before his demise, hearing of the
appearance of one of their fleets not far from the mouth of the
Rhine, he shed tears, and foretold the innumerable evils it
portended. He saw, no doubt, that the long and oft-repeated
efforts of his life to subdue and convert the northern Saxons
would fail to obtain for his successors the peace he had hoped
to win by his sword, and, knowing from the Saxons themselves the
relentless ferocity, audacity, and frightful cruelty, inoculated
in their Scandinavian blood, he could not but expect for his
empire the fierce attacks which were preparing in the arctic
seas. All his life had he been a conqueror, and under his sway
the Franks, whom he had ever led to victory, acquired a name
through Europe for military glory which, he dreaded, would no
longer remain untarnished. His forebodings, however, could not
be shared by any of those who surrounded him in his old age; his
eagle eye alone discerned the coming misfortunes.

Seven times had the great emperor subdued the Saxons. He had
crushed them effectually, since he could not otherwise prevent
them from disturbing his empire. The Franks, who formed his army,
were therefore the real conquerors of Western Europe. Starting
from the banks of the Rhine, they subjugated the north as far as
the Baltic Sea; they conquered Italy as far south as Beneventum,
by their victories over the Lombards; by the subjugation of
Aquitaine, they took possession of the whole of France; the only
check they had ever received was in the valley of Roncevaux,
whence a part of one of their armies was compelled to retreat,
without, however, losing Catalonia, which they had won.

Nevertheless, we see them a few years after powerless and
stricken with terror at the very name of the Northmen, as soon
as Hastings and Rollo appeared. Those sea-rovers established
themselves straightway in the very centre of the Frankish
dominion; for it was at the mouth of the Rhine, in the island of
Walcheren, that they formed their first camp. From Walcheren
they swept both banks of the Rhine, and, after enriching
themselves with the spoils of monasteries, cathedrals, and
palaces, they thought of other countries. Then began the long
series of spoliations which desolated the whole of France along
the Seine, the Loire, and the Garonne.

Opposition they scarcely encountered. Paris alone, of all the
great cities of France, sustained a long siege, and finally
bought them off by tribute. The military power of the nation was
annihilated all at once, and of all French history this period
is undoubtedly the most humiliating to a native of the soil.

And now let us see how the Irish met the same piratical
invasions.

We are already acquainted with the chief defect of their
political system, namely, its want of centralization. The Ard-
Righ was in fact but a nominal ruler, except in the small
province which acknowledged his chieftainship only. Throughout
the rest of Ireland the provincial kings were independent save
in name. Not only were they often reluctant to obey the Ard-Righ,
but they were not seldom at open war with him. Nor are we to
suppose that, at least in the case of a serious attack from
without, their patriotism overcame their private differences,
and made them combine together to show a common front against a
common foe. In a patriarchal state of government there is
scarcely any other form of patriotism than that of the
particular sept to which each individual belongs. All the ideas,
customs, prejudices, are opposed to united action.

Yet an invasion so formidable as that of the Scandinavian tribes
showed itself everywhere to be, would have required all the
energies and resources of the whole country united under one
powerful chief, particularly when it did not consist of one
single fearful irruption.

During two centuries large fleets of dingy, hide-bound barks
discharge on the shores of Erin their successive cargoes of
human fiends, bent on rapine and carnage, and altogether proof
against fear of even the most horrible death, since such death
was to them the entry to the eternal realms of their Walhalla.

But, at the period of which we speak, the terrible evil of a
want of centralization was greatly aggravated by a change
occurring in the line which held the supreme power in the island.

The vigorous rule of a long succession of princes belonging to
the northern Hy-Niall line gave way to the ascendency of the
southern branch of this great family; and the much more limited
patrimony and alliances of this new quasi-dynasty rendered its
personal power very inferior to that of the northern branch, and
consequently lessened the influence possessed by the ruling
family in past times. In Ireland the connections, more or less
numerous, by blood relationship with the great families, always
exercised a powerful influence over the body of the nation in
rendering it docile and amenable to the will of the Ard-Righ.

Mullingar, in West Meath, was the abode of the southern Hy-
Nialls, and Malachy of the Shannon, the first Ard-Righ of this
line, succeeded King Niall of Callan in 843. The Danes were
already in the country and had committed depredations. Their
first descent is mentioned by the Four Masters as taking place
at Rathlin on the coast of Antrim in the year 790.

But the country was soon aroused; and religious feelings, always
uppermost in the Irish heart, supplied the deficiencies of the
constitution of the state and the particularly unfavorable
circumstances of the period. The Danes, as usual, first attacked
the monasteries and churches, and this alone was enough to
kindle in the breasts of the people the spirit of resistance and
retaliation. Iona was laid waste in 797, and again in 801 and
805. "To save from the rapacity of the Danes," says Montalembert
in his Monks of the West, "a treasure which no pious liberality
could replace, the body of S. Columba was carried to Ireland.
And it is the unvarying tradition of Irish annals, that it was
deposited finally at Down, in an episcopal monastery, not far
from the eastern shore of the island, between the great
monastery of Bangor in the North, and Dublin the future capital
of Ireland, in the South."

Ireland was first assailed by the Danes on the north immediately
after they had gained possession of the Hebrides; but the coasts
of Germany, Belgium, and France had witnessed their attacks long
before. Religion was the first to suffer; and as the Island of
Saints was at the time of their descent covered with churches
and monasteries, the Scandinavian barbarians found in these a
rich harvest which induced them to return again and again. The
first expedition consisted of only a few boats and a small body
of men. Nevertheless, as their irruptions were unexpected, and
the people were unprepared for resistance, many holy edifices
suffered from these attacks, and a great number of priests and
monks were murdered.

We read that Armagh with its cathedral and monasteries was
plundered four times in one month, and in Bangor nine hundred
monks were slaughtered in a single day. The majority of the
inmates of those houses fled with their books and the relics of
their saints at the approach of the invaders, but, returning to
their desecrated homes after the departure of the pirates, gave
cause for those successive plunderings.

But the Irish did not always fly in dismay, as was the case in
England and France. A force was generally mustered in the
neighborhood to meet and repel the attack, and in numerous
instances the marauders were driven back with slaughter to their
ships.

For the clans rallied to the defence of the Church. Though the
chieftains and their clansmen might seem to have failed fully to
imbibe the spirit of religion, though in their insane feuds they
often turned a deaf ear to the remonstrances and reproaches of
the bishops and monks, nevertheless Christianity reigned supreme
in their inmost hearts. And when they beheld pagans landed on
their shores, to insult their faith and destroy the monuments of
their religion, to shed the blood of holy men, of consecrated
virgins, and of innocent children, they turned that bravery
which they had so often used against themselves and for the
satisfaction of worthless contentions into a new and a more
fitting channel--the defence of their altars and the punishment
of sacrilegious outrage.

The clan system was the very best adapted for this kind of
warfare, so long as no large fleets came, and the pirates were
too few in number and too sagacious in mind to think of
venturing far inland. When but a small number of boats arrived,
the invaders found in the neighborhood a clan ready to receive
them. The clansmen speedily assembled, and, falling on the
plundering crews, showed them how different were the free men of
a Celtic coast, who were inspired by a genuine love for their
faith, from the degenerate sons of the Gallo-Romans.

So the annals of the country tell us that the "foreigners" were
destroyed in 812 by the men of Umhall in Mayo; by Corrach, lord
of Killarney, in the same year; by the men of Ulidia and by
Carbry with the men of Hy-Kinsella in 827; by the clansmen of Hy-
Figeinte, near Limerick, in 834, and many more.

But the hydra had a thousand heads, and new expeditions were
continually arriving. In the words of Mr. Worsaae, a Danish
writer of this century:

"From time immemorial Ireland was celebrated in the Scandinavian
north, for its charming situation, its mild climate, and its
fertility and beauty. The Kongspell--mirror of Kings--which was
compiled in Norway about the year 1200, says that Ireland is
almost the best of the lands we are acquainted with although no
vines grow there. The Scandinavian Vikings and emigrants, who
often contented themselves with such poor countries as Greenland
and the islands in the north Atlantic, must, therefore, have
especially turned their attention to the 'Emerald Isle,'
particularly as it bordered closely upon their colonies in
England and Scotland. But to make conquests in Ireland, and to
acquire by the sword alone permanent settlements there, was no
easy task.... When we consider that neither the Romans nor the
Anglo-Saxons ever obtained a footing in that country, although
they had conquered England, the adjacent isle, and when we
further reflect upon the immense power exerted by the English in
later times in order to subdue the Celtic population of the
island, we cannot help being surprised at the very considerable
Scandinavian settlements which, as early as the ninth century,
were formed in that country."

These are the words of a Dane. We shall see what the "very
considerable Scandinavian settlements" amounted to; the
quotation is worthy of note, as presenting in a few words the
motives of those who at any time invaded Ireland, and the
stubborn resistance which they met.

The Irish were not dismayed by the constant arrivals of those
northern hordes. They met them one after another without
considering their complexity and connection. They only saw a
troop of fierce barbarians landed on their shores, chiefly
intent upon plundering and burning the churches and holy houses
which they had erected; they saw their island, hitherto
protected by the ocean from foreign attack, and resting in the
enjoyment of a constant round of Christian festivals and joyful
feasts, now desecrated by the presence and the fury of ferocious
pagans; they armed for the defence of all that is dear to man;
and though, perhaps, at first beaten and driven back, they
mustered in force at a distance to fall on the victors with a
swoop of noble birds who fly to the defence of their young.

This kind of contest continued for two hundred years, with the
exception of the periods of larger invasions, when a single clan
no longer sufficed to avenge the cause of God and humanity, and
the Ard-Righ was compelled to throw himself on the scene at the
head of the whole collective force of the nation in order to
oppose the vast fleets and large armies of the Danes.

The country suffered undoubtedly; the cattle were slain; the
fields devastated; the churches and houses burned; the poets
silenced or woke their song only to notes of woe; the harpers
taught the national instrument the music of sadness; the
numerous schools were scattered, though never destroyed; as
centuries later, under the Saxon, the people took their books or
writing materials to their miserable cottages or hid them in the
mountain fastnesses, and thus, for the first time in their
history, the hedge school succeeded those of the large
monasteries. So the nation continued to live on, the energetic
fire which burned in the hearts of the people could not be
quenched. They rose and rose again, and often took a noble
revenge, never disheartened by the most utter disaster.

On three different occasions this bloody strife assumed a yet
more serious and dangerous aspect. It was not a few boats only
which came to the shores of the devoted island; but the main
power of Scandinavia seemed to combine in order to crush all
opposition at a single blow.

When the knowledge of the richness, fertility, and beauty of the
island had fully spread throughout Denmark and Norway, a large
fleet gathered in the harbors of the Baltic and put to sea. The
famous Turgesius or Turgeis--Thorgyl in the Norse--was the
leader. The Edda and Sagas of Norway and Denmark have been
examined with a view to elucidate this passage in Irish history,
but thus far fruitlessly. It is known, however, that many Sagas
have been lost which might have contained an account of it. The
Irish annals are too unanimous on the subject to leave any
possibility of doubt with regard to it; and, whatever may be the
opinion of learned men on the early events in the history of
Erin, the story of the eighth, ninth, and tenth centuries rests
entirely on historical ground, as surely as if the facts had
happened a few hundred years ago.

Turgesius landed with his fleet on the northeast coast of the
island, and straightway the scattered bands of Scandinavians
already in the country acknowledged his leadership and flocked
to his standard. McGeoghegan says that "he assumed in his own
hands the sovereignty of all the foreigners that were then in
Ireland."

From the north he marched southward; and, passing Armagh on his
route, attacked and took it, and plundered its shrines,
monasteries, and schools. There were then within its walls seven
thousand students, according to an ancient roll which Keating
says has been discovered at Oxford. These were slaughtered or
dispersed, and the same fate attended the nine hundred monks
residing in its monasteries.

Foraanan, the primate, fled; and the pagan sea-kong, entering
the cathedral, seated himself on the primatial throne, and had
himself proclaimed archbishop.--(O'Curry.) He had shortly before
devastated Clonmacnoise and made his wife supreme head of that
great ecclesiastical centre, celebrated for its many convents of
holy women. The tendency to add insult to outrage, when the
object of the outrage is the religion of Christ, is old in the
blood of the northern barbarians; and Turgesius was merely
setting the example, in his own rude and honest fashion, to the
more polished but no less ridiculous assumption of
ecclesiastical authority, which was to be witnessed in England,
on the part of Henry VIII. and Elizabeth.

The power of the invader was so superior to whatever forces the
neighboring Irish clans could muster, that no opposition was
even attempted at first by the indignant witnesses of those
sacrileges. It is even said that at the very time when the
Northmen were pillaging and burning in the northeast of the
island, the men of Munster were similarly employed in Bregia;
and Conor, the reigning monarch of Ireland, instead of defending
the invaded territories, was himself hard at work plundering
Leinster to the banks of the river Liffey--(Haverty.) But,
doubtless, none of those deluded Irish princes had yet heard of
the pagan devastations and insults to their religion, and thus
it was easy for the great sea-kong to strengthen and extend his
power. For the attainment of his object he employed two powerful
agents which would have effectually crushed Ireland forever, if
the springs of vitality in the nation had not been more than
usually expansive and strong.

The political ability of the Danes began to show itself in
Ireland, as it did about the same period (830) in England, and
later on in France. Turgesius saw that, in order to subdue the
nation, it was necessary to establish military stations in the
interior and fortify cities on the coast, where he could receive
reinforcements from Scandinavia. These plans he was prompt to
put into practice.

His military stations would have been too easily destroyed by
the bravery of the Irish, strengthened by the elasticity of
their clan-system, if they were, planted on land. He, therefore,
set them in the interior lakes which are so numerous in the
island, where his navy could repel all the attacks of the
natives, unused as they were to naval conflicts. He stationed a
part of his fleet on Lough Lee in the upper Shannon, another in
Lough Neagh, south of Antrim, a third in Lough Lughmagh or
Dundalk bay. These various military positions were strongholds
which secured the supremacy of the Scandinavians in the north of
the island for a long time. In the south, Turgesius relied on
the various cities which his troops were successively to build
or enlarge, namely, Dublin, Limerick, Galway, Cork, Waterford,
and Wexford. This first Scandinavian ruler could begin that
policy only by establishing his countrymen in Dublin, which they
seized in 836.

Up to that time the Irish had scarcely any city worthy of the
name. A patriarchal people, they followed the mode of life of
the old Eastern patriarchs, who abhorred dwelling in large towns.
Until the invasion of the Danes, the island was covered with
farm-houses placed at some distance from each other. Here and
there large _duns_ or _raths_, as they were called, formed the
dwellings of their chieftains, and became places of refuge for
the clansmen in time of danger. Churches and monasteries arose
in great numbers from the time of St. Patrick, which were first
built in the woods, but soon grew into centres of population,
corresponding in many respects to the idea of towns as generally
understood.

The Northmen brought with them into Ireland the ideas of cities,
commerce, and municipal life, hitherto unknown. The introduction
of these supposed a total change necessary in the customs of the
natives, and stringent regulations to which the people could not
but be radically opposed. And strange was their manner of
introduction by these northern hordes. Keating tells us how
Turgesius understood them. They were far worse than the
imaginary laws of the Athenians as recorded in the "Birds" of
Aristophanes. No more stringent rules could be devised, whether
for municipal, rural, or social regulations; and, as the
Northmen are known to have been of a systematic mind, no
stronger proof of this fact could be given.

Keating deplores in the following terms the fierce tyranny of
the Danish sea-kong:

"The result of the heavy oppression of this thraldom of the
Gaels under the foreigner was, that great weariness thereof came
upon the men of Ireland, and the few of the clergy that survived
had fled for safety to the forests and wildernesses, where they
lived in misery, but passed their time piously and devoutly, and
now the same clergy prayed fervently to God to deliver them from
that tyranny of Turgesius, and, moreover, they fasted against
that tyrant, and they commanded every layman among the faithful,
that still remained obedient to their voice, to fast against him
likewise. And God then heard their supplications in as far as
the delivering of Turgesius into the hands of the Gaels."

Thus in the ninth century the subsequent events of the sixteenth
and seventeenth were foreshadowed. The judicious editor of
Keating, however, justly remarks, that this description, taken
mainly from Cambrensis, is not supported in its entirety by the
contemporaneous annals of the island; that the power of the
Danes never was as universal and oppressive as is here supposed;
and that though each of the facts mentioned may have actually
taken place in some part of the country, at some period of the
Danish invasion, yet the whole, as representing the actual state
of the entire island at the time, is exaggerated and of too
sweeping a nature.

It is clear, nevertheless, that the domination of the Northmen
could not have been completely established in Ireland, together
with their notions of superiority of race, trade on a large
scale, and a consequent agglomeration of men in large cities,
without the total destruction of the existing social state of
the Irish, and consequently something of the frightful tyranny
just described.

But the people were too brave, too buoyant, and too ardent in
their nature, to bear so readily a yoke so heavy. They were too
much attached to their religion, not to sacrifice their lives,
if necessary, in order to put an end to the sacrilegious
usurpations of a pagan king, profaning, by his audacious
assumptions, the noblest, highest, purest, and most sacred
dignities of holy Church. A man, stained with the blood of so
many prelates and priests, seated on the primatial throne of the
country in sheer derision of their most profound feelings; his
pagan wife ruling over the city which the virgins of Bridget,
the spouses of Christ, had honored and sanctified so long; their
religion insulted by those who tried to destroy it--how could
such a state of things be endured by the whole race, not yet
reduced to the condition to which so many centuries of
oppression subsequently brought it down!

Hence Keating could write directly after the passage just quoted:
"When the nobles of Ireland saw that Turgesius had brought
confusion upon their country, and that he was assuming supreme
authority over themselves, and reducing them to thraldom and
vassalage, they became inspired with a fortitude of mind, and a
loftiness of spirit, and a hardihood and firmness of purpose,
that urged them to work in right earnest, and to toil zealously
in battle against him and his murdering hordes."

And hereupon the faithful historian gives a long list of
engagements in which the Irish were successful, ending with the
victory of Malachi at Glas Linni, where we know from the Four
Masters that Turgesius himself was taken prisoner and afterward
drowned in Lough Uair or Owell in West Meath, by order of the
Irish king.

This prince, then monarch of the whole island, atoned for the
apathy and the want of patriotism of his predecessors, Conor and
the Nialls. He was in truth a saviour of his country, and the
death of the oppressor was the signal for a general onslaught
upon the "foreigners" in every part of the island.

"The people rose simultaneously, and either massacred them in
their towns, or defeated them in the fields, so that, with the
exception of a few strongholds, like Dublin, the whole of
Ireland was free from the Northmen. Wherever they could escape,
they took refuge in their ships, but only to return in more
numerous swarms than before." - (M. Haverty.)

It is evident that their deep sense of religion was the chief
source of the energy which the Irish then displayed. They had
not yet been driven into a fierce resistance by being forcibly
deprived of their lands; although the Danes, when they carried
their vexatious tyranny into all the details of private life -
not allowing lords and ladies of the Irish race to wear rich
dresses and appear in a manner befitting their rank - when they
went so far as to refuse a bowl of milk to an infant, that a
rude soldier might quench his thirst with it - could have
scarcely permitted the apparently conquered people to enjoy all
the advantages accruing to the owner from the possession of land.
Yet in none of the chronicles of the time which we have seen is
any mention made of open confiscation, and of the survey and
division of the territory among the greedy followers of the sea-
kong. We do not yet witness what happened shortly after in
Normandy under Rollo, and what was to happen four hundred years
later in Ireland. The Scandinavians had not yet attained that
degree of civilization which makes men attach a paramount
importance to the possession of a fixed part of any territory,
and call in surveys, title-deeds, charters, and all the written
documents necessitated by a captious and over-scrupulous
legislation. The Irish, consequently, did not perceive that
their broad acres were passing into the control of a foreign
race, and were being taken piecemeal from them, thus bringing
them gradually down to the condition of mere serfs and
dependants.

What they did see, beyond the possibility of mistake or
deception, was their religion outraged, their spiritual rulers,
not merely no longer at liberty to practise the duties of their
sacred ministry, but hunted down and slaughtered or driven to
the mountains and the woods. They saw that pagans were actually
ruling their holy isle, and changing a paradise of sanctity into
a pandemonium of brutal passion, presided over by a
superstitious and cruel idolatry. For surely, although the Irish
chronicles fail to speak of it, the minstrels and historians
being too full of their own misery to think of looking at the
pagan rites of their enemies - those enemies worshipped Thor and
Odin and Frigga, and as surely did they detest the Church which
they were on a fair way to destroy utterly. This it was which
gave the Irish the courage of despair. For this cause chiefly
did the whole island fly to arms, fall on their foes and bring
down on their heads a fearful retribution. This it was,
doubtless, which breathed into the new monarch the energy which
he displayed on the field of Glas Linni; and when he ordered the
barbarian, now a prisoner in his hands, to be drowned, it was
principally as a sign that he detested in him the blasphemer and
the persecutor of God's church.

Thus did the first national misfortunes of this Celtic people
become the means of enkindling in their hearts a greater love
for their religion, and a greater zeal for its preservation in
their midst.

Ireland was again free; and, although we have no details
concerning the short period of prosperity which followed the
overthrow of the tyranny we have touched upon, we have small
doubt that the first object of the care of those who, under God,
had worked their own deliverance, was to repair the ruins of the
desecrated sanctuaries and restore to religion the honor of
which it had been stripped.

The Danes themselves came to see that they had acted rashly in
striving to deprive the Irish of a religion which was so dear to
their hearts; they resolved on a change of policy, as they were
still bent on taking possession of the island, which Mr. Worsaae
has told us they considered the best country in existence.

They resolved, therefore, to act with more prudence, and to make
use of trade and the material blessings which it confers, in
order to entice the Irish to their destruction, by allowing the
Northmen to carry on business transactions with them and so
gradually to dwell among them again. Father Keating tells the
story in his quaint and graphic style:

"The plan adopted by them on this occasion was to equip three
captains, sprung from the noblest blood of Norway, and to send
them with a fleet to Ireland, for the object of obtaining some
station for purpose of trade. And with them they accordingly
embarked many tempting wares, and many valuable jewels -- with
the design of presenting them to the men of Ireland, in the hope
of thus securing their friendship; for they believed that they
might thus succeed in surreptitiously fixing a grasp upon the
Irish soil, and might be enabled to oppress the Irish people
again . . . . The three captains, therefore, coming from the
ports of Norway, landed in Ireland with their followers, as if
for the purpose of demanding peace, and under the pretext of
establishing a trade; and there, with the consent of the Irish,
who were given to peace, they took possession of some sea-board
places, and built three cities thereon, to wit: Waterford,
Dublin, and Limerick."

We see, then, the Scandinavians abandoning their first project
of conquering the North to fall on the South and confining
themselves to a small number of fortified sea-ports.

The first result of this policy was a firmer hold than ever on
Dublin, once already occupied by them in 836. "Amlaf, or Olaf,
or Olaus, came from Norway to Ireland in 851, so that all the
foreign tribes in the island submitted to him, and they
extracted rent from the Gaels." - (Four Masters.)

From that time to the twelfth century Dublin became the chief
stronghold of the Scandinavians, and no fewer than thirty-five
Ostmen, or Danish kings, governed it. They made it an important
emporium, and such it continued even after the Scandinavian
invasion had ceased. McFirbis says that in his time - 1650 -
most of the merchants of Dublin were the descendants of the
Norwegian Irish king, Olaf Kwaran; and, to give a stronger
impulse to commerce, they were the first to coin money in the
country.

The new Scandinavian policy carried out by Amlaf, who tried to
establish in Dublin the seat of a kingdom which was to extend
over the whole island, resulted therefore only in the
establishment of five or six petty principalities, wherein the
Northmen, for some time masters, were gradually reduced to a
secondary position, and finally confined themselves to the
operations of commerce.

Since the attempt of Turgesius to subvert the religion of the
country, they never showed the slightest inclination to repeat
it; hence they were left in quiet possession of the places which
they occupied on the sea-board, and gradually came to embrace
Christianity themselves.

Little is known of the circumstances which attended this change
of religion on their part; and it is certain that it did not
take place till late in the tenth century. Some pretend that
Christianity was brought to them from their own country, where
it had already been planted by several missionaries and bishops.
But it is known that St. Ancharius, the first apostle of Denmark,
could not establish himself permanently in that country, and
had to direct a few missionaries from Hamburgh, where he fixed
his see. It is known, moreover, that Denmark was only truly
converted by Canute in the eleventh century, after his conquest
of England. As to Norway, the first attempt at its conversion by
King Haquin, who had become a Christian at the court of
Athelstan in England, was a failure; and although his successor,
Harold, appeared to succeed better for a time, paganism was
again reestablished, and flourished as late as 995. It was, in
fact, Olaf the Holy who, coming from England, in 1017, with the
priests Sigefried, Budolf, and Bernard, succeeded in introducing
Christianity permanently into Norway, and he made more use of
the sword than of the word in his mission.

With regard to the conversion of the Danes in Ireland, it seems
that, after all, it was the ever-present spectacle of the
workings of Christianity among the Irish which gradually opened
their eyes and ears. They came to love the country and the
people when they knew them thoroughly; they respected them for
their bravery, which they had proved a thousand times; they felt
attracted toward them on account of their geniality of
temperament and their warm social feelings; even their defects
of character and their impulsive nature were pleasing to them.
They soon sought their company and relationship; they began to
intermarry with them; and from this there was but a step to
embracing their religion.

The Danes of Waterford, Cork, and Limerick were, however, the
last to abandon paganism, and they seem not to have done so
until after Clontarf.

It is very remarkable that, during all those conflicts of the
Irish with the Danes, when the Northmen strewed the island with
dead and ruins; when they seemed to be planting their domination
in the Orkneys, the Hebrides, and even the Isle of Man, on a
firm footing; when the seas around England and Ireland swarmed
with pirates, and new expeditions started almost every spring
from the numerous harbors of the Baltic--the Irish colony of Dal
Riada in Scotland, which was literally surrounded by the
invaders, succeeded in wresting North Britain from the Picts,
drove them into the Lowlands, and so completely rooted them out,
that history never more speaks of them, so that to this day the
historical problem stands unsolved-- What became of the Picts?--
various as are the explanations given of their disappearance.
And, what is more remarkable still, is, that the Dal Riada
colony received constant help from their brothers in Erin, and
the first of the dynasty of Scottish kings, in the person of
Kenneth McAlpine, was actually set on the throne of Scotland by
the arms of the Irish warriors, who, not satisfied apparently
with their constant conflicts with the Danes on their own soil,
passed over the Eastern Sea to the neighboring coast of Great
Britain.

During the last forty years of the tenth century the Danes lived
in Ireland as though they belonged to the soil. If they waged
war against some provincial king, they became the allies of
others. When clan fought clan, Danes were often found on both
sides, or if on one only, they soon joined the other. They had
been brought to embrace the manners of the natives, and to adopt
many of their customs and habits. Yet there always remained a
lurking distrust, more or less marked, between the two races;
and it was clear that Ireland could never be said to have
escaped the danger of subjugation until the Scandinavian element
should be rendered powerless.

This antipathy on both sides existed very early even in Church
affairs, the Christian natives being looked upon with a jealous
eye by the Christian Danes; so that, toward the middle of the
tenth century, the Danes of Dublin having succeeded in obtaining
a bishop of their own nation, they sent him to England to be
consecrated by Lanfranc, the Archbishop of Canterbury, and for a
long time the see of Dublin was placed under the jurisdiction of
Lanfranc's successors.

This grew into a serious difficulty for Ireland, as the capital
of Leinster began to be looked upon as depending, at least
spiritually, on England; and later on, at the time of the
invasion under Strongbow, the establishment of the English Pale
was considerably facilitated by such an arrangement, to which
Rome had consented only for the spiritual advantage of her
Scandinavian children in Ireland.

And the Irish were right in distrusting every thing foreign on
the soil, for, even after becoming Christians, the Danes could
not resist the temptation of making a last effort for the
subjugation of the country.

Hence arose their last general effort, which resulted in their
final overthrow at Clontarf. It does not enter into our purpose
to give the story of that great event, known in all its details
to the student of Irish history. It is not for us to trace the
various steps by which Brian Boru mounted to supreme power, and
superseded Malachi, to relate the many partial victories he had
already gained over the Northmen, nor to allude to his splendid
administration of the government, and the happiness of the Irish
under his sway.

But it is our duty to point out the persevering attempts of the
Scandinavian race, not only to keep its footing on Irish soil,
but to try anew to conquer what it had so often failed to
conquer. For, in describing their preparations for this last
attempt on a great scale, we but add another proof of that Irish
steadfastness which we have already had so many occasions to
admire.

In the chronicle of Adhemar, quoted by Lanigan from Labbe (Nova
Bibl., MSS., Tom. 2, p.177), it is said that "the Northmen came
at that time to Ireland, with an immense fleet, conveying even
their wives and children, with a view of extirpating the Irish
and occupying in their stead that very wealthy country in which
there were twelve cities, with extensive bishopries and a king."

Labbe thinks the Chronicle was written before the year 1031, so
that in his opinion the writer was a contemporary of the facts
he relates.

The Irish Annals state, on their side, that "the foreigners were
gathered from all the west of Europe, envoys having been
despatched into Norway, the Orkneys, the Baltic islands, so that
a great number of Vikings came from all parts of Scandinavia,
with their families, for the purpose of a permanent settlement."

Similar efforts were made about the same time by the Danes for
the lasting conquest of England, which succeeded, Sweyn having
been proclaimed king in 1013, and Canute the Great becoming its
undisputed ruler in 1017.

It is well known how the attempt failed in Erin, an army of
twenty-one thousand freebooters being completely defeated near
Dublin by Brian and his sons.

From that time the existence of the Scandinavian race on the
Irish soil was a precarious one; they were merely permitted to
occupy the sea-ports for the purpose of trade, and soon Irish
chieftains replaced their kings in Dublin, Limerick, Waterford,
and Cork.

The reader may be curious to learn, in conclusion, what signs
the Danes left of their long sojourn on the island. If we listen
to mere popular rumor, the country is still full of the ruins of
buildings occupied by them. The common people, in pointing out
to strangers the remains of edifices, fortifications, raths,
duns, even round-towers and churches, either more ancient or
more recent than the period of the Norse invasion, ascribe them
to the Danes. It is clear that two hundred years of devastations,
burnings, and horrors, have left a deep impression on the mind
of the Irish; and, as they cannot suppose that such powerful
enemies could have remained so long in their midst without
leaving wonderful traces of their passage, they often attribute
to them the construction of the very edifices which they
destroyed. The general accuracy of their traditions seems here
at fault. For there is no nation on earth so exact as the Irish
in keeping the true remembrance of facts of their past history.
Not long ago all Irish peasants were perfectly acquainted with
the whole history of their neighborhood; they could tell what
clans had succeeded each other, the exact spots where such a
party had been overthrown and such another victorious; every
village had its sure traditions printed on the minds of its
inhabitants, and, by consulting the annals of the nation, the
coincidence was often remarkable. How is it, therefore, that
they were so universally at fault with respect to the Danes?

A partial explanation has been given which is in itself a proof
of the tenacity of Irish memory. It is known that the Tuatha de
Danaan were not only skilful in medicine, in the working of
metals and in magic, but many buildings are generally attributed
to them by the best antiquarians; among others, the great mound
of New Grange, on the banks of the Boyne, which is still in
perfect preservation, although opened and pillaged by the Danes--
a work reminding the beholder of some Egyptian monument. The
coincidence of the name of the Tuatha de Danaan with that of the
Danes may have induced many of the illiterate Irish to adopt the
universal error into which they fell long ago, of attributing
most of the ancient monuments of their country to the Danes.

The fact is, that the ruins of a few unimportant castles and
churches are all the landmarks that remain of the Danish
domination in Ireland; and even these must have been the product
of the latter part of it.

But a more curious proof of the extirpation of every thing
Danish in the island is afforded by Mr. Worsaae, whose object in
writing his account of the Danes and Norwegians in England,
Scotland, and Ireland, was to glorify his own country, Denmark.

He made a special study of the names of places and things, which
can be traced to the Scandinavians respectively in the three
great divisions of the British Isles; and certainly the language
of a conquering people always shows itself in many words of the
conquered country, where the subjugation has been of sufficient
duration.

In England, chiefly in the northern half of the kingdom, a very
great number of Danish names appear and are still preserved in
the geography of the country. In Mr. Worsaae's book there is a
tabular view of 1,373 Danish and Norwegian names of places in
England, and also a list of 100 Danish words, selected from the
vulgar tongue, still in use among the people who dwell north of
Watling Street.

In Scotland, likewise--in the Highlands and even in the Lowlands-
-a considerable number of names, or at least of terminations,
are still to be met in the geography of the country.

Three or four names of places around Dublin, and the
terminations of the names of the cities of Waterford, Wexford,
Longford, and a few others, are all that Mr. Worsaae could find
in Ireland. So that the language of the Irish, not to speak of
their government and laws, remained proof against the long and
persevering efforts made by a great and warlike Northern race to
invade the country, and substitute its social life for that of
the natives.

As a whole, the Scandinavian irruptions were a complete failure.
They did not succeed in impressing their own nationality or
individuality on any thing in the island, as they did in England,
Holland, and the north of France. The few drops of blood which
they left in the country have been long ago absorbed in the
healthful current of the pure Celtic stream; even the language
of the people was not affected by them.

As for the social character of the nation, it was not touched by
this fearful aggression. The customs of Scandinavia with respect
to government, society, domestic affairs, could not influence
the Irish; they refused to admit the systematic thraldom which
the sternness of the Northmen would engraft upon their character,
and preserved their free manners in spite of all adverse
attempts. In this country, Turgesius, Amlaf, Sitrick, and their
compeers, failed as signally as other Scandinavian chieftains
succeeded in Britain and Normandy.

The municipal system, which has won so much praise, was
scornfully abandoned by the Irish to the Danes of the sea port
towns, and they continued the agricultural life adapted to their
tastes. Towns and cities were not built in the interior till
much later by the English.

The clan territories continued to be governed as before. The
"Book of Rights" extended its enactments even to the Danish Pale;
and the Danes tried to convert it to their own advantage by
introducing into it false chapters. How the poem of the Gaels of
Ath Cliath first found a place in the "Book of Rights" is still
unknown to the best Irish antiquarians. John O'Donovan concludes
from a verse in it that it was composed in the tenth century,
after the conversion of the Danes of Dublin to Christianity. It
proves certainly that the Scandinavians in Ireland, like the
English of the Pale later on, had become attached to Erin and
Erin's customs--had, in fact, become. Irishmen, to all intents
and purposes. Not succeeding in making Northmen of the Irish,
they succumbed to the gentle influence of Irish manners and
religion.

As for the commercial spirit, the Irish could not be caught by
it, even when confronted by the spectacle of the wealth it
conferred on the "foreigners." It is stated openly in the annals
of the race that their greatest kings, both Malachi and Brian
Boru, did not utterly expel the Danes from the country, in order
that they might profit by the Scandinavian traders, and receive
through them the wines, silks, and other commodities, which the
latter imported from the continent of Europe.

The same is true of the sea-faring life. The Irish could never
be induced to adopt it as a profession, whatever may have been
their fondness for short voyages in their curraghs.

The only baneful effects which the Norse invasion exercised on
the Irish were: 1. The interruption of studies on the large,
even universal, scale on which, they had previously been
conducted; 2. The breaking up of the former constitution of the
monarchy, by compelling the several clans which were attacked by
the "foreigners" to act independently of the Ard-Righ, so that
from that time irresponsible power was divided among a much
greater number of chieftains.

But these unfortunate effects of the Norse irruptions affected
in no wise the Irish character, language, or institutions, which,
in fact, finally triumphed over the character, language, and
institutions of the pirates established among them for upward of
two centuries.

CHAPTER VI.

THE IRISH FREE CLANS AND ANGLO-NORMAN FEUDALISM.

The Danes were subdued, and the Irish at liberty to go on
weaving the threads of their history--though, in consequence of
the local wars, they had lost the concentrating power of the Ard-
Righ--when treachery in their own ranks opened up the way for a
far more serious attack from another branch of the great
Scandinavian family--the Anglo-Norman.

The manners of the people had been left unchanged; the clan
system had not been altered in the least; it had stood the test
of previous revolutions; now it was to be confronted by a new
system which had just conquered Europe, and spread itself round
about the apparently doomed island. Of all places it had taken
deep root in England, where it was destined to survive its
destruction elsewhere in the convulsions of our modern history.
That system, then in full vigor, was feudalism.

In order rightly to understand and form a correct judgment on
the question, and its mighty issues, we must state briefly what
the chief characteristics of feudalism were in those countries
where it flourished.

The feudal system proceeded on the principle that landed
property was all derived from the king, as the captain of a
conquering army; that it had been distributed by him among his
followers on certain conditions, and that it was liable to be
forfeited if those conditions were not fulfilled.

The feudal system, moreover, politically considered, supposed
the principle that all civil and political rights were derived
from the possession of land; that those who possessed no land
could possess neither civil nor political rights--were, in fact,
not men, but villeins.

Consequently, it reduced nations to a small number of landowners,
enjoying all the privileges of citizenship; the masses,
deprived of all rights, having no share in the government, no
opportunity of rising in the social scale, were forever
condemned to villeinage or serfdom.

Feudalism, in our opinion, came first from Scandinavia. The
majority of writers derive it from Germany. The question of its
origin is too extensive to be included within our present limits,
and indeed is unnecessary, as we deal principally with the fact
and not with its history.

When the sea-rover had conquered the boat of an enemy, or
destroyed a village, he distributed the spoils among his crew.
Every thing was handed over to his followers in the form of a
gift, and in return these latter were bound to serve him with
the greatest ardor and devotedness. In course of time the idea
of settling down on some territory which they had devastated and
depopulated, presented itself to the minds of the rovers. The
sea-kong did by the land what he had been accustomed to do by
the plunder: he parcelled it out among his faithful followers--
fideles--giving to each his share of the territory. This was
called feoh by the Anglo-Saxons, who were the first to carry out
the system on British soil, as Dr. Lingard shows. Thus the word
fief was coined, which in due time took its place in all the
languages of Europe.

The giver was considered the absolute owner of whatever he gave,
as is the commander of a vessel at sea. It was a beneficium
conferred by him, to which certain indispensable conditions were
attached. Military duty was the first, but not the only one of
these. Writers on feudalism mention a great number, the
nonfulfilment of which incurred what was called forfeiture.

In countries where the pirates succeeded in establishing
themselves, all the native population was either destroyed by
them, as Dudo tells us was the case in Normandy, or, as more
frequently happened, the sword being unable to carry destruction
so far, the inhabitants who survived were reduced to serfdom,
and compelled to till the soil for the conquerors; they were
thenceforth called villeins or ascripti glebae. It is clear that
such only as possessed land could claim civil and political
rights in the new states thus called into existence. Hence the
owning of land under feudal tenure was the great and only
essential characteristic of mediaeval feudalism.

This system, which was first introduced into Britain by the
Anglo-Saxons, was brought to a fixed and permanent state by the
Normans--followers of William the Conqueror; and, when the time
came for treachery to summon the Norman knights to Irish soil,
the devoted island found herself face to face with an iron
system which at that period crushed and weighed down all Europe.

The Normans had now been settled in England for a hundred years;
all the castles in the country were occupied by Norman lords;
all bishopries filled by Norman bishops; all monasteries ruled
by Norman abbots. At the head of the state stood the king, at
that time Henry II. Here, more than in any other country in
Europe, was the king the key-stone to the feudal masonry. Not an
inch of ground in England was owned save under his authority, as
enjoying the supremum dominium. All the land had been granted by
his predecessors as fiefs, with the right of reversion to the
crown by forfeiture in case of the violation of feudal
obligations. Here was no allodial property, no censitive
hereditary domain, as in the rest of, otherwise, feudal Europe.
All English lawyers were unanimous in the doctrine that the king
alone was the true master of the territory; that tenure under
him carried with it all the conditions of feudal tenure, and
that any deed or grant proceeding from his authority ought to be
so understood.

The south-western portion of Wales was occupied by Norman lords,
Flemings for the most part. Two of these, Robert Fitzstephens
and Maurice Fitzgerald, sailed to the aid of the Irish King of
Leinster. They were the first to land, arriving a full year
before Strongbow.

Strongbow came at last. The conditions agreed on beforehand
between himself and the Leinster king were fulfilled. He was
married to the daughter of Dermod McMurrough, chief of Leinster,
acknowledged Righ Dahma, that is, successor to the crown, while
the Irish, accustomed for ages to admire valor and bow
submissively to the law of conquest, admitted the claim. The
English adventurer they looked upon as one of themselves by
marriage. Election in such a case was unnecessary, or rather,
understood, and Strongbow took the place which was his in their
eyes by right of his wife, of head under McMurrough of all the
clans of Leinster.

When, a little later, came Henry II. to be acknowledged by
Strongbow as his suzerain, and to receive the homage of the
presumptive heir of Leinster, submission to him was, in the
eyes of the Irish, merely a consequence of their own clan system.
They understood the homage rendered to him in a very different
sense from that attached to it by feudal nations; and had they
had an inkling of the real intentions of the new comers, not one
of them would have consented to live under and bow the neck to
such a yoke.

In fact, on the small territory where those great events were
enacted, two worlds, utterly different from each other, stood
face to face. Cambrensis tells us that the English were struck
with wonder at what they saw. The imperialism of Rome had never
touched Ireland. The Danes, opposed so strenuously from the
outset, and finally overcome, had never been able to introduce
there their restrictive measures of oppression. The English
found the natives in exactly the same state as that in which
Julius Caesar found the Gauls twelve hundred years before,
except as to religion--the race governed patriarchally by
chieftains allied to their subordinates by blood relationship;
no unity in the government, no common flag, no private and
hereditary property, nothing to bind the tribes together except
religion. It was not a nation properly, but rather an
agglomeration of small nations often at war each with each, yet
all strongly attached to Erin-- a mere name, including,
nevertherless, the dear idea of country --the chieftains
elective, bold, enterprising; the subordinates free, attached to
the chief as to a common father, throwing themselves with ardor
into all his quarrels, ready to die for him at any moment.
Around chief and clansmen circled a large number of brehons,
shanachies, poets, bards, and harpers--poetry, music, and war
strangely blended together. The religion of Christ spread over
all a halo of purity and holiness; large monasteries filled with
pious monks, and convents of devout and pure virgins abounded;
bishops and priests in the churches chanting psalms, each
accompanying himself with a many-stringed harp, gave forth sweet
harmony, unheard at the time in any other part of the world.

A most important feature to be considered is their understanding
of property. Hereditary right of land with respect to
individuals, and the transmission of property of any kind by
right of primogeniture, were unknown among them. If a specified
amount of territory was assigned to the chieftain, a smaller
portion to the bishop, the shanachy, head poet, and other civil
officers each in his degree, such property was attached to the
office and not to the man who filled it, but passed to his
elected successor and not to his own children; while the great
bulk of the territory belonged to the clan in common. No one
possessed the right to alienate a single rood of it, and, if at
times a portion was granted to exiles, to strangers, to a
contiguous clan, the whole tribe was consulted on the subject.
Over the common land large herds of cattle roamed--the property
of individuals who could own nothing, except of a movable nature,
beyond their small wooden houses.

This state of things had existed, according to their annals, for
several thousand years. Their ancestors had lived happily under
such social conditions, which they wished to abide in and hand
down to their posterity.

Foreign trade was distasteful to them; in fact, they had no
inclination for commerce. Lucre they despised, scarcely knowing
the use of money, which had been lately introduced among them.
Yet, being refined in their tastes, fond of ornament, of wine at
their feasts, loving to adorn the persons of their wives and
daughters with silk and gems, they had allowed the Danes to
dwell in their seaports, to trade in those commodities, and to
import for their use what the land did not produce.

Those seaport towns had been fortified by the Northmen on their
first victories when they took possession of them. Throughout
the rest of the island, a fortress or a large town was not to be
seen. The people, being all agriculturists or graziers, loved to
dwell in the country; their houses were built of wattle and clay,
yet comfortable and orderly.

The mansions of the chieftains were neither large architectural
piles, nor frowning fortresses. They bore the name of raths when
used for dwellings; of duns when constructed with a view to
resisting an attack. In both cases, they were, in part under
ground, in part above; the whole circular in form, built
sometimes of large stones, oftener of walls of sodded clay.

Instead of covering their limbs with coats of mail, like the
warriors of mediaeval Europe, they wore woollen garments even in
war, and for ornaments chains or plates of precious metal. The
Norman invaders, clad in heavy mail, were surprised, therefore,
to find themselves face to face with men in their estimation
unprotected and naked. More astonished were they still at the
natural boldness and readiness of the Irish in speaking before
their chieftains and princes, not understanding that all were of
the same blood and cognizant of the fact.

Still less could they understand the freedom and familiarity
existing between the Irish nobility and the poorest of their
kinsmen, so different from the haughty bearing of an aristocracy
of foreign extraction to the serfs and villeins of a people they
had conquered.

The two nations now confronting each other had, therefore,
nothing in common, unless, perhaps, an excessive pertinacity of
purpose. The new comers belonged to a stern, unyielding,
systematic stock, which was destined to give to Europe that
great character so superior in our times to that of southern or
eastern nations. The natives possessed that strong attachment to
their time-honored customs, so peculiar to patriarchal tribes,
in whose nature traditions and social habits are so strongly
intermingled, that they are ineradicable save by the utter
extirpation of the people.

And now the characteristics of both races were to be brought out
in strong contrast by the great question of property in the soil,
which was at the bottom of the struggle between clanship and
feudalism. The Irish, as we have seen, knew nothing of
individual property in land, nor of tenure, nor of rent, much
less of forfeiture. They were often called upon by their
chieftains to contribute to their support in ways not seldom
oppressive enough, but the contributions were always in kind.

A new and very different system was to be attempted, to which
the Irish at first appeared to consent, because they did not
understand it, attaching, as they did, their own ideas to words,
which, in the mouths of the invaders, had a very different
meaning.

With the Irish "to do homage" meant to acknowledge the
superiority of another, either on account of his lawful
authority or his success in war; and the consequences of this
act were, either the fulfilment of the enactments contained in
the "Book of Rights," or submission to temporary conditions
guaranteed by hostages. But that the person doing homage became
by that act the liegeman of the suzerain for life and
hereditarily in his posterity, subject to be deprived of all
privileges of citizenship, as well as to the possibility of
seeing all his lands forfeited, besides many minor penalties
enjoined by the feudal code which often resolved itself into
mere might--such a meaning of the word homage could by no
possibility enter the mind of an Irishman at that period.

Hence, when, after the atrocities committed by the first
invaders, who respected neither treaties nor the dictates of
humanity, not even the sanctuary and the sacredness of religious
houses, Henry II. came with an army, large and powerful for that
time, the Irish people and their chieftains, hoping that he
would put an end to the crying tyranny of the Fitzstephens,
Fitzgeralds, De Lacys, and others, went to meet him and
acknowledge his authority as head chieftain of Leinster through
Strongbow, and, perhaps, as the monarch who should restore peace
and happiness to the whole island. McCarthy, king of Desmond,
was the first Irish prince to pay homage to Henry.

While the king was spending the Christmas festivities in Dublin,
many other chieftains arrived; among them O'Carrol of Oriel and
O'Rourke of Breffny. Roderic O'Connor of Connaught, till then
acknowledged by many as monarch of Ireland, thought at first of
fighting, but, as was his custom, he ended by a treaty, wherein,
it is said, he acknowledged Henry as his suzerain, and thus
placed Ireland at his feet. Ulster alone had not seen the
invaders; but, as its inhabitants did not protest with arms in
their hands, the Normans pretended that from that moment they
were the rightful owners of the island.

Without a moment's delay they began to feudalize the country by
dividing the land and building castles. These two operations,
which we now turn to, opened the eyes of the Irish to the
deception which had been practised upon them, and were the real
origin of the momentous struggle which is still being waged
today.

Sir John Davies, the English attorney-general of James I., has
stated the whole case in a sentence: "All Ireland was by Henry
II. cantonized among ten of the English nation; and, though they
had not gained possession of one-third of the kingdom, yet in
title they were owners and lords of all, so as nothing was left
to be granted to the natives."

McCarthy, king of Desmond, had been the first to acknowledge the
authority of Henry II., yet McCarthy's lands were among the
first, if not the first, bestowed by Henry on his minions. The
grant may be seen in Ware, and it is worthy of perusal as a
sample of the many grants which followed it, whereby Henry
attempted a total revolution in the tenure of land. The charter
giving Meath to De Lacy was the only one which by a clause
seemed to preserve the old customs of the country as to
territory; and yet it was in Meath that the greatest atrocities
were committed.

Yet one difficulty presented itself to the invaders: their
rights were only on paper, whereas the Irish were still in
possession of the greatest part of the island, and once the real
purpose of the Normans showed itself, they were no longer
disposed to submit to Henry or to any of his appointed lords.
The territory had to be wrested from them by force of arms.

The English claimed the whole island as their own. They were, in
fact, masters only of the portion occupied by their troops; the
remainder was, therefore, to be conquered. And if in Desmond,
where the whole strength of the English first fell, they
possessed only a little more than one-fourth of the soil, what
was the case in the rest of the island, the most of which had
not yet seen them?

Long years of war would evidently be required to subdue it, and
the systematic mind of the conquerors immediately set about
devising the best means for the attainment of their purpose. The
lessons gathered from their continental experience suggested
these means immediately; they saw that by covering the country
with feudal castles they could in the end conquer the most
stubborn nation. A thorough revolution was intended. The two
systems were so entirely antagonistic to each other that the
success of the Norman project involved a change of land tenure,
laws, customs, dress--every thing. Even the music of the bards
was to be silenced, the poetry of the files to be abolished, the
pedigrees of families to be discontinued, the very games of the
people to be interrupted and forbidden. A vast number of castles
was necessary. The project was a fearful one, cruel, barbarous,
worthy of pagan antiquity. It was undertaken with a kind of
ferocious alacrity, and in a short time it appeared near
realization. But in the long run it failed, and four hundred
years later, under the eighth Henry, it was as far from
completion as the day on which the second Henry left the island
in 1171.

To show the importance which the invaders attached to their
system, and the ardor with which they set about putting it in
practice, we have only to extract a few passages from the old
annals of the islands; they are wonderfully expressive in their
simplicity:

"A.D. 1176. The English were driven from Limerick by Donnall
O'Brian. An English castle was in process of erection at Kells."-
-(Four Masters.)

"A.D. 1178. The English built and fortified a castle at Kenlis,
the key of those parts of Meath, against the incursions of the
Ulster men."--(Ware's Antiquities.)

"A.D. 1180. Hugh De Lacy planted several colonies in Meath, and
fortified the country with many castles, for the defence and
security of the English."--(Ibid.)

Such enumerations might be prolonged indefinitely; we conclude
with the following entry taken from the Four Masters:

"A.D. 1186. Hugh De Lacy, the profaner and destroyer of many
churches, Lord of the English of Meath (the Irish cannot call
him their lord), Breffni, and Oirghialla, he who had conquered
the greater part of Ireland for the English, and of whose
English castles all Meath, from the Shannon to the sea, was full,
after having finished the castle of Der Magh, set out
accompanied by three Englishmen to visit it . . . . One of the
men of Tebtha, a youth named O'Miadhaigh, approached him, and
with an axe severed his head from his body."

So wide-reaching and comprehensive was the plan of the invaders
from the beginning that they felt confident of holding
possession of Ireland forever; and to effect this they must
certainly have intended to destroy or drive out the native race,
or at best to make slaves of as many of them as they chose to
keep. Thus they had prophecies manufactured for the purpose, and
Cambrensis, in his second book, chapter xxxiii., says
confidently: "Prophecies promise a full victory to the English
people. . . . and that the island of Hibernia shall be subjected
and fortified with castles--literally incastellated,
incastellatam--throughout from sea to sea."

Meanwhile, together with the building of castles, the partition
of the territory was being carried out. The ten great lords,
among whom, according to Sir John Davies, Henry II. had
cantonized Ireland, saw the necessity of giving a part of their
large estates to their followers that so they might occupy the
whole. McGeohegan compiles from Ware the best view of this very
interesting and comparatively unexplored subject. Curious
details are found there, showing that, with the exception of
Ulster, not only the geography, but even the most minute
topography of the country, had been well studied by those feudal
chieftains. Their characteristic love for system runs all
through these transactions.

But the Irish had now seen enough. The whole country was in a
blaze. That kind of guerilla war peculiar to the Celtic clans
began. The newly built castles were attacked and often captured
and destroyed. Strongbow was shut up and besieged in Water- ford,
which fell into the hands of the Danes. The latter sided
everywhere with the Irish. Limerick changed hands several times,
until Donnall O'Brian, who was left in possession, set fire to
it rather than see it fall again into the hands of the invaders.

In Meath, where the numerous castles of De Lacy were situated, a
war to the knife was being waged. O'Melachlin first tried
persuasion, but in conference with De Lacy he dared inveigh
loudly against the King of England, and, as his words must have
expressed the feelings of the great majority of the people, we
give them:

"Notwithstanding his promise of supporting me in the possession
of my wealth and dignities, he has sent robbers to invade my
patrimony. Avaricious and sparing of his own possessions, he is
lavish of those of others, and thus enriches libertines and
profligates who have consumed the patrimony of their fathers in
debauchery."

This manly protest was answered by the stroke of a dagger from
the hand of Raymond Legros, and, after being beheaded,
0'Melachlin was buried feet upward as a rebel.

The monarch himself, Roderic O'Connor, finally appeared on the
scene, beat the English at Thurles, and, marching into Meath,
laid the country waste.

Henry at last saw the necessity of adopting a milder policy, and
O'Connor dispatching to England Catholicus O'Duffy, Archbishop
of Tuam, Lawrence O'Toole, of Dublin, and Concors, Abbot of St.
Brendan, the Treaty of Windsor was concluded, which was really a
compromise, and yet remained the true law of the land for four
hundred years. It may be seen in Rymer's "Foedera."

Sir John Davies justly remarks that by the treaty "the Irish
lords only promised to become tributaries to King Henry II.; and
such as pay only tribute, though they are placed by Bodin in the
first degree of subjection, yet are not properly subjects, but
sovereigns; for though they be less and inferior to the princes
to whom they pay tribute, yet they hold all other points of
sovereignty.

"And, therefore, though King Henry had the title of Sovereign
Lord over the Irish, yet did he not put those things in
execution, which are the true marks of sovereignty.

"For to give laws unto a people, to institute magistrates and
officers over them, to punish or pardon malefactors, to have the
sole authority of making war or peace, are the true marks of
sovereignty, which King Henry II. had not in Ireland, but the
Irish lords did still retain all those prerogatives to
themselves. For they governed their people by the Brehon law;
they appointed their own magistrates and officers; . . . . they
made war and peace one with another, without control; and this
they did not only during the reign of Henry II., but afterward
in all times, even until the reign of Queen Elizabeth."

By an article of the treaty the Irish were allowed to live in
the Pale if they chose; and even there they could enjoy their
customs in peace, as far as the letter of the law went. Many
acts of Irish parliaments, it is true, were passed for the
purpose of depriving them of that right, but without success.

Edmund Spenser, himself living in the Pale in the reign of
Elizabeth, speaks as an eye-witness of "having seen their meeton
their ancient accustomed hills, where they debated and settled
matters according to the Brehon laws, between family and family,
township and township, assembling in large numbers, and going,
according to their custom, all armed."

Stanihurst also, a contemporary of Spenser, had witnessed the
breaking up of those meetings, and seen "the crowds in long
lines, coming down the hills in the wake of each chieftain, he
the proudest that could bring the largest company home to his
evening supper."

Here would be the proper place to speak of the Brehon law, which
remained thus in antagonism to feudal customs for several
centuries. Up to recently, however, only vague notions could be
given of that code. But at this moment antiquarians are revising
and studying it preparatory to publishing the "Senchus Mor" in
which the Irish law is contained. It is known that it existed
previous to the conversion of Ireland to Christianity, and that
the laws of tanistry and of gavelkind, the customs of gossipred
and of fostering, were of pagan origin. Patrick revised the code
and corrected what could not coincide with the Christian
religion. He also introduced into the island many principles of
the Roman civil and canon law, which, without destroying the
peculiarities natural to the Irish character, invested their
code with a more modern and Christian aspect.

Edmund Campian, who afterward died a martyr under Elizabeth,
says, in his "Account of Ireland," written in May, 1571: "They
(the Irish) speak Latin like a vulgar language, learned in their
common schools of leechcraft and law, whereat they begin
children, and hold on sixteen or twenty years, conning by rote
the aphorisms of Hippocrates, and the Civil Institutes, and a
few other parings of these two faculties. I have seen them where
they kept school, ten in some one chamber, grovelling upon
couches of straw, their books at their noses, themselves lying
prostrate, and so to chant out their lessons by piecemeal, being
the most part lusty fellows of twenty-five years and upward."

It was then after studies of from sixteen to twenty years that
the Brehon judge--the great one of a whole sept, or the inferior
one of a single noble family--sat at certain appointed times, in
the open air, on a hill generally, having for his seat clods of
earth, to decide on the various subjects of difference among
neighbors.

Sir James Ware remarks that they were not acquainted with the
laws of England. He might have better said, they preferred their
own, as not coming from cold and pagan Scandinavia, but from the
warm south, the greatest of human law-givers, the jurisconsults
of Old Rome, and the holy expounders of the laws of Christian
Rome.

What were those laws of England of which Ware speaks? There is
no question here of the common law which came into use in times
posterior to Henry II., and which the English derived chiefly
from the Christian civil and canon law; but of those feudal
enactments, which the Anglo-Normans endeavored to introduce into
Ireland, for the purpose of supplanting the old law and customs
of the natives.

There was, first, the law of territory, if we may so call it, by
which the supreme ruler became really owner of the integral soil,
which he distributed among his great vassals, to be
redistributed by them among inferior vassals.

There was the law of primogeniture, which even to this day
obtains in England, and has brought about in that country since
the days of William the Conqueror, and in Ireland since the
English "plantations" of the sixteenth and seventeenth centuries,
the state of things now so well known to Europe.

There was also the long list of feudal conditions to be observed,
by the fulfilment of which the great barons and their followers
held their lands. For their tenure was liable to homage and
fealty, as understood in the feudal sense, to wardships and
impediments to marriage, to fines for alienations, to what
English legists call primer seizins, rents, reliefs, escheats,
and, finally, forfeitures; this last was at all times more
strictly observed in England than in any other feudal country,
and by its enactments so many noble families have, in the course
of ages, been reduced to beggary, and their chiefs often brought
to the block. English history is filled with such cases.

The law of wardship, by which no minor, heir, or heiress could
have other guardian than the suzerain, and could not marry
without his consent, was at all times a great source of wealth
to the royal exchequer, and a correspondingly heavy tribute laid
on the vassal. So profitable did the English kings find this law,
that they speedily introduced it into Church affairs, every
bishop's see or monastery being considered, at the death of the
incumbent, as a minor, a ward, to be taken care of by the
sovereign, who enjoyed the revenues without bothering himself
particularly with the charges.

There were, finally, the hunting laws, which forbade any man to
hunt or hawk even on his own estate.

Such were the laws of England, which Sir James Ware complains
the Irish did not know.

In signing the treaty of Windsor, the English king had
apparently recognized in the person of Roderic O'Connor, and in
the Irish through him, the chief rights of sovereignty over the
whole island, except Leinster and, perhaps, Meath. But, at the
same time, a passage or two in the treaty concealed a meaning
certainly unperceived by the Irish, but fraught with mischief
and misfortune to their country.

First, Roderic O'Connor acknowledged himself and his successors
as liegemen of the kings of England; in a second place, the
privileges conceded to the Irish were to continue only so long
as they remained faithful to their oath of allegiance. We see
here the same confusion of ideas, which we remarked on the
meaning given to the word homage by either party. The natives of
the island understood to be liegemen and under oath in a sense
conformable to their usual ideas of subordination; the English
invested those words with the feudal meaning.

All the calamities of the four following centuries, and,
consequently, all the horrors of the times subsequent to the
Protestant Reformation, were to be the penalty of that
misunderstanding.

Let us picture to ourselves two races of men so different as the
Milesian Celts on the one side, and the Scandinavian Norman
French on the other, having concluded such a treaty as that of
Windsor, each side resolved to push its own interpretation to
the bitter end.

The English are in possession of a territory clearly enough
defined, but they are ever on the alert to seize any opportunity
of a real or pretended violation of it, in order to extend their
limits and subjugate the whole island. Yet they are bound to
allow the Brehon Irish to live in their midst, governed by their
own customs and laws. Moreover, they acknowledge that the former
great Irish lords of the very country which they occupy are not
mere Irish, but of noble blood; for, from the beginning, the
English recognized five families of the country, known as the
"five bloods," as pure and noble, in theory at least.

The Irish without the Pale are acknowledged as perfectly
independent, completely beyond English control, with their own
magistrates and laws, even that of war; subject only to tribute.
But, at the same time, this independence is rendered absolutely
insecure by the imposition of conditions, whose meaning is well
known and perfectly understood in all the countries conquered by
the Scandinavians, but utterly beyond the comprehension of the
Irish.

The consequence is clear: war began with the conclusion of the
treaty--a war which raged for four centuries, until a new and
more powerful incentive to slaughter and desolation showed
itself in the Reformation, ushered in by Henry VIII.

First came a general rebellion. This is the word used by
Ware, when John, a boy of twelve years of age, was dispatched by
his father Henry, with the title of Lord of Ireland, to receive
the submission of various Irish lords at Waterford, where he
landed. "The young English gentlemen," says Cambrensis, who was
a witness of the scene, "used the Irish chieftains with scorn,
because," as he says, "their demeanor was rude and barbarous."
The Irish naturally resented this treatment from a lad, as they
would have resented it from his father; and they retired in
wrath to take up arms and raise the whole land to "rebellion."

This solemn protest was not without effect in Europe. At the
beginning of the reign of Richard I., Clement III., on
appointing, by the king's request, William de Longchamps,
Bishop of Ely, as his legate in England, Wales, and Ireland,
took good care to limit the authority of this prelate to those
parts of Ireland which lay under the jurisdiction of the Earl
of Moreton-- that is, of John, brother to Richard. He had power
to exercise his jurisdiction "in Anglia,, Wallia, et illis
Hiberniae partibus in quibus Joannes Moretonii Comes potestatem
habet et dominium."--(Matth. Paris.) It would seem, then, that
Clement III. knew nothing of the bull of Adrian IV.

The war, as we said, was incessant. England finally so despaired
of conquering the country, that some lords of the court of Henry
VI. caused him to write letters to some of his "Irish enemies,"
urging the latter to effect the conquest of the island in the
king's name. This was assuredly a last resource, which history
has never recorded of any other nation warring on a rival. But
even in this England failed. Those lords--the "Irish enemies" of
King Henry VI.--sent his letters to the Duke of York, then Lord-
Lieutenant, "and published to the world the shame of England."--
(Sir John Davies.)

The result was that, at the end of the reign of Henry VI., the
Irish, in the words of the same author, "became victorious over
all, without blood or sweat; only that little canton of land,
called the English Pale, containing four small shires;
maintained yet a bordering war with the Irish, and retained the
form of English government."

Feudalism was thus reduced in Ireland to the small territory
lying between the Boyne and the Liffey, subject to the constant
annoyance of the O'Moores, O'Byrnes, and O'Cavanaghs. And this
state of affairs continued until the period of the so-called
Reformation in England.

Ireland proved itself then the only spot in Western Europe where
feudal laws and feudal customs could take no root. Through all
other nations of the Continent those laws spread by degrees,
from the countries invaded by the Northmen, into the most
distant parts, modified and mitigated in some instances by the
innate power of resistance left by former institutions. In this
small island alone, where clanship still held its own, feudalism
proved a complete failure. We merely record a fact, suggestive,
indeed, of thought, which proves, if no more, at least that the
Celtic nature is far more persevering and steady of purpose than
is generally supposed.

But a more interesting spectacle still awaits us--that of the
English themselves morally overcome and won over by the example
of their antagonists, renouncing their feudal usages, and
adopting manners which they had at first deemed rude and
barbarous.

The treaty of Windsor, which was subsequently confirmed by many
diplomatic enactments, obliged King Henry III. of England to
address O'Brien of Thomond in the following words: "Rex regi
Thomond salutem." The same English monarch was compelled to give
O'Neill of Ulster the title of Rex, after having used,
inadvertently perhaps, that of Regulus.--(Sir John Davies.) Both
O'Brien and O'Neill lived in the midst of a thickly populated
Irish district, with a few great English lords shut up in their
castles on the borders of the respective territory of the clans.

The Norman lords in many parts of the country lived right in the
midst of an Irish population, with its Brehon judges, shanachies,
harpers, and other officers, attached to their customs of
gossipred, fostering, tanistry, gavelkind, and other usages,
which the parliaments of Drogheda, Kilkenny, Dublin, Trim, and
other places, were soon to declare lewd and barbarous. The
question of the moment was: Which of the two systems, clanship
or feudalism, brought thus into close contact and antagonism,
was to prevail?

Ere long it began to appear that the aversion first felt by the
English lords at such strange customs was not entirely
invincible, and many of them even went so far as to choose wives
from among the native families. In fact, there lay a great
example before their eyes from the outset, in the marriage of
Strongbow with Eva, the daughter of McMurrough. Intermarriage
soon became the prevailing custom; so that the posterity of the
first invaders was, after all, to have Celtic blood in its veins.

Hence, a distinction arose between the English by blood and the
English by birth. The first had, indeed, an English name; but
they were born in the island, and soon came to be known as
degenerate English.--That degeneracy was merely the moral effect
of constant intercourse with the natives of their neighborhood. -
-The others were continually shifting, being always composed of
the latest new-comers from England.

It is something well worthy of remark that a residence of a
short duration sufficed to blend in unison two natures so
opposed as the Irish and the English. The latter, not content
with wedding Irish wives, sent their own children to be fostered
by their Irish friends; and the children naturally came from the
nursery more Irish than their fathers. They objected no longer
to becoming gossips for each other at christenings, to adopt the
dress of their foster-parents, whose language was in many cases
the only one which they brought from their foster-home.

Thus Ireland, even in districts which had been thoroughly
devastated by the first invaders, became the old Ireland again;
and the song of the bard and the melody of the harper were heard
in the English castle as well as in the Irish rath.1 (1 The
process of gaining over an Englishman to Irish manners is
admirably described in the "Moderate Cavalier," under Cromwell,
quoted by Mr. J. P. Prendergast in his second edition of the
"Cromwellian Settlement," p. 263. If this process were common
with the Protestant officers of Cromwell, how much more so with
Catholic Anglo-Normans!)

The nationalization of their kin, which received a powerful
impetus from the fact that the English who lived without the
Pale escaped feudal exactions and penalties from the
impossibility of enforcing the feudal laws on Irish territory,
alarmed the Anglo-Normans by birth, in whose hand rested the
engine of the government; and, looking around for a remedy, they
could discover nothing better than acts of Parliament.

We have not been able to ascertain the precise epoch in which
the first Irish Parliament was convened; indeed, to this day, it
seems a debated question. The general belief, however, ascribes
it to King John. The first mention of it by Ware is under the
year 1333, as late as Edward III., more than one hundred and
fifty years after the Conquest. But the need of stringent rules
to keep the Irish at bay, and prevent the English from
"degenerating," became so urgent that, in 1367, the famous
Parliament met at Kilkenny, and enacted the bill known as the
"Statutes of Kilkenny," in which the matter was fully elaborated,
and a new order of things set on foot in Ireland.

The Irish could recognize no other Parliament than their ancient
Feis; and, these having been discontinued for several centuries,
they showed their appreciation of the new English institution in
the manner described by Ware under the year 1413: "On the 11th
of the calends of February, the morrow after St. Matthias day, a
Parliament began at Dublin, and continued for the space of
fifteen days; in which time the Irish burned all that stood in
their way, as their usual custom was in times of other
Parliaments."

The reader who is acquainted with the enactments which go by the
name of the "Statutes of Kilkenny" will scarcely wonder at this
mode of proceeding.

Neither at that period, nor later on save once under Henry VIII.,
was the Irish race represented in those assemblies. In the
reign of Edward III. no Irish native nor old English resident
assisted at the Parliament of Kilkenny, but only Englishmen
newly arrived; for all its acts were directed against the Irish
and the degenerate English--against the latter particularly. How
the members composing these Parliaments were elected at that
time we do not know; but they were not summoned from more than
twelve counties, which number, first established by King John,
gradually dwindled, until, in the reign of Henry VII., it was
reduced to four, so that the Irish Parliament came to be
composed of a few men, and those few representatives of purely
English interests.

A true history of the times would demand an examination of the
various enactments made by these so-called Irish Parliaments, as
setting forth more distinctly than any thing else could do the
points at variance between the two nations. Our space, however,
and indeed our purpose, forbids this. In order to put the reader
in possession of at least an idea of the difficulties on either
side, we add a few extracts from the very famous "Statutes of
Kilkenny."

The preamble sets forth "that already the English in Ireland
were mere Irish in their language, names, apparel, and their
manner of living, and had rejected the English laws and
submitted to the Irish, with whom they had many marriages and
alliances, which tended to the utter ruin and destruction of the
commonwealth." And then the Statutes go on to enact --we cull
from various chapters: "The English cannot any more make peace
or war with the Irish without special warrant; it is made penal
to the English to permit the Irish to send their cattle to graze
upon their land; the Irish could not be presented by the English
to any ecclesiastical benefice; they--the Irish--could not be
received into any monasteries or religious houses; the English
could not entertain any of their bards, or poets, or shanachies,
" etc.

This extraordinary legislation proves beyond any amount of facts
to what degree the posterity of the first Norman invaders of
Ireland had adopted Irish customs, and made themselves one with
the natives.

The Irish, therefore, had, in this instance, morally conquered
their enemies, and feudalism was defeated. Another example was
given of the invariable invasions of the island. The enemy,
however successful at the beginning, was compelled finally to
give way to the force of resistance in this people; and the time-
honored customs of an ancient race survived all attempts at
violent foreign innovations. The posterity of those proud nobles,
who, with Giraldus Cambrensis, had found nothing but what was
contemptible in this nation, so strange to their eyes, who
looked upon them as an easy victim to be despoiled of their land,
and that land to be occupied by them, that posterity adopted,
within, comparatively speaking, a few years, the life and
manners of the mere Irish in their entirety. Feudalism they
renounced for the clan. Each of the great English families that
first landed in the island had formed a new sept, and the clans
of the Geraldines, De Courcys, and others, were admitted into
full copartnership with the old Milesian septs. This the two
great families of the Burkes in Connaught called their chiefs
McWilllams Either and McWilliams Oughter. The Berminghams bad
become McYoris; the Dixons, McJordans; the Mangles, McCostellos.
Other old English families were called McHubbard, McDavid, etc.;
one of the Geraldine septs was known as McMorice, another as
McGibbon; the chief of Dunboyne's house became McPheris.

Meanwhile, "it was manifest," says Sir John Davies, "that those
who had the government of Ireland under the crown of England
intended to make a perpetual separation and enmity between the
English settled in Ireland and the Irish, in the expectation
that the English should in the end root out the Irish."

There is no doubt that, if these laws of Kilkenny could have
been enforced and carried out, as they were meant to be, the
effect hoped for by these legislators might have been the
natural result. Yet even much later on, at a period, too, when
the English power was considerably increased, under Henry VIII.,
a very curious discussion of this possibility, which took place
at the time, did not by any means promise an easy realization.
The following passage of the "State Papers," under the great
Tudor, contains a rather sensible view of the subject, and is
not so sanguine of the success of the hopes cherished by the
attorney-general of James I.:

"The lande is very large--by estimation as large as Englande--so
that, to enhabit the whole with new inhabiters, the number would
be so great that there is no prince christened that commodiously
might spare so many subjects to depart out of his regions. . . .
But to enterprise the whole extirpation and totall destruction
of all the Irishmen of the lande, it would be a marvellous and
sumptuous charge and great difficulty, considering both the lack
of enhabitors, and the great hardness and misery these Irishmen
can endure, both of hunger, colde, and thirst, and evill lodging,
more than the inhabitants of any other lande."

There were, therefore,