The Life of St. Declan of Ardmore | Page 4

had been sown therein in the first and
second decades of the preceding century by Gaulish scholars who had
fled from their own country owing to invasion of the latter by Goths
and other barbarians. The fact that these scholars, who were mostly
Christians, sought asylum in Ireland indicates that Christianity had
already penetrated thither, or at any rate that it was known and tolerated
there. Dr. Meyer answers the objection that if so large and so important
an invasion of scholars took place we ought have some reference to the
fact in the Irish annals. The annals, he replies, are of local origin and
they rarely refer in their oldest parts to national events: moreover they
are very meagre in their information about the fifth century. One Irish
reference to the Gaulish scholars is, however, adduced in corroboration;
it occurs in that well known passage in St. Patrick's "Confessio" where
the saint cries out against certain "rhetoricians" in Ireland who were
hostile to him and pagan,--"You rhetoricians who do not know the Lord,
hear and search Who it was that called me up, fool though I be, from
the midst of those who think themselves wise and skilled in the law and
mighty orators and powerful in everything." Who were these "rhetorici"
that have made this passage so difficult for commentators and have
caused so various constructions to be put upon it? It is clear, the
professor maintains, that the reference is to pagan rhetors from Gaul
whose arrogant presumption, founded on their learning, made them
regard with disdain the comparatively illiterate apostle of the Scots.
Everyone is familiar with the classic passage of Tacitus wherein he
alludes to the harbours of Ireland as being more familiar to continental
mariners than those of Britain. We have references moreover to refugee
Christians who fled to Ireland from the persecutions of Diocletian more
than a century before St. Patrick's day; in addition it is abundantly
evident that many Irishmen--Christians like Celestius the lieutenant of
Pelagius, and possibly Pelagius himself, amongst them--had risen to
distinction or notoriety abroad before middle of the fifth century.
Possibly the best way to present the question of Declan's age is to put in
tabulated form the arguments of the pre-Patrician advocates against the
counter contentions of those who claim that Declan's period is later

than Patrick's:--
For the Pre-Patrician Mission. Against Theory of Early Fifth Century
period.
I.--Positive statement of Life, I.--Contradictions, anachronisms,
corroborated by Lives of SS. &c., of Life. Ciaran and Ailbhe. II.--Lack
of allusion to Declan in II.--Patrick's apparent avoidance the Lives of St.
Patrick. of the Principality of Decies. III.--Prosper's testimony to the
III.--The peculiar Declan cult and mission of Palladius as first the
strong local hold which bishop to the believing Scots. Declan has
maintained. IV.--Alleged motives for later invention of Pre-Patrician
story.
In this matter and at this hour it is hardly worth appealing to the
authority of Lanigan and the scholars of the past. Much evidence not
available in Lanigan's day is now at the service of scholars. We are to
look rather at the reasoning of Colgan, Ussher, and Lanigan than to the
mere weight of their names.
Referring in order to our tabulated grounds of argument, pro and con,
and taking the pro arguments first, we may (I.) discard as evidence for
our purpose the Life of St. Ibar which is very fragmentary and
otherwise a rather unsatisfactory document. The Lives of Ailbhe,
Ciaran, and Declan are however mutually corroborative and consistent.
The Roman visit and the alleged tutelage under Hilarius are probably
embellishments; they look like inventions to explain something and
they may contain more than a kernel of truth. At any rate they are
matters requiring further investigation and elucidation. In this
connection it may be useful to recall that the Life (Latin) of St. Ciaran
has been attributed by Colgan to Evinus the disciple and panegyrist of
St. Patrick.
Patrick's apparent neglect of the Decies (II.) may have no special
significance. At best it is but negative evidence: taken, however, in
connection with (I.) and its consectaria it is suggestive. We can hardly
help speculating why the apostle--passing as it were by its front
door--should have given the go-bye to a region so important as the
Munster Decies. Perhaps he sent preachers into it; perhaps there was no
special necessity for a formal mission, as the faith had already found
entrance. It is a little noteworthy too that we do not find St. Patrick's
name surviving in any ecclesiastical connection with the Decies, if we

except Patrick's Well, near Clonmel, and this Well is within a mile or
so of the territorial frontier. Moreover the southern portion of the
present Tipperary County had been ceded by Aengus to the Deisi, only
just previous to Patrick's advent,