"Flavia Domitilla and Vitus," said the emperor, "stand forth! Is it true, Vitus, that, despite our known will, you have espoused our ward and cousin in the Christian assembly? Can it be that you, so favored, so honored by us, have become a traitor to our throne and person?"
"My sovereign lord!" said Vitus, stepping boldly into the centre of the hall and making obeisance to the emperor, "I am not a traitor. On the contrary, I am bound by every motive of loyalty and religion to serve you in all things lawful. I appeal to your own experience of me in the past, if I have not hitherto acted as became a Roman and an officer of the household. Neither, most exalted emperor, is it true that the Lady Flavia and I have plighted troth. My troth and faith are plighted to one higher and more beautiful than she is; to one who can never know speck, or stain, or wrinkle, who has been washed to a spotless whiteness in the blood of the Lamb!" As he said this he turned toward Flavia, as if deprecating a seeming want of courtesy.
At this moment, Aurelian, excited and travel-stained, entered, accompanied by the troop of the guard he had led to arrest Pope Clement. The only prisoners he brought back were Damian, the missionary from Britain, and Lucius, one of his own slaves. He had met these two wandering among the tombs, but got no trace of others.
Domitian, motioning Aurelian to a place near Vitus and Flavia, asked the latter:
"Is this true, Flavia Domitilla, which Vitus says?"
"It is, my lord!" she answered, in a low, tremulous voice.
"What sayest thou, Senator Aurelian? I trust you have not, through jealousy, led us to offer indignity to gentle ladies of rank! If so, by our crown, the high favor in which you have stood shall not save you from due atonement."
Aurelian was confused and confounded by this address, the cause of which he did not well comprehend. One circumstance, however, worked in his favor: Flavia's white veil. The emperor, remarking it, asked:
"What mean these flowing robes of white? They seem more a festive costume than an evening dress."
She answered not. But Aurelian, having recovered his presence of mind, said:
"Was I not right, O mighty potentate? This is the bridal garment she wore last night when she was married to Vitus, after being drugged with a cup of human blood! See! the influence of that drug is upon her yet."
"Answer me, Flavia Domitilla, truly. Have you been in the secret meeting of the Christians last night?"
"I have," she replied, with firm voice and unflinching eye.
"Have you withdrawn the faith you gave Aurelian by our desire, and bestowed it on another?"
"I have."
"To whom? to Vitus?"
"No! but to One more beautiful, more lovable, more glorious than Vitus, or than any earthly being; to One whose wisdom outdistances the accumulated lore of sages and philosophers; to One whose years are not counted by the sands on the ocean's shores, by the grass blades clothing the earth, or the water-drops in the encircling seas; yet whose youth is greener, fresher, softer, and more lovely than the eye of man has rested on or the fancy of poet has pictured; to One whose sceptre rules the nations of the earth and all things therein, the islands of the deep and all things thereon, whose messengers guide the stars in their courses, whose beauty and majesty are faintly mirrored in the universe, and whose love for me is so great that he left all these aside and became a servant in order that he might suffer and die for me, and thus free me from the clutches of a tyrant! Yes, O emperor! I have plighted my faith, and hope, and love, my body and my soul, my present and my future, to my God and my Redeemer, Jesus Christ! He is my glorious spouse, and I am his accepted bride.Behold the garments in which I have been betrothed to him!" As she spoke her face became animated, her voice grew strong and eloquent, her eye flashed with courage, her whole bearing gave proof of a soul raised by the excitement of unusual happiness to heroic daring. She stood before the cruel tyrant, with hand uplifted to heaven, and the white Ionic veil waving round her face like a shifting glory; and might, in the eyes of the heathen soldiers, have passed for the goddess Juno, as described by Virgil, or for Iris freshly descended from Olympus. But Domitian was not moved by her youth, her eloquence, or her beauty, but bounded from his throne as if stung by a serpent when he heard her thus mention the Saviour's name.
"What! In my presence—to my face—declaring yourself the bride of my worst enemy. By the manes of Vespasian and Titus! If you do not offer sacrifice to Jupiter and to my divinity, and renounce all connection with this Crucified Jew, your head, with all its attractions, shall not long remain upon those rounded shoulders!" He waved his sceptre and directed the soldiers to bring her toward the altar. But she would not raise her hand toward the incense.
"Never! never!" she exclaimed, "by word or act, shall I deny the Lord of lords, the God of gods, and acknowledge by the supreme worship of sacrifice a demon that has usurped his place, or a creature to be a god because he sits on an earthly throne. You may force my hand, but you cannot force my will!"
Domitian was frantic: "Away with her! away with her! Her family have always crossed my path. Let not her head," he turned to the gladiators, "remain an instant on her body, that her tongue may no longer insult me!"
A smile rippled over the face of the virgin confessor.
"See! she smiles, she mocks me! Off with it! off with it! Craven cowards! do you hesitate before a mere woman? Give me that executioner's sword and I shall make short work of it. By heavens she is smiling still and calling on Jesus. Where is he now, God of gods, as you name him? Why does he not come forward at his beloved's bidding to resist the power and stay the arm of Domitian?"
Aurelian interposed nervously:
"Most powerful monarch and irresistible deity! she is smiling in joy under the infatuating belief that, when her head is severed from her body, she shall be out of your power, freed wholly from my claims upon her, and received into the kingdom which Jesus promises to all who die for him. Do not allow him to triumph over you, do not gratify her desire of martyrdom; but entrust her to me, that I may make her my own; and then both you and I shall have triumphed over those who have driven her into this madness."
"Be it so! Ha, ha! I believe you have taken the right view. See the tears glisten in her eyes, and her joy is changed to sadness. But take her hence, never to enter my presence, lest her words excite me to gratify her insane longings. Who are those that drugged her?"
"Behold them!" said Aurelian, pointing to Vitus, Priscilla, Theodora, and Damian. "There were others, too, who took a leading part in the ceremony, but we have not been yet able to arrest them."
"Vitus! come forward and offer sacrifice to the gods!"
"I cannot, O mighty emperor! Because there is but one God to whom the honor of sacrifice may be paid, and that is Jesus Christ, true God and true Man."
"Are you, my ladies," the emperor turned to Priscilla and Theodora, "of a like disposition?"
"Yes," was the low but firm answer.
"Executioners, advance and do your duty by these recusants!"
Sisinnius fell upon his knees before the emperor and pleaded hard for his wife's life, pleaded his own long services and fidelity to the imperial family, pleaded her youth and innocence.
Domitian at length relaxed.
"I shall spare her life as I have spared that of Flavia Domitilla, until such time as will show whether she will return to a better sense or not; but both must be under the surveillance of a guard, whom I shall appoint. As to those others," he said pointing to Priscilla and Damian, "the traitors of my household, I shall make an example of them." He gave orders in a voice which was not to be disobeyed for the execution of Priscilla and Vitus, Damian and Lucius, (strangers in whom no one seemed interested;) and the command was obeyed.
As Domitian saw the heads severed from the shoulders, he gloated over the scene with the savage cruelty peculiar to him. Theodora and Flavia covered their faces and prayed for the victory of the martyrs, managing to saturate pieces of cloth in the blood.
Alas! what dire mischance is wrought?A Friend was here who gently soughtAn entrance to my humble cot,Whilst I—O sorrow!—heeded not.In meekest guise he came and went,And I, on trifles vain intent,The joyful greeting still forboreWhile he was knocking at my door.For me he left a regal throne,And came in silence, and alone;No shining guard his steps attend:O earth! hadst ever such a friend?And yet I did not rise to meetThose wearied, patient, wounded feet,Nor did I shield that kingly headOn which the chill night-dews were shed.Oh! did I wake, or did I sleep,That midnight vigil not to keep?I knew, and yet I heeded not;Methought I heard, and then forgotThat he had warned of swift surprise,And only termed thewatchers"wise."Dear Bridegroom of my soul! return!Bereft of every joy, I mourn:Return! my house, at last, is swept,And where thy feet have stood, I wept.Beloved Guest! I call—I wait;Hope whispers, "It is not too late."Be then that hope no more deferred,Speak to my soul the pardoning word,Then will I list in rapture sweet,And dwell for ever at thy feet!Marie.Beaver, Pa.
As with men, so with cities. Whenever one of the latter becomes famous, and the eyes of the world are fixed upon it, we desire to know more of it than what is presented on the surface. A thousand little details, trifling, perhaps, in themselves, share in the interest attaching to the whole to which they belong. And as the most interesting biographies of great men are those which not merely make us acquainted with the prominent features of their lives—with the great exploits which they achieved—but also follow them into their solitude or home-life, so the most attractive chronicles of states and cities are those which enter into the seemingly unimportant minutiae, neglected by the general historian and the compiler of the guide-book.
Lutetia (civitas) Parisiorum is first mentioned in Caesar's Commentaries. Lutetia has had various derivations assigned to it, but most probably it is the Latinized form ofLoutouhezi, the Celtic for "a city in the midst of waters," it having been built on an island in the Seine. In the fourth century it received the name of the people whose chief city it was. During the middle ages it was supposed that Francus, a son of Hector, founded Paris, and also Troyes in Champagne, giving to the former the name of his uncle. In all likelihood, it comes from the Celticparorbar, a frontier.
Christianity, according to Gregory of Tours, was first preached to the Parisians by St. Dionysius, or Denis, in the year 250; and the first synod held in Paris took place in 360, which seems to prove that the Christian missionaries had already made numerous converts there. Paganism, however, was not wholly uprooted until the episcopate of St. Marcellus, who died in 436, and who, according to a legend, is said to have hurled into the Seine a frightful dragon which desolated the city, and which, perhaps, was the emblem of heathenism.
Julian the Apostate had a great liking for Paris, and spent five winters there. He praises its inhabitants for their intelligence and good conduct, and the surrounding vineyards for their excellent produce. An edifice, improperly called the Thermes de Julien, still exists in the Rue de la Harpe, which perpetuates his memory, and possibly served as his residence. In his time, the Montagne Ste. Geneviève was a sort of Campus Martius; the gardens of the Luxembourg were occupied by a Roman camp, and Roman villas lined both sides of the Seine.
The Merovingians made Paris their capital, and Clovis constantly resided there. His sons, while dividing his states, judged the possession of Paris of so great importance that they shared it among themselves, and agreed that none of them should enter it without the consent of the others. Under this dynasty, several of the Parisian churches were founded. Childebert built the church of St. Vincent, afterward St. Germain des Prés, the vaulting of each window in which was supported by costly pillars of marble. Paintings, decorated with gold, covered the ceiling and the walls. The roof, composed of plates of gilded bronze, when struck by the rays of the sun, dazzled the eyes of beholders with its brilliancy.
Under Louis VI. and Louis VII. Paris became celebrated for its schools. The best known were the Cathedral School, the school of St. Germain des Prés, and that of Ste. Geneviève. At the first mentioned, Guillaume de Champeaux taught theology, and counted among his pupils the well-known Abélard, at the end of the eleventh and beginning of the twelfth century.In 1118 Abélard opened on the Montague Ste. Geneviève his famous school, which soon eclipsed all the others, and at which no less than ten thousand scholars attended.
Philip Augustus, judging that Paris was not sufficiently protected by its walls, caused a tower to be built outside them, on the site of aLouveterie, or wolf-hunting establishment, from which it received the name of the Louvre. It served at once for a royal residence, a fortress, and a state-prison, and was completed, according to the original plan, in 1204. It was under this monarch that the streets of Paris were first paved. One day, while standing at a window of his palace in the city, the mud or filth in the street, shaken by some vehicles which were passing, exhaled an unbearable stench, which invaded the royal nostrils. It was then that Philip conceived the project of paving the streets. The work was done at the expense of the town, the pavement consisting of rough flagstones, about three feet and a half square, and six inches in thickness.
It was in this reign, in 1182, that the legate of the holy see consecrated the cathedral of Notre Dame, begun in 1163 by Maurice de Sully, Bishop of Paris. This immense edifice, however, was not finished till the reign of Charles VII. in the fifteenth century. The original flooring of Philip Augustus was lately found at eight or nine feet below the surface; and the thirteen steps which in his time, it is said, led to the entrance have disappeared. It was under Philip that the municipality of Paris received its first developments, and assumed a regular form. Besides the provost, who, as officer of the king, presided over the courts of justice, there was the syndic, nominated by the community of merchants, whose duty it was to protect the commercial interests of the town. He was afterward called the provost of the merchants, and was assisted byechevins, who formed his council. Under Philip, this officer acquired many new rights. The police, the streets, the care of public edifices, the administration of the lands belonging to the town, passed from the provost of Paris to this functionary.
Philip was also the patron of learning. He instituted schools in the Rue du Fouarre.Fouarre, orfoare, from which is derived the existingfourrage, (forage,) is an old French word signifying straw. The scholars in those simple ages sat upon bundles of straw during the lectures, and as this custom naturally resulted in the frequent appearance of that material in the neighborhood of the schools, the street received its title from it. During the middle ages, no traffic was permitted in this street, in order to obviate any disturbance to the students.
Philip the Fair founded the parliament of Paris. It held its sessions in the king's palace, (Palais de Justice,) which, in the middle of the fifteenth century, was entirely abandoned to it. In this palace was the vast hall which served for receiving the homage of vassals, giving audience to ambassadors, public festivities, and other occasions of national interest, at one of the extremities of which was an enormous marble table, round which sovereigns alone were permitted to sit; and upon which, at certain times of the year, the society ofclercs de la basoche(lawyers' clerks) gave dramatic entertainments of a farcical character.
In the fourteenth century, as now, Paris was celebrated as the seat of fashion in dress, though those dazzlingmagasins de nouveautéswhich we now admire there did not then exist. Wearing apparel, as well as other merchandise, was generally sold by criers in the streets. "They do not cease to bray from morning till night," writes Guillaume de Villeneuve. Venders of all classes swelled the discordant concert. To cry goods for sale was the daily special occupation; among others, of the three hundred blind men supported by the king, St. Louis. These unfortunates, it seems, were in the habit of performing their duties without guidance, and the consequence was that they frequently came in collision, and gave each other severe contusions.
The first stone of the famous Bastille was laid by the provost of Paris, in the reign of Charles V., 1369. That formidable edifice was built for the purpose of protecting the king, who had seen his authority braved by the Parisians while residing in his palace in the city, which on that account he quitted. He frequently dwelt in the Louvre, of which the Bastille was a pendant, and of which M. Vitet gives the following picturesque description as it was in the fourteenth century:
"The king caused to be raised outside the moats a number of buildings, useful and ornamental, of a middling height, forming what were then calledbasses-cours, and united to the chateau by gardens of considerable extent. One cannot imagine all the various objects that were heaped together in these dependencies and gardens. Besides lodgings for the officers of the crown, there were a menagerie of lions and panthers, bird-rooms, aviaries for the king's parrots, fish-ponds, basins, labyrinths, tunnels, trellises, leafy pavilions—the favorite decoration! of gardens in the middle ages. These parterres, cut in symmetrical compartments, and thrown in the midst of buildings varying in form and elevation; that chaos of towers and turrets—the former rising heavily from the moats, the latter as if suspended from the walls; that pell-mell of pointed roofs, here covered with lead, there with varnished tiles, some crested with heavy vanes, some with tufts of various colors—all this has no resemblance to a modern palace; but that disorder, these contrasts, which seem to us only barbarously picturesque, appealed quite differently to the imagination in those days, and were not without their grandeur and majesty. These were the bright days of the feudal Louvre, when it was living, peopled, and well cared for."
The space of ground which, until lately, formed the Marché des Innocents, was, in the middle ages, the principal cemetery of Paris. It was surrounded by a sort of vaulted gallery, which was reserved for the corpses of distinguished persons and for dress-makers' shops. Here, in the year 1424, the English, who were then masters of Paris, gave a grand fete of rejoicing for the battle of Verneuil, and indulged in a frightful "dance of the dead" over the level tombstones. In the middle of the cemetery rose an obelisk, surmounted by a lamp, which alone feebly illumined at night the field of the dead, and animated its solitude. But at sunrise all was changed—daylight brought back with it noise, luxury, and pleasure.
Victor Hugo, in the chapter of his romance, Notre Dame de Paris, entitledParis à vol d'oiseau, (book iii. chapter ii.,) gives a vivid description of the town as it was in the fifteenth century. Paris, according to him, was at that time divided into three distinct parts—the city, the university, and the town. The city, occupying the island, was the oldest and smallest, and was the mother of the other two. "It stood between these," he says, "like a little, old woman between two tall, handsome daughters." The university was on the left bank of the Seine, stretching between points which at present correspond with the Halles aux Vins and La Monnaie. The town, the largest of the three divisions, was on the right side of the river. Each of the divisions formed a town, depending for its completeness upon the others. The city had churches; the town, palaces; the university, colleges.
In 1539, Francis I., having given permission to the Emperor Charles V. to traverse France, entertained the idea of receiving him at the Louvre, which underwent, on that account, a general restoration, according to the style of the renaissance; but as soon as the emperor departed, Francis, perceiving that the new works were merely of a temporary character, resolved to build a new palace on the same site as the former one, and confided its erection to Pierre Lescot.The building, begun in 1541, was continued till the death of Henry II. It is the finest portion of the Louvre; the south-west angle. When Catherine de Médicis came into power, she dismissed Lescot, engaged an Italian architect, and caused that wing to be built which advances toward the river.
In 1564, tired of the Louvre, Catherine bought a piece of ground called theSalbonière, covered with pottery-works, theTuileries Saint Honoré, and commenced the palace which received its name from the fabrics which had occupied its site. For six years, the new edifice steadily progressed; but Catherine, having learned from her astrologer, Ruggieri, that it was her fate to die under the ruins of a house near St. Germain, suddenly gave up the works of the Tuileries, because it was in the parish of St. Germain l'Auxerrois, and built the Hôtel de Soissons, on the site of the present corn-market.
The famous Pont-Neuf was begun in 1578, Henry III. laying the first stone.
The Place Royale was completed in 1612. Here Cardinal Richelieu soon afterward built a palace, which he called the Palais Cardinal, but which, in a spirit of regal munificence, he presented to his king, Louis XIII. Thenceforth it became the Palais Royal. Numerous hotels of thenoblessesprang up in the same quarter, and with them first appeared there the warehouses forbijouterieand other fancy goods, for which the Palais Royal is at present so celebrated. A writer of that time severely blames the merchants of these shops for permitting their wives to flirt with customers—"all to induce them to buy a fashionable collar, a child's purse, a drachm or two of perfume for the perruques or a boy's wooden sword." Speaking of perruques, we must not omit to mention that they reached their full development at the time of Louis Quatorze. Their most celebrated maker was a M. Binet, from whom they sometimes were calledbinettes. They weighed several pounds, sometimes cost a thousand crowns, and rose five or six inches above the brow. The wordbinettestill exists in the language of the Parisgamin, designating a person with a droll countenance.
The last insurrection at Paris before the revolution was that called theFronde, (sling.) This revolt received its name in a singular manner. In the moat of the town, near Saint Roch, the little boys of the quarter used to fight with slings. When the constable appeared, they all took to their heels. In the disputes of the parliament, a young counsellor, Bauchaumont, observed the modesty and docility of the members in the presence of the king, and their turbulence in his absence. "They are quiet just now," said he, "but, when he is gone, they will sling (on frondera) with a will." The word remained. The Fronde soon gained the whole town, which eagerly took the side of the insurgents, as the first cause of the troubles was a new tax on houses built outside the walls. Afterward, when the rebellion was quelled, the Parisians paid dearly for their share in it. Their privileges were abolished, a royal garrison took the place of their civic guards, and magistrates dependent on the crown, that of the municipal authorities.
Deprived of its independence, it became the sole glory of Paris to be the stage on which the splendors of the court of Louis XIV. were revealed. In 1662, that king gave an idea of what his reign would cost by the famousfète du carrousel, which has left its name to the vastplacebetween the Louvre and the Tuileries. It cost 1,200,000 francs. Gold and silver were employed in so great profusion on the trappings of the horses, that the material of which they were made could not be distinguished from the embroidery with which it was covered. The king and the princes shone with the prodigious quantity of diamonds with which their arms and the harness of their horses were covered.About the same time the Tuileries and the Louvre were completed, and a garden was designed for the former by Le Nôtre. The former garden of the Tuileries, like other ancient French gardens, comprised a strange medley; among other objects, it contained a pretty little abode, beside the quay, and mysteriously concealed by a thick grove, which Louis XIII. had given to his valet-de-chambre, Renard, who had furnished it with rare and costly articles, and had made it a secret rendezvous for young seigneurs, and the scene of luxuriouspetits soupers.
It was in 1669 that Soliman Aga, the Turkish ambassador at the French court, introduced the use of coffee into Paris. The first café was opened at thefoireSt. Germain, which was then one of the most frequented and fashionable places of resort in the town, and the suppression of which, toward the end of the eighteenth century, went far to destroy the industry and commerce of the left bank of the river, to the profit of the right. An Armenian named Pascal afterward established acafé, which was much in vogue, called the Manouri, upon the Quai de l'Ecole; and, in 1689, a Sicilian, Procopio, opened the Café Procope in the present Rue de l'Ancienne Comédie, which was for long the favorite place of reunion for thesavansandbeaux-espritsof the period.
But the café reminds us that we are leaving Paris in old times for the Paris of the present, and that we are close upon that blood-written page, the revolution, which divides the chronicles of the former from those of the latter. These notes must not be brought to a conclusion without the acknowledgment that from M. Malte-Brun's laborious compilation, La France Illustrée, they derive whatever archaeological interest they possess.
Students of Irish topography are sometimes at a loss to account for so many names of places in that island bearing the prefix "Kil." The explanation of this seeming want of inventive nomenclature is that the word Kil is an abbreviation or corruption of the vernacularCill, a church; thus, Kilkenny means the church of St. Canice, or Kenny; Kilmore, the great church,moremeaning, in the Irish, great or large; Kildare, church of the oak, fromdaire, oak. In the early ages of Christianity the church or abbey was to the people of Ireland what the feudal castle or walled town was to the inhabitants of the continent of Europe, at once a rallying point in case of danger, and a common centre where learning, trade, and the mechanical arts found teachers and patrons.
The Irish, before and long after their conversion, were essentially an agricultural people, caring little for large towns; and, though insular, seem to have neglected foreign commerce, except such as flowed from their periodical incursions in Britain and Gaul, or which necessarily arose out of their emigration from the north of Ireland to Scotland. Hence we find that, while most of the inland cities and towns bear the name of some favorite saint or church, the seaports generally owe their origin and name to the Danes and Anglo-Normans.
The first Catholic churches erected in Ireland, of which we have any authentic account, were three in number, built in the present counties of Wicklow and Wexford, by Palladius, A.D. 430. It seems that this missionary landed on the Wexford coast in that year, accompanied by four priests, but, having met with opposition from the Druids and persecution from the local chiefs, he returned the following year to Britain, leaving, however, behind him some converts under the care of two of his assistants. We are told by the annalists that, before his departure, he deposited in the church of Cellfine, some relics of Sts. Peter and Paul and other saints, the sacred books, and his own writing-tablets, all of which were preserved with great veneration for many years afterward.
But the great church planter in Ireland was Patrick, the son of Potitus, who commenced his task of a nation's conversion, with all the advantages of a personal knowledge of the people and their language, a matured judgment, profound learning, piety chastened by exile and long-suffering, and an unconquerable faith. His first convert after landing, in 432, was a chief named Dicho, who in proof of his sincerity built, at his own expense, a church near Lecale, in Down, which was calledSabhall Padruic, (Patrick's Barn.) Thence the saint proceeded to Tara, in Meath, where, as it is well known, he appeared before the monarch Leogaire, and, though his preaching made no impression on the heart of that stern pagan, he baptized many of the Druids, poets, and courtiers. By St. Patrick's direction two churches were built in the neighborhood, one at Drumcondrah, and the other at Drumshallon, near the present town of Drogheda. Having thus stormed the enemy's citadel, he advanced confidently to capture the outworks. He passed westward through Connaught to the sea; thence returning to Ulster, he spent some time in Down, Antrim, Ardmagh, and other northern counties; he next visited the different parts of Leinster, and finally entered the populous province of Munster, then a separate kingdom, and planted the standard of the cross in the royal city of Cashel. He remained about seven years in Munster, when, his mission having been successfully completed, he retraced his steps to his favorite place in Down, in 452. Three years afterward he founded the metropolitan see of Armagh, erected a cathedral on land given him for that purpose by Daire, and thus laid the foundation of the primacy of Ireland, and the city of that name. "Suitable edifices were annexed to the cathedral for the accommodation of the clergy, and adjacent to it were several religious retreats, in which members of both sexes, forsaking the world, made a sacrifice of all to the Great Author of their existence." [Footnote 300]
[Footnote 300: Ecclesiastical History of Ireland, Brenan.]
The extraordinary success of this great missionary is without a parallel in the history of the church. In the course of twenty years a whole people, rulers and princes, men and women, were won over to Christianity, without the shedding of a drop of human blood, or even any serious opposition. Sees were founded in all parts of the island, churches and monasteries built, bishops consecrated and priests ordained, and, in fact, the moral and social condition of the entire population revolutionized. Nor was this a triumph over weak-minded or stolid barbarians, for we find that from his neophytes St. Patrick chose his bishops and priests almost exclusively—men whose genius and ability became in the service of the church second only to his own. It might also be supposed that impressions so suddenly produced would be transitory, did we not know how irradicably fixed in the Irish heart is the faith he taught and the doctrine he expounded.
The sees of Ardagh, Clogher, Emly, and Elphin were founded during the life-time of St. Patrick, and fifteen others of lesser note before the close of the century.The cathedral of Kildare, second only in extent and magnificence to that of Armagh, was built about the year 490, and belonged jointly to the diocesan and the nunnery of St. Brigid. It is described as having been divided by a partition beyond the sanctuary; the bishop and clergy entering the church by a door on the north, and the abbess and her community by a door on the south side. In all the sees thus founded, cathedrals, churches, monasteries, schools, and nunneries were erected. History records the building of twenty-one monasteries and schools of great celebrity in the fifth century, besides many others of minor reputation. The schools of Emly at one time contained six hundred scholars; those of Louth are said to have educated one hundred bishops and three hundred priests, while the great institution of Mungret contained within its walls six churches, and, besides its scholars, fifteen hundred religious, equally divided into learned preachers, psalmists, and persons devoted to contemplation and works of charity. At this time, also, St. Brigid founded several nunneries, the most celebrated of which was that of Kildare.
The following century saw seventeen more sees founded and cathedrals built, including those of Dromore, Ossory, Tuam, Clonfert, and Down; while, to meet the growing demand for Christian education, four principal colleges were erected in different parts of the kingdom—Clonard in Meath, Clonfert in Galway, Clonmacnois in Kings county, and Bangor in Down. The number of students educated in the last mentioned was at one time not less than three thousand. Forty-four new monasteries and abbeys are named in the annals of the sixth century, besides many others forgotten in history. Even the place whereon stood the famous monastery of Inniscathy, established at the mouth of the Shannon at this period, is now only marked by a small portion of the ruins of its round tower, while that of Glendaloch, perhaps from its romantic surroundings, is somewhat better preserved. Speaking of the ruins of the latter as seen some years since, the learned author of the Ecclesiastical History of Ireland says:
"The venerable ruins of Glendaloch, even at this day, present an awful and an interesting picture to the mind of the curious and contemplative stranger. Among these must be noticed the church of the Trinity, standing on a rising ground north of the abbey. The seven churches, which in former days were the pride and glory of Glendaloch, and for which it will be celebrated even when the vestiges now remaining are no more. The Cathedral church, with its curious doors, jambs and lintels, and its round tower, one hundred and ten feet high, rising up in its ancient grandeur amidst the prostrate ruins which surround it. Our Lady's church, the most westward of the seven, and nearly opposite the cathedral, is in ruins; but these very ruins speak volumes, and the scattered monuments, crosses, and inscriptions refresh the memory, and fill the mind with new and painful thoughts. St. Kevin's kitchen, so called, and undoubtedly one of the seven churches, is entire; together with its architraves, fretted arches, and round belfry, forty-five feet high. The finger of time alone and of human neglect seem to have wrought the work of desolation in this part of the building. The Rhefeart, or the Sepulchre of Kings, is rendered famous for having seven kings interred within its walls. The Ivy church stands to the westward, with its unroofed walls overgrown with ivy. The Priory of St. Saviour is a complete ruin. Tampull-na-Skellig, in the recess of the mountain, was formerly called the Temple of the Desert, and whither the austere fathers of the abbey were wont to retire on vigils and days of particular mortification. The celebrated bed of St. Kevin, on the south side of the lough, and hanging perpendicularly at a frightful height over the surface of the waters, is another object in which the mind of the antiquary would be much gratified; and on the same side of the mountain are to be seen the remains of a small stone building, called St. Kevin's cell."
The next two centuries added Ferns, Cork, Killaloe, and eleven other sees, with their cathedrals and churches, and fifty-five principal schools, monasteries, and abbeys. During the ninth and tenth centuries we find only two sees created, and no mention of additional monasteries or schools. This may be accounted for by the continual incursions of the Northmen, a swarm of barbarians whose native element seems to have been the ocean and whose only end and object were bloodshed and rapine.From 807 until the decisive battle of Clontarf in 1012, they perpetrated an uninterrupted series of raids on Ireland, and even sometimes held the larger portion of the country in subjection. Landing from their ships at remote and undefended points on the coast, they marched stealthily into the interior, marking their paths with the blood of the defenceless inhabitants, sparing neither age, sex, nor condition in their fury, and bearing off or destroying every species of property. Churches were given to the flames, the relics of the saints stolen or scattered to the winds, monks, nuns, and students put to the sword without mercy or remorse. In one of those incursions Bangor was plundered and nine hundred monks slaughtered. Armagh was sacked and its cathedral destroyed. Cork, Ferns, and Taghmon shared the same fate, while the city of Kildare, its cathedral and nunnery were razed, and their inhabitants massacred or carried into slavery. Clonmacnois was thirteen times plundered, and scarcely a religious house on the island but received at least one visit from the sacrilegious invaders.
After a long and brilliant career an eclipse seemed to have fallen on the church in Ireland, her monasteries were in ruins, her priesthood slaughtered, and her schools deserted. But the genius of one great man was put forth to save the people. Brian, surnamed Boroimhe, King of Munster, and monarch of Ireland, after repeated victories drove the Danes out of his kingdom, and, finally, by his last great battle, destroyed their power for ever in Ireland. The remnant of the once dreaded enemy, embracing the faith of their conquerors, were permitted, upon paying tribute, to settle along the coast for the purpose of foreign traffic. This great king during his long reign did much to reinstate the church in possession of her property, and to repair the damages of two centuries of organized plunder, and his successors continued to follow his example. Even the converted Danes imbibed the prevailing spirit of restitution. The see of Dublin was established in 1040, and its cathedral, consecrated to the Holy Trinity, (now Christ's church,) was built by Bishop Donatus. The see of Waterford was founded in 1096, and its splendid cathedral, also under the invocation of the Holy Trinity, erected by Malchus, its first bishop; and the celebrated priory of Selsker, in Wexford, was established by the new converts some few years afterward. The see of Ardfert was founded in the middle of the eleventh century, and that of Derry about one hundred years subsequently.
It is reasonable to infer that most of the early Irish ecclesiastical structures of any magnitude were of wood, with perhaps a stone tower or stronghold to serve as a depository for sacred vessels, libraries, etc., and for defence in case of actual attack. Dr. Petrie, in his great book on Round Towers, produces convincing proofs that these curious specimens of architecture, some seventy of which still remain more or less well preserved, were intended for these purposes. Ireland at the time of Saint Patrick was densely wooded, oak being predominant, and where so many extensive buildings had to be erected in so limited a time no more convenient and suitable, though certainly very destructible, material could be used. This, as well as the ravages of time and foreign invasion, will explain the fact that so many of the sites of our primitive edifices are recognized only by local tradition. The art of building in stone was indeed known in the country before the introduction of Christianity, but it was not generally applied to church purposes till about the beginning of the twelfth century.
When Cormac McCulinan was appointed to the see of Cashel, it is recorded that he built a cathedral in that city in the latter part of the ninth century, which, according to the annals of the priory of the Island of all Saints, was not long after rebuilt and consecrated with great ceremony.Whether the beautiful ruin now called Cormac's chapel owes its origin to the warrior bishop or to a successor of the same name is a mooted question among antiquarians, as the records of the succession in this diocese are very imperfect. However, it must have been erected at an early age, for we find that in 1170 Donald O'Brian, King of North Munster, built the cathedral of St. Patrick in his royal city of Cashel, and the former church of Cormac was converted into a chapter-house, on the south side of the choir. Bishop O'Heden in 1420 repaired and beautified St. Patrick's and erected a hall for the vicars choral. In the same year that Donal O'Brian built St. Patrick's he also caused to be constructed the beautiful cathedral of St. Mary's in Limerick, endowing it liberally, and it existed in great splendor until the Reformation, when it shared the general fate of all such noble institutions.
The cathedral of St. Patrick, in Down, was rebuilt on the site of the old one by St. Malachy in 1138, and forty years afterward was enlarged by one of his successors and a namesake. About this time it was dedicated to St. Patrick, having been formerly consecrated to the Most Holy Trinity, a favorite name, it would appear, for cathedrals in the early centuries of Christianity.
St. Mary's, at Tuam, was built in 1152, by O'Connor, King of Ireland, and Bishop O'Hoisin, the first archbishop of that see; in 1260 it was enlarged and a new choir added. Finally, it was given over by Henry VIII. to an apostate named Bodkin.
St. Columba's, in Derry, was built in 1164, by King Maurice MacLaughlin. It also had to succumb to the reformers who settled in Ulster, and the present Protestant cathedral of that town was built on its ruins, by the "London Company," in 1633.
The majestic cathedral of Kilkenny, dedicated to St. Canice, was commenced in 1178, by Bishop Felix O'Dullany, and was finished by Bishop St. Leger in 1286. Some years later it was altered and beautified by Bishop Ledred, and at the time of the Reformation was considered one of the most beautifully situated buildings in Europe.
The cathedral of the Holy Trinity, in Waterford, was built about the beginning of the eleventh century. Its subsequent fate is thus related by a recent Protestant writer: [Footnote 301]
[Footnote 301: Ireland and her Churches, by James Godkin.]
"The old cathedral, or rather the oldest part of the first cathedral of Waterford, was built in 1096, by the Ostmen, on their' conversion from paganism; and about two centuries later it was endowed by King John, a dean and chapter having been appointed under the sanction of Innocent III. Endowments of various kinds had accumulated from age to age, till the Reformation, when the old altars were thrown down and the ornaments defaced. During the rebellions and wars that followed, its most costly treasures were carried away, with the brass ornaments of the tombs, the great standing pelican which supported the Bible, the immense candlesticks, six or seven feet high, the great brazen font, which was ascended by three stairs made of solid brass, and various gold and silver-gilt vessels. In 1773 the dean and chapter pronounced the old building so much decayed as to be unsafe for public worship, and unfortunately resolved that the whole pile should be taken down and replaced by a new edifice."
It will be seen that some of those lasting monuments of Irish skill and piety were raised subsequent to the English invasion, but the advent of the Norman soldiers was destined soon to dry up the springs of public munificence, if not to exterminate the old race, and obliterate the faith of St. Patrick. The Anglo-Norman of the twelfth century, though professing Christianity, was at heart as much a pagan as the race from which he sprung. He was brave, cunning, cruel, and rapacious. His greediness could not withstand any inducement to plunder, even though sacrilege had to be added to robbery; and he generally had courage and skill enough to carry out his intentions. He was neither an Englishman nor a Frenchman, but a compound of elements common to the worst classes of both races, super-induced on the genuine, old northern barbarism. He was, in fact, the prototype of the modern filibuster, and, though given to fighting, preferred the spoils to the glory of warfare.Like most of his class in every age and country, he substituted superstition for religion, and became only generous of his goods when death threatened to snatch them from his grasp. When reduced to Protestantism by act of parliament, it is unnecessary to say that even the check of remorse, weak as it was, was removed, and the spoliation of gifts given to God and his poor sat as lightly on his conscience as his coronet or crown sat on his head. Consequently, from the landing of Strongbow and his friends until the Reformation, the wars which ensued against the natives were occasionally diversified by the plunder of a rich abbey, or the burning of a church, while now and then we read of an institution being founded by some repentant lord of the Pale, from which all "mere Irish" were excluded.
There were, indeed, a few men who came into Ireland in the track of its invaders, who were men of true piety. Among these may be classed John Cornin, archbishop of Dublin. It was he who, in 1190, built St. Patrick's collegiate church in that city, and repaired and beautified Holy Trinity; St. Lawrence O'Toole having, eighteen years before, added to its original dimensions by building a choir, belfry, and three chapels. Those two noble buildings are still in use by the Protestants of Dublin, and but little changed since their Catholic days. St. Patrick's has been renovated and improved through the liberality of a public-spirited merchant. Though ever dear to the Catholic hearts of Dublin for its old memories; its fame, since it has fallen into the possession of its present occupants, rests only in its association with the name of the gifted and eccentric Swift, whose flashes of wit and sly sarcasms were wont to arouse his drowsy congregation.
Notwithstanding the impoverished condition of the people, and the insecurity of life and property, during the wars of the twelfth, thirteenth, fourteenth, and early part of the fifteenth centuries, we find the following religious houses established throughout the country: Priories of the Canons Regular of St. Augustin, 20; abbeys of the Cistercian order, 29; convents of the Dominican order, 23; of the Franciscan order, 56; of the Augustan order, 21; of the Carmelite order, 24; commanderies of Knights Templar, 11. This latter order was suppressed about the middle of the fourteenth century, and its property given to the Hospitallers.
But a new era now commenced in the history of the church. To the bitterness of national hate were to be added bloody persecution and wholesale confiscation. Henry VIII. had commenced his quarrel with the pope, and, with the vain intention of revenging himself on his holiness, he turned reformer, initiated a state religion, and unanimously elected himself head of the same. But Henry Tudor had method in his madness, and knew well that the best way to convert his Anglo-Irish subjects was by appealing to their old passion for plunder. Accordingly, his lord deputy, St. Ledger, in 1536, summoned, what was in that age called a parliament, and this assembly, representing nobody but the hirelings about the deputy, with one fell swoop confiscated three hundred and seventy monasteries and abbeys, whose yearly value amounted to £32,000, while their movables amounted to more than three times that amount. A year or two later all religious houses were suppressed and their property turned over to the king.
That this atrocious spoliation of the patrimony of the church and the property of the poor had not even the pretext of being perpetrated to replenish the treasury of an impoverished, state may be inferred from the words of Ware, who, in his life of this new Defender of the Faith, says: "Henry soon after disposed of the possessions of the religious orders to his nobles, courtiers, and others, reserving to himself certain revenue or annual rents."This exhibition of royal magnificence at once convinced the aforesaid "nobles and courtiers" that Henry was the veritable Head of the Church, not only in England, but in Ireland also, and they hastened to accept his gifts and his new religion with equal alacrity. The cathedrals and churches had now to be disposed of. That portion of the laity described as nobles and courtiers was well provided for, and the clergy had to be satisfied; a new religion, Henry wisely thought, would not look well without churches and a hierarchy. Pliant tools of the school of Cranmer and Cromwell were sent over from England, who shielded by the military power of the deputy, and aided by a few apostates of native growth, were fraudulently inducted into Irish sees. While Brown, who had become archbishop of Dublin, was burning in the public streets the sacred image of our crucified Redeemer, taken from the abbey of Ballibogan, and the crosier of St. Patrick, rifled from Holy Trinity; the lord deputy was "gutting" the old cathedral of Down, violating the graves of Ireland's three greatest saints, and destroying their sacred relics. As these acts did not bring enlightenment to the minds of the benighted Catholics, a more general system of devastation was adopted. All the churches were seized and their sacred vessels and ornaments appropriated as legitimate spoils, by the "reformed clergy," while such of the buildings as were not required for the preachers of the new evangel were converted into barracks or stables. The people, though decimated and dispirited by long and disastrous wars, were too much attached to the ancient faith not to resist those iniquitous proceedings; but fire, sword, famine, and pestilence pursued them everywhere, martyred their priests, and laid their homes and their fields desolate.
What Henry commenced, his son, and worthy daughter Elizabeth, followed up; Cromwell's troopers nearly left the country a desert; and the vacillating and treacherous Stuarts added, if possible, to its already degraded condition. So abject was the state of the population in the time of William of Orange, that his penal laws, and those of the house of Hanover subsequently enacted, though in themselves most atrocious, were comparatively harmless, so well had the scythe of persecution been wielded by their predecessors. Even as late as the middle of the last century, the Catholics, still the bulk of the population, were sunk in the most pitiful misery and prostration; their priests churchless and outcasts before the laws, their monks and nuns banished or fled the country; or, if any remained of the once splendid institutions of piety and charity, they were to be found secreted in the purlieus of the larger towns, stealthily attending the sick and consoling, if unable to relieve, the wants of the poor. "No places of public worship were permitted," says the author of the History of Dublin, "and the clergyman moved his altar-books and everything necessary for the celebration of his religious rites from house to house among such of his flock as were enabled in this way to support an itinerant domestic chaplain; while for the poorer part some waste house or stable in a remote or retired situation was selected, and here the service was silently and secretly performed, unobserved by the public eye." Indeed, in many counties the people suffered worse; children were unbaptized, men and women unmarried, the dying deprived of the last consolations of religion, and the poor and infirm left to the cold charity of an unfeeling and hostile minority. The force of persecution could go no further. The experiment of conversion by force had been tried with a vengeance, and had signally failed. It was evident that utter extermination or reaction must follow.
Fortunately for the honor of humanity it was the latter. God was with his people in their afflictions and hearkened to their prayers. Slowly the light of toleration broke upon the darkened minds of the dominant Protestant party, and, though but the merest glimmer at first, gradually and steadily gained in intensity.One hundred and twenty years ago the first chapel tolerated by law was publicly opened in Dublin; the more atrocious of the penal laws fell into disuse; chapels, poor indeed, and monasteries, feeble in their very sense of insecurity, commenced to raise their humble heads. Protestant gentlemen of liberal views found a voice in the Irish and English parliaments. Maynooth and Carlow colleges were established; a great and fearless Catholic, O'Connell, arrayed his coreligionists in solid phalanx in defence of their rights; and, finally, the British government, abashed at the scorn of Christendom, and yielding to fears of internal revolution, consented to emancipation. Of the many causes which led to this tardy act of justice the moral effect of religious freedom in the United States and the conduct of our Catholic immigrants during the revolution were not among the least effective.
Turning from the past with all its varied trials and defeats, it is pleasant to dwell on the condition of Catholic Ireland of to-day, with its churches, monasteries, colleges, and schools innumerable. Of the city of Dublin, where the Reformation made its first attacks, and where, at the beginning of the century, there were but a few poor chapels and "friaries," we find the following picture drawn by one who, though not a Catholic nor of Catholic sympathies, is too clear-minded to shut his eyes to the actual condition of affairs around him. He says: [Footnote 302]
[Footnote 302: Ireland and Her Churches. By James Godkin. This very able book has just been published in England, and, though written by a Protestant and a devoted believer in the opinions of that sect, is full of very valuable information regarding the present condition of the Catholics of Ireland.]
"There are now thirty-two churches and chapels in Dublin and its vicinity. In the diocese the total number of secular clergy is 287, and of regulars, 125; total, priests, 412. The number of nuns is 1150. Besides the Catholic university, with its ample staff of professors, there are in the diocese six colleges, seven superior schools for boys, fourteen superior schools for ladies, twelve monastic primary schools, forty convent schools, and 200 lay schools, without including those which are under the National Board of Education. The Christian Brothers have 7000 pupils under their instruction, while the schools connected with the convents in the diocese contain 15,000. Besides Maynooth, which is amply endowed by the state, and contains 500 or 600 students, all designed for the priesthood, there is the college of All Hallows, at Drumcondra, in which 250 young men are being trained for the foreign mission. The Roman Catholic charities of the city are varied and numerous. There are magnificent hospitals, one of which especially— the Mater Misericordiae—has been not inappropriately called 'The Palace of the Sick Poor'—numerous orphanages, several widows' houses, and other refuges for virtuous women; ragged and industrial schools, night asylums, penitentiaries, reformatories, institutions for the blind and deaf and dumb; institutions for relieving the poor at their own houses, and Christian doctrine fraternities almost innumerable. All these wonderful organizations of religion and charity are supported wholly on the voluntary principle, and they have nearly all sprung into existence within half a century."
Miss Fannie Taylor, an English lady, in a recent work entitled Irish Homes and Irish Hearts, admirably describes, from personal and minute examination, the efficiency, success, and untiring devotion of the numerous orders of holy women, whose houses everywhere are to be found in and around the capital. Every conceivable want, every ill that flesh is heir to, finds at their busy and gentle hands an alleviation and a soothing remedy. The daughters of the rich are taught their duties to themselves and to society; the children of the poor are gratuitously trained in all the necessary arts of life; the orphan has a refuge; the sick are visited and comforted; even the outcast woman, the loathing of the worldly of her own sex, is taken by the hand and gently led back to the path of virtue. Hospitals; asylums for the blind, the deaf and dumb, have been built by them, generally out of their own slender means; and even the raving maniac and drivelling idiot find a shelter and a home. Wherever death, sickness, poverty, ignorance, crime, or affliction is, there also is to be found the "sister," consoling, helping, teaching, admonishing, always gentle, patient, and cheerful."I would speak," said the writer, in her introductory chapter, "of that marvellous net of religious institutions spread over the land, and of those deeds of charity which in reality form a powerful element in Irish life." Words as truthful as they are applicable.
Following Mr. Godkin in what he calls his "Inspection of Bishoprics," (Protestant of course,) we come to the diocese of Ferns, embracing the county of Wexford. "Here, then," says the inspector, "is a population that seems naturally fitted in a preeminent degree for the reception of Protestantism;" but he found himself mistaken. In the very cradle of Catholicity in Ireland he could not find even one out of every ten who even professed to be Protestants. He is equally surprised at the respect and veneration in which our blessed mother was held in this diocese of "industrious, self-reliant, and independent" men, and acknowledges his astonishment gracefully enough:
"I had plenty of proofs of this in the town of Wexford, where there are two splendid new churches, with grand towers, built almost exactly alike, in cathedral style; erected also at the same time, and chiefly through the exertions of the same priest. One of them is called the church of the Immaculate Conception, and the other the church of the Assumption; both, therefore, specially dedicated to the Virgin Mary. There could be no mistake about this in the mind of any one visiting these splendid places of worship, which are fitted up admirably with seats to the very doors, finished in the most approved style, and with a degree of taste that would do honor to the best cathedrals in England. Behind the high altar there is a very large window of stained glass, and a similar one of smaller dimensions at each side. To the right is Mary's chapel, with an altar brilliant and gorgeous in the extreme. There is a beautiful statue of the Virgin and Child, before which three lamps were burning during the day, and in the evening eight or nine dozen of candles are lighted, while ten or twelve vases are filled with a variety of flowers, kept constantly fresh, and producing the most brilliant and dazzling effects for the worshippers, who are nearly all attracted to this favorite altar, the beauty and splendor of which throw the altar of Christ completely in the shade. Generally, indeed, the Saviour appears only agonized on the cross, his hands fastened with nails, and the blood flowing from his pierced side, or else lying dead and ghastly in the sepulchre. It is only the Virgin that appears arrayed in beauty, crowned with majesty, and encircled with glory. Her altar in the Wexford church of the Assumption is decorated in the same style as the Immaculate Conception, but not with so much elaboration. Great local sacrifices must have been made for the erection and furnishing of these two churches, with their magnificent towers and spires, but much of the money came from Great Britain and the colonies; and to a question which I put on the subject to my guide, I received for answer that it came 'from all parts of the habitable world.'
"But, beautiful as those two new churches are, they are surpassed in internal decorations by the Franciscan church of this town. This is a perfect gem in its way so elegantly painted and ornamented, and so nicely kept, so bright and cheering in its aspect, and evincing such regard to comfort in all its arrangements, that we can easily conceive it to be a very popular and fashionable place of worship. It is not cruciform, but built in the shape of an L. To the left of the principal altar, at the junction of the two portions, stands in impressive prominence the altar of the Virgin Mary, which is covered by an elevated canopy, resting upon white and blue pillars with golden capitals. Upon the altar stands a beautiful marble statue of the Virgin. Three lamps burn constantly before it. One hundred candles are lighted round it in the evening with half a dozen gas-burners. Floral ornaments are in the greatest profusion and variety. There are four large stands on the altar floor, two others higher up on the pedestal, and a number of small vases with bouquets ranged on the altar. The friary attached to the church presents a picture of order, neatness, and cleanliness which seemed to be a reflection of the characteristics of the 'English baronies,' showing how national idiosyncrasies and social circumstances affect religion. In fact, a community of Quakers could not keep their establishment in better order than these Franciscans keep their friary. I observed a great contrast in this respect in the Roman Catholic establishments of Waterford and Thurles. Wexford, indeed, is quite a model town in the Roman Catholic Church. There are three other places of worship besides those already mentioned—the college chapel and the nunnery chapels, and certainly there are no people in the world, perhaps, not excepting the Romans themselves, more abundantly supplied with masses. There is a mass for workingmen at five o'clock in the morning, there are masses daily during the week at later hours, and no less than six or seven on Sundays in each of the principal chapels, or churches as they are now generally called. The college is a large building, and in connection with it is the residence of the bishop, Dr. Furlong."