ON ST. MOCTEUS OR MOCHTEUS,
BISHOP OF LOUTH IN IRELAND,
About the YEAR 535.
PRELIMINARY COMMENTARY.
Mocteus or Mochteus, bishop of Louth in Ireland (St.)
BY J. P.
§ I. The Saint's name, disciples, and monasteries; whether he was bishop of Armagh.
When we give this holy Bishop on this day, we are discharging the pledge of a promise: for at the XXIV day of March these things were long since said among those Passed Over in our work, volume III of the same month, page 474, The name of this Saint, deferred hither from the 24th day of March which it is helpful to recall here: St. Mochteus or Mochta, bishop of Louth, has his name on this day in the Irish Martyrologies, and therefore Colgan gave his Acts here from a codex
of ours copied at Salamanca: which, since they are not so full or genuine as we could wish to obtain, and since he is also commemorated on the XIX day of August in the Irish hagiologies, and since Ussher, Ware, and the Four Masters name that day as his birthday, according to Colgan, we defer treating of him until the said XIX of August. Now therefore the deeds of that Saint must be illustrated and examined by us, we being about to take most of our matter from the notes of the aforesaid Colgan, which he appended to his Life from page 731, and from the Appendix after the said notes, page 732 and following. Let us begin then from the various formation of his name, concerning which that author writes this with some labor:
[2] is expressed in various ways. This most holy Prelate's name is expressed variously by various writers. Jocelin calls him Moccheus in the Life of Patrick, chapters 134 and 135; Pits, Possevino, Bale, Gesner, and others, to be cited below in the Appendix, chapter 2, call him Maccaeus; Gennadius, Bachiarius; Honorius of Autun, Bachianus; St. Adamnan in the Life of St. Columba, as it was published by Canisius, Maueteus; but in the Biburg manuscript Mauctaneus, and in the first Antwerp edition he calls him Mocteus. By the Irish everywhere, as also by the author of this Life, he is called Mochteus, and sometimes Macteus, and more correctly. For in Irish he is everywhere called Mochta, and sometimes Machta. But what Pits, Gesner, Bale, and others hand down, that his proper name was Bacchiarius, and that he was called Maccaeus by surname, is not approved by us. For we judge that so many and so various expressions of the same name arose from the errors of copyists. Thus Colgan, who at once adduces other placings of letters for others. But enough has already been said of niceties of this kind. I note, however, that I have above expressed the name of Mocteus, as I everywhere read it in our Salamanca manuscript codex, although Colgan in his printed Life repeatedly has Macteus. Nor does Mochteus displease me, as I find it written elsewhere, as will be clear from what is to be said.
[3] Concerning our Saint's disciples the aforesaid Colgan observes various things. Who his disciple For as to their number of twelve, of which the Life in our text speaks in chapter 1, number 3, Behold, he says, this Apostolic custom of a twelvefold number of disciples, especially familiar to our truly Apostolic fathers before all the Saints of the world, and first received from the Apostolic See itself: which is read to have sent, not only with St. Mocteus, but also with St. Palladius, the same number of companions for the conversion of our nation, as I have shown in the Acts in the Life of St. Suithbert, and in its notes, at the I of March: where I have also recorded very many other bands of twelve colleagues under one leader sent by our Saints for the conversion of the nations, there to be seen. But who was that Edanus of whom the Life of our Saint just cited treats, and to whom it attributes a great miracle, which it records to have been done thus at the bidding of holy Mocteus: And when the Saint came to the Irish sea, forgetting a certain Edanus, who had been separated from the brethren for some cause, he went on board the ship; to whom afterwards, as he cried out for passage, he bade him use a branch cut from a tree in place of a ship. He obeys the Master's orders … he sits upon the branch, he crosses the waters; nay, he even outstrips the ship, and receives the Master in the harbor. Who, I say, was that disciple Edanus, or, as Colgan notes on this passage, more correctly Aedanus or Aidanus?
[4] That he labors in determining this among so many others of the same name, may have been; the same author does not conceal, speaking thus: But who this man may have been of the twenty-four Saints of the same name, whose birthdays are observed in our Martyrologies and calendars, is not easy to define; unless he be, as I judge him to be, St. Aidanus, son of Aengus, whom Marianus Gorman, the Donegal martyrologist, and others record as honored in the church of Kill-mor Aedhain in the region of Huadmeth, or of the Methians, on the 2nd day of November. For in this region St. Mocteus built the first church in Ireland, called Kill-mor, as is stated in this Life, chapter 4 (but in our text, chapter 1, number 4). Whence that St. Aedanus, whom the Martyrologies observe as honored in it, does not seem to be other than the aforesaid disciple of St. Mocteus its founder.
[5] Another difficulty which occurs in the Life consists in this, others likewise that it scarcely seems credible that so many and so distinguished disciples came frequently to the Saint as the author of the Life records in our text, chapter 1, number 7. For not to speak, he says, of the multitude of the rest of his progeny, which was without number, he is said to have had as disciples a hundred bishops and three hundred presbyters. But Colgan meets this difficulty and resolves it with these sufficiently probable arguments. To some perhaps this number of a hundred bishops and three hundred presbyters coming forth from one school might seem too excessive: but if they consider the matter more deeply, there is here no place for doubting. From the disciples of a Master most ancient of days, successively frequenting his most celebrated school, so great a number could easily arise: nor, if he had had so many disciples at once, afterwards ordained bishops and presbyters, ought this to move any wonder in one who has read that three thousand monks in the same or the immediately following age were under St. Brendan; as many or more under St. Comgall; likewise that three thousand holy disciples frequented the school of St. Finnian of Clonard, as is clear from what we have said at the XXIII of February in treating of St. Finnian; and as we shall say in the Acts of St. Comgall and St. Brendan at the X and XVI of May (that is, if the Acts of the Saints of Ireland had been carried so far).
[6] almost beyond belief numerous: But where, you say, are so many episcopal sees in a narrow kingdom, in which not even forty are found today? I answer, that kingdom in that age was far more flourishing, abounded in far more cities, towns, villages, and riches, and almost every town had its more celebrated monasteries, and sometimes villages had their own bishops, as is plainly clear to one who reads the Acts of our Saints, and especially of St. Patrick, in which Jocelin, chapter 185, and St. Evin, part 3, chapter 95, relate that St. Patrick ordained with his own hand three hundred and fifty bishops and five thousand presbyters, and founded seven hundred churches. And that St. Mochteus had so many disciples is reported by St. Columba and other weighty authors, to be cited below in the Appendix, chapters 1 and 3. Further, as so many and so great disciples begot a great name in Ireland for our Bishop, so the foundations of monasteries, of which I shall now speak, furnished matter for no common praise to him.
[7] the monasteries Our biographer, chapter 1, number 4, says: Mocteus began to build in the woods of the Methians a monastery which is called the Great Cell. Colgan explains this place, writing thus: The region of the Methians, commonly called Hua-Meth, is in the diocese of Armagh in Ulster; and in it, as he adds, there is seen today (Colgan was publishing the Acts of the Saints of Ireland in the year of Christ 1645) the aforesaid church called Kill-mor, that is, the Great Cell, sacred to St. Aedanus; from whom, for distinction's sake, it is called Kill-mor-Aedain. But lest what he had rightly begun should fall away, although he himself was the rector, he himself the rule of the brethren, according to the biographer alleged, yet lest anything of this religious observance should be neglected through any forgetfulness, and that it might persist without failure not only among those present but also among those to come, he wrote a rule of holy institution. But of what kind that rule was is not known to us, nor was it to Colgan, who relates only this concerning it: Here observe that St. Mocteus was the founder of a peculiar rule, as are read to have been also Saints Patrick, Brigid, Brendan, Ailbe, Columba Kille, Comgall, Kieran, Adamnan, and several others of our sacred island.
[8] built by him. The holy Man likewise built another monastery, as the writer of his Life testifies, who in chapter 1, numbers 5 and 6, relates this: He himself directed his steps to a place named Lughmud \. For he had long since foreknown that this place was given him by God … But Mocteus began to build, and constructed a most noble monastery: whose etymology and situation Colgan thus sets forth: This monastery, which seems more correctly Lugh magh, that is, the field of Lugus; unless more truly Lubh magh, that is, the grassy field; and now … is called Luthia; lies in that pleasant and spacious plain of southern Ulster which was called by the ancients Conaille, and today commonly Machaire-Oirgiall, that is, the plain of the Oirgiellians: and there is there a noble monastery of the Order of Canons Regular, and formerly it was an episcopal see, according to what is to be said in the Appendix; and from it the surrounding region is now named the County of Louth.*
[9] He was not properly bishop of Armagh, It may here be asked whether St. Mocteus ought to be reckoned among the Prelates of Armagh. Occasion for the question is given by the writer of the Life, who, after he had related in chapter 1, number 8, that St. Patrick the pontiff had at one time begun to dwell near our Saint's monastery, but at an angel's warning had departed from it, subjoins this: And Mocteus governed the see after him for some days, and enthroned Benignus, his disciple. But to the question proposed Colgan gives this answer: The name of St. Mochteus is not found in the catalogue of the primates or archbishops of Armagh. Nor is this strange, since he presided only for a few days, and perhaps until provision should be made for a successor. In the tripartite Life of St. Patrick, part 2, chapter 97, it is read that St. Mochteus was St. Patrick's ARCHPRESBYTER, and St. Secundinus his VICAR IN SPIRITUALS AND SUFFRAGAN. And although St. Benignus succeeded St. Patrick, and perhaps immediately, yet in the catalogue of the primates he is placed third after Patrick, namely after St. Secundinus and St. Patrick surnamed the elder. Which I judge was done because each successively was suffragan of St. Patrick, and the two former are read to have died before Patrick the apostle himself; whom, on his death, as is here indicated, St. Benignus immediately succeeded, after bishop Mochteus had administered the vacant see for some days, until by common suffrages a successor should be provided. Hence it follows that our holy Prelate is not to be numbered among the primates of the see of Armagh.
[10] He was nevertheless bishop of Lugmad, or by whatever other form of letters you may express this place. but of Lugmad. That this dignity truly belongs to him I do not indeed read expressly stated by the biographer, except in the title of the Life itself, which runs thus: Here begins the Life of St. Mocteus, bishop of Lubgunum. But that episcopal office will nevertheless be confirmed afterwards from other sources, both from the sacred calendars which we shall produce, and from other documents, of which there will occur a place to speak below, so that, being established by the assent of very many writers, it ought not to be called into doubt. It remains for us to proceed hence to certain other points pertaining to the life and sanctity of St. Mocteus.
Annotations.\ elsewhere Lughmadh*.
§ II. His cult attached to various days; the saints of the same name distinct from ours; the time of his life.
Two feasts of St. Mochteus, on the 24th of March and the 19th of August Camerarius, at the VII day of October, announces the Saint thus, liberally enough after his manner: St. Maccaeus, who went forth from Scotland with St. Patrick. Of him various writers. See his Life. Colgan in the Appendix to the Life of St. Mochteus, page 732, meets the said hagiologist with these words: But since this author could nowhere have read either his Life, or that he is honored on that day, or that he went forth from Scotland with Patrick, nor do I find anything recorded of these matters either in the Life which we have given above or in any other author, I pass on to the testimonies of other ancient writers about St. Mochteus and his feasts. Presently therefore he turns aside to the two chief days of his annual veneration, and discourses about them in these words: That at least two feasts of St. Mochteus were formerly wont to be celebrated in Ireland, our Festilogies commonly, even the very ancient ones, relate. The first on the XXIV of March, on which the Martyrology of Tallaght, compiled before the year 785, writes thus of him: "St. Mocteus of Lugmad: Cumain was his mother's name." St. Aengus: "Mocteus the faithful and devout." Marianus Gorman: "Mocteus of Lugmad, father of an excellent family." The Cashel Calendar: "Mocteus, bishop of Lugmad." Of him also Maguire and the Donegal Martyrology have similar things on the same day. These things he adduces concerning the Saint's first feast; but concerning the other, this, proceeding thus:
[12] were wont to be celebrated: whether the namesakes, The second feast is celebrated on the XIX of August; on which Marianus Gorman treats of him, saying: "Mochteus the bishop, lamp of the men of Lugmad." The Martyrology of Tallaght: "Mocteus, bishop of Lugmad." St. Aengus in his Festilogy: "Mocteus, great, excellent, and long-lived." Maguire adds: "He is called long-lived on account of the great length of his life." He also subjoins certain verses … by which it is signified that St. Mocteus lived three hundred years. Likewise the Donegal Martyrology: "St. Mocteus, bishop of Lugmad: he lived three hundred years, and passed to the Lord in the year 534." He also cites in the same place the verses mentioned. But of so great an age of the Saint, extended beyond belief, there will be fuller discussion below, when we shall have given the rest which Colgan goes on to relate concerning the other sacred days, which nevertheless he judges to belong not to this St. Mocteus but to others of the same name, laying it down thus: On two other days also I find the memory of St. Mocteus observed by our domestic Festilogies, namely on the XXVI day of March, on which Marianus Gorman, Cathal Maguire, and the Donegal Martyrology relate that the feast of St. Mocteus of Inismochta, that is, of the island of Mocteus, is celebrated. But since this island is in the County of Louth, not far from the very monastery of Louth, it might seem that it is the same St. Mocteus who dwelt and is honored in both places. Moreover, that the feast of St. Mocteus, son of Derganus, is celebrated on the IX of September, the authors just cited and the Martyrology of Tallaght relate.
[13] who are assigned to other days, But the reasons by which Colgan is led to separate these two Saints of the same name from our present one are these: Yet I think it truer, he says, that they are two other Mocteuses who are honored on these days. For him who is honored on the XXVI of March I judge to be St. Mocteus, presbyter of Armagh: concerning whose death the Four Masters write thus in their Annals: "In the year 922 Mocteus of the Island, son of Kernachan, presbyter of Armagh, died." For this island does not seem to be other than that which the Martyrologies cited above call the Island of Mocteus. Likewise he who is honored on the IX of September seems to be St. Mochteus, bishop and doctor of Armagh, of whom at the year 876 these things are read in the same Annals: "Mocteus the master, or supreme prefect of the schools of Armagh, is taken by the Northmen or Danes": and they report his death in the year 889, saying in that same year: "Mocteus, disciple of St. Fethgna, bishop, anchorite, and scribe of Armagh, died" — where by scribe he means a writer, especially a chronographer. For in most monasteries, at least the chief ones, and in the episcopal sees of Ireland, there was formerly a certain man held in great honor, who was commonly called sometimes FERLEGINN, that is, prelector or master or doctor; and sometimes SCRIBHNIDH, that is, scribe, writer, or chronographer.
[14] distinct from our present Saint. Ferrarius, in his general Catalogue of the Saints who are not in the Roman Martyrology, writes this at the XI day of April in his notes: On the same day, in the island of Bura, of St. Maccaeus, prophet, disciple of St. Patrick, bishop of Ireland. And likewise in his notes at the V day of October: On the same day, of St. Maccaeus, in a Caledonian fortress, disciple of St. Patrick. Colgan saw these things; but because what he has is printed faultily in his book, I have preferred to exhibit them here more correctly from Ferrarius himself. But the same Colgan corrects them thus on page 733: But since he seems to have taken these things from the fabrications of Dempster, who is wont to attribute places of cult and feasts to the Saints at his pleasure, they are to me of suspect credit. One may consult Dempster in the Scottish Menology at the XI day of April and at the V of October. For the rest, as the Irish hagiographer, already so often praised, presently observes, whether it be the birthday feast or another of St. Mocteus that the Martyrologies cited relate to be celebrated at the XXIV day of March, is to me, he says, unknown. The Four Masters, Ussher, and Ware, to be cited below, indicate that his birthday is celebrated on the XIX day of August, inasmuch as they assert that he died in the year 534, on the XIX day of August, according to what is to be said in chapter 3.
[15] But no small controversy now presents itself to us concerning St. Mochteus's age, The age of three hundred years, which commonly among the writers who treat of it is stretched to three hundred years; with what appearance of truth, I do not for my part sufficiently grasp. The Irish hagiographer, in the Appendix alleged, chapter 3, page 734, heaps up the foundations of that opinion in these words: That St. Mochteus lived three hundred years in this mortal life is related by the author of his Life above, chapter 19; but in our edition, chapter 2, number 17, where these words stand: For three hundred years he is said neither to have uttered any idle word nor to have tasted anything rich. Besides the author of the Life, there are also adduced by Colgan Jocelin in the Life of St. Patrick, chapter 35 … Maguire at the XXIV of March and the XIX of August; the Donegal Martyrology at the XVI of August; the Four Masters in their Annals at the year 534, according to what is presently to be said, and Keating On the Kings of Ireland, book 2, treating of King Tuathal; and (what is the chief foundation of this assertion) certain little verses in our ancient tongue, which Maguire, the Donegal Martyrology, and the Four Masters cite in their Annals, nay even St. Aengus, or his old scholiast, asserting besides that St. Columba Kille is their author … Which verses, rendered into Latin, exhibit this sense: The teeth of Mocteus … for the space of three hundred years … neither sent forth an idle word without, nor admitted any dainty within, etc. In confirmation, moreover, of that opinion he produces the following: This prodigious prolongation of human life might seem incredible to many, unless what made its excessive length less incredible were that it is attributed not to the powers of nature but to a miracle, as Jocelin reports, to be cited below on another occasion. Thus he in defense of St. Mochteus's age of three hundred years.
[16] But the same author, who neither in collecting the Acts of the Saints of Ireland nor in illustrating them ought in the least to be held suspect of wishing anything to be detracted from the true praises of those Heavenly ones, not only does not approve as historically true the opinion of so long-lived an age, which is everywhere spread abroad, as we have seen, in which our Saint is said to have lived, but even overthrows that prodigious length of years with these arguments: Three arguments indeed, he says, render it suspect to me. The first, that the Four Masters in their Annals report that St. Mochteus died in the year 534, saying at that same year: "St. Mochteus, bishop of Lugmad, disciple of Patrick, gave up the spirit on the XIX day of August." They then subjoin the little verses already cited. The same thing Ware also relates, On the Writers of Ireland, book 2, chapter 1. "He governed that see," he says, "until the year 535, or 534, in which he left this life on the XIII Kalends of September." He adds likewise Ussher, who On the Origins of the British Churches, page 855, reports these things, transcribed hither by me from Ussher himself, because they are printed faultily in Colgan: The Annals of Ulster, he says, make mention of him: in which at the year of the Lord 534, or 536 according to others (that is, of our usual era 535 or 537), "The falling asleep of St. Muchtus, or Mochta, disciple of Patrick, on the XIII Kalends of September," is reported. And presently, concerning his age here in controversy, he subjoins this: For what Jocelin narrates in chapter 135, that by St. Patrick's sentence his life was prolonged, in punishment of his unbelief, to three hundred years, is certainly worthy to have a place among the other prodigies, ASTONISHING BY THEIR UNHEARD-OF NOVELTY, in William Thyraeus's Panegyrical Discourses on St. Patrick, pages 124, 125, which, if you please, consult. From these things meanwhile we can argue thus with Colgan: If therefore this Saint died in 534 or 535, and is nowhere read to have flourished in the third century, or even the fourth, how shall we grant him three hundred years of life? Thus he.
[17] is attacked Then, however, against the little verses, which are the chief foundation of the age thus asserted, he brings forward a second argument, by which he proves that an error of number crept into them. The second is, he says, that St. Cuimine of Connor, in his little Work reviewing the special virtues and eulogies of some of the chief Saints of Ireland, in reckoning the years in which St. Mocteus lived, at least after embracing Religion or the monastic institute, assigns him only a hundred years, as this old verse composed by him testifies; and, rendered into Latin in Colgan, it runs thus: Mochteus of Lugmad had it for his custom, out of the rigor and austerity of his life, that he tasted no dainty for the space of A HUNDRED years. Which being recited, the editor of the Acts of the Saints of Ireland concludes from it: We have therefore from a faithful and ancient writer, who flourished nine hundred, if not a thousand, years ago, that St. Mochteus lived only a hundred years in so great austerity of life: but that he lived before that in the world for two hundred years, no author relates, nor does it carry any appearance of truth. What then shall we say to the ancient little verses cited above, attributed to St. Columba, and to the other authors who write that he lived three hundred years? I answer, first, by a conjecture, if not altogether certain, at least probable, that an error seems to have crept into the aforesaid verses: and presently, exhibiting two various readings, written in a script foreign to us, that is Irish, For the first reading, he says, signifies FOR THE SPACE OF THREE HUNDRED; but the second, FOR THE SPACE OF A HUNDRED YEARS. The first, therefore, the faulty reading, the authors cited above seem to have followed, thinking that that opinion was St. Columba's; but the second, St. Cuimine, who lived in the time of St. Columba, or in the century immediately following, and the Annals cited above.
[18] by Colgan I would not, however, deny that St. Mochteus lived more than a hundred years, especially since St. Aengus, cited above in chapter 1, calls him LONG-LIVED: and others calling him Bacchiarius or Bacchianus relate that he flourished in the time of St. Augustine before the year 430; but I assert only that he seems to have lived only for the space of a hundred years in that great austerity of life of which we spoke above, after he had embraced the monastic institute. Let us grant, then, that he was thirty years old or more before he began that strict manner of living, and afterwards lived a hundred years: and thus most of the things which men assert about him with any foundation will be able to cohere well. A third argument confirming this is that no Life of any Saint, of the countless who flourished in the sixth and seventh centuries in the regions neighboring Ireland, and no historian at all, relates that he lived after the time given by the Annals cited above. Add that the Life of St. Dageus, in the words cited in the preceding chapter, relates that St. Dageus, who died full of years in the year 586, administered the viaticum to him as he was dying; and that Keating above relates that he died in the time of King Tuathal, who died in the year 538. And these indeed are the things which it seemed good to transcribe hither from Colgan's collection and on his credit: but on these matters, what occurs to me to be observed I shall now say in a few words.
[19] His opinion pleases me, by which he rejects that chronological paradox of three centuries. who, however, extends it liberally enough. Yet in this I do not agree with him, that he liberally enough extends that age to a hundred and thirty, or even to more years besides. For why could our Saint not truly be called long-lived, even if he had survived only to the hundred and twentieth year of his life? Why likewise should the other arguments which Colgan produced not stand on this footing, namely that St. Dageus gave him the viaticum; that he died in the time of King Tuathal, and so, according to what has been said, before the year of Christ 538? If, however, it were established that he flourished in the time of St. Augustine before the year 430, then, I confess, the addition of thirty years, or even of more beyond a hundred, would have to be granted him with Colgan, because he is reported to have departed this life in the year of Christ 534, according to the chronological Catalogue excerpted from the Annals of the Four Masters, and published in the aforesaid Colgan in the Appendix mentioned above, chapter 5, where these words are read: In the year 534 Mochteus, bishop of Lugmad, disciple of St. Patrick, died on the XIX day of August. But others, as we noted before, mark another year, differing however only slightly from that just named. But that it is doubtful whether our St. Mochteus flourished in the time of St. Augustine we shall see when we treat of his writings. In the meantime let us discuss the famous prophecy which is said to have been uttered by St. Patrick concerning him, his unbelief being punished by that long old age.
§ III. The prophecy which is reported to have been uttered by St. Patrick concerning our Saint seems more probably of doubtful credit; our Saint's own prophecies.
The prophecy by which St. Patrick is reported to have foretold In the Life of St. Patrick by Jocelin, published by us in volume II of March, at the XVII day, chapter 14, page 567, the matter is narrated in these words: When some days had rolled by, while the book of Genesis was being read in the presence of St. Mochteus, hearing that the holy Fathers before the flood lived for the space of nine hundred years or more, and that after the cataclysm several lived more than three hundred years, he did not readily give credence to the sacred History, because he asserted that the clay tabernacle of the human body, clothed with such frail flesh and skin, compacted of bones and sinews, could in no wise last so long a time. And when this had become known to St. Patrick, he went to the Man, that by true assertions of reasons he might remove from his mind all scruple of this kind. For St. Patrick said that all Canonical Scripture had been dictated and written by the finger of God, and therefore that nothing at all should be detracted from it or disbelieved in it. He asserted also that it was no more difficult for the Maker of all things to prolong the life of a man for the space of a thousand years than for a single day, if he willed; since, as the Psalmist witnesses, "A thousand years before his eyes are as yesterday, which is past."
[21] that our Saint would live three hundred years, But when the Man still wavered upon these things which had been said by St. Patrick, the holy Pontiff is reported to have pronounced, giving sentence, or rather prophesying: "Since," he said, "you were unbelieving toward sacred Scripture, you shall learn by your own experience that what is contained in it is true: for your years shall be prolonged upon the earth for three hundred years, nor before so great a space of time is completed shall you enter into the joy of the Lord your God." And the servant of the Lord afterwards repented of the error of his doubt; but the sentence uttered by Patrick's mouth, at the dictation of the Holy Spirit, proved irrevocable: for St. Mochteus lived three hundred years, and so, paying the debt of nature, shining with virtues and signs, passed from the world to Christ. These are the things that passed between those two Saints, if that prophecy deserves full historical credit; which I add because there are certain things which seem to tell against it. Let us weigh them one by one for a moment.
[22] is weighed First. St. Patrick flourished in the fifth century; but Jocelin undertook to compile his Life only after the year 1180, from what has been said by us in the Preliminary Commentary to that Saint's Acts, page 521; so that so great a distance of time does not much commend the authority of that collector, especially in a matter so paradoxical in its circumstances. Further, that the Life which goes about under Jocelin's name is in places interpolated and sprinkled with fables, and in places suspect, we long since indicated in our notes upon it in the volume cited, pages 556 and 576, which see likewise in the Appendix after the Life published by us, page 584. Secondly. Concerning St. Mochteus's age, prolonged by St. Patrick to three hundred years in punishment of his unbelief, we indicated in the notes alleged, page 569, for readers' caution, in these words: How deceptive Irish numbers are we have already seen (see the Preliminary Commentary, §§6 and 7) and shall further see in the Appendix. But there is no need to add more in this place about that portentous age, since it has already been sufficiently and more than sufficiently overthrown above. Thirdly. As that prophecy is very honorable to St. Patrick, and was perhaps devised for this end by some man or other and stuffed into that Saint's Acts, so it seems little probable, not to say unseemly, on St. Mochteus's part. For a greater and grosser ignorance, not free even from a certain obstinacy of an unbelieving will, seems to be imputed by it to that Saint than can fall upon a man so distinguished in life and character, and so thoroughly versed in sacred Letters.
[23] and rejected. Fourthly. We know indeed that that prediction cannot be convicted by us of certain falsity in substance, since in truth it could have happened: but we know also that it is one thing altogether if a man asks whether it could have happened, and another whether it actually did happen. And this last appears to us less probable for the reasons already produced. Fifthly. What of this, that even Colgan himself, no fastidious censor otherwise of Irish prodigies, in chapter 2 of the Appendix to the Life of St. Mochteus, after he had recited among other things from Jocelin the text of the above prophecy, notices that this is recorded by Jocelin alone, candidly confessing that he finds nothing of it in St. Evin and the other ancient writers of the Acts of St. Patrick. Thus far of that prophecy, and more than enough. Here now are for you some eulogies of St. Mochteus extracted from various writers.
[24] In Colgan, in the Trias Thaumaturga, in the seventh or tripartite Life of St. Patrick, The praises of St. Mochteus, which is attributed to St. Evin, part 3, page 162, our holy Prelate is praised in these words: While St. Patrick was staying in the aforesaid monastery of Ard, St. Mocteus, a Briton by birth, fixed his seat and built a monastery in a neighboring place commonly called Lugmhang: between whom and St. Patrick there passed frequent conversations, mutual visits, and many other offices of spiritual friendship. For they were often wont to meet beside a certain rock commonly called Leach-Mochta, that is, the rock of Mochteus, and to confer together about the things that pertain to God. But on a certain day, while they were sitting in that place, an angel of the Lord, appearing, held out a letter to be read by both: which Patrick, reading, found in it an admonition, or more truly a precept of the Lord, by which it was commanded him that he should leave to St. Mocteus the place which he had built, with all its appurtenances, and that he himself should betake himself to Macha, or, as we say today, Armagh, there to build the cathedral church and metropolis of the kingdom. And the servant of God did what had been commanded, and left and commended to St. Mochteus, to be supported, twelve lepers to whom he devoutly ministered for Christ in that place. One may also consult Jocelin in the Life of St. Patrick in our work, in the place cited above.
[25] In the second Life of St. Columba or Columban the abbot, and his prophecies. which in the aforementioned Trias Thaumaturga, by an author supposed to be St. Cuimine, is given from page 325, it is said near the beginning of that Life: The most holy Moctaeus also, bishop of Lugmad, foretold that same Columba sixty years beforehand, by the revelation of the Holy Spirit. In the second Preface to the fourth Life of the same St. Columba, page 336, St. Adamnan, the author of that Life, makes mention of the same prophecy in these words: A certain British sojourner, a holy man, disciple of St. Patrick the bishop, Mauctaneus by name, thus prophesied of our patron, as it has been handed down to us by the ancients and is known for certain to those who have proved it: "In the last times of the world," he said, "a son shall be born, whose name, Columba, shall be spread abroad and known through all the provinces of the islands of the ocean, and shall brightly illumine the last times of the world. The little fields of my monastery and of his shall be divided by the interval of a single little hedge. He is a man very dear to God, and of great merit before him." Various other prophecies of this our Saint are noted in the Life of St. Dageus, published by us at the XVIII day of this month from page 656, which may be read there in chapter 1 of that Life, number 2. Hence it is plain that the title of prophet, with which we saw above that our Prelate is honored by writers, was rightly and deservedly bestowed on him. And that the prophecies uttered by this Man of God were neither rare nor sparing is indicated by the Life of St. Dageus just alleged, number 4, since it calls him full of the prophetic spirit.
§ IV. His writings and his Life are examined.
Concerning the lucubrations, If it were certainly established that the various formations of the name which are attributed to this our Saint truly belong to him alone and not to another, his writings could be treated with greater foundation. But because this is not certainly established, therefore certain little works or lucubrations are ascribed to him as doubtful by Colgan in the Appendix assigned above, chapter 4, in which he weaves a catalogue of them from various bibliographers. It is helpful therefore to hear him on the subject
discoursing on this subject. Above, he says, in the notes, number 1 (but in our text above, §1, number 2) we noted that the name of St. Mochteus is expressed variously by writers: for they call him now Mocteus, Macteus; now Bachiarius, Baitharius, Batchianus, Batchanus; and sometimes Mauctanus, Maucteus, Mochta; and Pits On the Writers of England, number 37, Bale, century 1, number 46, Gesner in his Library, and others add that Bacchiarius is called Macceus. But those names I read expressed a little differently in the said authors: for in Pits he is called Bacharius Maccaeus; in Bale, Bachiarius Macceus; but in Gesner, Barchiarius Macceus, whom, as he adds, some call Bacciarius, others Bacchianus. Ussher, On the Origins of the British Churches, chapter 17, affirms that Macceus the prophet, and so, from what has been said above, our Saint, is wrongly confounded by John Bale (and by Nicholas Harpsfield and John Pits, who follow him here) with Bachiarius; whose letter to Januarius, On Receiving the Lapsed, is extant, and another little book of whose, On Faith, Gennadius writes that he has read. This confusion Ware also holds, On the Writers of Ireland, book 2, chapter 1: but neither the one nor the other there proves it.
[27] which to this Saint, And indeed I do not see, says Colgan, why the authors cited should have presumed to distinguish St. Macteus with both names, unless they had so read in some ancient writers, or in the titles of his Works, or at least had noticed that one and the same work was entitled sometimes under the name of Bacchiarius, sometimes under the name of Macceus or Macteus. With whom Nicholas Harpsfield also agrees, in the Ecclesiastical History of England, century 1 (nay, among those things which he records in century 6), chapter 22, where he relates that Bacciarius was a Briton by race and a disciple of St. Patrick, and wrote "a certain book, in which he gives an account to Leo, the Roman Pontiff, against the calumnies about his pilgrimage, and certain other things pertaining to theology." Whence it has seemed good to enumerate under doubt among his works those things which are attributed to Bacchiarius, or Macceus Mocteus, or to one man under both names.
[28] under different But neither by Ussher nor by Ware, who were asserting the confusion just mentioned, do I see any doubt raised concerning a letter written by our St. Mochteus. Understand the matter from the words of both already alleged. For Ussher reports this: There was also extant a letter of our Mochteus, bearing this superscription: "Mauchteus (elsewhere Mochthaeus), a sinner, presbyter, disciple of St. Patrick, greeting in the Lord." The Annals of Ulster make mention of it, etc. But Ware, assigning the Annals of Ulster to the year 534 and relating the same things, says: He wrote a letter, of which this was the superscription: "Maucteus, a sinner, presbyter, disciple of St. Patrick, greeting in the Lord." And presently he adds this: He seems also to have composed another work: for he it was (I suppose) whom I find cited thus in the Annals of Ulster: "In the year 471 the first plunder of the Saxons was carried off from Ireland, as others say, in that year, as Macteus says. Thus I found it in the book of Cuanach." Which passage of the Annals Colgan thus explains: But that the Mocteus who is here indicated, and who wrote some Chronicle, may not be thought by anyone not to have been our man of Lugmad but that scribe and master of Armagh who died in the year 889, according to what has been said above in chapter 1 (see what I said before, §2, number 13), let him note that that Cuanus who cites his work was scribe and bishop of Lugmad, who died in the year 823, as will appear from what is to be said in the following chapter. (For there is adduced there a Chronicle of the church of Lugmad or Louth and of its Prelates, in which this is noted: In 823 Cuana, or Cuanus, a wise man and bishop of Lugmad, rested in the Lord.) And so Colgan presently concludes: Whence, since he died many years before Mocteus of Armagh, he seems to cite the Chronicle not of him nor of any other than of his own patron and predecessor.
[29] But the other Works which are recorded either under one name or under two different ones names I review from the bibliographers. Gennadius of Marseilles, who flourished in the fifth century, in Miraeus, Ecclesiastical Library, chapter 24, page 50, writes thus: Bachiarius, a man of Christian philosophy, purposing to be free for God stripped \ and unencumbered, chose even pilgrimage for the preservation of the integrity of his life. He is said to have published pleasing little works: but I have read only one of them, a little book on faith: in which he gives satisfaction to the Pontiff of the City against the complainers and defamers of his pilgrimage, and shows that he undertook that pilgrimage not from fear of men but of God, that, going out from his land and from his kindred, he might become a co-heir of the patriarch Abraham.*
[30] Honorius of Autun, who flourished in the twelfth century, expressions in the same Miraeus, in the second little book gathered from Gennadius, chapter 24, page 117, says: Bachiarius, a man polished and unencumbered in Christian philosophy, published pleasing little works on faith. Observe in passing that nothing is said by these two writers about Macceus: whence then did the more recent writers draw it? Whence so many other writings? Of which I shall now speak. But the more recent have handed down these things to memory. In the supplement to the epitome of Gesner's Library this is found: Barchiarius Macceus, disciple of St. Patrick, a Briton by nation, wrote to Januarius, On the Restoration of the Lapsed, or On the Fruit of Penance, book 1. On Persevering Faith, book 1. Prognostics of Nativities, book 1. This last he published as a young man, while he was engaged in mathematics. He flourished in the year of salvation 460. Some call him Bacciarius, others Bacchianus … The book On Receiving the Lapsed was printed in volume 1 of the Orthodoxographa at Basel. Pits, number 37, speaks thus: Bacharius Maccaeus, a Briton by nation, disciple of St. Patrick, gave his labor to good letters in the academy of Léon, a distinguished prophet, a most skilled mathematician: whose writings he then enumerates. By the peculiarities which he adds he seems to indicate our present St. Mochteus; but when he affirms that he gave his labor to good letters in the academy of Léon, which he perhaps drew from Bale, he does not seem to speak sufficiently agreeably to his Life, which says thus: An angel of the Lord … taught him the elements of letters; and charged him, saying: "Seek Rome, and there learn the sacred Scripture" … And he departed, and arriving there happily, applied himself to divine studies.
[31] Possevino, in his Sacred Apparatus, distinguishes Bacciarius from Maccaeus: the meaning not sufficiently for he names the writings of the former; but the latter he says is unknown to him, using these words: Maccaeus, who is said to have been a disciple of St. Patrick, and a Briton by nation, and a prophet, since he has not come into my hands, I ought to pass no judgment upon him. But as to what they assert, that he published a book On Persevering Faith, and another On the Judgments of Nativities; if he rightly approved the former and disapproved the latter, he could have written suitably and orthodoxly; but in an unknown author I lay down nothing. They say he lived in the year 460. Muratori, in volume 2 of the Anecdota which he unearthed from the codices of the Ambrosian library and illustrated with notes and disquisitions, on page 1 and following prefixes Prolegomena on Bachiarius, whose little Work On Faith or Apology he then had printed from a most ancient codex of the Ambrosian library, as he notes on page 8, which he affirms the form of the letters unhesitatingly testifies to have been written at least a thousand years ago. In the said Prolegomena, therefore, disputing about the native country of Bachiarius, after various arguments which he adduces, he concludes that he was not a Briton by birth; but of what country he was, he leaves to others to determine. Then he discourses about the time in which Bachiarius lived, and, having adduced the opinions of Bale, Pits, Possevino, and Oudin, he indicates that they indulged too much in conjectures, and that he cannot support their view, namely that that author wrote to Leo the Great. The reasons which he sets forth I do not transcribe here; from which he concludes thus: Therefore about the year of Christ 390, and somewhat later, I should believe that Bachiarius prepared this Apology for himself.
[32] with sufficient foundation Then, passing to the other writings attributed to him by various men, Further, he says, what Bale reports about Bachiarius beyond the authority of Gennadius seems to me altogether fabricated and asserted without documents. "Bachiarius" (says he) "a disciple of St. Patrick, a Briton by nation (others call him Macceus the prophet), after various studies of the good arts in the gymnasium of Léon, devoted himself wholly in his youthful age to the mathematical disciplines. Coming at last to more advanced years, purposing through Christian philosophy to be free for God stripped and unencumbered, he undertook a long pilgrimage for the preservation of the integrity he had conceived. For, by an unheard-of tyranny in those days (as Gildas, Geoffrey, and Bede teach in their histories), the Huns, Picts, and Scots were oppressing the Britons, weakened by King Maximus; and on that account some suspected that Bachiarius had fled from his country, etc. That most eloquent man composed to Januarius, On the Restoration of the Lapsed, otherwise On the Fruit of Penance, book 1. On Persevering Faith, book 1. Prognostics of Nativities, book 1, etc. Some call him Bacciarius, others Bachianus." Thus Bale, a heterodox man, and an apostate both from his Order and from the Catholic religion, and one whose care was more to vomit forth virulent and pestilent bile against the orthodox than to inquire into the truth.
[33] are attributed His words, or, if you prefer, his dreams, as Muratori observes, were copied out almost entirely by Pits, On English Affairs, at the year of Christ 460, age 5; Oudin, On Ecclesiastical Writers; Nicholas Harpsfield; William Cave, in his Literary History of Ecclesiastical Writers; and others. But, as I was just saying, since these things are brought forward without any witness, they will win no credence. But speaking of the two copies of the letter to Januarius On the Restoration of the Lapsed, which he collated together, Muratori confesses that he recognized one and the same author in them continuously, although the different superscription of one copy had first cast a doubt upon him whether Bachiarius was the author of both copies. He adds also that that letter is extant in the Library of the Fathers, last edition, and is attributed by all writers to that Bachiarius of whom he treats; but whether truly enough, according to what has been set forth from Muratori, since writers report this beyond the authority of Gennadius? What the same author discusses about his rank I do not report. For let these things be said sufficiently and more than sufficiently for our purpose concerning Bachiarius, on the occasion of our St. Mochteus, whose name the more recent writers, under the notion of Macceus, coupled together with that of Bachiarius or Bacchianus, without ancient documents and beyond the authority of Gennadius.
[34] From these things therefore which we have thus far set forth, a criterion is proposed. we deduce two conclusions. The first indeed, that those writings indicated in our text at number 28 under the name of Mochteus, Mauchtaeus, or Mauchteus, seem not without probability to be attributed to our present Saint. But the second: that those writings which come under the name of Bachiarius, etc., appear to us altogether uncertain, obscure, and apocryphal, except the little book on faith, which alone Gennadius writes that he has read; he is said indeed, as he adds, to have published other pleasing little works; but since Gennadius determines none of these; nay, since not even he himself
Honorius of Autun, only in the twelfth century, marks anything else than his pleasing little Works on faith; we do not seem obliged to have recourse to Bale and the other modern bibliographers in order to learn of other little Works which they ascribe to him, so long as antiquity is silent about them. Let the same be the judgment about those peculiar phrases Bachiarius Macceus, disciple of St. Patrick, a Briton, a prophet, which we saw above joined together by the more recent writers and understood of St. Mochteus; whereas Gennadius has nothing of these.
[35] Nor must certain observations about our Saint's Life be passed over. The characteristics of the Life. That greater fullness or genuineness in it was long since desired in our work is indicated by the words reported at the beginning of our Commentary prefixed to it. And indeed we seem able to require in it not merely disjunctively, but conjunctively, greater fullness and genuineness. And fullness indeed, because the author is almost wholly taken up with heaping together the Saint's prodigious deeds; while in reviewing his virtues one by one he is very sparing and meagre. But genuineness; partly because he is written to have lived three hundred years, an age beyond belief which has been rejected by us above; partly because so many and so great marvels are heaped together in that Life — which character of writing is familiar to the genius of Irish biographers, and of which we complained at the XVIII day of this month in the Preliminary Commentary to the Life of St. Dega Maccayrill, which consult in this volume, page 658. See also the Annotations to chapter 2 of this our St. Mochteus, letter d. Indeed we should conceive a greater esteem of our biographer if he had been contemporary with St. Dageus, as Colgan indeed indicates, but does not prove, below in the said Annotations, letter l. Another difficulty then is, even if he had lived at that time, whether that Life has not afterwards been corrupted or interpolated by others. Meanwhile take it such as it is from our codex to be presently designated, and divided by us into two chapters.
Annotations\ perhaps polished*
THE LIFE
by an anonymous author.
From our ancient Salamanca parchment manuscript codex, which is marked P. Ms. II.
Mocteus or Mochteus, bishop of Louth in Ireland (St.)
BHL Number: 5976
BY AN ANONYMOUS AUTHOR.
CHAPTER I.
He is delivered from shipwreck, learns letters from an angel, studies and teaches at Rome; becomes a bishop; founds monasteries; the concourse of disciples to him; St. Patrick's departure.
The Saint's birth, who is delivered from shipwreck: The apostolic bishop Mocteus a, sprung from Britain, was born there, tokens of his future sanctity going before. For at the canonical hours he leapt for joy in his mother's womb. But that great Provider of all things, from the very rudiments of his infancy, prepared him for the enlightening of the Irish who sat in darkness: and he prepared him thus. A magus called Hoam, of great name and honor in Britain, purposed by divine counsel to go and dwell in Ireland. And so with the parents of Mocteus (for they were of his household), and the rest of his people, he puts to sea: and behold, the winds rage, the waters seethe, the waves rise like mountains, fear and trembling seize the sailors, certain of destruction. Then the magus said to Mocteus's mother: "Cast your Infant as quickly as may be into the sea: for it will devour us all, unless we give it one to devour." She rose to carry out the command, for she could not resist her lord. But inspired by the spirit of counsel (for she knew that the boy was of great protection), she plunged his hand into the wave: thereupon the rage of the winds ceases, the boiling of the waves subsides, and the whole sea is laid out into a plain: and with favorable breezes they came to Ireland, and began to dwell in the plain of the Conaille. And Mocteus was brought up in the house of that same magus.
[2] an angel teaches him letters: he studies and teaches at Rome. It came to pass one day, as he was sitting in a field, that an angel of the Lord, having brought a waxen tablet b, taught him the elements of letters, and charged him, saying: "Seek Rome, and there learn the sacred Scripture: for through you very many shall be instructed, and you shall be an example for many to imitate." And he departed, and arriving there happily, applied himself to divine studies, gracious to God and to men, and became day by day wiser and holier than himself, edifying others by his life and speech: and disciples flocked to him, who, drinking from his sacred breast the waters of saving wisdom, were made perfect in faith, word, and deed.
[3] Being there consecrated bishop, he returns to Ireland with 12 companions: And when he adorned the fullness of his learning with all uprightness of manners, he was raised to the episcopate by the Supreme Pontiff c. Afterwards, supported by the Apostolic blessing and authority, and the angelic tablet having been offered to the Pope, he returned accompanied by twelve d disciples. And when he came to the Irish sea, forgetting a certain Edanus e, who for some cause had been separated from the brethren, he went on board the ship; to whom afterwards, as he cried out for passage, he bade him use a branch cut from a tree in place of a ship. He obeys the Master's orders, not distrusting his merits; he sits upon the branch, he crosses the waters; nay, he even outstrips the ship, and receives the Master in the harbor.
[4] Then Mocteus began to build in the woods of the Methians f a monastery he founds a monastery, and prescribes a rule to the brethren. which is called the Great Cell g. He himself was the rector, he himself the rule of the brethren: for they read in his life how they should conduct themselves, and he went before them in justice and holiness before God; besides the common institutes doing many things singularly, in which he went before all the rest; and none of the others could follow him to things so arduous. But lest anything of this religious observance should be neglected through any forgetfulness, and that it might persist without failure not only among those present but also among those to come, he wrote a rule h of holy institution, whence, deservedly bearing the surname of his sanctity, he is rightly proclaimed by all as "the Religious."
[5] Further, he remained there a short time, the inhabitants of the land compelling him to depart, He comes to Lugmud, a little spring following him thither; and being about to depart, he sent to found places the holy men whom God should lead, whom he foresaw would be shepherds of the flocks of Christ; and dividing the goods of the monastery among them, he said: "My portion shall be the little spring of this place; it shall follow me, to profit the brethren and those who shall come after me." And he himself directed his steps to a place named Lugmud i, then a possession of the magi. For he had long since foreknown that this place was given him by God; and the little spring already named, gliding through hidden channels of the earth, broke forth there.
[6] First of all the blessed Father marks out a cemetery; then the tablet mentioned above is restored to him by angelic ministry. where he builds a monastery. Then he kindles a fire, which the magi seeing say: "Unless," they say, "this fire be at once extinguished, ours shall fail, and it shall endure forever." They hasten therefore to pour water upon it, but the more they poured, the more it blazed. For the water gave it nourishment, not detriment. But they, convicted, flee away: and Mocteus began to build, and constructed a most noble monastery.
[7] By the fame of his distinguished life running through all the borders of Ireland, A vast concourse of disciples to him: he shone forth like a star blazing at the rising of the light. Therefore very many flock to him from divers parts, as bees to a flowering garden; whom, instructing them in the exercises of the heavenly life with unrelaxed rigor of discipline, he ever called on by his own example to higher things. For he himself ascended to so great a grace of perfection that, full of all virtue, he towered above all things that roll away, and thought of nothing but heavenly things. Growing therefore greater, he was made into a great nation, abundant both in number and in merits. For, not to speak of the multitude of the rest of his progeny, which was without number, he is said to have had as disciples a hundred bishops and three hundred presbyters k. Whence, sending forth swarms of Saints as of bees, he was the father of many monasteries. He went out and came in to do the work of an evangelist, he rooted out heathen rites, he sowed Christian ones, and the idolatrous nation, sanctified by the sacred font, becomes a worshipper of Christ: what manner of man he is, and of how great merits, the signs of his merits \* attest.
[8] The supreme bishop Patrick began at one time to dwell near his monastery: St. Patrick departs from him at an angel's warning. and while both of them were conversing on a certain day, an angel was sent to them bringing a letter: which Patrick having read through said to Mocteus: "Here I shall not dwell: for through you God has visited the inhabitants of this land; in the fountain of your light they shall see light, and shall obtain eternal life. For aptly does David speak to you in their person: 'For with thee is the fountain of life, and in thy light we shall see light.'" Mocteus said: "If this pleases God, that separated from one another we should serve him, I will depart." Patrick answered: "The word of the Lord cannot be changed." Then Mocteus said: "If I shall depart from this light before you, I commit my family to you." And Patrick said: "And I commend mine to you, if I shall go before you to the Lord"; and so it came to pass: and Mocteus governed the see after him for some days l, and enthroned Benignus, his disciple, in his place.
ANNOTATIONS.
\ perhaps of miracles*.
CHAPTER II.
Miracles wrought by the Saint; his prophecies; his happy death.
He consecrates to God a maiden raised from death: Let us take up again the order of the narrative. Hoam, of whom we spoke before, had a virgin daughter, whom Bl. Mocteus made a Christian, and gave her his girdle: with which, when she had girded herself, the pleasure of the flesh was extinguished in her. She was betrothed against her will by her parents to a certain nobleman: for she wished to show herself a chaste virgin to Christ, whose vow of virginity God, willing to preserve it entire, on the night of the wedding, before they came together, she was found dead. And when, as was the custom of the heathen, the seven days of the funeral rites were completed, and when they were about to bury her, they say: "If this woman,"
they said, "Mocteus could raise up, we would give her to him and to his God": and when he had heard this, he went to the dead woman, prays, and life follows upon the prayer for the deceased; and she forthwith offered herself and all that was hers to him and to God, and lived afterwards for thirty years, preparing garments for the monks.
[10] Amid these and such things Bl. Mocteus was also renowned for the spirit of prophecy, [To Hoam the magus, converted, he foretells his death, and to his wife the place of her dwelling.] which is manifest also from what has been recorded above. To the oft-named Hoam a virgin, the daughter of a certain magus, named Brigid \* a, was betrothed; and before he had slept with her, being laid low by a grievous infirmity, he lay abed for a whole year. Further, she, like a lawful wife, ministered to him, and urgently persuaded him to receive the faith, and said: "If you shall believe and be baptized, you shall live and be saved." At last he consented: Mocteus is called, teaches him; he believes and is washed in the saving wave. Then he adds: "Believe her," he says, "for after this you shall obtain salvation — not, however, temporal, but eternal. For this is the life and salvation which your betrothed, the virgin Brigid, promised you: for on the seventh day you shall depart from this life." Meanwhile he did penance most devoutly, and died at the aforesaid term. But Brigid gave herself and her dowry-field to the Man of God, and wished to dwell with him. To whom he said: "In your own country your resurrection shall be; there, beside the house of your parents, you shall found a cell, in a place surrounded by dense thickets, and there is a tree in the middle of it, at whose roots a certain boar, hitherto most ferocious, lies tame, which shall be prepared as food for those who build the cell for you." Nor did one jot fail.
[11] A certain notorious robber, who was giving himself up to bonds on behalf of his parents, on account of his own wickedness, a robber is preserved by him in the waters for three days; the Father of the afflicted sought from King Ailill. But he, in no way yielding to him, ordered the man to be cast alive into the sea, with a huge stone hung about his neck. A wonderful thing! With cheerful countenance he is seen in the deep, while the servants awaited his death and perceived that the water brought him no more trouble than it does a fish. Nor even so did the impious king give him to the one who sought him. What more? For three days and nights he was thus in the deep; but still he is refused. Mocteus therefore permitted him to die, that he might carry off his body for burial: for the soul, which he had retained in the body, could not go out without his command. Then, being carried by the brethren, he orders him to be set down on the way; he prays, and the man rose again, follows Mocteus, and became a perfect monk.
[12] At another time also, when with Bl. Patrick on Mount Croagh, His disciple Fintan, cut into pieces, is restored to life. warring down the diabolical hosts and keeping the Lenten fast, his disciple Fintan b, thrust by the adversaries over the crags into the depths of a deep valley and divided into many pieces, he restored to life, his limbs being gathered together, so whole that not even a scar appeared on him. He, after a time had elapsed, was made abbot of the monastery \* which in Latin means the Cell of the East.
[13] The holy presbyter Corbanus c came on the sacred night of the Lord's Nativity to Bl. Mocteus, and found the brethren joyful at his arrival. And while they were celebrating the nocturnal praises, a certain boy of clear voice was in one choir; but in the other, in which Mocteus was, there was no boy. Wherefore he said to Corbanus: "Has your boy a clear voice, like that one?" "He does not even," he said, "read the alphabet." "Nevertheless," he said, "let him come here." And when he came, signing his mouth he said to him with a clear voice: "Sing the psalms, like that boy." And without delay he at once began to sing so clearly that his voice filled the whole church: he is bishop Ibar d.
[14] When certain brethren arrived, since there was no bread, other miracles, he caused a calf to be killed for their needs: but when morning came the calf is found with its mother. Likewise in the land of the Methians, beside the house of a certain hospitable man, he converted certain heathen murderers, carrying the heads of the slain, to the monastic life. Then, being invited by that man, he enters his lodging with his disciples and the rest who accompanied him. And when they had been joyfully received, he ministers to them with his wife, and from the vessel which they had they set forth butter in abundance. Mocteus, seeing their generosity and charity, blessing a little of the butter, said to the woman: "Put this little portion in your vessel, but let no one except yourself know or see it, and distribute it liberally to the poor of Christ and to all the needy. For the more abundantly it shall be distributed, the more shall it be increased." He spoke, and the effect followed the word. For that butter, abundantly distributed, lasted four years. Then, when others looked upon it out of vain curiosity, so great a grace ceased.
[15] the conversion of thieves, and prophecies Once, making a journey, being wearied, he passed the night under the open sky e with his companions. Further, thieves coming upon them carried off their horses, who, riding all night and thinking that they were going far, when day returned were near at hand: seeing which, they wished to let the horses go, but were quite unable to dismount. Then he, knowing of what was absent, said to the brethren: "Go into that part of the land, and bring back your horses wearied with useless labor, and loose the wretches whom you shall find sticking to their backs." They therefore, coming to the Man of God, did penance, and being converted under his yoke, served God for the rest of their lives. At another time, when the king, that is Aedh son of Colcan f, offered him a field, he refused to receive it, saying: "There shall be born in the northern region of Ireland a Saint by name Columba g, chosen and beloved of God, to whom that field has been given by God; whom not only Ireland but Britain also shall serve."
[16] [uttered by him; by the ministry of angels he is carried elsewhere and brought back.] On a certain day, looking aside on the journey, he said: "Go, brethren, and bring hither to me the child whom you will find alone in that little house." They go, and find him, and, as he wished, bring him. Whom the man of God, on account of his beauty, called Luchar h. But as time went on, having been well formed in knowledge and holiness, he promoted him to the episcopate, and sending him to seek a place suitable for himself, said: "Where, between the mountain and the sea, a wolf, laying aside its fierceness, shall meet you gentle, there build yourself a cell." To these and such things there is added, for the heaping up of his merits, the ministry of angels, who, where human ability was less sufficient, did not delay to be at hand forthwith: in testimony of which I shall set down one instance for example's sake.
On the sacred day of Easter, going round the cemetery in the morning with the brethren in prayer, he rebuked a certain little boy playing there. Who said: "You ought rather to fulfil what you promised to St. Treanan i, namely to celebrate Easter with him." Then the Man of God, lifted up by angels across long spaces of lands, is brought to Treanan, and, the office of the Mass being completed, is restored to his own men; who meanwhile had gone but a little way from the place whence he was lifted up. Afterwards he celebrated the solemnities of the Mass. Thus and thus burning and shining, he passed all his time in the leisure of the contemplative life and in the exercises of the active.
[17] The Saint's age and death. But among the rest of his virtues, at each of which he sweated all days and nights, he was of an exceedingly admirable continence, for during three hundred k years he is said neither to have uttered any idle word nor to have tasted anything rich. Who could tell what God wrought in his Beloved, and works today? Who can describe him singly in all things? For of his disciples the blessed bishop Dageus l bears this testimony, preaching to the brethren of Bangor: "I give thanks," he says, "to my God, that I see you like the last assembly of St. Mocteus. For he had three kinds of monks succeeding one another: the first angelic in purity; the second apostolic in deeds; the third, like the holy Martyrs, ready to pour out their blood for Christ." Thus Dageus. Blessed Mocteus therefore, the day drawing near which he awaited ever watchful, received the saving viaticum from St. Dageus, and, full of days and of merits, happily fell asleep with the other pastors of holy Church, to rise again in the glory of Christ: to whom with the Father and the Holy Spirit be honor and glory for ever and ever. Amen.
ANNOTATIONS.
and from other things to be said of him at the XXIII of April. Perhaps he is the one whom Camerarius treats at the XXII of March. It is helpful to weave in with these things what at the said XXIII day of April in our work, page 174, Henschen long since observed in these words: That everything may be attributed to one Ibarus, he is reported to have lived three centuries. St. Abban, his nephew, went to Rome to Pope Gregory I, so that from this too we may gather that St. Ibarus flourished in the sixth century of Christ. One may consult what was said on the XVII of March in the Appendix to the Life of St. Patrick, §1: whence it will appear how little credit the above-cited Acts of St. Abban deserve, in which St. Ibarus is feigned to have preached in Ireland before St. Patrick; which therefore were alleged by us for this alone, that from them at least the well-known sanctity of St. Ibarus among the Irish might be established, although obscured by them with many fables and with miracles of a portentous nativity and childhood: from which would that the Lives of SS. Patrick and Brigid themselves were free! But the collectors of those Lives have also thrown all the Chronology of the Saints into confusion, since they let go none of the more celebrated ones whose name they did not insert into those same Lives, as of men contemporary with and familiar to the aforesaid Saints, or at least foreknown by them, as though they were to come into this light within a determinately marked number of years.
\ perhaps Brigid*
\ There is added in Colgan, Kill-Oirthir*.