Heremon, and Ith, gave a race of kings to Ireland, under whose government Ireland proceeded from barbarism and anarchy, to civilization and refinement; that at length Ollam Fodla arose, and gave to Ireland a regular form of government, instituted a grand seminary of learning, and assembled the Fes, or triennial convention of kings, priests, and bards, at Tarah, in Meath.-Keating writes that the object of this convention was to introduce order, and to punish and suppress those crimes which generally predominate in a period of rudeness and violence. Ollam Fodla, the monarch so celebrated in Irish annals, was succeeded by Kimbath and Hugony; both made great advances in the work of reformation. There were in Ireland five provincial dynasties, and Hugony, to break the power of those rivals, divided the country into twenty-five dynasties. This arrangement did not long exist; the pentarchy was again restored, and subsequent to this event, the celebrated code or body of laws, called the Celestial Decisions were drawn up by the Irish bards, or Filias, who were in those ages the dispensers and depositories of the laws. The tranquillity expected to follow from the promulgation of this celebrated code of laws did not take place; and the distraction of the country became so extreme, that an Irish chieftain encouraged Agricola to make a descent on Ireland. The invitation was not accepted, and the Irish historian records with triumph, that the Irish monarch of that day, not only was able to repel any foreign invader, but actually sailed to the assistance of the Picts against the Romans, and returned laden with treasure. On the death of this monarch, whose name was Crimthan, Tuathal succeeded, a prince of the Milesian line; the latter separated Meath from the other provinces of Ireland, and appointed it the special appendage of the monarch: he revived the famous assembly at Taltion in Meath, the great resort of the whole nation. The peace of Tuathal's reign was inter

rupted by a domestic affliction, which was afterwards the source of national sorrow and distraction. The provincial king of Leinster was married to the daughter of Tuathal, but conceiving an adulterous passion for her sister, pretended his wife had died. He demanded and obtained her sister in marriage; the two ladies met in the royal house of Leinster: the Irish monarch invaded his sonin-law, and the province of Leinster was obliged to pay a tribute, as a perpetual memorial of Tuathal's resentment. This tribute was resisted; and Con, one of the most famous of the Irish monarchs, (called Con of the Hundred Battles,) was slain in his struggles to enforce so odious an exaction.

Cormac-O'Con, grand-son of this king, is celebrated by historians as the most renowned of all the Irish monarchs.* The magnificence and splendor of his court, his warlike sons, the number of his generals, his powerful army, their illustrious leader, Finn, the father of Ossian the immortal bard; the terror of his arms in war, and the mildness of his philosophy in solitude, were equally the theme of universal praise. This distinguished prince is said to have reigned about 254 years after Christ. Cormac-O'Con was succeeded by his son Carbray Liffecar, who inherited the wisdom as well as the power of his father. Such was the fury and the fanaticism of faction, that this monarch with his immediate successors died by the sword in the field, or by treachery in the palace. Crimthan, who carried his

The days of Cormac were those of the greatest glory; in his time most of the utensils of the court were of pure gold or silver; when he dined in state he was waited upon by the most distinguished gentlemen of the kingdom, besides 1000 men to guard his palace; on his side-board were 150 cups of massy gold and silver. We may form some idea of the munificence truly royal, which prevailed at Tara, from the annual consumption of the provincial palace of Brian Boru; 2670 beeves, 1370 hogs, 365 pipes of red, and 150 hogsheads of other wine. Such are the relations of Irish annalists, from Stanihurst and Keating, to O'Connor and O'Halloran.

arms into Gaul, and Nial of the Nine Hostages, fell victims to the assassin. To Dathy, the last of the pagan monarchs, annalists assign a long and peaceful reign; it is written that he was killed by lightning at the foot of the Alps.

The period above described was marked with all those strong and leading features of the human character, which for the most part distinguish the progress of society in other European settlements. Here are to be found a grand display of all the noble passions of our nature, undaunted valour, the most generous effusions of benevolence and hospitality, great disinterestedness and an insatiable ambition of fame and glory; on the other hand will be seen examples of implacable resentment, of desperate and vindictive cruelty. To poetry and music* the ancient Irish were peculiarly devoted; to the influence of the bard+ every other power gave way, and to be made mention of in the poet's song was to the Irish hero sufficient compensation for all his toils and the most consoling soothing of all his sorThe ministers of religion were accounted more than human. To the druid was submitted all their differences, and from him there was no appeal. He was the oracle of Irish law and the grand dispenser of public justice. Thus do we see that the ancient Irish were not insensible to the value of settled laws, and that while the annalists of other countries have to describe the savage conflicts of the various clans into which their countrymen were perpetually divided, the Irish historian has to record the solemn and venerated decisions of the druids, before whom the sword of the

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Giraldus Cambrensis, who would conceal the flattering testimony if he could, is obliged to acknowledge the musical genius of our country B "In musicis solum, præ-omni natione quam videmus, incomparabiliter est instructa gens hæc".

†The controversies of the ancient Irish were generally determined by the Brehons. The Brehon seated himself in the open air on a heap of tones, and his decree was final. King John abolished the Brehon laws of

warrior and the vengeance of the chieftain bowed with deferential homage. Such was the state of Ireland previous to the introduction of Christianity. From this period we may trace its history with more certainty, less clouded with legendary or poetical fiction. The adversaries of Irish antiquity endeavour to prove that St. Patrick, the great apostle of Christianity in Ireland, was the first to dispel the mists of ignorance and barbarity, and that he abolished the order of druidism so ancient, so venerated and so powerful. On the other hand, the advocates for the old Irish character, contend that the Irish were prepared by their learned men to receive the divine and benevolent doctrines of Christ,* and that they transcribed the scriptures and liturgies given to them by the Irish apostle with the greatest facility. It is however to be admitted, that many instances of revenge and barbarity are exhibited after the introduction of Christianity, and that the divine morality of the Christian doctrine did not entirely succeed in era

Ireland. The Brehons were all of one family, without any knowledge of civil or canon law. They only retain in memory certain decisions, which by use or length of time obtained force, and by their construction of those they framed a sort of art, which they by no means suffered to be published, but reserved to themselves as abstruse and recondite mysteries, concealed from common comprehension. Such is the account of those celebrated tribunals given by Archbishop Usher, Sir James Ware, Sir Richard Cox, Stanihurst, Spencer and Davis.

The year 432 commences a new æra. A revolution in religion and the introduction of Latin letters into Ireland by St. Patrick, after whom a succession of pious and learned men arose, who gave celebrity to their country for the four following centuries, during which polite and solid literature languished in almost every other corner of Europe. After Rome had again and again been plundered by the Goths, they ceased, it is said, to speak Latin in Rome itself.

Dr. Campbell, in his learned and enlightened Strictures on the Ecclesiastical and Literary History of Ireland, makes the following observations on the labours of the Irish Apostle: "Full thirty years did St. Patrick employ in the most active and exemplary discharge of his ministry, instructing the Irish people in the principles of piety and virtue, beginning as he did with the elements of knowledge, pointing to the first author as the moral governor of the universe, opening by degrees the mysteries of providence in the gracious scheme of redemption, imitating in this the procedure of divine wisdom which at different periods, was pleased to give different revelations, of is will to frail and fallible man, letting in the rays of illumination by little and little, lest like weak eyes they should

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dicating the old vicious habits of the country. The monks multiplied to a great extent, and became the arbiters of the people. The monks (says Mr. O'Connor of Ballenagar) fixed their habitations in deserts, which they cultivated with their own hands, and rendered the most delightful spots. These deserts became well policed cities, and it is remarkable enough, that to the monks we owe so useful an institution in Ireland as bringing great numbers into one civil community. In those cities the monks set up schools, in which they educated youth, not only of the island, but the neighbouring nations. So writes the venerable Bede; his testimony cannot be contradicted by the enemies of Ireland, that the inhabitants of all parts of Europe, resorted to Ireland as the mother of the arts and sciences, the nurse of learning, and the great encourager of the most liberal and philanthropic principles. The darkness of Europe at this period gave increased celebrity to the fame of Irish literature; and the seven thousand students in the seminary of Armagh alone, circulated through the civilized world the literary glory of our illustrious ancestors. Europe with gratitude confessed the superior knowledge, the piety, and zeal and purity of the Island of Saints. Mr. O'Connor (a

be dazzled by the splendour of too great a blaze, till at length when the fulness of time was come, he sent that great light which was finally to irradiate every corner of the earth, the author and finisher of our faith, who delivered the glad tidings of our salvation, love to God, good will to man, without distietion of nation or respect of persons, teaching what philosophy could never teach, that denying our ungodliness and our worldly lusts, we should live soberly and righteously in this present world, to entitle us to another and a better when the world shall pass away and time and place shall be no more. This excellent personage being now ninety years old, committed the care of those churches he founded to the pastors which he had set over them, and dedicated the remainder of his life to contemplation in different convents.-The entire virtues of a life already protracted beyond the ordinary limits, and now continued in the pious discharge of monastic functions, could not fail of attracting to this venerated patron á sovereign influence over the minds of his converts, and therefore we may believe what is recorded of him, that he was enabled to make a temporal provision for the ministers of that religion he had planted, by obtaining from several chietins endowments of lands, and from the people grants of the tithes of their corn and cattle."