counter-scheme of Nicholas MacMaelisa, who was one of the greatest opposers of the English that ever governed the See of Armagh."1 How low must have been the tone of morality when men of the highest position in the Church were prepared to lend their sanction to such miserable dodgery!

During this period of degeneracy Ireland produced a few writers of reputation. Among these may be mentioned the anonymous authors of the Annals of Inisfallen and Multifernan. John a Sacro Bosco, or John of Holywood, was distinguished as a philosopher and mathematician. Peter, surnamed Hibernicus, an Irishman who settled at Naples about A.D. 1240, is said to have been the teacher of the celebrated Thomas Aquinas.5 Gotofrid, a native of Waterford, was famous as a linguist; and at a time when such acquirements were rare, signalized himself by his knowledge, not only of Greek and Latin, but also of French, Hebrew, and Arabic. So great was his thirst for information, that he travelled to Asia Minor, Palestine, and Syria, and spent many years there in the study of Eastern literature. Thomas Palmer, or Palmerston, usually styled Thomas Hibernicus, was another eminent literary Irishman. Leaving his own country in early life, he removed to Paris, where he became a Doctor of the Sorbonne. He subsequently settled in Italy, and died there about the close of the thirteenth century. He was the author of a large

1 O'Donovan's Annals of the Four Masters, iii. 458, note. See also Haverty, p. 274. Nicholas Le Blund, who was now Bishop of Down, seems to have been an Englishman or Norman: and this fact probably embittered the jealousy of his Irish namesake.

2 Inisfallen is a small island in the lakes of Killarney.

The monastery is said

to have been founded by Finian in the sixth century. The Annals have been brought down to A.D. 1320.

3 Multifernan is in the diocese of Meath. These Annals, edited by Dr. Aquila Smith, are among the publications of the Irish Archæological Society. Much obscurity hangs around the question of their authorship.

4 Either Holywood, near Belfast, or, as others maintain, Holywood in Co. Dublin. See Harris's Co. Down, p. 260.

6 Brenan, pp 318-9.

6 Brenan, p. 318.

7 The Sorbonne was the great French school of theology connected with the University of Paris. It was established about A.D. 1250, and was so called from Robert de Sorbonne, its founder.

8 Brenan, p. 320.

number of learned works. But by far the most noted of the literati who flourished during this period, and who are claimed by Ireland, was John Duns Scotus, a Franciscan monk of wonderful subtlety and eloquence.1 The place of his birth has been very much disputed. According to some he was an Englishman; according to others a Scotchman; but there are good grounds for believing that he was born in county Down, and that he was a native of the barony of Lecale. He studied, first in a Franciscan monastery, and afterwards at Oxford, where he soon attained the highest distinction. He subsequently removed to Paris; and in A.D. 1308 died at Cologne, when he had reached the age of only thirty-four years. He is particularly known as the great champion of the doctrine of the Immaculate Conception of Mary, the mother of our Lord. Before his time this doctrine had been explicitly denied by many of the most eminent doctors of the Churchincluding Augustine, Bernard, Peter Lombard, and Thomas Aquinas ; but Duns Scotus devoted all his powers to its vindication, and added greatly to its popularity.

Almost all the literary Irishmen of whom we read during the period before us, spent much of their lives abroad. In their native land a superior education could no longer be obtained. They were obliged to go to England, or France, or Italy, to complete their studies. As they could expect no adequate encouragement at home, they never returned to Ireland. They acquired their fame after they had left it, and they died in foreign countries.

Early in the fourteenth century the Bishop of Rome

1 He was born in A.D. 1274, the year in which Thomas Aquinas, the great doctor of the Dominicans, died.

See Wadding's Annales Min. Fratr., tom. vi. See also an article in Duffy's Irish Catholic Magazine for June, 1847, pp. 129, 132. St. Patrick and St. Francis were recognised by Scotus as his patron saints. Maurice O'Fihely or De Portu, an Irishman and a Franc'scan, who commented on some of his works, and who died Archbishop of Tuam in A.D. 1513, speaks of Duns Scotus as his countryman. See Joannis Duns Scoti Opera Omnia, tom. i., vita p. 3. Lugduni, 1639. It appears that, even in the time of O'Fihely, Ireland was sometimes called Scotia Major. Ibid, tom. i. p. 499.

3 See Preuss On the Immaculate Conception, pp. 16, 18, 22, 23, 27. Edinburgh, 1867.

removed his residence to Avignon, where his court remained about seventy years. This step considerably lowered his prestige; and was particularly disagreeable to the inhabitants of the States of the Church, who were accustomed to designate his long absence from Italy his Babylonish captivity.2 During its continuance the sovereign Pontiffs were the mere vassals of the French monarch; and the conclave of cardinals was ruled by the same influence. Clement V., who inaugurated the change of residence, was obliged to suppress the Knights Templars to gratify his Gallic master. These military monks whose wealth seems to have excited the cupidity of Philip the Fair-were put down in Ireland, as well as in other parts of Europe. The mean subserviency with which the Pope submitted to their ruin is acknowledged even by Roman Catholic historians. The writ for their suppression in this country was issued by Edward II. in 1307, the first year of his reign; and some time afterwards the Templars all over the island were arrested, conducted to Dublin, and imprisoned in the Castle. Their trial was little better than a mockery of the forms of justice; for the charges against them were supported by most unsatisfactory evidence; but they were condemned, and their property confiscated. The Pope granted their possessions throughout the kingdom to the Hospitallers; and Edward II. subsequently confirmed the donation. Though their treatment was very harsh, they are said to have experienced less severity in Ireland than in most other countries.4

1 From A.D. 1305 to A.D. 1376.

2 Reid's Mosheim, p. 492.

3 This order was instituted in the time of the Crusades. It was so called because the house in which the knights originally resided was near the site of the temple of Jerusalem. The knights undertook to defend Christianity by force of arms, and especially to protect pilgrims on their way to the Holy Land.

4 Gilbert's Viceroys, p. 125.

CHAPTER IV.

FROM THE DEATH OF EDWARD I. TO THE DEPOSITION OF

RICHARD II.1 A.D. 1307 TO A.D. 1399.

IN the early part of the fourteenth century the social state of Ireland was most unsatisfactory. After one hundred and thirty years' experience of English sovereignty, the people still submitted impatiently to the yoke. Little care was taken to win them over to more cordial obedience. Those who belonged to the English settlements or what was subsequently called the Pale-were subject to the provisions of the British statute-book; whilst almost all the rest of the inhabitants remained under the old Brehon law. There was always a border territory of undefined extent, where neither English nor native rule decisively predominated; where lawlessness was the order of the day; and where the people lived in a wretched condition. The natives within the Pale did not enjoy the privileges of English or Anglo-Irish residents: they were regarded as an inferior class of human beings; and received the harshest and most unjust treatment. They were robbed of their cattle, but they could obtain no redress; they were stripped of their lands on the most frivolous pretences;

1 Edward II. A.D. 1307 to A.D. 1327; Edward III. A.D. 1327 to A.D. 1377; Richard II. A.D. 1377 to A. D. 1399.

2 There were five families of the Irish, viz: the O'Melaghlins, the O'Neills, the O'Conors, the O'Briens, and the McMurroughs (Cavanaghs)-called "the five bloods"-entitled to the coveted distinction of the advantage of the English laws. See Sir John Davys' Historical Relations, p. 23. Dublin, 1704. It was to these five septs that the old royal families of Ireland belonged. Hallam's Const. Hist. of England, p. 837. Ed. London, 1870.

VOL. I.

T

and an Englishman could kill an Irishman with impunity.1 In the reign of Edward I. these natives, again and again, petitioned government for admission to the enjoyment of the laws of England; and offered the king a large sum of money for the privilege; but the British settlers, aware that such a concession would curb their rapacity and violence, contrived to defeat the application. Without the vision of a seer the consequences might have been predicted. The aborigines deeply resented their cruel oppression; the estrangement between them and the colonists increased; and it became more and more difficult to maintain the authority of the English monarch. When Robert Bruce appeared as the deliverer of Scotland, and when on the memorable 24th of June, 1314, he secured its independence by the glorious victory of Bannockburn, the Irish began to take courage. They invited the Scottish hero to interfere in their defence; Robert induced his brother Edward to respond to their appeal; and, accordingly, in May 1315, this brave soldier landed with six thousand men at Larne on the coast of Antrim.3 Joined by the natives in great numbers, he soon overran a large portion of the country, and was crowned King of Ireland. For upwards of three years he maintained his ground against all opposition; but famine at length began to make terrible ravages among his troops; the ablest English generals encountered him in the field; and, in October, 1318, he sustained a complete defeat near Dundalk, and lost his life in the

1 See King's Primer, ii. 638.

2 Leland, i. 243-247. "The great Anglo-Irish lords had a direct interest in excluding their Irish tenants from the protection of the English law. Over their English tenants they could legally exercise no powers but such as were exercised in England; but over their Irish tenants they claimed, and were legally entitled to, all the privileges which had been exercised by the Irish princes." Note to Grace's Annals, p. 84. Irish Archæol. Soc. Publications.

3 See Reeves's Antiq. of Down, Connor, and Dromore, pp. 265, 271. King Robert Bruce himself came to Ireland when his brother was in the country, but remained only for a short period. The appearance of Edward Bruce in Ireland seems to have been hailed with delight by the bulk of the native population. Clyn says that " during the whole time the Scots were in Ireland, almost all the Irish of the land adhered, very few preserving faith and fidelity to the English crown." But the horrors of the war seem to have at length made them weary of Bruce's presence, and hence the annalists speak of his death with so much satisfaction.