the reliques of St. Audoen, Bishop and Confessor. Also, of the reliques of St. Benedict, Abbot.

"Also, of the reliques of St. Basil, Bishop. And of St. Germanus, Bishop.

66

Also, of the reliques of St. Olave, King.

"Also, other reliques innumerable, of which it were tedious to make special mention."

SECTION VI.

Superstitions continued. Pilgrimages. Penances. Indulgences. Dramatick representations of Scripture. Assumption of a monastick habit before death. Masses for the dead. Patron Days. Depressed condition of the lay-members of the Church. Need of Reformation.

10. THE practice of going on pilgrimages, intimately Pilgrimages: connected with some of the foregoing superstitions,

was observed at the same time to a very great extent

and with earnest diligence and zeal.

These were undertaken sometimes to the Con- To Rome; tinent, as in the instance of the Abbot Imar, who in the year 1134 died on a pilgrimage to Rome'; and in that of fifty persons, who went from the diocese. of Dublin in 1451, with recommendatory certificates from the archbishop to Pope Nicholas the Fifth, to celebrate the jubilee then kept under the Pope's authority; of which number seven were pressed to death, together with many other pilgrims from all parts of Christendom, besides those who died on their return'.

of Ireland;

More commonly such journeys were undertaken To different parts from one part to another of Ireland, from various motives dictated by a blind superstition, and with different objects of spiritual or temporal advantage. • WARE'S Bishops, p. 341. G

1 ARCHDALL, p. 24.

To places chosen by celebrated saints;

To pieces of handicraft by saints;

To memorials of

antiquity, called

Sometimes the attraction was the peculiar sanctity attributed to a particular spot, which had been blessed by the choice of some celebrated saint, as the site of some religious edifice of his foundation: thus, in the twelfth century an opinion generally prevailed, that no person could die in the Isle of Monaincha, be his malady ever so extreme, or his fate ever so urgent, secured as it was in the enjoyment of this privilege, by the merits of its patron saint Colomba, and thence called "Insula viventium," the island of the living. This legendary celebrity brought from the remotest parts innumerable pilgrims to expiate their sins at the altar of the saint, and was the occasion of a gainful trade for several centuries".

Sometimes the special attraction was some piece of handicraft, the supposed workmanship of the saint's own hand; thus, in Cape Clear Island was a pillar of stone, bearing towards the top a cross rudely carved, as tradition reported, by St. Kieran; and greatly venerated by incredible crouds of pilgrims, who assembled around it on the 5th of March, which was his festival'.

Sometimes a memorial of antiquity, bearing a by saints' names; Saint's name, and imagined to be possessed of some peculiar miraculous property, drew together the itinerant multitudes: thus on the day of St. Patrick, the saint's penitential bed, and other similar ancient monuments, fit objects as they were deemed for the devotion of pilgrims, filled with devotees the parish church of Domnach Glinne Tochuir, in Inisoen; while Devenish was rendered alike attractive by the stone coffin, called the bed of St. Molaise, the usual place of his devotions, and celebrated for the relief

which it was said to afford to pains in the backs of those who reposed in it; and to women in a state of pregnancy a similar inducement was offered by an assurance, that such as should enter and turn thrice round in the cavity of a rock, near the door of the church of Inismore, called our Lady's Bed, saying at the same time certain prayers, should be safely delivered from the perils of child-birth'.

built by workers

of miracles;

Sometimes a church or churches built by some To churches, distinguished worker of miracles, with other remnants of his devotion whilst alive, gathered together large concourses of his posthumous admirers; thus, multitudes of persons of every age and either sex continually flocked to the valley of Glendaloch; and there, among his seven churches and his numerous crosses of stone, celebrated the festival of their venerable founder, St. KeivinR.

saints' inter

Sometimes the place of a saint's interment was To places of the cause of a like assemblage; thus, in the monas- ment; tery of Begery, where were deposited the mortal remains of St. Ivar, and where his reliques continued to be kept in honourable preservation, crowds were assembled to unite in the litany of St. Angus, which invoked the departed saint, together with one hundred and fifty of his disciples'.

images;

Sometimes a favourite image, celebrated for its To miraculous miraculous powers, became equally memorable for the multitudinous pilgrimages, and the costly offerings with which it was honoured. This was the case, in a remarkable degree, with the wonders attributed, and the adoration paid, to an image of the Blessed Virgin preserved in the abbey of Trim ; which, in the year 1444, is said to have wrought great miracles; particularly to have restored eyes to 5 ARCHDALL, pp. 97, 260, 634. Ib., p. 766. 7 Ib., p. 733.

6

To holy wells:

To reliques.

Pilgrimages, acts

of penance, or for indulgences.

the blind, tongues to the dumb, and limbs to the weak and decrepit. The narrative adds that "in the same year a woman is said to have brought forth cats"."

Holy wells, imagined to enjoy the special patronage and benediction of some tutelary saint, and to be endued with salutary or healing properties, attracted to their miraculous waters annual crowds of infirm and diseased visitants, in pursuit of preternatural health and vigour. These wells were generally dispersed over the country, and the pilgrims who visited them were numerous in proportion; and, as examples, may be mentioned, especially St. Patrick's at Finglass, St. Colomb's at Swords, St. Francis's at Kilkenny, and St. Conald's at Iniskeel; St. Finian's at Erynagh, St. Thomas the Martyr's near Down, St. Kilian's at Fenaugh, and others equally celebrated and frequented; for instance, those of Kilmacduagh, St. Michael's Mount, and Inislounagh'.

Probably a mere feeling of ignorant and indefinite devotion in favour of some valued relique on some occasions animated the enterprise: as appears to have been the case with those, who resorted on every Holy Thursday to pay their offerings to a piece of the holy cross preserved in the abbey of Tracton; and with the great rebel chief O'Neil, when, in 1579, he made a pilgrimage, as did one of the Desmonds in 1599, to visit a piece of the same original instrument of our blessed Saviour's death, said to be preserved in the abbey of the Holy Cross1. In some cases, again, the pilgrimage was con

ARCHDALL, p. 577.

• MASON'S, St. Patrick, p. 49.

ARCHDALL, pp. 216, 100, 375, 119, 129, 409, 292, 301, 663.

10

ARCHDALL, pp. 79, 660.

nected with acts of penance and mortification for the expiation of sins; and in others was regarded as the price paid for indulgences granted as in remuneration of a meritorious act.

parliament.

For the protection of persons thus engaged, the Protected by interposition of the ruling powers had been solicited and procured. In a petition preferred by Nicholas Dovedale, prebendary of Clonmethan, to parliament, in 1476, it was stated, that "divers persons, aliens, strangers, and denizens, did frequent, in considerable numbers, by way of pilgrimage, the chapel of St. Catherine, the virgin and martyr of Feldstown, which was appropriated and annexed to his prebend, being for the health and safety of their souls, and accomplishment of their petitions and prayers; and upon his complaint that they had been at divers times vexed and molested, on divers pretences; by reason of which they were obliged to lay aside such devotions and pilgrimages; it was thereupon enacted, that the persons and properties of all such pilgrims should, during their pilgrimage, be under the king's protection; nor should the persons of any such be arrested, on any writ or authority whatever, for debt, treason, felony, or trespass, until said pilgrimage be accomplished"."

11. Penances, whether in connexion with pil- Penances. grimages, or otherwise inflicted on the sinner by his ecclesiastical superior, in punishment and expiation of his sins, were among the other characteristicks of the Church at the season under review.

One of the most notorious theatres of this sort of superstitious infliction was St. Patrick's purgatory, on an island of Lough Dearg, in the county of "Stat. Roll, 14 Edw. IV., cited in MASON's St. Patrick, p. 54.