refugee Christians who fled to Ireland from the persecutions of Diocletian more than a century before St. Patrick's day; in addition it is abundantly evident that many Irishmen—Christians like Celestius the lieutenant of Pelagius, and possibly Pelagius himself, amongst them—had risen to distinction or notoriety abroad before middle of the fifth century.

    Possibly the best way to present the question of Declan's age is to put in tabulated form the arguments of the pre-Patrician advocates against the counter contentions of those who claim that Declan's period is later than Patrick's:—

    In this matter and at this hour it is hardly worth appealing to the authority of Lanigan and the scholars of the past.  Much evidence not available in Lanigan's day is now at the service of scholars.  We are to look rather at the reasoning of Colgan, Ussher, and Lanigan than to the mere weight of their names.

    Referring in order to our tabulated grounds of argument, pro and con, and taking the pro arguments first, we may (I.) discard as evidence for our purpose the Life of St. Ibar which is very fragmentary and otherwise a rather unsatisfactory document.  The Lives of Ailbhe, Ciaran, and Declan are however mutually corroborative and consistent.  The Roman visit and the alleged tutelage under Hilarius are probably embellishments; they look like inventions to explain something and they may contain more than a kernel of truth.  At any rate they are matters requiring further investigation and elucidation.  In this connection it may be useful to recall that the Life (Latin) of St. Ciaran has been attributed by Colgan to Evinus the disciple and panegyrist of St. Patrick.

    Patrick's apparent neglect of the Decies (II.) may have no special significance.  At best it is but negative evidence:  taken, however, in connection with (I.) and its consectaria it is suggestive.  We can hardly help speculating why the apostle—passing as it were by its front door—should have given the go-bye to a region so important as the Munster Decies.  Perhaps he sent preachers into it; perhaps there was no special necessity for a formal mission, as the faith had already found entrance.  It is a little noteworthy too that we do not find St. Patrick's name surviving in any ecclesiastical connection with the Decies, if we except Patrick's Well, near Clonmel, and this Well is within a mile or so of the territorial frontier.  Moreover the southern portion of the present Tipperary County had been ceded by Aengus to the Deisi, only just previous to Patrick's advent, and had hardly yet had sufficient time to become absorbed.  The whole story of Declan's alleged relations with Patrick undoubtedly suggests some irregularity in Declan's mission—an irregularity which was capable of rectification through Patrick and which de facto was finally so rectified.

    (III.) No one in Eastern Munster requires to be told how strong is the cult of St. Declan throughout Decies and the adjacent territory.  It is hardly too much to say that the Declan tradition in Waterford and Cork is a spiritual actuality, extraordinary and unique, even in a land which till recently paid special popular honour to its local saints.  In traditional popular regard Declan in the Decies has ever stood first, foremost, and pioneer.  Carthage, founder of the tribal see, has held and holds in the imagination of the people only a secondary place.  Declan, whencesoever or whenever he came, is regarded as the spiritual father to whom the Deisi owe the gift of faith.  How far this tradition and the implied belief in Declan's priority and independent mission are derived from circulation of the "Life" throughout Munster in the last few centuries it is difficult to gauge, but the tradition seems to have flourished as vigorously in the days of Colgan as it does to-day.  Declan's "pattern" at Ardmore continues to be still the most noted celebration of its kind in Ireland.  A few years ago it was participated in by as many as fourteen thousand people from all parts of Waterford, Cork, and Tipperary.  The scenes and ceremonies have been so frequently described that it is not necessary to recount them here—suffice it to say that the devotional practices and, in fact, the whole celebration is of a purely popular character receiving no approbation, and but bare toleration, from church or clergy.  Even to the present day Declan's name is borne as their prænomen by hundreds of Waterford men, and, before introduction of the modern practice of christening with foolish foreign names, its use was far more common, as the ancient baptismal registers of Ardmore, Old Parish, and Clashmore attest.  On the other hand Declan's name is associated with comparatively few places in the Decies.  Of these the best known is Relig Deaglain, a disused graveyard and early church site on the townland of Drumroe, near Cappoquin.  There was also an ancient church called Killdeglain, near Stradbally.

    Against the theory of the pre-Patrician or citra-Patrician mission we have first the objection, which really has no weight, and which we shall not stop to discuss, that it is impossible for Christianity at that early date to have found its way to this distant island, beyond the boundary of the world.  An argument on a different plane is (I.), the undoubtedly contradictory and inconsistent character of the Life.  It is easy however to exaggerate the importance of this point.  Modern critical methods were undreamed of in the days of our hagiographer, who wrote, moreover, for edification only in a credulous age.  Most of the historical documents of the period are in a greater or less degree uncritical but that does not discredit their testimony however much it may confuse their editors.  It can be urged moreover that two mutually incompatible genealogies of the saint are given.  The genealogy given by MacFirbisigh seems in fact to disagree in almost every possible detail with the genealogy in 23 M. 50 R.I.A.  That however is like an argument that Declan never existed.  It really suggests and almost postulates the existence of a second Declan whose Acts and those of our Declan have become mutually confused.

    (II.) Absence of Declan's name from the Acts of Patrick is a negative argument.  It is explicable perhaps by the supposed irregularity of Declan's preaching.  Declan was certainly earlier than Mochuda and yet there is no reference to him in the Life of the latter saint.  Ailbhe however is referred to in the Tripartite Life of Patrick and the cases of Ailbhe and Declan are a pari; the two saints stand or fall together.

    (IV.) Motives for invention of the pre-Patrician myth are alleged, scil.:—to rebut certain claims to jurisdiction, tribute or visitation advanced by Armagh in after ages.  It is hard to see however how resistance to the claims in question could be better justified on the theory of a pre-Patrician Declan, who admittedly acknowledged Patrick's supremacy, than on the admission of a post-Patrician mission.

    That in Declan we have to deal with a very early Christian teacher of the