9? 



Christian faith, towards the end of the second century, and it is but 

 right to observe, that the Irish historians are silent as to all such 

 events. 



These historians do, howeA^er, allege that in the middle of the 

 third century, King Connac carried on a theological discussion with 

 the heathen priesthood, so earnestly, that his sudden death is attri- 

 buted to their provoked resentment. Hector Boethius will have it, 

 that the Irish, " from whom," says he, " the Scots derive their ori- 

 gin,"* were converted about the middle of the fourth century, by the 

 instrumentality of a female; a period at which. Saint Chrysostom dis- 

 tinctly says,"!" the inhabitants of the Bi'itish istands not only believed 

 in Christ, but erected churches and altars of sacrifice {Ova-iaarTjpia) 

 to God. And if England heard the Gospel (as Gildas says) so early 

 as A. D. 62, it is impossible to conceive how Ireland could have been 

 ignorant of the faith, consistently with those predatory invasions 

 Avhich it has been shewn the Scots undertook in the fourth century. 

 Rupert states,:]: that in A. D. 350, Elephius, the son of a Scoto-Hiber- 

 nian king suffered martyrdom, having been decapitated by the 

 Emperor Julian, who was present at the execution ; and Gennadius 

 records,! how Ctelestius, when a very youth, and before he had preci- 

 pitated himself into the Pelagian heresy, wrote, from the monastery 

 wh^re he sojourned, three letters in the manner of little books to his 



• " Hiberniam, untie Scotis origo, per id tempus Christi cultum accepisse ferunt." — Hist. 

 Scot. lib. 6. fo. 101. 



f " A( BfiTTcttiKxi »i)r«i, cu Tn? SlaiAaTTnj «xt»{ ictifinxi Ta-jTH?, xxi ft a-jra turxi tu 

 riKtxtti, -m^ ^vtxfiiui r»v {ii/<«T35 i|9-J(e»T», x«i y«5 KXKit vcxXriirixi xxt B-vrixTTV^tx TtTmyxri"— 



Opera. Ed. Saviliana, t. 6. p. 635. 



+ Vita Elephii, c. 12. torn. 5. oct. 16. 



§ " Cselestius, antequam Pelagianum dogma concurreret, imo adhuc adolescens scripsit ad 

 parentes suos de monasterio epistolas, in raodum libellorum, tres, omni Deum desideranti ne- 

 cessarias."— Illustr. vir. cat. c. 44. 



