ADDRESSES 229 



I can yet be a man of God, wise, virtuous, free and noble in 

 the sight of God, though not in the sight of Caesar's courts 

 and knights.'" 



The time at which this great work began was almost coin- 

 cident with the Christian era, and lasted through what we 

 are pleased to call the dark or mediaeval ages, which, how- 

 ever, when we come to examine them, we find to our sur- 

 prise filled with light, with charities of the noblest kind 

 and enduring monuments of Christian grace. 



With the fall of the Roman empire and the influx of the 

 great waves of barbaric tribes that swept over Europe, 

 civilization was stamped out and Christianity ceased to 

 exist. The cleared lands and cultivated fields reverted to 

 forest and moor, cities and towns lay in ruins, and the citi- 

 zen was reduced to the condition of the beggar and the slave. 

 The despairing cry of St. Jerome from his peaceful hermit- 

 age at Bethlehem fell vainly on the ears of a hopeless world : 

 "For twenty years Roman blood has been flowing every 

 day between Constantinople and the Julian Alps. Scythia, 

 Thrace, Macedonia, Dacia, Thessalonica and Epirus all 

 belong to the barbarians, who ravage, rend and destroy 

 everything before them. How many noble matrons and 

 maids have been the toys of their lust; how many bishops in 

 chains, priests butchered, churches destroyed, altars turned 

 into stables, relics profaned ! Sorrow, mourning and death 

 are everywhere. The Roman world is crumbling into ruins." 

 And what St. Jerome so vividly describes of the Eastern 

 world was equally true of the West. France, Germany, 

 Spain, Italy, and England had all fallen a prey to the never- 

 ending swarms that poured across the barrier rivers, the 

 Rhine and the Danube. 



