Frercuson—On the “ Confessio”’ of St. Patrick. 207 
plicity which breathes from all the composition, made even more 
persuasive by its inartificial and confused construction. 
But for the additional matter supplied by the later copies, it would 
be extremely difficult to understand the purport or relevancy of some 
passages of the original. Whatever be the right opinion touching its 
equal authority, there can be no doubt that it gives such a degree 
of cohesion and consecutiveness to some of the scattered hints conveyed 
by the older copy, and is, in style and sentiment, so much in harmony, 
that it ought not to be passed by in this examination. 
There is one specially obscure passage in the original in which 
reference is made to a writing intimating some personal dishonour : 
“Vidi in yissu noctis scriptum erat contra faciem meam sine honore.”’ 
With the aid of the supplemental matter it may be collected that 
an imputation on St. Patrick’s good name had been made in some 
assembly of seniors, held in Britain in his absence, and that some one 
who had been instrumental in designating him for the Episcopate had 
taken an unfriendly part towards him on that occasion. This seems to 
afford a key to the meaning of ‘‘ contra faciem meam”’ in the original. 
It is m fact word for word the Latin equivalent of the idiomatic 
Irish phrase 1n 65410, ‘‘against my face,” ‘‘in opposition to me,” 
the phrase by which an Irish-speaking person might properly refer 
to the presentment of a written accusation; and this also may help 
to explain the words next following in the original: ‘“‘ Et inter hee 
audivi responsum dicentem mihi Male audivimus [ contra] faciem de- 
signati nudato nomine,”’ as meaning ‘‘ We are ill-styled in this script 
against one described by his naked name.’ But I do not profess to 
account for the use, in the later copies, of the expression in reference 
to the same proceeding, ‘‘ Kt quando temptatus sum ab aliquantis 
senioribus meis,” where tempto seems to be used in the sense of 
assailing or impeaching, though this also might be reconcilable if 
examined by a competent Irish scholar; but I incline to the belief 
that temptatus is written per incuriam for tentatus, which would be 
good Latin in the same sense. 
This supplemental matter also furnishes what possibly may be an 
example of the characteristic transposition of the pronoun in Irish 
syntax. The writer regrets his inability, consistently with his duties 
to his country, to journey, as he would have desired to do, to Britain 
as to his country and parents, and even further yet, to Gaul, to visit 
the brethren and see the faces of the Lord’s saints; and says, yet not 
I it was [ who yielded to this sense of duty ], ‘‘sed Christus Dominus 
qui me imperavit ut venirem esse meum illis residuum eetatis mee,” 
where ‘‘illis”’ may answer to the infixed pronoun in some equivalent 
Irish sentence. 
There are some other Latin peculiarities which, if they could be 
explained by Irish analogies, might actually contribute facts left un- 
explained in the Confessio. As, where the writer says his father, 
‘‘fuit vico Bannavem,” the Latin leaves it doubtful was he de wico, as 
of that residence, or 7 vico, as there by a chance sojourn, which would 
