structed in many things very profitable to himself, and for those who should chuse to attend to him. On his way back under the same escort, he had again to go through the fire, and as he was passing a door which stood open in the flames, the Devils snatched up a soul which they were tormenting and flung it at him. This unhappy soul was so burning hot, that it scorched his shoulder and his cheek where it touched him. The Angels of his guard tost it back, and told Fursey that he now felt the fire which he had helped to kindle; for this miserable soul, as he had perceived, was that of a man from whom he had accepted a garment when he was dying; and if he had not defiled his hands by receiving that gift from one who died in his sins, he would not now have tasted of his punishment.

Bede proceeds no farther with the relation. But as if to confirm the authority of the biographical account to which he had before referred, he adds, that there was an ancient monk then living in his monastery, to whom this story had been told by a pious man of undoubted veracity, who knew St. Fursey, and had heard him relate his visions and said that though it was in winter, and during a severe frost, and the Saint wore only a single garment, and that a slight one, he perspired while relating them

as if it had been in the heat of summer, sometimes for horror, and sometimes for delight at recollecting what he had seen.*

You will probably, Sir, agree with me that this vision is as much a fiction as the dream of the Pilgrim's Progress, and that it was composed with a like intention of communicating religious instruction in an attractive and impressive form. But Bede believed it to have been an actual revelation, so it was represented to him by the old monk of Jarrow, and according to the monk's voucher St. Fursey himself related it as such. We know that in Bede's time it was recorded in the Saint's life, not as a fiction, but as a vision, seen by him when he was out of the body, and proved by the burn upon his shoulder and cheek. As a vision it is found in F. Alford's characteristic compilation; and that Jesuit, with all the self-complacency of his order,† sneers at the Centuriators for presuming

* Bede, t. iii. 1. 3. c. 19. p. 67-9.

† He gives all that he finds in Bede quia luculenter testata, and then proceeds thus: Nec moror quatuor Magdeburgicos, qui omnium sæculorum sanctitati irascentes, nihil probare volunt, quod cum nuperá eorum et exoticâ factione non consentiat: quicquid contra in Sanctorum vitis legitur, pro deridiculo habent. Ita ergo illi has mirabiles visiones censent. Ridicula sunt, inquiunt, quæ de Fursæo commemorat Vincentius, &c.-Beda eadem

to disbelieve it. We have it also in F. Cressy, not as allegorical, but as one of those " wonderful* visions which, in an excess of mind, our Lord revealed" to St. Fursey; and which this sincere and credulous compiler thought it necessary to set down, supposing it might be for the reader's edification. And Mr. Alban Butler, though too cautious to insert it in his prudent work, alludes to it nevertheless, in a manner which indicates no design of discrediting its authenticity as a true vision; and he refers to the ancient life published by the Bollandists, as if he believed that life, or was at least willing that those for whom he wrote should believe it.

If the vision alone had come down to us we might have thought that there was as little intention to deceive in the inventor, as there was in John Bunyan himself, a man whose integrity was not inferior to his genius, and when that is said no higher praise can be bestowed. I could

propemodo nugatur ex libro de vitâ ejus. Fuit ut apparet homo plenus superstitionibus, &c. Ita illi: Vincentius ridicula commemorat: Beda nugatur; Fursæus superstitiosus est.. Aliter - moderna factio stare non potest; Quæ tamen, his male materiata commentis, stat (quis non videt ?) satis debiliter.—Annales Ecc. Ang. Saxonicæ, t. ii. p. 250.

* Page 354.

allow also for the old monk of Jarrow's additions, or those of the pious person who had been the Saint's ear-witness, for we know that tales of this kind, or indeed of any kind, generally gain something in repetition;

mensuraque ficti

Crescit, et auditis aliquid novus adjicit auctor. But the life of St. Fursey is extant. Shall we say that the deceitful intention belongs to his biographers, (for he had more than one,) who presented his innocent and well meant works of imagination for undoubted visions, and garnished his real adventures with correspondent miracles? Were this the case in the present instance, (as it certainly is with many other heroes of hagiology,) the charge of fraud would only be removed from one person to another, and rest with equal weight upon the Romish Church, which in all ages has endeavoured to support its own pretensions by encouraging, adopting and authenticating with its sanction such impostures. Let us however set this life before you; the originals are of unquestioned antiquity; and though I give it you in a form suited to the place, not as translation, you will find it composed with a fidelity that defies investigation. Your kinsman, Sir, has distilled it in his alembic till nothing but a caput mortuum

remains the spirit of these legends lies in what he evaporates. They are not less valuable where they are false than where they are true, for the very falsehoods are facts in ecclesiastical history. They might be read as works of fiction sometimes for the mere amusement which they afford; the physiologist and the philosopher also might peruse them with advantage; and frequently some accidental truth occurs amid a tissue of inventions, to reward the historian's labour, and give light to the antiquary in his pursuits. You will perhaps say with me, in my great master's words, altering them a little for this occasion;

The ways through which my weary steps I guide
In this religious land of Faëry,

Are so exceeding spacious and wide

And sprinkled with such sweet variety

Of all that wondrous is to ear or eye,

That I nigh ravisht with rare thoughts delight
My tedious travel do forget thereby :

And when I 'gin to feel decay of might

It strength to me supplies and cheers my dulled spright.

The reader may judge by the contents of this life whether it is wronging the clergy of Bede's age to accuse them of systematically deceiving the people; and he may perhaps see cause for concluding that St. Fursey himself assisted in