1. Independence of the Pope. Iona was its Rome, and the Abbot of Iona, and afterwards of Dunkeld, though a mere Presbyter, ruled all Scotland.

2. Monasticism ruling supreme, but mixed with secular life, and not bound by vows of celibacy; while in the Roman church the monastic system was subordinated to the hierarchy of the secular clergy.

3. Bishops without dioceses and jurisdiction and succession. 4. Celebration of the time of Easter.

5. Form of the tonsure.

It has also been asserted, that the Kelts or Culdees were opposed to auricular confession, the worship of saints and images, purgatory, transubstantiation, the seven sacraments, and that for this reason they were the forerunners of Protestantism.

But this inference is not warranted. Ignorance is one thing, and rejection of an error from superior knowledge is quite another thing. The difference is one of form rather than of spirit. Owing to its distance and isolation from the Continent, the Keltic church, while superior to the churches in Gaul and Italy—at least during the sixth and seventh centuries-in missionary zeal and success, was left behind them in other things, and adhered to a previous stage of development in truth and error. But the general character and tendency of both during that period were essentially different from the genius of Protestant Christianity. We find among the Kelts the same or even greater love for monasticism and asceticism, the same superstitious belief in incredible miracles, the same veneration for relics (as the bones of Columba and Aidan, which for centuries were carried from place to place), the same scrupulous and narrow zeal for outward forms and ceremonies (as the observance of the mere time of Easter, and the mode of monastic tonsure), with the only difference that the Keltic church adhered to an older and more defective calendar, and to the semi-circular instead of the circular tonsure. There is not the least evidence that the Keltic church had a higher conception of Christian freedom, or of any positive distinctive

principle of Protestantism, such as the absolute supremacy of the Bible in opposition to tradition, or justification by faith without works, or the universal priesthood of all believers.1

Considering, then, that the peculiarities of the Keltic church arose simply from its isolation of the main current of Christian history, the ultimate triumph of Rome, with all its incidental evils, was upon the whole a progress in the onward direction. Moreover, the Culdees degenerated into a state of indolence and stagnation during the darkness of the ninth and tenth centuries, and the Danish invasion, with its devastating and disorganizing influences. We still find them in the eleventh century, and frequently at war with the Roman clergy about landed property, tithes and other matters of self-interest, but not on matters of doctrine, or Christian life. The old Culdee convents of St. Andrews, Dunkeld, Dunblane and Brechin were turned into the bishop's chapter with the right of electing the bishop. Married Culdees were gradually supplanted by Canons-Regular. They lingered longest in Brechin, but disappeared in the thirteenth century. The decline of the Culdees was the opportunity of Rome. The Saxon priests and monks, connected with the more civilized countries, were very active and aggressive, building cathedrals, monasteries, hospitals, and getting possession of the land.

1 The Duke of Argyll, who is a Scotch Presbyterian, remarks (l. c. p. 41): "It is vain to look, in the peculiarities of the Scoto-Irish Church, for the model either of primitive practice, or of any particular system. As regards the theology of Columba's time, although it was not what we now understand as Roman, neither assuredly was it what we understand as Protestant. Montalembert boasts, and I think with truth, that in Columba's Life we have proof of the practice of the auricular confession, of the invocation of saints, of confidence in their protection, of belief in transubstantiation [?], of the practices of fasting and of penance, of prayers for the dead, of the sign of the cross in familiar-and it must be added-in most superstitious use. On the other hand there is no symptom of the worship or 'cultus' of the Virgin, and not even an allusion to such an idea as the universal bishopric of Rome, or to any special authority as seated there."

§ 20. Extinction of the Keltic Church, and Triumph of Rome under King David I.

The turning-point in the history of the Scotch church is the reign of the devout Saxon queen St. Margaret, one of the best queens of Scotland (1070-1093). She exerted unbounded influence over her illiterate husband, Malcolm III., and her sons. She was very benevolent, self-denying, well versed in the Scriptures, zealous in reforming abuses, and given to excessive fasting, which undermined her constitution and hastened her death. "In St. Margaret we have an embodiment of the spirit of her age. What ostentatious humility, what almsgiving, what prayers! What piety, had it only been freed from the taint of superstition! The Culdees were listless and lazy, while she was unwearied in doing good. The Culdees met her in disputation, but, being ignorant, they were foiled. Death could not contend with life. The Indian disappears before the advance of the white man. The Keltic Culdee disappeared before the footsteps of the Saxon priest."

The change was effected by the same policy as that of the Norman kings towards Ireland. The church was placed upon. a territorial in the place of a tribal basis, and a parochial system and a diocesan episcopacy was substituted for the old tribal churches with their monastic jurisdiction and functional episcopacy. Moreover the great religious orders of the Roman Church were introduced and founded great monasteries as centres of counter-influence. And lastly, the Culdees were converted from secular into regular canons and thus absorbed into the Roman system. When Turgot was appointed bishop of St. Andrews, A. D. 1107, "the whole rights of the Keledei over the whole kingdom of Scotland passed to the bishopric of St. Andrews."

From the time of Queen Margaret a stream of Saxons and Normans poured into Scotland, not as conquerors but as settlers, and acquired rapidly, sometimes by royal grant, sometimes by

1 Cunningham, Church Hist. of Scotland, p. 100.

marriage, the most fertile districts from the Tweed to the Pentland Firth. From these settlers almost every noble family of Scotland traces its descent. They brought with them English civilization and religion.

The sons and successors of Margaret enriched the church by magnificent endowments. Alexander I. founded the bishoprics of Moray and Dunkeld. His younger brother, David I., the sixth son of Malcolm III., who married Maud, a grand-niece of William the Conqueror (1110) and ruled Scotland from 1124 to 1153, founded the bishoprics of Ross, Aberdeen, Caithness, and Brechin, and several monasteries and religious houses. The nobility followed his example of liberality to the church and the hierarchy so that in the course of a few centuries one half of the national wealth passed into the hands of the clergy, who were at the same time in possession of all the learning.

In the latter part of David's reign an active crusade commenced against the Culdee establishments from St. Andrews to Iona, until the very name gradually disappeared; the last mention being of the year 1332, when the usual formula of their exclusion in the election of a bishop was repeated.

"Thus the old Keltic Church came to an end, leaving no vestiges behind it, save here and there the roofless walls of what had been a church, and the numerous old burying-grounds to the use of which the people still cling with tenacity, and where occasionally an ancient Keltic cross tells of its former state. All else has disappeared; and the only records we have of their history are the names of the saints by whom they were founded preserved in old calendars, the fountains near the old churches bearing their name, the village fairs of immemorial antiquity held on their day, and here and there a few lay families holding a small portion of land, as hereditary custodiers of the pastoral staff, or other relic of the reputed founder of the church, with some small remains of its jurisdiction."

1 Skene, II. 418.

II. THE CONVERSION OF FRANCE, GERMANY, AND ADJACENT COUNTRIES.

General Literature.

I. Germany before Christianity.

TACITUS: Germania (cap. 2, 9, 11, 27, 39-45); Annal. (XIII. 57); Hist. (IV. 64).

JAC. GRIMM: Deutsche Mythologie. Göttingen, 2nd ed. 1854, 2 vols.

A. F. OZANAM: Les Germains avant le christianisme. Par. 1847.

K. SIMROCK: Deutsche Mythologie. Bonn, 2nd ed. 1864.

A. PLANCK: Die Götter und der Gottesglaube der Deutschen. In "Jahrb. für Deutsche Theol.," 1866, No. 1.

II. The Christianization of Germany.

F. W. RETTBERG: Kirchengeschichte Deutschlands. Göttingen, 1846-48. 2 vols.

C. J. HEFELE (R. C.): Geschichte der Einführung des Christenthums im südwestl. Deutschland. Tübingen 1837.

H. RÜCKERT: Culturgeschichte des deutschen Volkes in der Zeit des Uebergangs aus dem Heidenthum. Leipz. 1853, 2 vols.

W. KRAFFT: Kirchengeschichte der German. Völker. Berlin 1854 (first vol.)

HIEMER (R. C.): Einführung des Christenthums in Deutschen Landen. Schaffhausen 1857 sqq. 4 vols.

COUNT DE MONTALEMBERT (R. C.): The Monks of the West from St. Benedict to St. Bernard. Edinb. and Lond. 1861 sqq. 7 vols.

I. FRIEDRICH (R. C., since 1870 Old Cath.): Kirchengeschichte Deutschlands. Regensb. 1866, 1869, 2 vols.

CHARLES MERIVALE: Conversion of the West. The Continental Teutons. London 1878. (Popular).

G. KÖRBER: Die Ausbreitung des Christenthums im südlichen Baden. Heidelb. 1878.

R. CRUEL: Geschichte der deutschen Predigt im Mittelalter. Detmold 1879. (Chs. I. and II.)

§ 21. Arian Christianity among the Goths and other German Tribes. I. Editions of the remains of the Gothic Bible Version of WULFILA: by H. C. VON DER GABELENZ and J. LOEBE, Leipz. 1836-46; MASSMANN, 1855-57; E. BERNHARDT, 1875 (with the Greek text and notes); and STAMM, 7th ed. 1878, and in fac-simile by UPPSTRÖM, 1854-1868. See also ULPHILE Opera, and SCHAFF, Compan. to Gr. Test., p. 150.

ULPHILE Opera (Versio Bibliorum Gothica), in Migne's Patrolog., Tom. XVIII. pp. 462–1559 (with a Gothic glossary).

II. G. WAITZ: Ueber das Leben und die Lehre des Ulfila. Hanover 1840.