AN ARTICLE

BY

REV. THOMAS SMYTH, D. D.,

of Charleston, S. C.

Published in the Princeton Review, January, 1867.

THE CULDEE MONASTERIES.

The Early Scottish Church; The Ecclesiastical History of Scotland from the First of the Twelfth century. By the REV. THOMAS MCLAUCHLIN, M. A., F. S. A. S. Edinburgh: T. & T. Clark. 1865.

Iona. By the REV. W. LINDSAY ALEXANDER, D. D., F. S. S. A. Edinburgh.

Late researches throw increased light upon the distinction between Celtic and Latin christianity. They were separated by a boundary of facts, more enduring than the stone wall completed by Severus between the Solway and the Tyne, and warding off from Scotland both prelacy and papacy for more than a thousand years. There is reason to think that before the close of the second christian century there were "Scots believing in Christ," and that for the gospel they were not indebted to missionaries from Rome. These Scots dwelt in Ireland as well as in Scotland, and there are historic intimations that they received their first christian teachers from lands where the Greek language prevailed. It was perhaps three hundred years after christianity dawned upon Scotland, when Ninian was commissioned by Rome as the primus Episcopus, "the first bishop to the Picts," and Palladius as "the first bishop to the Scots," these Scots being partly in Ireland. Whatever was meant by the title, "the first bishop," it goes far to verify the statement of the chronicler Fordun, a Romish monk of the fourteenth century, who says of Palladius, "Before whose coming the Scots had as teachers of the faith and administrators of the sacraments presbyters only and monks, following the order of the primitive church." It might be shown that these presbyters held rank with the bishops of the primitive church, and received not their ordination from the Roman primate. They did not need over them a bishop of an unscriptural rank, and scarcely deplored the failure of Palladius to establish a see in Scotland. They were doubtless missionaries and pastors apostolic, so far as they followed the order of the apostles.

But what of the "monks?" Of what order? A monk in Fordum's time was a vastly different man from a monk in the fourth century, even if we take him from Mediterranean regions. Monasticism was bad enough in its first and best estate, but it grew worse and worse as Rome became papal and endorsed the eremite system. That the so-called Scottish 46-VOL. VI.

monks, as late as the twelfth century, differed greatly from the peculiarly Romish orders, is a fact quite perplexing to those who would place early Scotland within the pale of Latin christianity. It does not account for their differences to assume that Marin of Tours imparted his Gallic ideas to the prebystery St. Patrick, who transmitted them to Columba, and that Columba disseminated them from Iona throughout all Scotland; or that the said Martin, who first gave organic form to monasticism in Western Europe, did in some other way transplant it from Gaul into the land of the Gael. There was no little antagonism between the Gallic monks and the Roman primate, but this proves nothing in regard to the monastic system of the Culdees. There is nothing found in the early monasteries of Gaul analogous to the peculiarities which distinguished the Culdee system. Martin of Tours died shortly before the mission of Palladius; "before whose coming," says Fordun, there were "monks" amongs the Scots, and these Scots had "long been believers in Christ," having these "monks" as one class of teachers. It may be shown that they were not monks at all, in the same sense employed by Roman Catholic writers, from the venerable Bede down to Fordun, and even to Montalambert. They were ministers of God's word, "administrators of the sacraments," missionaries among the Picts, the Scots, and the Strathclyde Britons, co-workers with the presbytery-bishops; and if in defence from persecution, or in self-denial and self-support, they lodged in cells, this fact did not make them monks. In all probability they and the presbyters were of the same class. In the course of centuries the imagination of a genuine monk put a difference between them. They were the Cuildich* the cellmen, the Culdees. They did not deserve the epithet of "monks," and yet something like a monastery was peculiar to their system of means for promoting the gospel and maintaining the church. Using the term in a qualified sense, Mr. McLauchlan says: "The very monachism of Celtic Britain had features of its own, and these continued to distinguish it, in some measure, till the close of its existence." (Page 163.)

Our desire is to present certain facts relative to the early institutions, often called Monasteries, which were peculiar to the Culdees after the influence of Columba was so powerfully impressed upon Scotland. It is not meant that he introduced the eremite principle into that country. It was there, in a

*That the word "Culdee" is but a modification of the Gaelic Cuildich, can scarcely be questioned. Like the term "Huguenot," it has been the subject of various surmises. The term was doubtless in existence before the Latin translation, "Cultores Dei," or "Keledeus." Of "Ceile De," and "Gille De," the Gael knows nothing, but "Cuiltich" is still in use among the Highlanders. On Iona there is a spot still called, "Cobhan nan Cuildeach," the Culdee's recess. The plural form is Cuildich, the men of the recess.