FIFTH CENTURY.
39
by the Councfl of Trent.* The councils of Cfhalcedon, ^c. recognized this translation as canonical, but, at the Reformation, the Protestant divines finding that certain books were in no BTebrew copies, pronounced them apocryphal, and they constitute the apocrypha of Protestant bibles.
4 to. At this period there were twenty-nine public libraries in Rome. The fine one belong- ing to the bishop Hippo, in North Africa, was destroyed by the Vandals.
420, Sep. 30. St. Jerome, who died on this day, states that he had ruined himself in buying the works of Origin.
Origin, stimamed Adamantinus, from his in- defatigable assiduity and labour, was born at Alexandria in the year 185, and died at Tyre, in the 60th year of his age. Eusebius gives a curi- ous picture of Origin's mode of composition : he had several notarii, or short-hand writers, who succeeded each other, as they became weary with writing : he had also a regular establishment of men and young women, who wrote beautifully, to copy his wons. Montfaucon supposes that his Heraplaf must have made fifty large folio vols. 449. The dawn of knowledge which spread over Britain from the conquest of the Romans, quickly faded after the fall of that extraordinary empire, and was almost wholly extinguished upon the arrival of the Saxons in this year. For a centiUT and a half after this, England may be said to have been equally destitute of learning, and of the means of obtaining it. There is not the name of any learned man of that period handed down to us; nor does it appear there was such a thing as a book in the whole kingdom. The only remnants of knowledge and learning that were preserved in what is now called Great Britain, existed amongst the clergy of Scotland and Wales; and the extent of their acquirements may be imagined, when a little Latin, a talent for polemical controversy, and some knowledge of church mnsic, was sufficient to entitle an individual to the character of a very learned man. The conversion of the Anglo-Saxons to Chris- tiaiuty in the course of the seventh century, had its usual effect in enlightening their niinas, and promoting the interests of learning. Before this period they had no intercourse with any other nation except in the way of hostility; but the commnmcation then opened with Rome, and the necessi^ of studying in order to qualify them- selves for the high offices in the churcn, occa- sioned a pretty general application to learning amongst the nobles. Public seminaries were then for the first time established, one of the most noted of which was that at Canterbury. The laity, however, remained generally as igno- rant as ever; one cause of which was the con-
- The Council oTTrent commenced Dec. 13, IMS, ter-
minated Dec. 4, \itt.
t The name Hbxapla, or Sextuple was derived from the «iT principal Oreek venions employed in the collation. Some fri^menta excepted, this work has been long iire- coTcrablr lost. All that conld be gathered from the works of the ancients, was collected and published in 1713, bj Montftttroo, in two vdomet folio.
tinned scarcity of books. If we look for persons who were particularly eminent in the annals of literature, during the period from the desertion of the Romans, to the introduction of the Saxons, we shall find very few whose names have reached us; but some stifl continue to be mentioned with respect Pelegius, a native of Britain, and some of whose works are still extant. Celestinus, a Scotchman, who was famous as a scholar both in his own country and abroad. Dutricius and Iltutus, founded schools at Bangor, in North Wales, which produced several men whose names have been transmitted with honour to posterity. Among the rest, Gildas, who wrote a treatise on the destruction of Britain, and from whom we principally derive our information concerning the state of things, during the latter end of the fifth, and beginning of the sixth century.
460. Died, at an advanced age, St. Patrick. We remarii an event which, from its influence upon Christian literature, deserves to be recorded; this was the itutruction of the Iriih m the tue of the Roman letten, by St, Patrick, the apostle of Ireland. Patrick was born in Scotland, near Dunbarton. In his sixteenth year he was carried into captivity by certain barbarians, together with many of his father's vassals and slaves, taken upon his estate, they took him to Ireland, then called Scotia, where be was obliged to keep cattle on the mountains, and in the forests, in hunger and nakedness, amidst snows, rains, and ice. Here he learnt the language and customs of the country, Irom whence he was afterwards, by some pirates, conveyed into Gaul; and, after various adventures, returned a volun- teer into Ireland, with a view to undertake the conversion of the barbarous natives, among whom the worship of idols still generally reigneid. To effect his hepevolent purposes, he travelled over the whole island, and not only preached fre- quently but maintained and instructed the natives in the use of the Roman letter, for before their conversion the Irish were utterly unac- quainted with the Latin language. The labours of St. Patrick proved eminently successful, and Christianity was very generally embraced throughout the island.
During the interval between their conversion to Christianity, and their subjection to England,the Irish were considered as the most learned nation in Europe. Their teaming, however, consisted in the discussion of subtle metaphysical questions, a scanty stock of Grecian literature, a very slight acquaintance with Hebrew, and a knowledge of the more simple and elementary partsof geometry. Among the Irish literati, the highest place is due to John Scatus Erigena,the ornament of the court of Charles the Bald, an eminent philosopher and learned divine, whose erudition was accompanied with uncommon marks of sagacity and genius, and whose various performances, as well as his trans- lations from the Greek, gained him a shining and lasting reputation.
475. Hebrew points first introduced in reading.
476. By order of the emperor Leo I, 200,000 books were burnt at Constantinople.
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