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We know
there was a real Patrick because he left us a record, his
Confession, written in Latin near the end of his life. It
is a fascinating insight into Patrick, the man. Here are some
key extracts:
Patrick
introduces himself and tells how he was kidnapped at the age
of 16…
On
his embarrassment about his lack of education…
On
finding God while herding…
Guided
by a voice, he escapes….
Called
back to Ireland by a dream…
Haunted
by a youthful confession…
The
faith he brought to the Irish…
Baptising
a beautiful noblewoman…
'My
confession…'
Patrick
introduces himself and tells how he was kidnapped at the age
of 16…
I, Patrick, a sinner, a most simple countryman, the least
of all the faithful and most contemptible to many, had for
father the deacon Calpurnius, son of the late Potitus, a priest,
of the settlement of Bannavem Taburniae; he had a small villa
nearby where I was taken captive. I was at that time about
16 years of age. I did not, indeed, know the true God; and
I was taken into captivity in Ireland with many thousands
of people, according to our deserts, for quite drawn away
from God, we did not keep his precepts, nor were we obedient
to our priests who used to remind us of our salvation. And
the Lord brought down on us the fury of his being and scattered
us among many nations, even to the ends of the earth, where
I, in my smallness, am now to be found among foreigners.
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On
his embarrassment about his lack of education…
And therefore for some time I have thought of writing,
but I have hesitated until now, for truly, I feared to expose
myself to the criticism of men, because I have not studied
like others, who have assimilated both Law and the Holy Scriptures
equally and have never changed their idiom since their infancy,
but instead were always learning it increasingly, to perfection,
while my idiom and language have been translated into a foreign
tongue. So it is easy to prove from a sample of my writing,
my ability in rhetoric and the extent of my preparation and
knowledge, for as it is said, 'wisdom shall be recognised
in speech, and in understanding, and in knowledge and in the
learning of truth.'
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On finding God while herding…
But after I reached Ireland I used to pasture the flock
each day and I used to pray many times a day. More and more
did the love of God, and my fear of him and faith increase,
and my spirit was moved so that in a day (I said) from one
up to 100 prayers, and in the night a like number; besides
I used to stay out in the forests and on the mountain and
I would wake up before daylight to pray in the snow, in icy
coldness, in rain, and I used to feel neither ill nor any
slothfulness, because, as I now see, the Spirit was burning
in me at that time.
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Guided by a voice, he escapes….
And it was there of course that one night in my sleep
I heard a voice saying to me: 'You do well to fast: soon you
will depart for your home country.' And again, a very short
time later, there was a voice prophesying: 'Behold, your ship
is ready.' And it was not close by, but, as it happened, 200
miles away, where I had never been nor knew any person. And
shortly thereafter I turned about and fled from the man with
whom I had been for six years, and I came, by the power of
God who directed my route to advantage (and I was afraid of
nothing), until I reached that ship.
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Called back to Ireland by a dream…
And after a few years I was again in Britain with my kinsfolk,
and they welcomed me as a son, and asked me, in faith, that
after the great tribulations I had endured I should not go
anywhere else away from them. And, of course, there, in a
vision of the night, I saw a man whose name was Victoricus
coming as if from Ireland with innumerable letters, and he
gave me one of them, and I read the beginning of the letter:
'The Voice of the Irish', and as I was reading the beginning
of the letter I seemed at that moment to hear the voice of
those who were beside the forest of Foclut which is near the
western sea, and the were crying as if with one voice: 'We
beg you, holy youth, that you shall come and shall walk again
among us.' And I was stung intensely in my heart so that I
could read no more, and thus I awoke. Thanks be to God, because
after so many years the Lord bestowed on them according to
their cry.
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Haunted by a youthful confession…
They brought up against me after 30 years an occurrence
I had confessed before becoming a deacon. On account of the
anxiety in my sorrowful mind, I laid before my close friend
what I had perpetrated on a day, nay, rather in one hour,
in my boyhood because I was not yet proof against sin. God
knows, I do not, whether I was 15 years old at the time, and
I did not then believe in the living God, nor had I believed,
since my infancy; but I remained in death and unbelief until
I was severely rebuked, and in truth I was humbled every day
by hunger and nakedness.
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The faith he brought to the Irish…
So, how is it that in Ireland, where they never had any
knowledge of God but, always, until now, cherished idols and
unclean things, they are lately become a people of the Lord,
and are called children of God; the sons of. the Irish and
the daughters of the chieftains are to be seen as monks and
virgins of Christ.
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Baptising a beautiful noblewoman…
And there was, besides, a most beautiful, blessed, native-born
noble Irish woman of adult age whom I baptised; and a few
days later she had reason to come to us to intimate that she
had received a prophecy from a divine messenger who advised
her that she should become a virgin of Christ and she would
draw nearer to God. Thanks be to God, six days from then,
opportunely and most eagerly, she took the course that all
virgins of God take, not with their fathers' consent but enduring
the persecutions and deceitful hindrances of their parents.
Notwithstanding that, their number increases, (we do not know
the number of them that are so reborn) besides the widows,
and those who practise self-denial. Those who are kept in
slavery suffer the most. They endure terrors and constant
threats, but the Lord has given grace to many of his handmaidens,
for even though they are forbidden to do so, still they resolutely
follow his example.
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'My confession…'
But I entreat those who believe in and fear God, whoever deigns
to examine or receive this document composed by the obviously
unlearned sinner Patrick in Ireland, that nobody shall ever
ascribe to my ignorance any trivial thing that I achieved
or may have expounded that was pleasing to God, but accept
and truly believe that it would have been the gift of God.
And this is my confession before I die.
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