is traceable in its constitution and laws, into every
part of which, as was its wont from the beginning, the
spirit of Christianity sought patiently to infuse itself.
We have already spoken of the expurgation of the
constitution, which prohibited the observance of Pagan
rites to the kings, and imposed on them instead, certain
social obligations. This was a first change suggested by
Saint Patrick, and executed mainly by his disciple, Saint
Benignus. We have seen the legislative success which
attended the measures of Columbkill, Moling, and Adamnan;
in other reforms of minor importance the paramount
influence of the clerical order may be easily traced.

But it is in their relation as teachers of human and
divine science that the Irish Saints exercised their
greatest power, not only over their own countrymen, but
over a considerable part of Europe. The intellectual
leadership of western Europe--the glorious ambition of
the greatest nations--has been in turn obtained by Italy,
Prance, Britain and Germany. From the middle of the sixth
to the middle of the eighth century, it will hardly be
disputed that that leadership devolved on Ireland. All
the circumstances of the sixth century helped to confer
it upon the newly converted western isle; the number of
her schools, and the wisdom, energy, and zeal of her
masters, retained for her the proud distinction for two
hundred years. And when it passed away from her grasp,
she might still console herself with the grateful reflection
that the power she had founded and exercised, was divided
among British and continental schools, which her own