History of the Scottish Nation Volume III: From Union of Scots and Picts, A.D. 843, to Death of Alexander III, A.D. 1286 by James A. Wylie

Author:James A. Wylie
Language: eng
Format: azw3
Publisher: Wallachia Publishers
Published: 2015-12-19T16:00:00+00:00

CHAPTER XV.TRANSLATIONS OF THE CHAIR OF COLUMBA—THE ONE BISHOP OF ALBAN—A GREAT TEMPEST IN WHICH SCOTLAND DOES NOT SINK.

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IONA HAS FALLEN, AND YET Iona lives and flourishes. The great evangelical work inaugurated by Columba goes on despite the defection of the fathers of the monastery, and the devastation accomplished by the fire and sword of the Danes. The power of the latter to destroy extends no farther than to the material fabric of Iona; they have no power over the grand missionary spirit which the fabric enshrined. That spirit is not tied to this or to any spot of earth. If it shall continue to linger round the grave of Columba, and haunt the scene of his earthly footsteps, it will by and by become a fetish, and draw men into the debasing worship of material objects and dead men’s bones. It is better that it should be set free from temples and tombs, that it may be able to put forth its mighty expansive force, and show that its power is wholly spiritual, and not dependent upon any man however holy, or any spot of earth however sacred. The tendency of the age was to connect holiness with certain men and certain things. That tendency was growing stronger every century. The fire and sword of the Dane came to counteract that tendency. The remedy was a drastic but a much needed one, though we fear it was but little appreciated by the men of that day.

We have come to the ninth century, but we have not come to the close of the career of the Columban Church. Her footprints are still distinctly traceable. She is still a powerful organisation, despite the troops of Romanisers which from across the Tweed are invading the country and laying siege to Iona. At home we see her struggling to maintain her ancient independence and preserve the scriptural faith of her people in the face of hostile edicts and of many painful sacrifices. On the continent of Europe we behold her putting forth still mightier efforts, as if resolved by her foreign conquests to compensate for the losses and defeats she is beginning to experience at home. We see her spreading the light over vast areas, combating the darkness all round, civilising barbarous tribes, permitting neither the inhospitable plain nor the stormy ocean to turn back her steps, and pushing on into the lands of the Viking, and taking revenge for his many bloody raids into her own native country by enriching the lands under his sway with the blessings of the Gospel.

This untiring and hopeful energy on the part of the Columban Church has been certified to us by many concurring testimonies. No small portion of the evidence that attests the continued action of the Columban Church has been supplied by Rome herself, and it is perhaps not the least convincing and conclusive portion of it. Against what society is it that the Rome of that day enacts her decrees and fulminates her

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