‘Confession of Saint Patrick’ by Saint Patrick ## 20-29; pp. 5-7
[Saint Patrick - mid-fifth to early-sixth century; Roman Britain/Ireland; Missionary, Bishop; Apostle of Ireland]“20. The very same night while I was sleeping Satan attacked me violently, as I will remember as long as I shall be in this body; and there fell on top of me as it were, a huge rock, and not one of my members had any force. But from whence did it come to me, ignorant in the spirit, to call upon Helias? And meanwhile I saw the sun rising in the sky, and while I was crying out “Helias, Helias” with all my might, lo, the brilliance of that sun fell upon me and immediately shook me free of all the weight; and I believe that I was aided by Christ my Lord, and that his Spirit then was crying out for me, and I hope that it will be so in the day of my affliction, just as it says in the Gospel: “In that hour”, the Lord declares, “it is not you who speaks but the Spirit of your Father speaking in you.”
21. And a second time, after many years, I was taken captive. On the first night I accordingly remained with my captors, but I heard a divine prophecy, saying to me: “You shall be with them for two months.” So it happened. On the sixtieth night the Lord delivered me from their hands.
22. On the journey he provided us with food and fire and dry weather every day, until on the tenth day we came upon people. As I mentioned above, we had journeyed through an unpopulated country for twenty-eight days, and in fact the night that we came upon people we had no food.
23. And after a few years I was again in Britain with my parents [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 they 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.
24. And another night - God knows, I do not, whether within me or beside me – they called me most unmistakably with words which I heard and could not understand, except at the end of the speech it was represented thus: “He who gave his life for you, he it is who speaks within you.” And thus I awoke, joyful.
25. And on a second occasion I saw Him praying within me, and I was as it were, inside my own body, and I heard Him above me - that is, above my inner self. He was praying powerfully with sighs. And in the course of this I was astonished and wondering, and I pondered who it could be who was praying within me. But at the end of the prayer it was revealed to me that it was the Spirit. And so I awoke and remembered the Apostles words: “Likewise the Spirit helps us in our weakness; for we know not how to pray as we ought. But the Spirit Himself intercedes for us with sighs too deep for utterance.” And again: “The Lord our advocate intercedes for us.”
26. And then I was attacked by a goodly number of my elders, who [brought up] my sins against my arduous episcopate. That day in particular I was mightily upset, and might have fallen here and for ever; but the Lord generously spared me, a convert, and an alien, for his names sake, and he came powerfully to my assistance in that state of being trampled down. I pray God that it shall not be held against them as a sin that I fell truly into disgrace and scandal.
27. They brought up against me after thirty 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 fifteen 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.
28. On the other hand, I did not proceed to Ireland of my own accord until I was almost giving up, but through this I was corrected by the Lord, and he prepared me so that today I should be what was once far from me, in order that I should have the care of - or rather, I should be concerned for - the salvation of others, when at that time, still, I was only concerned for myself.
29. Therefore, on that day when I was rebuked, as I have just mentioned, I saw in a vision of the night a document before my face, without honour, and meanwhile I heard a divine prophecy, saying to me: “We have seen with displeasure the face of the chosen one divested of [his good] name.” And he did not say “You have seen with displeasure”, but “We have seen with displeasure” (as if He included Himself). He said then: “He who touches you, touches the apple of my eye.”
Image: 14th-century French ivory triptych
Music: ‘Ad infantum triumfantum’ · Stephen Grant · Paul Guttry · William Sharp · Sequentia · Barbara Thornton · Benjamin Bagby · Anonymous
‘Ad infantum triumfantum’ = ‘To the triumphant infant’
>>> youtube.com/watch?v=ytnQcgccEHI