ty abroad before middle of the fifth century.
Possibly the best way to present the question of Declan's age is to put in tabulated form the arguments of the pre-Patrician advocates against the counter contentions of those who claim that Declan's period is later than Patrick's:--
For the Pre-Patrician Mission. Against Theory of Early Fifth Century period.
I.--Positive statement of Life, I.--Contradictions, anachronisms, corroborated by Lives of SS. &c., of Life. Ciaran and Ailbhe. II.--Lack of allusion to Declan in II.--Patrick's apparent avoidance the Lives of St. Patrick. of the Principality of Decies. III.--Prosper's testimony to the III.--The peculiar Declan cult and mission of Palladius as first the strong local hold which bishop to the believing Scots. Declan has maintained. IV.--Alleged motives for later invention of Pre-Patrician story.
In this matter and at this hour it is hardly worth appealing to the authority of Lanigan and the scholars of the past. Much evidence not
