_Of the Miraculous but Terrible Rescue of Saint Patrick._
But the king, being much grieved at the death of the magician, burned
with anger, and, with all the manifold multitude of his people, he
arose to destroy the saint. And he, beholding their violence, and
singing forth with a loud voice, began this verse from the Psalms: "Let
God arise, and let His enemies be scattered, and let them who hate His
face be put to confusion." Then the Lord, the protector of His chosen
ones in the time of need, saved from this multitude his faithful
servant; for, with a terrible earthquake, and with thundering and the
stroke of the thunderbolt, some he destroyed, some he smote to the
ground, and some he put to flight. Thus, as was said by the prophet,
"The Lord shot forth His arrows, and He scattered them; He poured forth
His lightnings, and He overturned them." For He sent among them,
according to the prophecy of Isaiah, the spirit of giddiness; and He
set the idolaters against the idolaters, like the Egyptians against the
Egyptians; each man rushed on his fellow, and brother fought against
brother, and the chariots and their riders were cast to the ground and
overturned; and forty and nine men were slain, and hardly did the rest
escape. But the king trembled at the rebuke of the Lord, and at the
breath of the spirit of His anger, and ran into a hiding-place with
only four of his people, that he might conceal himself from the terrors
of the face of the Lord. But the queen, entreating for the pardon of
the king, reverently approached, and, bending her knee before Saint
Patrick, promised that her consort should come unto him and should
adore his God. And the king, according to her promise, yet with a
designing heart, bended his knees before the saint, and simulated to
adore the Christ in which he believed not. There, with the tongue of
iniquity and the heart of falsehood, he promised that if on the morrow
he would vouchsafe to visit his palace, he would obey all his precepts.
But the man of God, though the Lord suffered not the wickedness which
this unworthy king had conceived in his heart, confidently trusting in
the protection of the Lord, assented to his entreaty.