(Vol. v., p. 344.).
From the following extracts I send in answer to your correspondent CEYREP,
there seems to be very great doubt if St. Patrick ever existed in reality,
but that we ought rather to place him in the same category with St.
Amphibalus, St. Denis, &c. Dr. Ledwich relates that--
"In Usuard's, and the _Roman Martyrology_, Bishop Patrick, of Auvergne,
is placed at the 16th day of March, and on the same day the office of
the Lateran canons, approved by Pius V., celebrates the festival of a
Patrick, the apostle of Ireland. The 17th of March is dedicated to
Patrick, Bishop of Nola. Had not Dr. Maurice, then, the best reasons
for supposing that Patricus Auvernensis sunk a day lower in the
calendar, and made for the Irish a Patricius Hibernensis? This seems
exactly to be the case. It is very extraordinary the 16th and 17th of
March should have three Patricks, one of Auvergne, another of Ireland,
and a third of Nola! The antiquities of Glastonbury record three
Patricks, one of Auvergne, another archbishop of Ireland, and a third
an abbot. The last, according to a martyrology cited by Usher, went on
the mission to Ireland, A.D. 850, but was unsuccessful: he returned and
died at Glastonbury. If all that is now advanced be not a fardel of
monkish fictions, which it certainly is, the last Patrick was the man
who was beatified by the bigoted Anglo-Saxons, for his endeavours to
bring the Irish to a conformity with the Romish church."