The Irish have many lives of their great apostle, whereof the two
principal are, that compiled by Jocelin, a Cistercian monk, in the
twelfth century, who quotes four lives written by disciples of the
saint; and that by Probus, who, according to Bollandus, lived in the
seventh century. But in both are intermixed several injudicious popular
reports. We, with Tillemont, chiefly confine ourselves to the saint's
own writings, his Confession, and his letter to Corotic, which that
judicious critic doubts not to be genuine. The style in both is the
same; he is expressed in them to be the author; the Confession is quoted
by all the authors of his life, and the letter was written before the
conversion of the Franks under king Clovis, in 496. See Tillemont, t.
16, p. 455, and Brininnia Sancta.