Page:A View of the State of Ireland - 1809.djvu/320

, hee confessed the murther of five, the rest hee left wounded, so as he knew not whether they lived or no. Then was he taught that both the one, and the other were execrable, and verie meekelie humbled himselfe to repentance.

Solinus writeth that they woonted (because they would seeme Terrible and Martiall,) to embrue their faces in the bloude of their Enemyes skine. Strabo the famous Geographer, who flourished under Augustus and Tiberius Cæsar, more then fifteene hundred yeares agoe, telleth (without asseveration) that the Irish were great Gluttons, eaters of mans flesh: and counted it Honourable for Parents deceased, to bee eaten up of their Children, and that in open sight they medled with their Wiues, Mothers, and Daughters: which is the lesse incredible, considering what Saint Hierome avoucheth of the Scots their Ofspring and Allies, and what all Histories doe witnesse of the Scithians their auncient founders. See Strabo lib. 4. Geograph.

Although since the time of Saint Patricke, Christianize was never extinct in Ireland, yet the governement being hayled into contrarie factions, the Nobilitie lawlesse, the multitude willfull, it came to passe that Religion waxed with the temporall common sort cold and feeble, untill the Conquest did settle it, especiallie in cases of restrainte and Discipline. The Honourable state of Marriage they much abused,