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The Early Celtic Church in Scotland. 15
Song— "The Garb of Old Gaul"— 3lr Paul Fiusit.
Humorous Scotch lloading—"A (iowk's En and"—Mr Ross
Cauipbell, Elocutionist.
Oran Gailig—
" Cruinneacliadh nan Gaidlieal "—Miss Jessie K.
Maclachlan.
Dance — "Highland
Ghaidhealach.
Fling and Reel o' Tulloch " — Oganaich
Vote of thanks to the speakers and performers— Sir K. S. Mac-
kenzie.
8th December 1885.
A largely attended meeting was held on tl.is date, when
Pi-ovost IVIacandrew delivered the inaugural address for the
Session of 1885-6— the subject being "The Early Celtic Church
in Scotland." Provost Macandrew's paper was as follows:
THE EARLY CELTIC CHURCH IN SCOTLAND.
What I have undertaken to do to-night is to give some account
of the Christian Church as it existed in Scotland in the earliest
Christian times, and before it fell under the influence and authority
of the Bishop of Rome. The Christianity of Scotland came from
Ireland, and at the outset of our enquiry it is necessary to consider
when and by whom the Irish were converted. The Roman world
become oflicially Christian about 321, and at that time Britain, up
at least to the Southern wall, was a Roman province, and presumably
it became Christian as the rest of the Empire did. We
know that a Christian Church existed among the provincial
Britons at the time the Romans took their departure, and continued
to exist among those Britons who were not subdued by the
Saxons. But whether the Christianity of the Roman Province
extended itself among the unsubdued Caledonians to the North,
or among the inhabitants of Ireland, is a matter as to which we
have no certain light. Aboxit 397, thirteen years before the linal
abandonment of the province by the Romans, St Ninian, a bishop
of the Britons, built a Church at Whithern, in Galloway, and is
said by Bede to have converted the Southern Picts; and the
Southern Picts are said by Bede to have been those living
between the Firths of Foitli and Clyde and the Grampian range.
Whether Bede is right in this is a matter about which I shall ImAC
something to say farther on ; but if the Picts to the south of the
—