The character as well as the language of the hagiographical stories, which were doubtless read aloud in the pulpit, was determined by the needs of the public for which they were intended. The excellent remarks of Professor W. Meyer, in the introduction to _Die Legende des h. Albanus_ (1904), apply here. The chief object in these compositions was to produce “a strong impression” on the faithful (_ein starker Eindruck auf die Glaubensgenossen_). “Die Legenden wurden christliche Unterhaltungsliteratur. Solche Literatur schmiegt sich dem Empfinden des Volkes an und das Volk schafft selbst dabei mit. Die glänzenden Gedanken und die glänzende Darstellung der Caecilialegende entspricht der feinen Kultur Roms im 5. Jahrhundert; die phrasenhafte oder die unbeholfene Darstellung, mit welcher die so verschiedenen Freunde Fortunat und Gregor von Tours platte Kleinigkeiten umhüllen, entspricht ihrer Zeit, wo der Massstab des Schönen gänzlich fehlte” (p. 5). 6. _Vita Secunda (V₂) and Vita Quarta (V₄)_ The two anonymous Lives, most conveniently distinguished by their order in the _Trias Thaumaturga_ of Colgan, who first published them,[318] are closely related, and taken together have considerable importance for the criticism of Muirchu’s Life. A full comparison between the two documents will be found in my paper on the “Tradition of Muirchu’s Text” (_Hermathena_, 1902, 186 _sqq._). Both follow the order of Muirchu up to the end of the Tara episode, and at this point our text of V₂ stops abruptly. There is a close parallelism throughout. V₄ is rather more prolix, and has some notices which are not in V₂; but V₂ has also notices which are not in V₄, and has some Irish sentences which do not appear, or appear in a Latin equivalent, in V₄.[319] In the parts dependent on Muirchu, V₂ is closer to Muirchu. The comparison shows that neither document depends on the other, but both on a common source which I have designated W, the tenor of which can be, almost mechanically, reconstructed. It can then be shown that W was not simply a MS. of Muirchu, but “a document which was sometimes a free paraphrase, sometimes a close copy” of Muirchu (but derived from a MS. of Muirchu of different lineage from that contained in the _Lib. Arm._). But it must have been something more. For there are a number of passages in V₂ and V₄ which are not in Muirchu, and “the close parallelism between V₂ and V₄ throughout, and not merely in the Muirchu portions, makes it practically certain that, in the other portions too, they were both following” the same source, namely W. Thus W was a compilation based on Muirchu and some other source (or sources).