When Christianity did arrive in Wales it came in the form of monasticism. This was not the type of monasticism which became so famous afterwards under the name Benedictinism. Its pattern was not found at Monte Cassino but in the Egyptian desert, where abbots ruled over a number of associated, but otherwise independent, cells. From Egypt {42} the fashion had travelled to St. Honorat, one of the beautiful isles of Lérins off the French coast, now a favourite resort of visitors from Cannes. There the great St. Patrick himself lived for a time; and a painting on the walls of the monastic refectory commemorates his expulsion of all venomous reptiles from the island. From Lérins the new ideal spread to Arles and the cities of Provence; then up the Rhone valley and to Tours, where it received a warm welcome from St. Martin. It then came to Britain where it struck root and, in the course of the succeeding two centuries, produced a large number of saints, the most celebrated of whom were David, Patrick, and Columba. That the British Church was full of vigour is proved by the rise of Pelagius at the beginning of the fifth century, and the heresy associated with his name; for the presence of heretics in a Church always indicates life, just as orthodoxy indicates apathy and indifference. So firm a hold did this type of Christian life lay upon the Celtic people of the British Isles that, despite the pressure of the Roman Church, it lingered on well into the twelfth century. This early Celtic Christianity was, in many respects, an exceedingly beautiful thing. Never {43} has the world beheld more perfect missionaries than the spiritual and tender-hearted preachers who took the Gospel across stormy seas, amid countless perils, to Britain, Ireland, Scotland, parts of Germany, and even distant Iceland. To Christians of the West, Iona ought surely to be a spot scarcely less sacred than Rome itself. But little priestly pomp pertained to these early preachers; gentleness, simplicity, and faith were their most pronounced qualities. Their meekness overcame every obstacle, from the ferocity of wild beasts to the more dangerous ferocity of savage men. They knew little or nothing about rules and discipline, and there is hardly a trace of Latin order and love of law perceptible in their genius. As saints they were superb; but their churchmanship was indifferent. It was the Roman and the Teuton who built the splendid edifice of the mediæval Catholic Church. The Christian communities of the Celts were too mystical and too spiritual to attempt to compress the Almighty into human formulas; they could produce holy men, and they could produce heretics, but defenders of the Faith they could not produce. To appreciate the immense difference it is only necessary to contrast the generous and genial character of Columba {44} with that of the hard, grasping, and narrow Augustine! From the year 664, when the famous Synod of Whitby met,