During the civil war, Cork held out for King Charles, but its garrison was ultimately surprised and taken.
When, in 1685, the bigoted and cruel Louis XIV. revoked the Edict of Nantes, Cork, though a Catholic community, opened her friendly arms to welcome the fugitive sons of France, and threw around them the mantle of her protection.
The name of St. Finbarr, the first Bishop of Cork, is so commonly referred to in connection with Southern Ireland that it is perhaps allowable to extract and reprint here, from Butler's "Lives of the Saints," the leading events of his life:
"Called by some St. Barrus, or Barroeus, he was a native of Connaught, and instituted a monastery at Lough Eirc, which lake, said the antiquarian Harris, was the hollowed basin in which the greater part of the city of Cork now sits. From this monastery and its immediate surroundings grew up the present city of Cork. St. Finbarr's disciple, St. Colman, founded the see of Cloyne, of which he became first bishop. St. Nessan succeeded St. Finbarr at the monastery and built the town of Cork. (This saint, too, is honoured, locally, on the 17th of March and 1st of December.)
"The name under which St. Finbarr was baptized was Locahan, the surname Finbarr, or Barr the White, was given to him afterward. He was Bishop of Cork seventeen years, and died at Cloyne, fifteen miles distant. His body was buried in his own cathedral at Cork, which bears his name, and his _reliques_, some years after, were put in a silver shrine and preserved in the same edifice."
The Abbey of St. Finbarr was a veritable outpost of Christianity. Dungarvan owes its name, and Waterford its Christianity, to Brother Garvan of this abbey; while Brother Brian became the patron of St. Brienne in France.
Cork University was a glorious institution in its time, and many who had no prejudices in favour of Ireland have endorsed its virtues from the times of Johnson to those of Newman, Hallam, and Macaulay.
After the fall of the Western Roman Empire the schools and the abbeys of Ireland became famous. "Hither fled the timid for safety, and the leisured for learning." Students came from all lands and teachers went out to all lands.
England's Alfred came here to study, and Charlemagne drew his teachers from this "school of the West," as it was afterward called by Johnson.