Columba's Last Years — His Death — His Character

Columba the confidant of the joys and consoler of the sorrows of domestic life. — He blesses little Hector with the fair locks. — He prays for a woman in her delivery; he reconciles the wife of a pilot to her husband. —Vision of the saved wife who receives her husband in heaven. — He continues his missions to the end of his life. — Visions before death. — The Angels' Hill. — Increase of austerities. — Nettle-soup his sole food. — A supernatural light surrounds him during his nightly work and prayers. —His death is retarded for four years by the prayers of the community. —When this respite has expired, he takes leave of the monks at their work he visits and blesses the granaries of the monastery. — He announces his death to his attendant Diarmid. — His farewell to his old white horse. —Last benediction to the isle of lona; last work of transcription; last message to his community. — He dies in the church. — Review of his life and character.

portum, a quo nuper coram vobis emigravit, nunquam revertetur; sed nee ad alias quas appetit, terras... cum suis perveniet malis cooperatoribus. Hodie, quam mox videbitis, de nube a borea orta immitis iramissa procella eum cum sociis submerget: nee de eis etiam unus remanebit fabulator.... Die serenissima, et ecce de mari oborta, sicut sanctus dixerat, nubes cum magno fragore venti emissa, raptorem cum praeda inter Maleam et Colonsam insulas inveniens... submersit." — Adamnan, ii. 22.

By the side of the terrible acts of vengeance which have just been narrated, the student loves to find in this bold enemy of the wicked and the oppressor a gentle and familiar sympathy for all the affections as well as all the trials of domestic life. Rich and poor, kings and peasants, awoke in his breast the same kindly emotion, expressed with the same fulness. When King Aidan brought his children to him, and spoke of his anxiety about their future lives, he did not content himself with seeing the eldest. " Have you none younger?" said the abbot; ''bring them all— let me hold them in my arms and on my heart! " And when the younger children were brought, one fair-haired boy, Hector (Eochaidh Buidhe), came forward running, and threw himself upon the saint's knees. Columba held him long pressed to his heart, then kissed his forehead, blessed him, and prophesied for him a long life, a prosperous reign, and a great posterity.-'^^

Let us listen while his biographer tells how he came to the aid of a woman in extremity, and how he made peace in a divided household. One day at lona he suddenly stopped short while reading, and said with a smile to his monks, " I must now go and pray for a poor little woman who is in the pains of childbirth and suffers like a true daughter of Eve. She is down yonder in Ireland, and reckons upon my prayers, for she is my kinswoman, and of my mother's family." Upon this he hastened to the church, and when his prayer was ended returned to his brethren, saying— " She is delivered. The Lord Jesus, who deigned to be born of a woman, has come to her aid; this time she will not die." ^3^

^•'^ " Seel nunc si alios jiiniores habes, ad me veniant, et quem ex eis elegerit Dominus regem, subito super meum irruit gremium... quibus accessis.... Echodius Buidhe adveniens in sinu ejus recubuit. Statimque sanctus cum osculatus benedixit." — Adamxan, i. 0. Columba had predicted that none of the four elder sons of the king should succeed him, and that they should all perish in war. The three eldest were actually killed in the battle for which Columba had rung the bells of his new monastery (see page 55), and the fourth also died sword in hand " in Saxonia bellica, in strage." The kings of Scotland, wJiose lineage is traced to the Dalriadians, were probably descendants of the fair-haired Hector.

23a ii ^ Icctione surgit et subridens ait: Nunc ad oratorium mihi properandum est ut pro quadam misellula deprecer femina, quas nunc in Hibernia nonicn hujus inclamitans commemorat Columba;, in magnis parturitionis, ut filia Ev£E, difficillimaD torta punitionibus... quia et milii cognationis est... de parentela niatris mete. ... Ad ecclesiam currit.... Nunc propitius Doniinus Jesus, de muliere progenitus, opportune misers subvciiiens, prospere proleni peperit; nee hac vice niorietur. Eadcni bora, nomcn ejus invocans, absoluta salutem recuperavit. Ita ab aliquibus postca de Scotia et de cadeui rcgione ubi mulier inhabitabat, transmcantibus, intimatum est." —Adamnax, ii. 40.

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Herocon- Another day, while he was visiting an island on ''iiot's wife ^^^° Irish coast, a pilot came to him to complain of his wife, who had taken an aversion for him. The ^bbot Called her and reminded her of the duties imposed upon her by the law of the Lord. " I am ready to do everything," said the woman— " I will obey you in the hardest things you can command. I do not draw back from any of the cares of the house. I will go even, if it is desired, on pilgrimage to Jerusalem, or I will shut myself up in a nunnery— in short, I will do everything except live with him."

The abbot answered that there could be no question of pilgrimage or of a convent so long as her husband lived; " but," he added, " let us try to pray God, all three, fasting—you, your husband, and myself."

" Ah," said the woman, " I know that you can obtain even what is impossible from God." However, his proposal was carried out— the three fasted, and Colamba passed the whole night in prayer without ever closing his eyes. Next morning he said to the woman, with the gentle irony which he so often employed, " Tell me to what convent are you bound after your yesterday's projects? " " To none," said the woman; " my heart has been changed to-night. I know not how I have passed from hate to love." And from that day until the hour of her death she lived in a tender and faithful union with her husband.'-^*

But Columba fortunately was connected with other households more united, where he could admire the happiness of his friends without feeling himself compelled to make peace. From his sanctuary at lona his habitual solicitude and watchful sympathy followed them to their last hour. One day he was alone with one of the Saxons whom he had converted and attached to his community', and who was the baker of the monks; Avhile this stranger prepared his bread, he heard j)q quodam guberneta.... De sua querebatur uxore quae... eum ad maritalem nullo modo admittebat concubitura..., Omnia qusecumque mihi prasceperis, sum parata, quamlibet sint valde laboriosa, adimplere, excepto uno, ut me nullo modo in uno lecto dormire cum Lugneo. Omnem domus curara exercere non recuso, aut etiara si jubcas, maria transiens in aliquo puellarum monasteiio permanere.... Scio quod tibi impossibile non erit ut ea quae... vel impossibiliavidemus, a Deo impetratadouentur.... Nocte subsequenti sanctus insomnis pro eis depreeatus est.... O feniina, si, ut hesterna dicebas die, parata hodie es ad feminarum emigrare monasteriolum?... Nunc quem lieri oderam, hodie amo: cor enira uicum hac nocte prasterita, quo modo ignoro, in me immutatura est de odio in amorem.... Anima ejusdem marita; indissociabllitcr in amore conglutinata est niariti, ut ilia maritalis concubitus debita... nullo modo deinceps recusarct." — Adamnan, ii. 41.

THE APOSTLE OF CALEDONIA. 99 the abbot say, looking up to heaven — " Oh! happy, happy woman! She goes into heaven with a guard of angels.'' Exactly a year after, the abbot and the Saxon baker were again together. " I see the woman," said Columba, "of whom I spoke to thee last 3^ear coming down from heaven to meet the soul of her husband, who has just died. She contends with powerful enemies for that dear soul, by the help of the holy angels: she gains the day, she triumphs, because her goodman has been a just man— and the two are united again in the home of everlasting consolation." ^35

This vision was preceded and followed by many others of the same description, in which the blessed death of many bishops and monks, his friends and contemporaries, were announced to him. They seem to have been intended to give him a glimpse of that heaven into which God was shortly to call him. Nor was it only at lona that these supernatural graces were accorded to him, for he did not limit his unwearied activity to the narrow enclosure of that island, any more in the decline of his life than in the earlier period of his emigration. Up to old age he continued to have sufficient strength and courage to return to the most northern regions where he had preached the faith to the Picts; and it was in one of his last missionary journeys, when upon the banks of Loch Ness, to the north of the great line of waters which cuts Caledonia in two, at a distance of fifty leagues from lona, that he was permitted to see the angels come to meet the soul of the old Pict, who, faithful during all his life to the law of nature, received baptism, and with it eternal salvation, from the great missionary's hands.^^'^

At this period the angels, whom he saw carrying to heaven the soul of the just and penitent, and aiding the believing wife to make an entrance there for her husband, continually appeared to him and hovered about him. Making all possible allowance for the exaggerations and fables which the proverbial credulity of Celtic nations have added to the

'•'^ "Quidam rcligiosus frater, Generous nomine, Saxo, pistor, opus pistorum cxercens.... Felix mulier, feiix bene morata, ciijus aniinani nunc angeli Dei ad paradisum eveliunt.... Ecce mulier, de qua to prffiscnte dixeram praeterito anno. Nunc niariti sui religiosi cujusdam plebeii in aere obviat animte, et cum Sanctis angelis contra a^inulas pro eo belligerat potestates; quorum adminiculo ejusdem lioniuncionis justitia suliragante, a dajmoniacis belligerationibus erepta, ad tetcrna; refrigeralionis locum aninia ipsius est pcrducta." — Auamkan, iii. 10.

^^ See «/i<e, page r)0. " Ultra Britanniae Dorsum iter agens, secus Nisae fluminis lacum... sanctus senex." — Ibid., iii. 14.

100 ST. COLUMBA,

legends of their saints,237 no Christian will be tempted to deny the verified narratives which bear witness, in Columba's case as well as in that of the other saints, to supernatural appearances which enriched his life, and especially bis old age. Those wonderful soldiers of virtue and Christian truth needed such miracles to help them to support the toils and live through the trials of their dangerous mission. They required to ascend from time to time into celestial regions to find strength there for their continual struggle against all obstacles and perils and continually renewed temptations — and to learn to brave the enmities, the savage manners, and blind hatreds of the nations whom it was the aim of their lives to set free.

'' Let no one follow me to-day," Columba said one morning with unusual severity to the assembled community: " I would be alone in the little plain to the west of the isle." He was obeyed; but a brother, more curious and less obedient than the rest, followed him far off, and saw him, erect and motionless, with Jiis hands and his eyes raised to heaven, standing on a sandy hillock, where he was soon surrounded by a crowd of angels, who came to bear him company and to talk with him. The hillock has to this day retained the name of the Angels' Hill.2^^ And the citizens of the celestial country, as they were called at lona, came often to console and strengthen their future companion during the long winter nights which he passed in prayer in soQie retired corner, voluntarily exposed to all the torments of sleeplessness and cold.239

For as he approached the end of his career this great servant of God consumed his strength in vigils, fasts, and dan- ^^'' Let us quote on this point, from the most illustrious of liagiographers, BoUandus himself, in his prefatory remarks to the life of the first Irish saint who came before him: " Malta continetadmiranda portenta, sed usitata apud gentem illam simplicera etsanctam; neque sacris dogmatibus ailt Dei erga electos suos suavissimje providentia; repugnantia; sunt tamen ibrtassis nonnuUa imperitorura libratorum culpa vitiata aut amplificata. Quod in gcntilium suorura rebus gestis animadverti oportere nos docuit Henricus Fitzsimon societatis nostra theologus, egregio rerum us'u pra;ditus.... Satis est lectorem monuisse ut cum discretione ea legat quaj prodigiosa, et crebro similia miracula commemorant, nisi ab sapicntibus scripta auctoribus sunt." — Acta Sanctorum, January, vol. i. p. 43.

2^^ Cnocan Aingel (colliculus Angelorum), in the map of the island by Graham.

2^' " Cum ingenti animadversione dixit: Hodie... solus exire cupio, nemo itaque ex vobis me sequatur.... Coelestis patriae cives... sanctum virum orantem circumstare... albatis induti vestibus, et post aliquam sermocinationem cum beato viro.... Quantae et qiiales ad beatum virum in hyemalibus plerumque noctibus insomnen, et in locis rcmotioribus, aliis quiescentibus, orantem, angelicae fuerint et suaves frequentationes." — Adamnan, iii. 16. gerous macerations. His life, which had been so generous struggles, hard trial, and toil in the service of God and his neighbor, seemed to him neither full enough nor pure enough. In proportion as the end drew near he redoubled his austerities and mortifications. Every night, according to one of his biographers, he plunged into cold water and remained there for the time necessary to recite an entire psalter.21'^ One day, when, bent by age, he sought, perhaps in a neighboring island, a retirement still more profound than usual, in which to pray, he saw a poor woman gathering wild herbs and even nettles, who told him that her poverty was such as to forbid her ^11 other food. Upon which the old abbot reproached himself bitterly that he had not yet come to that point. '' See,"' he said, " this poor woman, who finds her miserable life worth the trouble of being thus prolonged; and we, who profess to deserve heaven by our austerities, we live in luxury! " When ho went back to his monastery he gave orders that he should be served with no other food than the wild and bitter herbs with which the beggar supported her existence; and he severely reproved his minister, Diarmid,2^i who had come from Ireland with him, wdien he, out of compassion for his master's old age and weakness, threw a little butter into the caldron in which this miserable tare was cooked.^^^

The celestial light which was soon to receive him began already to surround him like a garment or a shroud. His monks told each other that the roimdrbim solitary cell in the isle of Himba, near lona, which he had built for himself, was lighted up every night by a great light, which could be seen through the chinks of the door and keyhole, while the abbot chanted unknown canticles till daybreak. After having remained ¹⁴⁰ O'DoNNELL, iii. 37. This incredible power of supporting cold in the damp and icy climate of the British Isles is one of the most marked features in the penances which the Irish saints inflicted on themselves. — See Colgan, Ada SS. HibernicE.

^^' MS. quoted by Reeves, p. 245, Appendix. The name of Diarmid or Diormid— the same as that of the king against whom Columba raised a civil war — was at a later date changed into that of Dermott, which is still to be found among the Irish.

'^'^ " Cum senio jam gravatus in quodam secessu ab aliis remotiori orationi vocali intentus deambularet.... Ecce paupercula hajc fcmina.... Et quid nos qui... laxius vivimus?... Diermitius... qui debebat cam misel- 1am escam parare... per fistulam instillatoriam modicum liquefacti hutyri et olla;... infudit. ... Sic Christi miles ultimam senectutem in continua carnis maceratione usque ad exitura... perduxit." — O'Donell, Vita Quinia, iii. 32. there three days and nights without food, he came out, full of joy at having discovered the mysterious meaning of several texts of Holy Scripture, which up to that time he had not understood.^'i'^ When he returned to lona to die, continuing faithful to his custom of spending a great part of the night in prayer, he bore about with him everywhere the miraculous light which already surrounded him like the nimbus of his holiness. The entire community was involuntarily agitated by the enjoyment of that foretaste of paradise. One winter's night, a young man who was destined to succeed Columbaas fourth abbot of lona remained in the church while the others slept: all at once he saw the abbot •come in preceded by a golden light which fell from the heights of the vaulted roof, and lighted all the corners of the building, even including the little lateral oratory where the young monk hid himself in alarm.21* All who passed during the night before the church, while their old abbot prayed, were startled b}^ this light, which dazzled them like lightning.^^^ Another of the young monks, whose education was specially directed by the abbot himself, resolved to ascertain whether the same illumination existed in Columba's cell; and notwithstanding that he had been expressly forbidden to do so, he got up in the night and went groping to the door of the cell to look in, but fled immediately, blinded by the light that filled it.^i^

These signs, which were the forerunners of his deliverance, showed themselves for several years towards the end of his life, which he believed and hoped was nearer its termination than it proved to be. But this remnant of existence, from which he sighed to be liberated, was held fast by the filial love of his disciples, and the ardent prayers of £0 many new Christian communities founded or ministered to

243 c( jyQ qyj^ domo immensae claritatis radii, per rimulas valvarum et clavium foramina, erumpentes, noctu videbantur. Carmina qiioque spiritalia et ante inaudita dccantari ab co audiebantur.... Scripturaruni... qua;que obscura et difficillima, plana et luce clarius aperta, mundissimi cordis oculis patebant." — Adamnan, iii. 18.

^^* " Simulque cum eo (ingreditur) aurea lux, de coeli altitudine descendens, totum illud ecclesiae spatium replens... et penetrans usque in illius exedrioliB separatum conclave ubi se Virgnous in quantum potuit latitare conabatur... extcrritus."— Ibid, iii. 19. Virgnous, or Fergna Brit, fourth abbot of lona, from G05 to 625. He told this incident to his nephew, by whom it was told to Adamnan.

²⁴⁵ u Fuiguralis lux." — Ibid., iii. 20.

24G u Cuidam suo sapientiam discenti alumno... qui, contra interdictuni, in noctis silentio accessit... callide explorans... oculos ad clavium foramina posuit.... Repletum hospitiolum coelestis splendore claritudims, quam non sustinens intueri, aufugit."— Ibid, iii. 20. by bis zealous care. Two of bis monks, one Irish and one Saxon, of tbe number of those whom be admitted to bis cell to belp him in bis labor or to execute bis instructions, saw bira one day change countenance, and perceived in bis face a sudden expression of tbe most contrary emotions: first a beatific joy, which made bim raise to heaven a look full of tbe sweetest and tenderest gratitude; but a minute after this ray of supernatural joy gave place to an expression of heavy and profound sadness. The two spectators pressed bim with questions which be refused to answer. At length they threw themselves at bis knees and begged bim, with tears, not to afiiict tbem by biding what bad been revealed to bim. " Dear children," be said to tbem, " 1 do not wish to afiiict you.... Know, then, that it is thirty years to-day since I began my pilgrimage in Caledonia. I bave long prayed God to let my exile end with this tbirtietb year, and to recall me to tbe heavenly country. When you saw me so joyous, it was because I could already see tbe angels wbo came to seek my soul. But all at once tbe}^ stopped short, down there upon that rock at tbe farthest limit of tbe sea which surrounds our island, as if they would approach to take me, and could not. And, in truth, they could not, because the Lord bad paid less regard to my ardent prayer than to that of tbe many churches which bave prayed for me, and which bave obtained, against my will, that I should still dwell in this body for four years. This is tbe reason of my sadness. But in four years I shall die without being sick; in four years, ¹ know it and see it, they will come back, these boly angels, and I shall take my flight with tbem towards tbe Lord." ²⁴⁷

At the end ofthe four years thus fixed be arranged no takes everything for bis departure. It was tbe end of monks iit'*° May, and it was bis desire to take leave of tbe their work, monks who worked in the fields in tbe only fertile part of lona, tbe western side. His great age prevented bim from walking, and be was drawn in a car by oxen. When bo

²¹⁷ "Facies ejus subita, mirifica ct lajtifica liilaritate effloruit.... Inconiparabili repletus gavidio, valde laitificabatur. Turn ilia sapida ct suavis lajtificatio in inoestara convertitur tristificationem.... Duo... qui... ejus tugurioli ad j^anuam stabant... illacrymati, ingeuiisculantes.... Quia vos, ait, amo, tristificari nolo.... Usque in hunc prajsentein diem, niea; in Britannia peregrinationis terdeni completi sunt anni.... Sed ecce nunc, subito retardati, ultra nostra) fretum insulje slant in rupe... cum Sanctis mihi obviaturis illo tempore, ad Dominum lajtus emigrabo." — Adamnan, iii. 22. reached the laborers he said to them, " I greatly desired to die a month ago, on Easter-da}^, and it was granted to me; but I preferred to wait a little longer, in order that the festival might not be changed into a day of sadness for you." And when all wept he did all he could to console them. Then turning towards the east, from the top of his rustic chariot he blessed the island and all its inhabitants — a blessing which, according to local tradition, was like that of St. Patrick in Ireland, and drove, from that day, all vipers and venomous creatures out of the island,^*^

On Saturday in the following week he "went, leanthcmmfaT J^g ou his faithful attendant Diarmid, to bless the tic granary, granary of the monastery. Seeing there two great heaps of corn, the fruit of the last harvest, he said, " I see with joy that my dear monastic family, if I must leave them this year, will not at least suffer from famine." " Dear father," said Diarmid, " why do you thus sadden us by talking of your death? " " Ah, well," said the abbot, " here is a little secret which I will tell thee if thou wilt swear on thy knees to tell no one before I am gone. To-day is Saturday, the day which the Holy Scriptures call Salibath or rest. And it will be truly my day of rest, for it shall be the last of my laborious life. This very night I shall enter into the path of my fathers. Thou weepest, dear Diarmid, but console thyself; it is my Lord Jesus Christ who deigns to invite me to rejoin Him; it is He who has revealed to me that my summons will come to night." ^'^^

Then he left the storehouse to return to the monoid white^ astery, but when he had gone half-way stopped to horse. rest at a spot which is still marked by one of the ancient crosses of lona.^s'^ At this moment an ancient and faithful servant, the old white horse which had been em-

248 u^jj visitandos fratres operarios senex senio fessus, plaustro vectus, pergit.... In occidua insulce lona; Jaborantes parte... ut erat in vehiculo sedens, ad orienteni suani convertens faciem, insulaiu cum insulanis benedixit habitatoribus.... Ex qua die, viperarum venena trisulcarum linguarum usque in hodiernam diem nullo modo aut liomini aut pecori nocere potuere." — Adamnan, ii. 28, iii. 53.

-^* "Quod cum benedixisset et duos in eo frugum sequestratos acervos.... Valde congratulor meis familiaribus monacbis, quia hoc etiani anno si a vobis emigrare nie oportuerit, annum sufficientem habebitis.... Aliquem arcanum luibeo sermusculum (sz'c).... Et mlhi vere est sabbatum hsec hodierna dies ... in qua post meas laborationum molestias sabbatizo.... Jam enim Dominus mens Jesus Christus me invitare dignatur."—Ibid, iii. 23.

250 rfjjg monument called Maclean's Cross. ployed to carry milk from the dairy daily to the monastery, came towards him. He came and put his head upon his master's shoulder, as if to take leave of him. The eyes of the old horse had an expression so pathetic that they seemed to be bathed in tears. Diarmid would have sent the animal away, but the good old man forbade him. " The horse loves me/' he said, " leave him with me; let him weep for my departure. The Creator has revealed to this poor animal what he has hidden from thee, a reasonable man." Upon which, still caressing the faithful brute, he gave him a last blessing.251 When this was done ho used the remnants of his strength to climb to the top of a hillock from which he could see all the isle and the monastery, and there lifted up his hands to pronounce a prophetic benediction on the sanctuary he had created. " This little spot, so small and low, shall be greatly honored, not only by the Scots kings and people, but also by foreign chiefs and barbarous nations; and it shall be venerated even by the saints of other Churches."

After this he went down to the monastery, entered his cell, and began to work for the last time. He was then occupied in transcribing the Psalter. When he had come to the 33d Psalm and the verse, Inqidrentes auteiti Dominum non deficient omni bono, he stopped short. " I must stop here," he said, " Baithen will write the rest." Baithen, as has been seen, was the steward of lona, and was to become its abbot. After this the aged saint was present at the vigil service before Sunday in the church. When he returned to his cell he seated himself upon the naked stones which served the septuagenarian for bed and pillow, and which were shown for nearly a century near his tomb.252 Then ho

^^' " Media via ubi postea crux molari lapide infixa, hodicque stans... in margine cernitur viae.... Senio fessus, paululum sedens.... Ecco albus occurrit caballus, obediens servitor... caput in sinu ejus ponens... dominum a se suum mox emigraturum... cojpit plangcre uberumque quasi homo fundere et valde spunieas flere lacrymas.... Sine hunc, sine nostri amatorem, ut in hunc meum sinum fictus eflundat amarissimi plangoris.... Moestum a se equum benedixit niinistratorera." — Adamnan, iii. 23.

2j2 II Monticellum monasterio supereminentem ascendens, in vertice ejus paululum stans, elevatis manibus, benedixit coenobiura: Huic loco, quamhbet angusto et vili, non tantum Scotorura reges cum populis, sed etiam barbararum et exterarura gentium regnatores cum plebibus suis.... Sedebat in tugurio Psalterium scribens.... Tost taleni pcrscriptum versum paginae, ad vespertinalem dominicae noctis missam " (note this singular expression for xigiles) " ingreditur ecclesiam. Qua consunimata, ad hospitioiuni revertens, in lectulo residet pernox, ubi pro stramine nudam habebat petrani et pro puivillo lapidem, qui hodie quasi quidam juxta sepulcruni ejus titulus stat monumenti." — Ibid, iii. 23. intrusted to his only companion a last message for the community: " Dear children, this is what I command with my last words — let peace and charity, a charity mutual and sincere, reign always among you! If you act thus, following the example of the saints, God who strengthens the just will help you, and I, who shall be near Him, will intercede on your behalf, and you shall obtain of Him not only all the necessities of the present life in sufficient quantity, but still more the rewards of eternal life, reserved for those who keep His law.253

These were his last words. As soon as the midnight bell had rung for the matins of the Sunday festival, he rose and hastened before the other monks to the church, where he knelt down before the altar. Diarmid followed him, but as the church was not yet lighted he could only find him by groping and crying in a plaintive voice, " Where art thou, my father?" He found Columba lying before the altar, and, placing himself at his side, raised the old abbot's venerable head upon his knees. The whole community soon arrived with lights, and wept as one man at the sight of their dying Columba opened his eyes once more, and turned them to his children on either side with a look full of serene and radiant joy. Then with the aid of Diarmid he 9th June!'"' raised, as best he might, his right hand to bless them all; his hand dropped, the last sigh came from his lips; and his face remained calm and sweet like that of a man who in his sleep had seen a vision of heaven.^^

2i3 (I fjggg vobis, o filioli, novissima commendo verba, ut inter vos mutuam et non fictam habeatis charitatem, cum pace." — Adamnan, iii. 23.

254 «( pQgj q^gg conticuit.... Vix media nocte pulsata personante clocca, festinus surgens ad ecclesiara pergit, citiorque ceteris currens, solus introgressus juxta altare. Diormitius ecclesiam ingrediens flebili ingeminat voce: Ubi es, pater? Et necdum allatis fratrum lucernis, per tenebras palpans, sanctum ante altariura recubantem invenit: quem paululum erigens et juxta sedans sanctum in suo greraio posuit caput. Et inter hoec coetus monachorum cum luminaribus accurrens, patre viso moriente, coepit plangere. Et, ut ab aliquibus qui prcesenies inerant didicimus, sanctus, necdum egrediente animo, apertis sursum oculis, ad utruraque latus cum mira vultus iiilaritate et laetitia circumspiciebat; sanctos scilicet obvios intuens angelos. Diormitius tum sanctam sublevat ad benedicendum sancfi monacborum chorum dexteram manum. Sed et ipse venerabiJis pater in quantum poterat, simul suani movebat manum. Et post sanctam benedictionem taliter significatam, continuo spiritum exhalavit. Facies rubens, et mirum in modum angelica visione exhilarata, in tantum remansit, ut non quasi mortui, sed dormientis videretur viventis." — Adamnan, iii. 23. The narrative of Adamnan is an almost literal reproduction of that of Cummian, the first known biographer of the saint.

Such was the life and death of the first great apostle of Great Britain. We have lingered, perhaps, too long on the grand form of this monk, rising up before us from the midst of the Hebridean sea, who, for the third part of a century, spread over those sterile isles, and gloomy distant shores, a pure and fertilizing light. In a confused age and unknown region he displayed all that is greatest and purest, and, it must be added, most easily forgotten in human genius: the gift of ruling souls by ruling himself.^^^ To select the most marked and graphic incidents from the general tissue of his life, and those most fit to unfold that which attracts the modern reader— that is, his personal character and influence upon contemporary events— from a world of minute details having almost exclusive reference to matters supernatural or ascetical, has been no easy task. But when this is done, it becomes comparatively easy to represent to ourselves the tall old man, with his fine and regular features, his sweet and powerful voice, the Irish tonsure high on his shaven head, and his long locks falling behind, clothed with his monastic cowl, and seated at the prow of his coracle, steering through the misty archipelago and narrow lakes of the north of Scotland, and bearing from isle to isle and from shore to shore, light, justice, and truth, the life of the conscience and of the soul.

One loves above all to study the depths of that soul, and the changes which had taken place in it since its youth. No more than his namesake of Luxeuil, the monastic apostle of Burgundy, was he of the Picts and Scots a Columba. Gentleness was of all qualities precisely the one in which he failed the most. At the beginning of his life the future abbot of lona showed himself still more than the abbot of Luxeuil to be animated by all the vivacities of his age, associated with all the struggles and discords of his race and country. He was vindictive, passionate, bold, a man of strife, born a soldier rather than a monk, and known, praised, and blamed as a soldier — so that even in his lifetime he was invoked in fight; '^^^ and continued a soldier, insulanus mUes{^^~' even upon the island rock from which he rushed forth to preach, convert, enlighten, reconcile, and reprimand both princes and nations, men and women, laymen and clerks.

255 (, Animarum dux," said the angel who announced his birth to his mother. This expression is also found in Adaranan (i. 2), but placed in the mouth of Columba, and applied by him to another saint.

"* See ante, page 94, note. ^^"^ Adamnan, Prafat.

He was at the same time full of contradictions and contrasts — at once tender and irritable, rude and courteous, ironical and compassionate, caressing and imperious, grateful and revengeful — led by pity as well as by wrath, ever moved by generous passions, and among all passions fired to the very end of his life by two which his countrymen understand the best, the love of poetry and the love of country. Little inclined to melancholy when he had once surmounted the great sorrow of his life, which was his exile; little disposed even, save towards the end, to contemplation or solitude, but trained by prayer and austerities to triumphs of evangelical exposition; despising rest, untiring in mental and manual toil; 2^^ born for eloquence, and gifted with a voice so penetrating and sonorous that it was thought of afterwards as one of the most miraculous gifts that he had received of God; ²⁵⁹ frank and loyal, original and powerful in his words as in his actions — in cloister and mission and parliament, on land and on sea, in Ireland as in Scotland, always swayed by the love of God and of his neighbor, whom it was his will and pleasure to serve with an impassioned uprightness. Such was Columba. Besides the monk and missionary there was in him the makings of a sailor, soldier, poet, and orator. To us, looking back, he appears a personage as singular as he is lovable, in whom, through all the mists of the past and all the cross-lights of legend, the man may still be recognized under the saint— a man capable and worthy of the supreme honor of holiness, since he knew how to subdue his inclinations, his weakness, his instincts, and his passions, and to transform them into docile and invincible weapons for the salvation of souls and the glory of God.

²⁵⁸ "Nullum etiani unius horse intervallum transire poterat, quo nou orationi. aut lectioni, vel scriptioni, vel etiara alicui operation!, incumberet. Jejunationuui et vigilarum indcfessis laboribus, sine uUa intermissione, die noctuque ita occupatus, ut supra humanam possibilitatem pondus uniuscujusque videretur specialis operis. Et inter hsec omnibus carus, liilarem semper faciem ostendens, spiritus sancti gaudio intimis Iffitificabatur prsecordiis." — Adamnan, Praf. ii.

259 ('^{j expertis quibusdam de voce beati psalmodise viri indubitanter traditum est. Qua2 vox in ecclesia cum fratribus decantatis, aliquando per quingentos passus... aliquando per mille incomparabiliter elevata modo audiebatur. Mirum dictu! Nee in auribus eorum qui secum in ecclesia stabantvox ejus modum humanaevocis in clamoris granditate excedebat.... Similiter enim in auribus prope et longe audientiuni personabat." — Ibid., i. 37. In another passage he calls it " sermone nitidus."