MORAL COURAGE:
Notwithstanding their humility these monks could, and did, show a high degree of moral courage when occasion demanded. This is shown by the action of St. Columba when he confronted the Irish King and the assembled chieftains at the Convention of Drumceat (575 A.D.).[188] Against great popular opposition he pleaded the cause of the Bardic Order and appealed for the freedom of the Irish colony in Scotland. In both cases success crowned his efforts. Still more daring was the action of St. Columbanus in his dealings with the Merovingian King, Theuderic, to whom he wrote a letter full of the bitterest reproaches and threatening to excommunicate him, if he did not immediately amend his sinful life. Thus did Columbanus draw upon himself not only the anger of the king but that of the crafty and cruel Brunechildis. Nothing daunted, however, he defied alike both their threats and violence. He adhered steadfastly to principle even though that adherence caused him to be driven from the kingdom of the Franks.[189]