DRYBURGH, situated near Mailros, was anciently one of the most famous
monasteries in Scotland: in this house of saints, Modan dedicated
himself to God, about the year 522. Being persuaded that Christian
perfection is to be attained by holy prayer and contemplation, and by a
close union of our souls with God, he gave six or seven hours every day
to prayer, and moreover seasoned with it all his other actions and
employments. A spirit of prayer is founded in the purity of the
affections, the fruit of self-denial, humility, and obedience. Hence
proceeded the ardor with which our saint studied to crucify his flesh
and senses by the practice of the greatest austerities, to place himself
beneath all creatures by the most profound and sincere humility, and in
all things to subject his will to that of his superiors with such an
astonishing readiness and cheerfulness, that they unanimously declared
they never saw any one so perfectly divested of all self-will, and dead
to himself, as Modan. The abbacy falling vacant, he was raised against
his will to that dignity. In this charge, his conduct was a clear proof
of the well-known maxim, that no man possesses the art of governing
{356} others well, unless he is perfectly master of that of obeying. His
inflexible firmness, in maintaining every point of monastic discipline,
was tempered by the most winning sweetness and charity, and an
unalterable calmness and meekness. Such, moreover, was his prudence, and
such the unction of his words in instructing or reproving others, that
his precepts and very reprimands gave pleasure, gained all hearts, and
inspired the love, and communicated the spirit of every duty. He
preached the faith at Stirling, and in other places near the Forth,
especially at Falkirk; but frequently interrupted his apostolic
employments to retire among the craggy mountains of Dunbarton, where he
usually spent thirty or forty days at once in the heavenly exercises of
devout contemplation, in which he enjoyed a kind of anticipation or
foretaste of the delights in which consists the happiness of the
blessed. He died in his retirement near Alcluid, (a fortress on the
river Cluid,) since called Dunbritton, now Dunbarton. His death is
usually placed in the seventh century, though some think he flourished
later. His relics were kept with singular veneration in a famous church
of his name at Rosneith. He is also titular saint of the great church at
Stirling, and honored particularly at Dunbarton and Falkirk. See Hector
Boetius, Lesley, King, in his Calendar, the Breviary of Aberdeen, and
the Chronicle of Scone: also Bollandus, p. 497.