St Gildas improved temporal afflictions into the greatest spiritual advantages, and, despising a false and treacherous world, aspired with his whole heart to an heavenly kingdom.
Having engaged himself in a monastic state, he retired with St Cado, abbot of Llan-carvan into certain desert islands, from whence they were drove by pirates from the Orcades.
After discharging this apostolical function for several years, he retired to the South-West part of Britain into the abbey of Glastenbury, where he died and was buried in 512.
[1] "Gildas the Albanian" was invented by British historians of the 17th and 18th century, including Bishop James Ussher and Alban Butler, in an attempt to explain inconsistencies in references made by historical sources and vitae to the 5th/6th century British writer "Gildas the Wise.
Altogether, the legend of St. Gildas is one of the most mysterious and controvertible in the whole Roman Calendar, and its only real interest arises from the circumstance of the existence of a book written in this island, and claiming so great an antiquity.