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<h1>THE HERMITS</h1>
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<h2>INTRODUCTION</h2>
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<p>St. Paphnutius used to tell a story which may serve as a fit introduction
to this book.&nbsp; It contains a miniature sketch, not only of the
social state of Egypt, but of the whole Roman Empire, and of the causes
which led to the famous monastic movement in the beginning of the fifth
century after Christ.</p>
<p>Now Paphnutius was a wise and holy hermit, the Father, Abba, or Abbot
of many monks; and after he had trained himself in the desert with all
severity for many years, he besought God to show him which of His saints
he was like.</p>
<p>And it was said to him, &ldquo;Thou art like a certain flute-player
in the city.&rdquo;</p>
<p>Then Paphnutius took his staff, and went into the city, and found
that flute-player.&nbsp; But he confessed that he was a drunkard and
a profligate, and had till lately got his living by robbery, and recollected
not having ever done one good deed.&nbsp; Nevertheless, when Paphnutius
questioned him more closely, he said that he recollected once having
found a holy maiden beset by robbers, and having delivered her, and
brought her safe to town.&nbsp; And when Paphnutius questioned him more
closely still, he said he recollected having done another deed.&nbsp;
When he was a robber, he met once in the desert a beautiful woman; and
she prayed him to do her no harm, but to take her away with him as a
slave, whither he would; for, said she, &ldquo;I am fleeing from the
apparitors and the Governor&rsquo;s curials for the last two years.&nbsp;
My husband has been imprisoned for 300 pieces of gold, which he owes
as arrears of taxes; and has been often hung up, and often scourged;
and my three dear boys have been taken from me; and I am wandering from
place to place, and have been often caught myself and continually scourged;
and now I have been in the desert three days without food.&rdquo;</p>
<p>And when the robber heard that, he took pity on her, and took her
to his cave, and gave her 300 pieces of gold, and went with her to the
city, and set her husband and her boys free.</p>
<p>Then Paphnutius said, &ldquo;I never did a deed like that: and yet
I have not passed my life in ease and idleness.&nbsp; But now, my son,
since God hath had such care of thee, have a care for thine own self.&rdquo;</p>
<p>And when the musician heard that, he threw away the flutes which
he held in his hand, and went with Paphnutius into the desert, and passed
his life in hymns and prayer, changing his earthly music into heavenly;
and after three years he went to heaven, and was at rest among the choirs
of angels, and the ranks of the just.</p>
<p>This story, as I said, is a miniature sketch of the state of the
whole Roman Empire, and of the causes why men fled from it into the
desert.&nbsp; Christianity had reformed the morals of individuals; it
had not reformed the Empire itself.&nbsp; That had sunk into a state
only to be compared with the worst despotisms of the East.&nbsp; The
Emperors, whether or not they called themselves Christian, like Constantine,
knew no law save the basest maxims of the heathen world.&nbsp; Several
of them were barbarians who had risen from the lowest rank merely by
military prowess; and who, half maddened by their sudden elevation,
added to their native ignorance and brutality the pride, cunning, and
cruelty of an Eastern Sultan.&nbsp; Rival Emperors, or Generals who
aspired to be Emperors, devastated the world from Egypt to Britain by
sanguinary civil wars.&nbsp; The government of the provinces had become
altogether military.&nbsp; Torture was employed, not merely, as of old,
against slaves, but against all ranks, without distinction.&nbsp; The
people were exhausted by compulsory taxes, to be spent in wars which
did not concern them, or in Court luxury in which they had no share.&nbsp;
In the municipal towns, liberty and justice were dead.&nbsp; The curials,
who answered somewhat to our aldermen, and who were responsible for
the payment of the public moneys, tried their best to escape the unpopular
office, and, when compelled to serve, wrung the money in self-defence
out of the poorer inhabitants by every kind of tyranny.&nbsp; The land
was tilled either by oppressed and miserable peasants, or by gangs of
slaves, in comparison with whose lot that even of the American negro
was light.&nbsp; The great were served in their own households by crowds
of slaves, better fed, doubtless, but even more miserable and degraded,
than those who tilled the estates.&nbsp; Private profligacy among all
ranks was such as cannot be described in these or in any modern pages.&nbsp;
The regular clergy of the cities, though not of profligate lives, and
for the most part, in accordance with public opinion, unmarried, were
able to make no stand against the general corruption of the age, because&mdash;at
least if we are to trust such writers as Jerome and Chrysostom&mdash;they
were giving themselves up to ambition and avarice, vanity and luxury,
intrigue and party spirit, and had become the flatterers of fine ladies,
&ldquo;silly women laden with sins, ever learning, and never coming
to the knowledge of the truth.&rdquo;&nbsp; Such a state of things not
only drove poor creatures into the desert, like that fair woman whom
the robber met, but it raised up bands of robbers over the whole of
Europe, Africa, and the East,&mdash;men who, like Robin Hood and the
outlaws of the Middle Age, getting no justice from man, broke loose
from society, and while they plundered their oppressors, kept up some
sort of rude justice and humanity among themselves.&nbsp; Many, too,
fled, and became robbers, to escape the merciless conscription which
carried off from every province the flower of the young men, to shed
their blood on foreign battle-fields.&nbsp; In time, too, many of these
conscripts became monks, and the great monasteries of Scetis and Nitria
were hunted over again and again by officers and soldiers from the neighbouring
city of Alexandria in search of young men who had entered the &ldquo;spiritual
warfare&rdquo; to escape the earthly one.&nbsp; And as a background
to all this seething heap of decay, misrule, and misery, hung the black
cloud of the barbarians, the Teutonic tribes from whom we derive the
best part of our blood, ever coming nearer and nearer, waxing stronger
and stronger, learning discipline and civilization by serving in the
Roman armies, alternately the allies and the enemies of the Emperors,
rising, some of them, to the highest offices of State, and destined,
so the wisest Romans saw all the more clearly as the years rolled on,
to be soon the conquerors of the C&aelig;sars, and the masters of the
Western world.</p>
<p>No wonder if that, in such a state of things, there arose such violent
contrasts to the general weakness, such eccentric protests against the
general wickedness, as may be seen in the figure of Abbot Paphnutius,
when compared either with the poor man tortured in prison for his arrears
of taxes, or with the Governor and the officials who tortured him.&nbsp;
No wonder if, in such a state of things, the minds of men were stirred
by a passion akin to despair, which ended in a new and grand form of
suicide.&nbsp; It would have ended often, but for Christianity, in such
an actual despair as that which had led in past ages more than one noble
Roman to slay himself, when he lost all hope for the Republic.&nbsp;
Christianity taught those who despaired of society, of the world&mdash;in
one word, of the Roman Empire, and all that it had done for men&mdash;to
hope at least for a kingdom of God after death.&nbsp; It taught those
who, had they been heathens and brave enough, would have slain themselves
to escape out of a world which was no place for honest men, that the
body must be kept alive, if for no other reason, at least for the sake
of the immortal soul, doomed, according to its works, to endless bliss
or endless torment.</p>
<p>But that the world&mdash;such, at least, as they saw it then&mdash;was
doomed, Scripture and their own reason taught them.&nbsp; They did not
merely believe, but see, in the misery and confusion, the desolation
and degradation around them, that all that was in the world, the lust
of the flesh, the lust of the eye, and the pride of life, was not of
the Father, but of the world; that the world was passing away, and the
lust thereof, and that only he who did the will of God could abide for
ever.&nbsp; They did not merely believe, but saw, that the wrath of
God was revealed from heaven against all unrighteousness of men; and
that the world in general&mdash;above all, its kings and rulers, the
rich and luxurious&mdash;were treasuring up for themselves wrath, tribulation,
and anguish, against a day of wrath and revelation of the righteous
judgment of God, who would render to every man according to his works.</p>
<p>That they were correct in their judgment of the world about them,
contemporary history proves abundantly.&nbsp; That they were correct,
likewise, in believing that some fearful judgment was about to fall
on man, is proved by the fact that it did fall; that the first half
of the fifth century saw, not only the sack of Rome, but the conquest
and desolation of the greater part of the civilized world, amid bloodshed,
misery, and misrule, which seemed to turn Europe into a chaos,&mdash;which
would have turned it into a chaos, had there not been a few men left
who still felt it possible and necessary to believe in God and to work
righteousness.</p>
<p>Under these terrible forebodings, men began to flee from a doomed
world, and try to be alone with God, if by any means they might save
each man his own soul in that dread day.</p>
<p>Others, not Christians, had done the same before them.&nbsp; Among
all the Eastern nations men had appeared, from time to time, to whom
the things seen were but a passing phantom, the things unseen the only
true and eternal realities; who, tormented alike by the awfulness of
the infinite unknown, and by the petty cares and low passions of the
finite mortal life which they knew but too well, had determined to renounce
the latter, that they might give themselves up to solving the riddle
of the former; and be at peace; and free, at least, from the tyranny
of their own selves.&nbsp; Eight hundred years before St. Antony fled
into the desert, that young Hindoo rajah, whom men call Buddha now,
had fled into the forest, leaving wives and kingdom, to find rest for
his soul.&nbsp; He denounced caste; he preached poverty, asceticism,
self-annihilation.&nbsp; He founded a religion, like that of the old
hermits, democratic and ascetic, with its convents, saint-worships,
pilgrimages, miraculous relics, rosaries, and much more, which strangely
anticipates the monastic religion; and his followers, to this day, are
more numerous than those of any other creed.</p>
<p>Brahmins, too, had given themselves up to penance and mortification
till they believed themselves able, like Kehama, to have gained by self-torture
the right to command, not nature merely, but the gods themselves.&nbsp;
Among the Jews the Essenes by the Dead Sea, and the Therapeut&aelig;
in Egypt, had formed ascetic communities, the former more &ldquo;practical,&rdquo;
the latter more &ldquo;contemplative:&rdquo; but both alike agreed in
the purpose of escaping from the world into a life of poverty and simplicity,
piety and virtue; and among the countless philosophic sects of Asia,
known to ecclesiastical writers as &ldquo;heretics,&rdquo; more than
one had professed, and doubtless often practised, the same abstraction
from the world, the same contempt of the flesh.&nbsp; The very Neo-Platonists
of Alexandria, while they derided the Christian asceticism, found themselves
forced to affect, like the hapless Hypatia, a sentimental and pharisaic
asceticism of their own.&nbsp; This phase of sight and feeling, so strange
to us now, was common, nay, prim&aelig;val, among the Easterns.&nbsp;
The day was come when it should pass from the East into the West.&nbsp;
And Egypt, &ldquo;the mother of wonders;&rdquo; the parent of so much
civilization and philosophy both Greek and Roman; the half-way resting-place
through which not merely the merchandise, but the wisdom of the East
had for centuries passed into the Roman Empire; a land more ill-governed,
too, and more miserable, in spite of its fertility, because more defenceless
and effeminate, than most other Roman possessions&mdash;was the country
in which naturally, and as it were of hereditary right, such a movement
would first appear.</p>
<p>Accordingly it was discovered, about the end of the fourth century,
that the mountains and deserts of Egypt were full of Christian men who
had fled out of the dying world, in the hope of attaining everlasting
life.&nbsp; Wonderful things were told of their courage, their abstinence,
their miracles: and of their virtues also; of their purity, their humility,
their helpfulness, and charity to each other and to all.&nbsp; They
called each other, it was said, brothers; and they lived up to that
sacred name, forgotten, if ever known, by the rest of the Roman Empire.&nbsp;
Like the Apostolic Christians in the first fervour of their conversion,
they had all things in common; they lived at peace with each other,
under a mild and charitable rule; and kept literally those commands
of Christ which all the rest of the world explained away to nothing.</p>
<p>The news spread.&nbsp; It chimed in with all that was best, as well
as with much that was questionable, in the public mind.&nbsp; That men
could be brothers; that they could live without the tawdry luxury, the
tasteless and often brutal amusements, the low sensuality, the base
intrigue, the bloody warfare, which was the accepted lot of the many;
that they could find time to look stedfastly at heaven and hell as awful
realities, which must be faced some day, which had best be faced at
once; this, just as much as curiosity about their alleged miracles,
and the selfish longing to rival them in superhuman powers, led many
of the most virtuous and the most learned men of the time to visit them,
and ascertain the truth.&nbsp; Jerome, Ruffinus, Evagrius, Sulpicius
Severus, went to see them, undergoing on the way the severest toils
and dangers, and brought back reports of mingled truth and falsehood,
specimens of which will be seen in these pages.&nbsp; Travelling in
those days was a labour, if not of necessity, then surely of love.&nbsp;
Palladius, for instance, found it impossible to visit the Upper Thebaid,
and Syene, and that &ldquo;infinite multitude of monks, whose fashions
of life no one would believe, for they surpass human life; who to this
day raise the dead, and walk upon the waters, like Peter; and whatsoever
the Saviour did by the holy Apostles, He does now by them.&nbsp; But
because it would be very dangerous if we went beyond Lyco&rdquo; (Lycopolis?),
on account of the inroad of robbers, he &ldquo;could not see those saints.&rdquo;</p>
<p>The holy men and women of whom he wrote, he says, he did not see
without extreme toil; and seven times he and his companions were nearly
lost.&nbsp; Once they walked through the desert five days and nights,
and were almost worn out by hunger and thirst.&nbsp; Again, they fell
on rough marshes, where the sedge pierced their feet, and caused intolerable
pain, while they were almost killed with the cold.&nbsp; Another time,
they stuck in the mud up to their waists, and cried with David, &ldquo;I
am come into deep mire, where no ground is.&rdquo;&nbsp; Another time,
they waded for four days through the flood of the Nile by paths almost
swept away.&nbsp; Another time they met robbers on the seashore, coming
to Diolcos, and were chased by them for ten miles.&nbsp; Another time
they were all but upset and drowned in crossing the Nile.&nbsp; Another
time, in the marshes of Mareotis, &ldquo;where paper grows,&rdquo; they
were cast on a little desert island, and remained three days and nights
in the open air, amid great cold and showers, for it was the season
of Epiphany.&nbsp; The eighth peril, he says, is hardly worth mentioning&mdash;but
once, when they went to Nitria, they came on a great hollow, in which
many crocodiles had remained, when the waters retired from the fields.&nbsp;
Three of them lay along the bank; and the monks went up to them, thinking
them dead, whereon the crocodiles rushed at them.&nbsp; But when they
called loudly on the Lord, &ldquo;the monsters, as if turned away by
an angel,&rdquo; shot themselves into the water; while they ran on to
Nitria, meditating on the words of Job, &ldquo;Seven times shall He
deliver thee from trouble; and in the eighth there shall no evil touch
thee.&rdquo;</p>
<p>The great St. Athanasius, fleeing from persecution, had taken refuge
among these monks.&nbsp; He carried the report of their virtues to Tr&ecirc;ves
in Gaul, and wrote a life of St. Antony, the perusal of which was a
main agent in the conversion of St. Augustine.&nbsp; Hilarion (a remarkable
personage, whose history will be told hereafter) carried their report
and their example likewise into Palestine; and from that time Jud&aelig;a,
desolate and seemingly accursed by the sin of the Jewish people, became
once more the Holy Land; the place of pilgrimage; whose ruins, whose
very soil, were kept sacred by hermits, the guardians of the footsteps
of Christ.</p>
<p>In Rome itself the news produced an effect which, to the thoughtful
mind, is altogether tragical in its nobleness.&nbsp; The Roman aristocracy
was deprived of all political power; it had been decimated, too, with
horrible cruelty only one generation before, <a name="citation12"></a><a href="#footnote12">{12}</a>
by Valentinian and his satellites, on the charges of profligacy, treason,
and magic.&nbsp; Mere rich men, they still lingered on, in idleness
and luxury, without art, science, true civilization of any kind; followed
by long trains of slaves; punishing a servant with three hundred stripes
if he were too long in bringing hot water; weighing the fish, or birds,
or dormice put on their tables, while secretaries stood by, with tablets
to record all; hating learning as they hated poison; indulging at the
baths in conduct which had best be left undescribed; and &ldquo;complaining
that they were not born among the Cimmerians, if amid their golden fans
a fly should perch upon the silken fringes, or a slender ray of the
sun should pierce through the awning;&rdquo; while, if they &ldquo;go
any distance to see their estates in the country, or to hunt at a meeting
collected for their amusement by others, they think that they have equalled
the marches of Alexander or of C&aelig;sar.&rdquo;</p>
<p>On the wives, widows, and daughters of men of this stamp&mdash;and
not half their effeminacy and baseness, as the honest rough old soldier
Ammianus Marcellinus describes it, has been told here&mdash;the news
brought from Egypt worked with wondrous potency.</p>
<p>Women of the highest rank awoke suddenly to the discovery that life
was given them for nobler purposes than that of frivolous enjoyment
and tawdry vanity.&nbsp; Despising themselves; despising the husbands
to whom they had been wedded in loveless marriages <i>de convenance</i>,
whose infidelities they had too often to endure: they, too, fled from
a world which had sated and sickened them.&nbsp; They freed their slaves;
they gave away their wealth to found hospitals and to feed the poor;
and in voluntary poverty and mean garments they followed such men as
Jerome and Ruffinus across the seas, to visit the new found saints of
the Egyptian desert, and to end their days, in some cases, in doleful
monasteries in Palestine.&nbsp; The lives of such women as those of
the Anician house; the lives of Marcella and Furia, of Paula, of the
Melanias, and the rest, it is not my task to write.&nbsp; They must
be told by a woman, not by a man.&nbsp; We may blame those ladies, if
we will, for neglecting their duties.&nbsp; We may sneer, if we will,
at the weaknesses&mdash;the aristocratic pride, the spiritual vanity&mdash;which
we fancy that we discover.&nbsp; We may lament&mdash;and in that we
shall not be wrong&mdash;the influence which such men as Jerome obtained
over them&mdash;the example and precursor of so much which has since
then been ruinous to family and social life: but we must confess that
the fault lay not with the themselves, but with their fathers, husbands,
and brothers; we must confess that in these women the spirit of the
old Roman matrons, which seemed to have been so long dead, flashed up
for one splendid moment, ere it sunk into the darkness of the Middle
Age; that in them woman asserted (however strangely and fantastically)
her moral equality with man; and that at the very moment when monasticism
was consigning her to contempt, almost to abhorrence, as &ldquo;the
noxious animal,&rdquo; the &ldquo;fragile vessel,&rdquo; the cause of
man&rsquo;s fall at first, and of his sin and misery ever since, woman
showed the monk (to his na&iuml;vely-confessed surprise), that she could
dare, and suffer, and adore as well as he.</p>
<p>But the movement, having once seized the Roman Empire, grew and spread
irresistibly.&nbsp; It was accepted, supported, preached, practised,
by every great man of the time.&nbsp; Athanasius, Basil, Chrysostom,
Gregory of Nazianzen in the East, Jerome, Augustine, Ruffinus, Evagrius,
Fulgentius, Sulpicius Severus, Vincent of Lerins, John Cassian, Martin
of Tours, Salvian, C&aelig;sarius of Arles, were all monks, or as much
of monks as their duties would allow them to be.&nbsp; Ambrose of Milan,
though no monk himself, was the fervent preacher of, the careful legislator
for, monasticism male and female.&nbsp; Throughout the whole Roman Empire,
in the course of a century, had spread hermits (or dwellers in the desert),
anchorites (retired from the world), or monks (dwellers alone).&nbsp;
The three names grew afterwards to designate three different orders
of ascetics.&nbsp; The hermits remained through the Middle Ages those
who dwelt in deserts; the anchorites, or &ldquo;ankers&rdquo; of the
English Middle Age, seem generally to have inhabited cells built in,
or near, the church walls; the name of &ldquo;monks&rdquo; was transferred
from those who dwelt alone to those who dwelt in regular communities,
under a fixed government.&nbsp; But the three names at first were interchangeable;
the three modes of life alternated, often in the same man.&nbsp; The
life of all three was the same,&mdash;celibacy, poverty, good deeds
towards their fellow-men; self-restraint, and sometimes self-torture
of every kind, to atone (as far as might be) for the sins committed
after baptism: and the mental food of all three was the same likewise;
continued meditation upon the vanity of the world, the sinfulness of
the flesh, the glories of heaven, and the horrors of hell: but with
these the old hermits combined&mdash;to do them justice&mdash;a personal
faith in God, and a personal love for Christ, which those who sneer
at them would do well to copy.</p>
<p>Over all Europe, even to Ireland, <a name="citation15"></a><a href="#footnote15">{15}</a>
the same pattern of Christian excellence repeated itself with strange
regularity, till it became the only received pattern; and to &ldquo;enter
religion,&rdquo; or &ldquo;be converted,&rdquo; meant simply to become
a monk.</p>
<p>Of the authentic biographies of certain of these men, a few specimens
are given in this volume.&nbsp; If they shall seem to any reader uncouth,
or even absurd, he must remember that they are the only existing and
the generally contemporaneous histories of men who exercised for 1,300
years an enormous influence over the whole of Christendom; who exercise
a vast influence over the greater part of it to this day.&nbsp; They
are the biographies of men who were regarded, during their lives and
after their deaths, as divine and inspired prophets; and who were worshipped
with boundless trust and admiration by millions of human beings.&nbsp;
Their fame and power were not created by the priesthood.&nbsp; The priesthood
rather leant on them, than they on it.&nbsp; They occupied a post analogous
to that of the old Jewish prophets; always independent of, sometimes
opposed to, the regular clergy; and dependent altogether on public opinion
and the suffrage of the multitude.&nbsp; When Christianity, after three
centuries of repression and persecution, emerged triumphant as the creed
of the whole civilized world, it had become what their lives describe.&nbsp;
The model of religious life for the fifth century, it remained a model
for succeeding centuries; on the lives of St. Antony and his compeers
were founded the whole literature of saintly biographies; the whole
popular conception of the universe, and of man&rsquo;s relation to it;
the whole science of d&aelig;monology, with its peculiar literature,
its peculiar system of criminal jurisprudence.&nbsp; And their influence
did not cease at the Reformation among Protestant divines.&nbsp; The
influence of these Lives of the Hermit Fathers is as much traceable,
even to style and language, in &ldquo;The Pilgrim&rsquo;s Progress&rdquo;
as in the last Papal Allocution.&nbsp; The great hermits of Egypt were
not merely the founders of that vast monastic system which influenced
the whole politics, and wars, and social life, as well as the whole
religion, of the Middle Age; they were a school of philosophers (as
they rightly called themselves) who altered the whole current of human
thought.</p>
<p>Those who wish for a general notion of the men, and of their time,
will find all that they require (set forth from different points of
view, though with the same honesty and learning) in Gibbon; in M. de
Montalembert&rsquo;s &ldquo;Moines d&rsquo;Occident,&rdquo; in Dean
Milman&rsquo;s &ldquo;History of Christianity&rdquo; and &ldquo;Latin
Christianity,&rdquo; and in Ozanam&rsquo;s &ldquo;Etudes Germaniques.&rdquo;
<a name="citation17a"></a><a href="#footnote17a">{17a}</a>&nbsp; But
the truest notion of the men is to be got, after all, from the original
documents; and especially from that curious collection of them by the
Jesuit Rosweyde, commonly known as the &ldquo;Lives of the Hermit Fathers.&rdquo;
<a name="citation17b"></a><a href="#footnote17b">{17b}</a></p>
<p>After an acquaintance of now five-and-twenty years with this wonderful
treasury of early Christian mythology, to which all fairy tales are
dull and meagre, I am almost inclined to sympathise with M. de Montalembert&rsquo;s
questions,&mdash;&ldquo;Who is so ignorant, or so unfortunate, as not
to have devoured these tales of the heroic age of monachism?&nbsp; Who
has not contemplated, if not with the eyes of faith, at least with the
admiration inspired by an incontrollable greatness of soul, the struggles
of these athletes of penitence? . . . .&nbsp; Everything is to be found
there&mdash;variety, pathos, the sublime and simple epic of a race of
men, <i>na&iuml;fs</i> as children, and strong as giants.&rdquo;&nbsp;
In whatever else one may differ from M. de Montalembert&mdash;and it
is always painful to differ from one whose pen has been always the faithful
servant of virtue and piety, purity and chivalry, loyalty and liberty,
and whose generous appreciation of England and the English is the more
honourable to him, by reason of an utter divergence in opinion, which
in less wide and noble spirits produces only antipathy&mdash;one must
at least agree with him in his estimate of the importance of these &ldquo;Lives
of the Fathers,&rdquo; not only to the ecclesiologist, but to the psychologist
and the historian.&nbsp; Their influence, subtle, often transformed
and modified again and again, but still potent from its very subtleness,
is being felt around us in many a puzzle&mdash;educational, social,
political; and promises to be felt still more during the coming generation;
and to have studied thoroughly one of them&mdash;say the life of St.
Antony by St. Athanasius&mdash;is to have had in our hands (whether
we knew it or not) the key to many a lock, which just now refuses either
to be tampered with or burst open.</p>
<p>I have determined, therefore, to give a few of these lives, translated
as literally as possible.&nbsp; Thus the reader will then have no reason
to fear a garbled or partial account of personages so difficult to conceive
or understand.&nbsp; He will be able to see the men as wholes; to judge
(according to his light) of their merits and their defects.&nbsp; The
very style of their biographers (which is copied as literally as is
compatible with the English tongue) will teach him, if he be wise, somewhat
of the temper and habits of thought of the age in which they lived;
and one of these original documents, with its honesty, its vivid touches
of contemporary manners, its intense earnestness, will give, perhaps,
a more true picture of the whole hermit movement than (with all respect,
be it said) the most brilliant general panorama.</p>
<p>It is impossible to give in this series all the lives of the early
hermits&mdash;even of those contained in Rosweyde.&nbsp; This volume
will contain, therefore, only the most important and most famous lives
of the Egyptian, Syrian, and Persian hermits, followed, perhaps, by
a few later biographies from Western Europe, as proofs that the hermit-type,
as it spread toward the Atlantic, remained still the same as in the
Egyptian desert.</p>
<p>Against one modern mistake the reader must be warned; the theory,
namely, that these biographies were written as religious romances; edifying,
but not historical; to be admired, but not believed.&nbsp; There is
not the slightest evidence that such was the case.&nbsp; The lives of
these, and most other saints (certainly those in this volume), were
written by men who believed the stories themselves, after such inquiry
into the facts as they deemed necessary; who knew that others would
believe them; and who intended that they should do so; and the stones
were believed accordingly, and taken as matter of fact for the most
practical purposes by the whole of Christendom.&nbsp; The forging of
miracles, like the forging of charters, for the honour of a particular
shrine, or the advantage of a particular monastery, belongs to a much
later and much worse age; and, whatsoever we may think of the taste
of the authors of these lives, or of their faculty for judging of evidence,
we must at least give them credit for being earnest men, incapable of
what would have been in their eyes, and ought to be in ours, not merely
falsehood, but impiety.&nbsp; Let the reader be sure of this&mdash;that
these documents would not have exercised their enormous influence on
the human mind, had there not been in them, under whatever accidents
of credulity, and even absurdity, an element of sincerity, virtue, and
nobility.</p>
<div class="GutenbergBlankLines2"><br /><br /></div>
<h2>SAINT ANTONY</h2>
<div class="GutenbergBlankLines2"><br /><br /></div>
<p>The life of Antony, by Athanasius, is perhaps the most important
of all these biographies; because first, Antony was generally held to
be the first great example and preacher of the hermit life; because
next, Athanasius, his biographer, having by his controversial writings
established the orthodox faith as it is now held alike by Romanists,
Greeks, and Protestants, did, by his publication of the life of Antony,
establish the hermit life as the ideal (in his opinion) of Christian
excellence; and lastly, because that biography exercised a most potent
influence on the conversion of St. Augustine, the greatest thinker (always
excepting St. Paul) whom the world had seen since Plato, whom the world
was to see again till Lord Bacon; the theologian and philosopher (for
he was the latter, as well as the former, in the strictest sense) to
whom the world owes, not only the formulizing of the whole scheme of
the universe for a thousand years after his death, but Calvinism (wrongly
so called) in all its forms, whether held by the Augustinian party in
the Church of Rome, or the &ldquo;Reformed&rdquo; Churches of Geneva,
France, and Scotland.</p>
<p>Whether we have the exact text of the document as Athanasius wrote
it to the &ldquo;Foreign Brethren&rdquo;&mdash;probably the religious
folk of Tr&ecirc;ves&mdash;in the Greek version published by Heschelius
in 1611, and in certain earlier Greek texts; whether the Latin translation
attributed to Evagrius, which has been well known for centuries past
in the Latin Church, be actually his; whether it be exactly that of
which St. Jerome speaks, and whether it be exactly that which St. Augustine
saw, are questions which it is now impossible to decide.&nbsp; But of
the genuineness of the life in its entirety we have no right to doubt,
contrary to the verdicts of the most distinguished scholars, whether
Protestant or Catholic; and there is fair reason to suppose that the
document (allowing for errors and variations of transcribers) which
I have tried to translate, is that of which the great St. Augustine
speaks in the eighth book of his Confessions.</p>
<p>He tells us that he was reclaimed at last from a profligate life
(the thought of honourable marriage seems never to have entered his
mind), by meeting, while practising as a rhetorician at Tr&ecirc;ves,
an old African acquaintance, named Potitanius, an officer of rank.&nbsp;
What followed no words can express so well as those of the great genius
himself.</p>
<p>&ldquo;When I told him that I was giving much attention to those
writings (the Epistles of Paul), we began to talk, and he to tell, of
Antony, the monk of Egypt, whose name was then very famous among thy
servants: <a name="citation23"></a><a href="#footnote23">{23}</a> but
was unknown to us till that moment.&nbsp; When he discovered that, he
spent some time over the subject, detailing his virtues, and wondering
at our ignorance.&nbsp; We were astounded at hearing such well-attested
marvels of him, so recent and almost contemporaneous, wrought in the
right faith of the Catholic Church.&nbsp; We all wondered: we, that
they were so great; and he, that we had not heard of them.&nbsp; Thence
his discourse ran on to those flocks of hermit-cells, and the morals
of thy sweetness, and the fruitful deserts of the wilderness, of which
we knew nought.&nbsp; There was a monastery, too, at Milan, full of
good brethren, outside the city walls, under the tutelage of Ambrosius,
and we knew nothing of it.&nbsp; He went on still speaking, and we listened
intently; and it befell that he told us how, I know not when, he and
three of his mess companions at Tr&ecirc;ves, while the emperor was
engaged in an afternoon spectacle in the circus, went out for a walk
in the gardens round the walls; and as they walked there in pairs, one
with him alone, and the two others by themselves, they parted.&nbsp;
And those two, straying about, burst into a cottage, where dwelt certain
servants of thine, poor in spirit, of such as is the kingdom of heaven;
and there found a book, in which was written the life of Antony.&nbsp;
One of them began to read it, and to wonder, and to be warned; and,
as he read, to think of taking up such a life, and leaving the warfare
of this world to serve thee.&nbsp; Now, he was one of those whom they
call Managers of Affairs. <a name="citation24"></a><a href="#footnote24">{24}</a>&nbsp;
Then, suddenly filled with holy love and sober shame, angered at himself,
he cast his eyes on his friend, and said, &lsquo;Tell me, prithee, with
all these labours of ours, whither are we trying to get?&nbsp; What
are we seeking?&nbsp; For what are we soldiering?&nbsp; Can we have
a higher hope in the palace, than to become friends of the emperor?&nbsp;
And when there, what is not frail and full of dangers?&nbsp; And through
how many dangers we do not arrive at a greater danger still?&nbsp; And
how long will that last?&nbsp; But if I choose to become a friend of
God, I can do it here and now.&rsquo;&nbsp; He spoke thus, and, swelling
in the labour-pangs of a new life, he fixed his eyes again on the pages
and read, and was changed inwardly as thou lookedst on him, and his
mind was stripped of the world, as soon appeared.&nbsp; For while he
read, and rolled over the billows of his soul, he shuddered and hesitated
from time to time, and resolved better things; and already thine, he
said to his friend, &lsquo;I have already torn myself from that hope
of ours, and have settled to serve God; and this I begin from this hour,
in this very place.&nbsp; If you do not like to imitate me, do not oppose
me.&rsquo;&nbsp; He replied that he would cling to his companion in
such a great service and so great a warfare.&nbsp; And both, now thine,
began building, at their own cost, the tower of leaving all things and
following thee.&nbsp; Then Potitianus, and the man who was talking with
him elsewhere in the garden, seeking them, came to the same place, and
warned them to return, as the sun was getting low.&nbsp; They, however,
told their resolution, and how it had sprung up and taken strong hold
in them, and entreated the others not to give them pain.&nbsp; They,
not altered from their former mode of life, yet wept (as he told us)
for themselves; and congratulated them piously, and commended themselves
to their prayers; and then dragging their hearts along the earth, went
back to the palace.&nbsp; But the others, fixing their hearts on heaven,
remained in the cottage.&nbsp; And both of them had affianced brides,
who, when they heard this, dedicated their virginity to thee.&rdquo;</p>
<p>The part which this incident played in St. Augustine&rsquo;s own
conversion must be told hereafter in his life.&nbsp; But the scene which
his master-hand has drawn is not merely the drama of his own soul or
of these two young officers, but of a whole empire.&nbsp; It is, as
I said at first, the tragedy and suicide of the old empire; and the
birth-agony of which he speaks was not that of an individual soul here
or there, but of a whole new world, for good and evil.&nbsp; The old
Roman soul was dead within, the body of it dead without.&nbsp; Patriotism,
duty, purpose of life, save pleasure, money, and intrigue, had perished.&nbsp;
The young Roman officer had nothing left for which to fight; the young
Roman gentleman nothing left for which to be a citizen and an owner
of lands.&nbsp; Even the old Roman longing (which was also a sacred
duty) of leaving an heir to perpetuate his name, and serve the state
as his fathers had before him&mdash;even that was gone.&nbsp; Nothing
was left, with the many, but selfishness, which could rise at best into
the desire of saving every man his own soul, and so transform worldliness
into other-worldliness.&nbsp; The old empire could do nothing more for
man; and knew that it could do nothing; and lay down in the hermit&rsquo;s
cell to die.</p>
<p>Tr&ecirc;ves was then &ldquo;the second metropolis of the empire,&rdquo;
boasting, perhaps, even then, as it boasts still, that it was standing
thirteen hundred years before Rome was built.&nbsp; Amid the low hills,
pierced by rocky dells, and on a strath of richest soil, it had grown,
from the mud-hut town of the Treviri, into a noble city of palaces,
theatres, baths, triumphal-arches, on either side the broad and clear
Moselle.&nbsp; The bridge which Augustus had thrown across the river,
four hundred years before the times of hermits and of saints, stood
like a cliff through all barbarian invasions, through all the battles
and sieges of the Middle Age, till it was blown up by the French in
the wars of Louis XIV., and nought remains save the huge piers of black
lava stemming the blue stream; while up and down the dwindled city,
the colossal fragments of Roman work&mdash;the Black Gate, the Heidenthurm,
the baths, the Basilica or Hall of Justice, now a Lutheran church&mdash;stand
out half ruined, like the fossil bones of giants amid the works of weaker,
though of happier times; while the amphitheatre was till late years
planted thick with vines, fattening in soil drenched with the blood
of thousands.&nbsp; Tr&ecirc;ves had been the haunt of emperor after
emperor, men wise and strong, cruel and terrible;&mdash;of Constantius,
Constantine the Great, Julian, Valentinian, Valens; and lastly, when
Potitianus&rsquo;s friends found those poor monks in the garden <a name="citation27"></a><a href="#footnote27">{27}</a>
of Gratian, the gentle hunter who thought day and night on sport, till
his arrows were said to be instinct with life, was holding his military
court within the walls of Tr&ecirc;ves, or at that hunting palace on
the northern downs, where still on the bath-floors lie the mosaics of
hare and deer, and boar and hound, on which the feet of Emperors trod
full fifteen hundred years ago.</p>
<p>Still glorious outwardly, like the Roman empire itself, was that
great city of Tr&ecirc;ves; but inwardly it was full of rottenness and
weakness.&nbsp; The Roman empire had been, in spite of all its crimes,
for four hundred years the salt of the earth: but now the salt had lost
its savour; and in one generation more it would be trodden under foot
and cast upon the dunghill, and another empire would take its place,&mdash;the
empire, not of brute strength and self-indulgence, but of sympathy and
self-denial,&mdash;an empire, not of C&aelig;sars, but of hermits.&nbsp;
Already was Gratian the friend and pupil of St. Ambrose of Milan; already,
too, was he persecuting, though not to the death, heretics and heathens.&nbsp;
Nay, some fifty years before (if the legend can be in the least trusted)
had St. Helena, the mother of Constantine the Great, returned from Palestine,
bearing with her&mdash;so men believed&mdash;not only the miraculously
discovered cross of Christ, but the seamless coat which he had worn;
and, turning her palace into a church, deposited the holy coat therein:
where&mdash;so some believe&mdash;it remains until this day.&nbsp; Men
felt that a change was coming, but whence it would come, or how terrible
it would be, they could not tell.&nbsp; It was to be, as the prophet
says, &ldquo;like the bulging out of a great wall, which bursteth suddenly
in an instant.&rdquo;&nbsp; In the very amphitheatre where Gratian sat
that afternoon, with all the folk of Tr&ecirc;ves about him, watching,
it may be, lions and antelopes from Africa slaughtered&mdash;it may
be criminals tortured to death&mdash;another and an uglier sight had
been twice seen some seventy years before.&nbsp; Constantine, so-called
the Great, had there exhibited his &ldquo;Frankish sports,&rdquo; the
&ldquo;magnificent spectacle,&rdquo; the &ldquo;famous punishments,&rdquo;
as his flattering court-historians called them: thousands of Frank prisoners,
many of them of noble, and even of royal blood, torn to pieces by wild
beasts, while they stood fearless, smiling with folded arms; and when
the wild beasts were gorged, and slew no more, weapons were put into
the hands of the survivors, and they were bidden to fight to the death
for the amusement of their Roman lords.&nbsp; But fight they would not
against their own flesh and blood: and as for life, all chance of that
was long gone by.&nbsp; So every man fell joyfully upon his brother&rsquo;s
sword, and, dying like a German man, spoilt the sport of the good folk
of Tr&ecirc;ves.&nbsp; And it seemed for a while as if there were no
God in heaven who cared to avenge such deeds of blood.&nbsp; For the
kinsmen, it may be the very sons, of those Franks were now in Gratian&rsquo;s
pay; and the Frank Merobaudes was his &ldquo;Count of the Domestics,&rdquo;
and one of his most successful and trusted generals; and all seemed
to go well, and brute force and craft to triumph on the earth.</p>
<p>And yet those two young staff officers, when they left the imperial
court for the hermit&rsquo;s cell, judged, on the whole, prudently and
well, and chose the better part when they fled from the world to escape
the &ldquo;dangers&rdquo; of ambition, and the &ldquo;greater danger
still&rdquo; of success.&nbsp; For they escaped, not merely from vice
and worldliness, but, as the event proved, from imminent danger of death
if they kept the loyalty which they had sworn to their emperor; or the
worse evil of baseness if they turned traitors to him to save their
lives.</p>
<p>For little thought Gratian, as he sat in that amphitheatre, that
the day was coming when he, the hunter of game&mdash;and of heretics&mdash;would
be hunted in his turn; when, deserted by his army, betrayed by Merobaudes&mdash;whose
elder kinsfolk were not likely to have kept him ignorant of &ldquo;the
Frankish sports &ldquo;&mdash;he should flee pitiably towards Italy,
and die by a German hand; some say near Lyons, some say near Belgrade,
calling on Ambrose with his latest breath. <a name="citation29"></a><a href="#footnote29">{29}</a>&nbsp;
Little thought, too, the good folk of Tr&ecirc;ves, as they sat beneath
the vast awning that afternoon, that within the next half century a
day of vengeance was coming for them, which should teach them that there
was a God who &ldquo;maketh inquisition for blood;&rdquo; a day when
Tr&ecirc;ves should be sacked in blood and flame by those very &ldquo;barbarian&rdquo;
Germans whom they fancied their allies&mdash;or their slaves.&nbsp;
And least of all did they fancy that, when that great destruction fell
upon their city, the only element in it which would pass safely through
the fire and rise again, and raise their city to new glory and power,
was that which was represented by those poor hermits in the garden-hut
outside.&nbsp; Little thought they that above the awful arches of the
Black Gate&mdash;as if in mockery of the Roman Power&mdash;a lean anchorite
would take his stand, Simeon of Syracuse by name, a monk of Mount Sinai,
and there imitate, in the far West, the austerities of St. Simeon Stylites
in the East, and be enrolled in the new Pantheon, not of C&aelig;sars,
but of Saints.</p>
<p>Under the supposed patronage of those Saints, Tr&ecirc;ves rose again
out of its ruins.&nbsp; It gained its four great abbeys of St. Maximus
(on the site of Constantine&rsquo;s palace); St. Matthias, in the crypt
whereof the bodies of the monks never decay; <a name="citation30"></a><a href="#footnote30">{30}</a>
St. Martin; and St. Mary of the Four Martyrs, where four soldiers of
the famous Theban legion are said to have suffered martyrdom by the
house of the Roman prefect.&nbsp; It had its cathedral of St. Peter
and St. Helena, supposed to be built out of St. Helena&rsquo;s palace;
its exquisite Liebfrauenkirche; its palace of the old Archbishops, mighty
potentates of this world, as well as of the kingdom of heaven.&nbsp;
For they were princes, arch-chancellors, electors of the empire, owning
many a league of fertile land, governing, and that kindly and justly,
towns and villages of Christian men, and now and then going out to war,
at the head of their own knights and yeomen, in defence of their lands,
and of the saints whose servants and trustees they were; and so became,
according to their light and their means, the salt of that land for
many generations.</p>
<p>And after a while that salt, too, lost its savour, and was, in its
turn, trodden under foot.&nbsp; The French republican wars swept away
the ecclesiastical constitution and the wealth of the ancient city.&nbsp;
The cathedral and churches were stripped of relics, of jewels, of treasures
of early art.&nbsp; The Prince-bishop&rsquo;s palace is a barrack; so
was lately St. Maximus&rsquo;s shrine; St. Martin&rsquo;s a china manufactory,
and St. Matthias&rsquo;s a school.&nbsp; Tr&ecirc;ves belongs to Prussia,
and not to &ldquo;Holy Church;&rdquo; and all the old splendours of
the &ldquo;empire of the saints&rdquo; are almost as much ruinate as
those of the &ldquo;empire of the Romans.&rdquo;&nbsp; So goes the world,
because there is a living God.</p>
<div class="GutenbergBlankLines1"><br /></div>
<p>&ldquo;The old order changeth, giving place to the new;<br />And
God fulfils himself in many ways,<br />Lest one good custom should corrupt
the world.&rdquo;</p>
<div class="GutenbergBlankLines1"><br /></div>
<p>But though palaces and amphitheatres be gone, the gardens outside
still bloom on as when Potitianus his friends wandered through them,
perpetual as Nature&rsquo;s self; and perpetual as Nature, too, endures
whatever is good and true of that afternoon&rsquo;s work, and of that
finding of the legend of St. Antony in the monk&rsquo;s cabin, which
fixed the destiny of the great genius of the Latin Church.</p>
<p>The story of St. Antony, as it has been handed down to us, <a name="citation32"></a><a href="#footnote32">{32}</a>
runs thus:&mdash;</p>
<div class="GutenbergBlankLines1"><br /></div>
<p>The life and conversation of our holy Father Antony, written and
sent to the monks in foreign parts by our Father among the saints, Athanasius,
Archbishop of Alexandria.</p>
<p>You have begun a noble rivalry with the monks of Egypt, having determined
either to equal or even to surpass them in your training towards virtue;
for there are monasteries already among you, and the monastic life is
practised.&nbsp; This purpose of yours one may justly praise; and if
you pray, God will bring it to perfection.&nbsp; But since you have
also asked me about the conversation of the holy Antony, wishing to
learn how he began his training, and who he was before it, and what
sort of an end he made to his life, and whether what is said of him
is true, in order that you may bring yourselves to emulate him, with
great readiness I received your command.&nbsp; For to me, too, it is
a great gain and benefit only to remember Antony; and I know that you,
when you hear of him, after you have wondered at the man, will wish
also to emulate his purpose.&nbsp; For the life of Antony is for monks
a perfect pattern of ascetic training.&nbsp; What, then, you have heard
about him from other informants do not disbelieve, but rather think
that you have heard from them a small part of the facts.&nbsp; For in
any case, they could hardly relate fully such great matters, when even
I, at your request, howsoever much I may tell you in my letter, can
only send you a little which I remember about him.&nbsp; But do not
cease to inquire of those who sail from hence; for perhaps, if each
tells what he knows, at last his history may be worthily compiled.&nbsp;
I had wished, indeed, when I received your letter, to send for some
of the monks who were wont to be most frequently in his company, that
I might learn something more, and send you a fuller account.&nbsp; But
since both the season of navigation limited me, and the letter-carrier
was in haste, I hastened to write to your piety what I myself know (for
I have often seen him), and what I was able to learn from one who followed
him for no short time, and poured water upon his hands; always taking
care of the truth, in order that no one when he hears too much may disbelieve,
nor again, if he learns less than is needful, despise the man.</p>
<p>Antony was an Egyptian by race, born of noble parents, <a name="citation33"></a><a href="#footnote33">{33}</a>
who had a sufficient property of their own: and as they were Christians,
he too was Christianly brought up, and when a boy was nourished in the
house of his parents, besides whom and his home he knew nought.&nbsp;
But when he grew older, he would not be taught letters, <a name="citation34"></a><a href="#footnote34">{34}</a>
not wishing to mix with other boys; but all his longing was (according
to what is written of Jacob) to dwell simply in his own house.&nbsp;
But when his parents took him into the Lord&rsquo;s house, he was not
saucy, like a boy, nor inattentive as he grew older; but was subject
to his parents, and attentive to what was read, turning it to his own
account.&nbsp; Nor again (as a boy who was moderately well off) did
he trouble his parents for various and expensive dainties, nor did he
run after the pleasures of this life; but was content with what he found,
and asked for nothing more.&nbsp; When his parents died, he was left
alone with a little sister, when he was about eighteen or twenty years
of age, and took care both of his house and of her.&nbsp; But not six
months after their death, as he was going as usual to the Lord&rsquo;s
house, and collecting his thoughts, he meditated as he walked how the
Apostles had left all and followed the Saviour; and how those in the
Acts brought the price of what they had sold, and laid it at the Apostles&rsquo;
feet, to be given away to the poor; and what and how great a hope was
laid up for them in heaven.&nbsp; With this in his mind, he entered
the church.&nbsp; And it befell then that the Gospel was being read;
and he heard how the Lord had said to the rich man, &ldquo;If thou wilt
be perfect, go, sell all thou hast, and give to the poor; and come,
follow me, and thou shalt have treasure in heaven.&rdquo;&nbsp; Antony,
therefore, as if the remembrance of the saints had come to him from
God, and as if the lesson had been read on his account, went forth at
once from the Lord&rsquo;s house, and gave away to those of his own
village the possessions he had inherited from his ancestors (three hundred
plough-lands, fertile and very fair), that they might give no trouble
either to him or his sister.&nbsp; All his moveables he sold, and a
considerable sum which he received for them he gave to the poor.&nbsp;
But having kept back a little for his sister, when he went again into
the Lord&rsquo;s house he heard the Lord saying in the Gospel, &ldquo;Take
no thought for the morrow,&rdquo; and, unable to endure any more delay,
he went out and distributed that too to the needy.&nbsp; And having
committed his sister to known and faithful virgins, and given to her
wherewith to be educated in a nunnery, he himself thenceforth devoted
himself, outside his house, to training; <a name="citation35"></a><a href="#footnote35">{35}</a>
taking heed to himself, and using himself severely.&nbsp; For monasteries
were not then common in Egypt, nor did any monks at all know the wide
desert; but each who wished to take heed to himself exercised himself
alone, not far from his own village.&nbsp; There was then in the next
village an old man, who had trained himself in a solitary life from
his youth.&nbsp; When Antony saw him, he emulated him in that which
is noble.&nbsp; And first he began to stay outside the village; and
then, if he heard of any earnest man, he went to seek him, like a wise
bee; and did not return till he had seen him, and having got from him
(as it were) provision for his journey toward virtue, went his way.&nbsp;
So dwelling there at first, he settled his mind neither to look back
towards his parents&rsquo; wealth nor to recollect his relations; but
he put all his longing and all his earnestness on training himself more
intensely.&nbsp; For the rest he worked with his hands, because he had
heard, &ldquo;If any man will not work, neither let him eat;&rdquo;
and of his earnings he spent some on himself and some on the needy.&nbsp;
He prayed continually, because he knew that one ought to pray secretly,
without ceasing.&nbsp; He attended, also, so much to what was read,
that, with him, none of the Scriptures fell to the ground, but he retained
them all, and for the future his memory served him instead of books.&nbsp;
Behaving thus, Antony was beloved by all; and submitted truly to the
earnest men to whom he used to go.&nbsp; And from each of them he learnt
some improvement in his earnestness and his training: he contemplated
the courtesy of one, and another&rsquo;s assiduity in prayer; another&rsquo;s
freedom from anger; another&rsquo;s love of mankind: he took heed to
one as he watched; to another as he studied: one he admired for his
endurance, another for his fasting and sleeping on the ground; he laid
to heart the meekness of one, and the long-suffering of another; and
stamped upon his memory the devotion to Christ and the mutual love which
all in common possessed.&nbsp; And thus filled full, he returned to
his own place of training, gathering to himself what he had got from
each, and striving to show all their qualities in himself.&nbsp; He
never emulated those of his own age, save in what is best; and did that
so as to pain no one, but make all rejoice over him.&nbsp; And all in
the village who loved good, seeing him thus, called him the friend of
God; and some embraced him as a son, some as a brother.</p>
<p>But the devil, who hates and envies what is noble, would not endure
such a purpose in a youth: but attempted against him all that he is
wont to do; suggesting to him the remembrance of his wealth, care for
his sister, relation to his kindred, love of money, love of glory, the
various pleasures of luxury, and the other solaces of life; and then
the harshness of virtue, and its great toil; and the weakness of his
body, and the length of time; and altogether raised a great dust-cloud
of arguments in his mind, trying to turn him back from his righteous
choice.&nbsp; But when the enemy saw himself to be too weak for Antony&rsquo;s
determination, but rather baffled by his stoutness, and overthrown by
his great faith, and falling before his continual prayers, then he attacked
him with the temptations which he is wont to use against young men;
. . . . but he protected his body with faith, prayers, and fastings,
. . . setting his thoughts on Christ, and on his own nobility through
Christ, and on the rational faculties of his soul, . . . and again on
the terrors of the fire, and the torment of the worm, . . . and thus
escaped unhurt.&nbsp; And thus was the enemy brought to shame.&nbsp;
For he who thought himself to be equal with God was now mocked by a
youth; and he who boasted against flesh and blood was defeated by a
man clothed in flesh.&nbsp; For the Lord worked with him, who bore flesh
on our account, and gave to the body victory over the devil, that each
man in his battle may say, &ldquo;Not I, but the grace of God which
is with me.&rdquo;&nbsp; At last, when the dragon could not overthrow
Antony even thus, but saw himself thrust out of his heart, then gnashing
his teeth (as is written), and as if beside himself, he appeared to
the sight, as he is to the reason, as a black child, and as it were
falling down before him, no longer attempted to argue (for the deceiver
was cast out), but using a human voice, said, &ldquo;I have deceived
many; I have cast down many.&nbsp; But now, as in the case of many,
so in thine, I have been worsted in the battle.&rdquo;&nbsp; Then when
Antony asked him, &ldquo;Who art thou who speakest thus to me?&rdquo;
he forthwith replied in a pitiable voice, &ldquo;I am the spirit of
impurity.&rdquo;. . .</p>
<p>Then Antony gave thanks to God, and gaining courage, said, &ldquo;Thou
art utterly despicable; for thou art black of soul, and weak as a child;
nor shall I henceforth cast one thought on thee.&nbsp; For the Lord
is my helper, and I shall despise my enemies.&rdquo;&nbsp; That black
being, hearing this, fled forthwith, cowering at his words, and afraid
thenceforth of coming near the man.</p>
<p>This was Antony&rsquo;s first struggle against the devil: or rather
this mighty deed in him was the Saviour&rsquo;s, who condemned sin in
the flesh that the righteousness of the Lord should be fulfilled in
us, who walk not after the flesh, but after the Spirit.&nbsp; But neither
did Antony, because the d&aelig;mon had fallen, grow careless and despise
him; neither did the enemy, when worsted by him, cease from lying in
ambush against him.&nbsp; For he came round again as a lion, seeking
a pretence against him.&nbsp; But Antony had learnt from Scripture that
many are the devices of the enemy; and continually kept up his training,
considering that, though he had not deceived his heart by pleasure,
he would try some other snares.&nbsp; For the d&aelig;mon delights in
sin.&nbsp; Therefore he chastised his body more and more, and brought
it into slavery, lest, having conquered in one case, he should be tripped
up in others.&nbsp; He determined, therefore, to accustom himself to
a still more severe life; and many wondered at him: but the labour was
to him easy to bear.&nbsp; For the readiness of the spirit, through
long usage, had created a good habit in him, so that, taking a very
slight hint from others, he showed great earnestness in it.&nbsp; For
he watched so much, that he often passed the whole night without sleep;
and that not once, but often, to the astonishment of men.&nbsp; He ate
once a day, after the setting of the sun, and sometimes only once in
two days, often even in four; his food was bread with salt, his drink
nothing but water.&nbsp; To speak of flesh and wine there is no need,
for such a thing is not found among other earnest men.&nbsp; When he
slept he was content with a rush-mat: but mostly he lay on the bare
ground.&nbsp; He would not anoint himself with oil, saying that it was
more fit for young men to be earnest in training, than to seek things
which softened the body; and that they must accustom themselves to labour,
according to the Apostle&rsquo;s saying, &ldquo;When I am weak, then
I am strong;&rdquo; for that the mind was strengthened as bodily pleasure
was weakened.&nbsp; And this argument of his was truly wonderful.&nbsp;
For he did not measure the path of virtue, nor his going away into retirement
on account of it, by time; but by his own desire and will.&nbsp; So
forgetting the past, he daily, as if beginning afresh, took more pains
to improve, saying over to himself continually the Apostle&rsquo;s words,
&ldquo;Forgetting what is behind, stretching forward to what is before;&rdquo;
and mindful, too, of Elias&rsquo; speech, &ldquo;The Lord liveth, before
whom I stand this day.&rdquo;&nbsp; For he held, that by mentioning
to-day, he took no account of past time: but, as if he were laying down
a beginning, he tried earnestly to make himself day by day fit to appear
before God, pure in heart, and ready to obey his will, and no other.&nbsp;
And he said in himself that the ascetic ought for ever to be learning
his own life from the manners of the great Elias, as from a mirror.&nbsp;
Antony, having thus, as it were, bound himself, went to the tombs, which
happened to be some way from the village; and having bidden one of his
acquaintances to bring him bread at intervals of many days, he entered
one of the tombs, and, shutting the door upon himself, remained there
alone.&nbsp; But the enemy, not enduring that, but rather terrified
lest in a little while he should fill the desert with his training,
coming one night with a multitude of d&aelig;mons, beat him so much
with stripes, that he lay speechless from the torture.&nbsp; For he
asserted that the pain was so great that no blows given by men could
cause such agony.&nbsp; But by the providence of God (for the Lord does
not overlook those who hope in him), the next day his acquaintance came,
bringing him the loaves.&nbsp; And having opened the door, and seeing
him lying on the ground for dead, he carried him to the Lord&rsquo;s
house in the village, and laid him on the ground; and many of his kinsfolk
and the villagers sat round him, as round a corpse.&nbsp; But about
midnight, Antony coming to himself, and waking up, saw them all sleeping,
and only his acquaintance awake, and, nodding to him to approach, begged
him to carry him back to the tombs, without waking any one.&nbsp; When
that was done, the doors were shut, and he remained as before, alone
inside.&nbsp; And, because he could not stand on account of the d&aelig;mons&rsquo;
blows, he prayed prostrate.&nbsp; And after his prayer, he said with
a shout, &ldquo;Here am I, Antony: I do not fly from your stripes; yea,
if you do yet more, nothing shall separate me from the love of Christ.&rdquo;&nbsp;
And then he sang, &ldquo;If an host be laid against me, yet shall not
my heart be afraid.&rdquo;&nbsp; Thus thought and spoke the man who
was training himself.&nbsp; But the enemy, hater of what is noble, and
envious, wondering that he dared to return after the stripes, called
together his dogs, and bursting with rage,&mdash;&ldquo;Ye see,&rdquo;
he said, &ldquo;that we have not stopped this man by the spirit of impurity;
nor by blows: but he is even growing bolder against us.&nbsp; Let us
attack him some other way.&rdquo; <a name="citation41"></a><a href="#footnote41">{41}</a>&nbsp;
For it is easy for the devil to invent schemes of mischief.&nbsp; So
then in the night they made such a crash, that the whole place seemed
shaken, and the d&aelig;mons, as if breaking in the four walls of the
room, seemed to enter through them, changing themselves into the shapes
of beasts and creeping things; <a name="citation42"></a><a href="#footnote42">{42}</a>
and the place was forthwith filled with shapes of lions, bears, leopards,
bulls, and snakes, asps, scorpions, and wolves, and each of them moved
according to his own fashion.&nbsp; The lion roared, longing to attack;
the bull seemed to toss; the serpent did not cease creeping, and the
wolf rushed upon him; and altogether the noises of all the apparitions
were dreadful, and their tempers cruel.&nbsp; But Antony, scourged and
pierced by them, felt a more dreadful bodily pain than before: but he
lay unshaken and awake in spirit.&nbsp; He groaned at the pain of his
body: but clear in intellect, and as it were mocking, he said, &ldquo;If
there were any power in you, it were enough that one of you should come
on; but since the Lord has made you weak, therefore you try to frighten
me by mere numbers.&nbsp; And a proof of your weakness is, that you
imitate the shapes of brute animals.&rdquo;&nbsp; And taking courage,
he said again, &ldquo;If ye can, and have received power against me,
delay not, but attack; but if ye cannot, why do ye disturb me in vain?&nbsp;
For a seal to us and a wall of safety is our faith in the Lord.&rdquo;&nbsp;
The d&aelig;mons, having made many efforts, gnashed their teeth at him,
because he rather mocked at them, than they at him.&nbsp; But neither
then did the Lord forget Antony&rsquo;s wrestling, but appeared to help
him.&nbsp; For, looking up, he saw the roof as it were opened and a
ray of light coming down towards him.&nbsp; The d&aelig;mons suddenly
became invisible, and the pain of his body forthwith ceased, and the
building became quite whole.&nbsp; But Antony, feeling the succour,
and getting his breath again, and freed from pain, questioned the vision
which appeared, saying, &ldquo;Where wert thou?&nbsp; Why didst thou
not appear to me from the first, to stop my pangs?&rdquo;&nbsp; And
a voice came to him, &ldquo;Antony, I was here, but I waited to see
thy fight.&nbsp; Therefore, since thou hast withstood, and not been
worsted, I will be to thee always a succour, and will make thee become
famous everywhere.&rdquo;&nbsp; Hearing this, he rose and prayed, and
was so strong, that he felt that he had more power in his body than
he had before.&nbsp; He was then about thirty-and-five years old.&nbsp;
And on the morrow he went out, and was yet more eager for devotion to
God; and, going to that old man aforesaid, he asked him to dwell with
him in the desert.&nbsp; But when he declined, because of his age, and
because no such custom had yet arisen, he himself straightway set off
to the mountain.&nbsp; But the enemy again, seeing his earnestness,
and wishing to hinder it, cast in his way the phantom of a great silver
plate.&nbsp; But Antony, perceiving the trick of him who hates what
is noble, stopped.&nbsp; And he judged the plate worthless, seeing the
devil in it; and said, &ldquo;Whence comes a plate in the desert?&nbsp;
This is no beaten way, nor is there here the footstep of any traveller.&nbsp;
Had it fallen, it could not have been unperceived, from its great size;
and besides, he who lost it would have turned back and found it, because
the place is desert.&nbsp; This is a trick of the devil.&nbsp; Thou
shalt not hinder, devil, my determination by this: let it go with thee
into perdition.&rdquo;&nbsp; And as Antony said that, it vanished, as
smoke from before the face of the fire.&nbsp; Then again he saw, not
this time a phantom, but real gold lying in the way as he came up.&nbsp;
But whether the enemy showed it him, or whether some better power, which
was trying the athlete, and showing the devil that he did not care for
real wealth; neither did he tell, nor do we know, save that it was real
gold.&nbsp; Antony, wondering at the abundance of it, so stepped over
it as over fire, and so passed it by, that he never turned, but ran
on in haste, until he had lost sight of the place.&nbsp; And growing
even more and more intense in his determination, he rushed up the mountain,
and finding an empty inclosure full of creeping things on account of
its age, he betook himself across the river, and dwelt in it.&nbsp;
The creeping things, as if pursued by some one, straightway left the
place: but he blocked up the entry, having taken with him loaves for
six months (for the Thebans do this, and they often remain a whole year
fresh), and having water with him, entering, as into a sanctuary, into
that monastery, <a name="citation44"></a><a href="#footnote44">{44}</a>
he remained alone, never going forth, and never looking at any one who
came.&nbsp; Thus he passed a long time there training himself, and only
twice a year received loaves, let down from above through the roof.&nbsp;
But those of his acquaintance who came to him, as they often remained
days and nights outside (for he did not allow any one to enter), used
to hear as it were crowds inside clamouring, thundering, lamenting,
crying&mdash;&ldquo;Depart from our ground.&nbsp; What dost thou even
in the desert?&nbsp; Thou canst not abide our onset.&rdquo;&nbsp; At
first those without thought that there were some men fighting with him,
and that they had got in by ladders: but when, peeping in through a
crack, they saw no one, then they took for granted that they were d&aelig;mons,
and being terrified, called themselves on Antony.&nbsp; But he rather
listened to them than cared for the others.&nbsp; For his acquaintances
came up continually, expecting to find him dead, and heard him singing,
&ldquo;Let the Lord arise, and his enemies shall be scattered; and let
them who hate him flee before him.&nbsp; As wax melts from before the
face of the fire, so shall sinners perish from before the face of God.&rdquo;&nbsp;
And again, &ldquo;All nations compassed me round about, and in the name
of the Lord I repelled them.&rdquo;&nbsp; He endured then for twenty
years, thus training himself alone; neither going forth, nor seen by
any one for long periods of time.&nbsp; But after this, when many longed
for him, and wished to imitate his training, and others who knew him
came, and were bursting in the door by force, Antony came forth as from
some inner shrine, initiated into the mysteries, and bearing the God.
<a name="citation45"></a><a href="#footnote45">{45}</a>&nbsp; And then
first he appeared out of the inclosure to those who were coming to him.&nbsp;
And when they saw him they wondered; for his body had kept the same
habit, and had neither grown fat, nor lean from fasting, nor worn by
fighting with the d&aelig;mons.&nbsp; For he was just such as they had
known him before his retirement.&nbsp; They wondered again at the purity
of his soul, because it was neither contracted as if by grief, nor relaxed
by pleasure, nor possessed by laughter or by depression; for he was
neither troubled at beholding the crowd, nor over-joyful at being saluted
by too many; but was altogether equal, as being governed by reason,
and standing on that which is according to nature.&nbsp; Many sufferers
in body who were present did the Lord heal by him; and others he purged
from d&aelig;mons.&nbsp; And he gave to Antony grace in speaking, so
that he comforted many who grieved, and reconciled others who were at
variance, exhorting all to prefer nothing in the world to the love of
Christ, and persuading and exhorting them to be mindful of the good
things to come, and of the love of God towards us, who spared not his
own son, but delivered him up for us all.&nbsp; He persuaded many to
choose the solitary life; and so thenceforth cells sprang up in the
mountains, and the desert was colonized by monks, who went forth from
their own, and registered themselves in the city which is in heaven.</p>
<p>And when he had need to cross the Arsenoite Canal (and the need was
the superintendence of the brethren), the canal was full of crocodiles.&nbsp;
And having only prayed, he entered it; and both he and all who were
with him went through it unharmed.&nbsp; But when he returned to the
cell, he persisted in the noble labours of his youth; and by continued
exhortations he increased the willingness of those who were already
monks, and stirred to love of training the greater number of the rest;
and quickly, as his speech drew men on, the cells became more numerous;
and he governed them all as a father.&nbsp; And when he had gone forth
one day, and all the monks had come to him desiring to hear some word
from him, he spake to them in the Egyptian tongue, thus&mdash;&ldquo;That
the Scriptures were sufficient for instruction, but that it was good
for us to exhort each other in the faith.&rdquo; . . .</p>
<p>[Here follows a long sermon, historically important, as being the
earliest Christian attempt to reduce to a science d&aelig;monology and
the temptation of d&aelig;mons: but its involved and rhetorical form
proves sufficiently that it could not have been delivered by an unlettered
man like Antony.&nbsp; Neither is it, probably, even composed by St.
Athanasius; it seems rather, like several other passages in this biography,
the interpolation of some later scribe.&nbsp; It has been, therefore,
omitted.]</p>
<p>And when Antony had spoken thus, all rejoiced; and in one the love
of virtue was increased, in another negligence stirred up, and in others
conceit stopped, while all were persuaded to despise the plots of the
devil, wondering at the grace which had been given to Antony by the
Lord for the discernment of spirits.&nbsp; So the cells in the mountains
were like tents filled with divine choirs, singing, discoursing, fasting,
praying, rejoicing over the hope of the future, working that they might
give alms thereof, and having love and concord with each other.&nbsp;
And there was really to be seen, as it were, a land by itself, of piety
and justice; for there was none there who did wrong, or suffered wrong:
no blame from any talebearer: but a multitude of men training themselves,
and in all of them a mind set on virtue.&nbsp; So that any one seeing
the cells, and such an array of monks, would have cried out, and said,
&ldquo;How fair are thy dwellings, O Jacob, and thy tents, O Israel;
like shady groves and like parks beside a river, and like tents which
the Lord hath pitched, and like cedars by the waters.&rdquo;&nbsp; He
himself, meanwhile, withdrawing, according to his custom, alone to his
own cell, increased the severity of his training.&nbsp; And he groaned
daily, considering the mansions in heaven, and setting his longing on
them, and looking at the ephemeral life of man.&nbsp; For even when
he was going to eat or sleep, he was ashamed, when he considered the
rational element of his soul; so that often, when he was about to eat
with many other monks, he remembered the spiritual food, and declined,
and went far away from them; thinking that he should blush if he was
seen by others eating.&nbsp; He ate, nevertheless, by himself, on account
of the necessities of the body; and often, too, with the brethren, being
bashful with regard to them, but plucking up heart for the sake of saying
something that might be useful; and used to tell them that they ought
to give all their leisure rather to the soul than to the body; and that
they should grant a very little time to the body, for mere necessity&rsquo;s
sake: but that their whole leisure should be rather given to the soul,
and should seek her profit, that she may not be drawn down by the pleasures
of the body, but rather the body be led captive by her.&nbsp; For this
(he said) was what was spoken by the Saviour, &ldquo;Be not anxious
for your soul, what ye shall eat; nor for your body, what ye shall put
on.&nbsp; And seek not what ye shall eat, nor what ye shall drink, neither
let your minds be in suspense: for after all these things the nations
of the world seek: but your Father knoweth that ye need all these things.&nbsp;
Rather seek first his kingdom; and all these things shall be added unto
you.&rdquo;</p>
<p>After these things, the persecution which happened under the Maximinus
of that time, <a name="citation49"></a><a href="#footnote49">{49}</a>
laid hold of the Church; and when the holy martyrs were brought to Alexandria,
Antony too followed, leaving his cell, and saying, &ldquo;Let us depart
too, that we may wrestle if we be called, or see them wrestling.&rdquo;&nbsp;
And he longed to be a martyr himself, but, not choosing to give himself
up, he ministered to the confessors in the mines, and in the prisons.&nbsp;
And he was very earnest in the judgment-hall to excite the readiness
of those who were called upon to wrestle; and to receive and bring on
their way, till they were perfected, those of them who went to martyrdom.&nbsp;
At last the judge, seeing the fearlessness and earnestness of him and
those who were with him, commanded that none of the monks should appear
in the judgment-hall, or haunt at all in the city.&nbsp; So all the
rest thought good to hide themselves that day; but Antony cared so much
for the order, that he all the rather washed his cloak, and stood next
day upon a high place, and appeared to the General in shining white.&nbsp;
Therefore, when all the rest wondered, and the General saw him, and
passed by with his array, he stood fearless, showing forth the readiness
of us Christians.&nbsp; For he himself prayed to be a martyr, as I have
said, and was like one grieved, because he had not borne his witness.&nbsp;
But the Lord was preserving him for our benefit, and that of the rest,
that he might become a teacher to many in the training which he had
learnt from Scripture.&nbsp; For many, when they only saw his manner
of life, were eager to emulate it.&nbsp; So he again ministered continually
to the confessors; and, as if bound with them, wearied himself in his
services.&nbsp; And when at last the persecution ceased, and the blessed
Bishop Peter had been martyred, he left the city, and went back to his
cell.&nbsp; And he was there, day by day, a martyr in his conscience,
and wrestling in the conflict of faith; for he imposed on himself a
much more severe training than before; and his garment was within of
hair, without of skin, which he kept till his end.&nbsp; He neither
washed his body with water, nor ever cleansed his feet, nor actually
endured putting them into water unless it were necessary.&nbsp; And
no one ever saw him unclothed till he was dead and about to be buried.</p>
<p>When, then, he retired, and had resolved neither to go forth himself,
nor to receive any one, one Martinianus, a captain of soldiers, came
and gave trouble to Antony.&nbsp; For he had with him his daughter,
who was tormented by a d&aelig;mon.&nbsp; And while he remained a long
time knocking at the door, and expecting him to come to pray to God
for the child, Antony could not bear to open, but leaning from above,
said, &ldquo;Man, why criest thou to me?&nbsp; I, too, am a man, as
thou art.&nbsp; But if thou believest, pray to God, and it comes to
pass.&rdquo;&nbsp; Forthwith, therefore, he believed, and called on
Christ; and went away, with his daughter cleansed from the d&aelig;mon.&nbsp;
And many other things the Lord did by him, saying, &ldquo;Ask, and it
shall be given you.&rdquo;&nbsp; For most of the sufferers, when he
did not open the door, only sat down outside the cell, and believing,
and praying honestly, were cleansed.&nbsp; But when he saw himself troubled
by many, and not being permitted to retire, as he wished, being afraid
lest he himself should be puffed up by what the Lord was doing by him,
or lest others should count of him above what he was, he resolved to
go to the Upper Thebaid, to those who knew him not.&nbsp; And, in fact,
having taken loaves from the brethren, he sat down on the bank of the
river, watching for a boat to pass, that he might embark and go up in
it.&nbsp; And as he watched, a voice came to him: &ldquo;Antony, whither
art thou going, and why?&rdquo;&nbsp; And he, not terrified, but as
one accustomed to be often called thus, answered when he heard it, &ldquo;Because
the crowds will not let me be at rest; therefore am I minded to go up
to the Upper Thebaid, on account of the many annoyances which befall
me; and, above all, because they ask of me things beyond my strength.&rdquo;&nbsp;
And the voice said to him, &ldquo;Even if thou goest up to the Thebaid,
even if, as thou art minded to do, thou goest down the cattle pastures,
<a name="citation52a"></a><a href="#footnote52a">{52a}</a> thou wilt
have to endure more, and double trouble; but if thou wilt really be
at rest, go now into the inner desert.&rdquo;&nbsp; And when Antony
said, &ldquo;Who will show me the way, for I have not tried it?&rdquo;
forthwith it showed him Saracens who were going to journey that road.&nbsp;
So, going to them, and drawing near them, Antony asked leave to depart
with them into the desert.&nbsp; But they, as if by an ordinance of
Providence, willingly received him; and, journeying three days and three
nights with them, he came to a very high mountain; <a name="citation52b"></a><a href="#footnote52b">{52b}</a>
and there was water under the mountain, clear, sweet, and very cold;
and a plain outside; and a few neglected date-palms.&nbsp; Then Antony,
as if stirred by God, loved the spot; for this it was what he had pointed
out who spoke to him beside the river bank.&nbsp; At first, then, having
received bread from those who journeyed with him, he remained alone
in the mount, no one else being with him.&nbsp; For he recognised that
place as his own home, and kept it thenceforth.&nbsp; And the Saracens
themselves, seeing Antony&rsquo;s readiness, came that way on purpose,
and joyfully brought him loaves; and he had, too, the solace of the
dates, which was then little and paltry.&nbsp; But after this, the brethren,
having found out the spot, like children remembering their father, were
anxious to send things to him; but Antony saw that, in bringing him
bread, some there were put to trouble and fatigue; and, sparing the
monks even in that, took counsel with himself, and asked some who came
to him to bring him a hoe and a hatchet, and a little corn; and when
these were brought, having gone over the land round the mountain, he
found a very narrow place which was suitable, and tilled it; and, having
plenty of water to irrigate it, he sowed; and, doing this year by year,
he got his bread from thence, rejoicing that he should be troublesome
to no one on that account, and that he was keeping himself free from
obligation in all things.&nbsp; But after this, seeing again some people
coming, he planted also a very few pot-herbs, that he who came might
have some small solace after the labour of that hard journey.&nbsp;
At first, however, the wild beasts in the desert, coming on account
of the water, often hurt his crops and his tillage; but he, gently laying
hold of one of them, said to them all, &ldquo;Why do you hurt me, who
have not hurt you?&nbsp; Depart, and, in the name of the Lord, never
come near this place.&rdquo;&nbsp; And from that time forward, as if
they were afraid of his command, they never came near the place.&nbsp;
So he was there alone in the inner mountain, having leisure for prayer
and for training.&nbsp; But the brethren who ministered to him asked
him that, coming every month, they might bring him olives, and pulse,
and oil; for, after all, he was old.&nbsp; And while he had his conversation
there, what great wrestlings he endured, according to that which is
written, &ldquo;Not against flesh and blood, but against the d&aelig;mons
who are our adversaries,&rdquo; we have known from those who went in
to him.&nbsp; For there also they heard tumults, and many voices, and
clashing as of arms; and they beheld the mount by night full of wild
beasts, and they looked on him, too, fighting, as it were, with beings
whom he saw, and praying against them.&nbsp; And those who came to him
he bade be of good courage, but he himself wrestled, bending his knees,
and praying to the Lord.&nbsp; And it was truly worthy of wonder that,
alone in such a desert, he was neither cowed by the d&aelig;mons who
beset him, nor, while there were there so many four-footed and creeping
beasts, was at all afraid of their fierceness: but, as is written, trusted
in the Lord like the Mount Zion, having his reason unshaken and untost;
so that the d&aelig;mons rather fled, and the wild beasts, as is written,
were at peace with him.</p>
<p>Nevertheless, the devil (as David sings) watched Antony, and gnashed
upon him with his teeth.&nbsp; But Antony was comforted by the Saviour,
remaining unhurt by his craft and manifold artifices.&nbsp; For on him,
when he was awake at night, he let loose wild beasts; and almost all
the hy&aelig;nas in that desert, coming out of their burrows, beset
him round, and he was in the midst.&nbsp; And when each gaped on him
and threatened to bite him, perceiving the art of the enemy, he said
to them all, &ldquo;If ye have received power against me, I am ready
to be devoured by you: but if ye have been set on by d&aelig;mons, delay
not, but withdraw, for I am a servant of Christ.&rdquo;&nbsp; When Antony
said this, they fled, pursued by his words as by a whip.&nbsp; Next
after a few days, as he was working&mdash;for he took care, too, to
labour&mdash;some one standing at the door pulled the plait that he
was working.&nbsp; For he was weaving baskets, which he used to give
to those who came, in return for what they brought him.&nbsp; And rising
up, he saw a beast, like a man down to his thighs, but having legs and
feet like an ass; and Antony only crossed himself and said, &ldquo;I
am a servant of Christ.&nbsp; If thou hast been sent against me, behold,
here I am.&rdquo;&nbsp; And the beast with its d&aelig;mons fled away,
so that in its haste it fell and died.&nbsp; Now the death of the beast
was the fall of the d&aelig;mons.&nbsp; For they were eager to do everything
to bring him back out of the desert, but could not prevail.</p>
<p>And being once asked by the monks to come down to them, and to visit
awhile them and their places, he journeyed with the monks who came to
meet him.&nbsp; And a camel carried their loaves and their water; for
that desert is all dry, and there is no drinkable water unless in that
mountain alone whence they drew their water, and where his cell is.&nbsp;
But when the water failed on the journey, and the heat was most intense,
they all began to be in danger; for going round to various places, and
finding no water, they could walk no more, but lay down on the ground,
and they let the camel go, and gave themselves up.&nbsp; But the old
man, seeing them all in danger, was utterly grieved, and groaned; and
departing a little way from them, and bending his knees and stretching
out his hands, he prayed, and forthwith the Lord caused water to come
out where he had stopped and prayed.&nbsp; And thus all of them drinking
took breath again; and having filled their skins, they sought the camel,
and found her; for it befell that the halter had been twisted round
a stone, and thus she had been stopped.&nbsp; So, having brought her
back, and given her to drink, they put the skins on her, and went through
their journey unharmed.&nbsp; And when they came to the outer cells
all embraced him, looking on him as a father.&nbsp; And he, as if he
brought them guest-gifts from the mountain, gave them away to them in
his words, and shared his benefits among them.&nbsp; And there was joy
again in the mountains, and zeal for improvement, and comfort through
their faith in each other.&nbsp; And he too rejoiced, seeing the willingness
of the monks, and his sister grown old in maidenhood, and herself the
leader of other virgins.&nbsp; And so after certain days he went back
again to the mountain.</p>
<p>And after that many came to him; and others who suffered dared also
to come.&nbsp; Now to all the monks who came to him he gave continually
this command: To trust in the Lord and love him, and to keep themselves
from foul thoughts and fleshly pleasures; and, as is written in the
Parables, not to be deceived by fulness of bread; and to avoid vainglory;
and to pray continually; and to sing before sleep and after sleep; and
to lay by in their hearts the commandment of Scripture; and to remember
the works of the saints, in order to have their souls attuned to emulate
them.&nbsp; But especially he counselled them to meditate continually
on the Apostle&rsquo;s saying, &ldquo;Let not the sun go down upon your
wrath;&rdquo; and this he said was spoken of all commandments in common,
in order that not on wrath alone, but on every other sin, the sun should
never go down; for it was noble and necessary that the sun should never
condemn us for a baseness by day, nor the moon for a sin or even a thought
by night; therefore, in order that that which is noble may be preserved
in us, it was good to hear and to keep what the Apostle commanded: for
he said: &ldquo;Judge yourselves, and prove yourselves.&rdquo;&nbsp;
Let each then take account with himself, day by day, of his daily and
nightly deeds; and if he has not sinned, let him not boast, but let
him endure in what is good and not be negligent, neither condemn his
neighbour, neither justify himself, as said the blessed Apostle Paul,
until the Lord comes who searches secret things.&nbsp; For we often
deceive ourselves in what we do, and we indeed know not: but the Lord
comprehends all.&nbsp; Giving therefore the judgment to Him, let us
sympathise with each other; and let us bear each other&rsquo;s burdens,
and examine ourselves; and what we are behind in, let us be eager to
fill up.&nbsp; And let this, too, be my counsel for safety against sinning.&nbsp;
Let us each note and write down the deeds and motions of the soul as
if he were about to relate them to each other; and be confident that,
as we shall be utterly ashamed that they should be known, we shall cease
from sinning, and even from desiring anything mean.&nbsp; For who when
he sins wishes to be harmed thereby?&nbsp; Or who, having sinned, does
not rather lie, wishing to hide it?&nbsp; As therefore when in each
other&rsquo;s sight we dare not commit a crime, so if we write down
our thoughts, and tell them to each other, we shall keep ourselves the
more from foul thoughts, for shame lest they should be known. . . .&nbsp;
And thus forming ourselves we shall be able to bring the body into slavery,
and please the Lord on the one hand, and on the other trample on the
snares of the enemy.&rdquo;&nbsp; This was his exhortation to those
who met him: but with those who suffered he suffered, and prayed with
them.&nbsp; And often and in many things the Lord heard him; and neither
when he was heard did he boast; nor when he was not heard did he murmur:
but, remaining always the same, gave thanks to the Lord.&nbsp; And those
who suffered he exhorted to keep up heart, and to know that the power
of cure was none of his, nor of any man&rsquo;s; but only belonged to
God, who works when and whatsoever he chooses.&nbsp; So the sufferers
received this as a remedy, learning not to despise the old man&rsquo;s
words, but rather to keep up heart; and those who were cured learned
not to bless Antony, but God alone.</p>
<p>For instance, one called Fronto, who belonged to the palace, and
had a grievous disease (for he gnawed his own tongue, and tried to injure
his eyes), came to the mountain and asked Antony to pray for him.&nbsp;
And when he had prayed he said to Fronto, &ldquo;Depart, and be healed.&rdquo;&nbsp;
And when he resisted, and remained within some days, Antony continued
saying, &ldquo;Thou canst not be healed if thou remainest here; go forth,
and as soon as thou enterest Egypt, thou shalt see the sign which shall
befall thee.&rdquo;&nbsp; He, believing, went forth; and as soon as
he only saw Egypt he was freed from his disease, and became sound according
to the word of Antony, which he had learnt by prayer from the Saviour
. . .</p>
<p>[Here follows a story of a girl cured of a painful complaint: which
need not be translated.]</p>
<p>But when two brethren were coming to him, and water failed them on
the journey, one of them died, and the other was about to die.&nbsp;
In fact, being no longer able to walk, he too lay upon the ground expecting
death.&nbsp; But Antony, as he sat on the mountain, called two monks
who happened to be there, and hastened them, saying, &ldquo;Take a pitcher
of water, and run on the road towards Egypt; for of two who are coming
hither one has just expired, and the other will do so if you do not
hasten.&nbsp; For this has been showed to me as I prayed.&rdquo;&nbsp;
So the monks going found the one lying dead, and buried him; and the
other they recovered with the water, and brought him to the old man.&nbsp;
Now the distance was a day&rsquo;s journey.&nbsp; But if any one should
ask why he did not speak before one of them expired, he does not question
rightly; for the judgment of that death did not belong to Antony, but
to God, who both judged concerning the one; and revealed concerning
the other.&nbsp; But this alone in Antony was wonderful, that sitting
on the mountain he kept his heart watchful, and the Lord showed him
things afar off.</p>
<p>For once again, as he sat on the mountain and looked up, he saw some
one carried aloft, and a great rejoicing among some who met him.&nbsp;
Then wondering, and blessing such a choir, he prayed to be taught what
that might be; and straightway a voice came to him that this was the
soul of Ammon, the monk in Nitria, <a name="citation60"></a><a href="#footnote60">{60}</a>
who had persevered as an ascetic to his old age; and the distance from
Nitria to the mountain where Antony was, is thirteen days&rsquo; journey.&nbsp;
Those then who were with Antony, seeing the old man wondering, asked
the reason, and heard that Ammon had just expired, for he was known
to them on account of his having frequently come thither, and many signs
having been worked by him, of which this is one. . . .</p>
<p>[Here follows the story (probably an interpolation) of Ammon&rsquo;s
being miraculously carried across the river Lycus, because he was ashamed
to undress himself.]</p>
<p>But the monks to whom Antony spoke about Ammon&rsquo;s death noted
down the day; and when brethren came from Nitria after thirty days,
they inquired and learnt that Ammon had fallen asleep at the day and
hour in which the old man saw his soul carried aloft.&nbsp; And all
on both sides wondered at the purity of Antony&rsquo;s soul; how he
had learnt and seen instantly what had happened thirteen days&rsquo;
journey off.</p>
<p>Moreover, Archeleas the Count, finding him once in the outer mountain
praying alone, asked him concerning Polycratia, that wonderful and Christ-bearing
maiden in Laodicea; for she suffered dreadful internal pain from her
extreme training, and was altogether weak in body.&nbsp; Antony, therefore,
prayed; and the Count noted down the day on which the prayer was offered.&nbsp;
And going back to Laodicea, he found the maiden cured; and asking when
and on what day her malady had ceased, he brought out the paper on which
he had written down the date of the prayer.&nbsp; And when she told
him, he showed at once the writing on the paper.&nbsp; And all found
that the Lord had stopped her sufferings while Antony was still praying
and calling for her on the goodness of the Saviour.</p>
<p>And concerning those who came to him, he often predicted some days,
or even a month, beforehand, and the cause why they were coming.&nbsp;
For some came only to see him, and others on account of sickness, and
others because they suffered from d&aelig;mons, and all thought the
labour of the journey no trouble nor harm, for each went back aware
that he had been benefited.&nbsp; And when he spoke and looked thus,
he asked no one to marvel at him on that account, but to marvel rather
at the Lord, because he had given us, who are but men, grace to know
him according to our powers.&nbsp; And as he was going down again to
the outer cells, and was minded to enter a boat and pray with the monks,
he alone perceived a dreadfully evil odour, and when those in the boat
told him that they had fish and brine on board, and that it was they
which smelt, he said that it was a different smell; and while he was
yet speaking, a youth, who had an evil spirit, had gone before them
and hidden in the boat, suddenly cried out.&nbsp; But the d&aelig;mon,
being rebuked in the name of our Lord Jesus Christ, went out of him,
and the man became whole, and all knew that the smell had come from
the evil spirit.&nbsp; And there was another man of high rank who came
to him, having a d&aelig;mon, and one so terrible, that the possessed
man did not know that he was going to Antony, but [showed the common
symptoms of mania].&nbsp; Those who brought him entreated Antony to
pray over him, which he did, feeling for the young man, and he watched
beside him all night.&nbsp; But about dawn, the young man, suddenly
rushing on Antony, assaulted him.&nbsp; When those who came with him
were indignant, Antony said, &ldquo;Be not hard upon the youth, for
it is not he, but the d&aelig;mon in him; and because he has been rebuked,
and commanded to go forth into dry places, he has become furious, and
done this.&nbsp; Glorify, therefore, the Lord for his having thus rushed
upon me, as a sign to you that the d&aelig;mon is going out.&rdquo;&nbsp;
And as Antony said this, the youth suddenly became sound, and, recovering
his reason, knew where he was, and embraced the old man, giving thanks
to God.&nbsp; And most of the monks agree unanimously that many like
things were done by him: yet are they not so wonderful as what follows.&nbsp;
For once, when he was going to eat, and rose up to pray about the ninth
hour, he felt himself rapt in spirit; and (wonderful to relate) as he
stood he saw himself as it were taken out of himself, and led into the
air by some persons; and then others, bitter and terrible, standing
in the air, and trying to prevent his passing upwards.&nbsp; And when
those who led him fought against them, they demanded whether he was
not accountable to them.&nbsp; And when they began to take account of
his deeds from his birth, his guides stopped them, saying, &ldquo;What
happened from his birth upwards, the Lord hath wiped out: but of what
has happened since he became a monk, and made a promise to God, of that
you may demand an account.&rdquo;&nbsp; Then, when they brought accusations
against him, and could not prove them, the road was opened freely to
him.&nbsp; And straightway he saw himself as if coming back and standing
before himself, and was Antony once more.&nbsp; Then, forgetting that
he had not eaten, he remained the rest of the day and all night groaning
and praying, for he wondered when he saw against how many enemies we
must wrestle, and through how many labours a man must traverse the air;
and he remembered that it is this which the Apostle means with regard
to the Prince of the power of the air; for it is in the air that the
enemy has his power, fighting against those who pass through it, and
trying to hinder them.&nbsp; Wherefore, also he especially exhorts us:
&ldquo;Take the whole armour of God, that the enemy, having no evil
to say about us, may be ashamed.&rdquo;&nbsp; But when we heard this,
we remembered the Apostle&rsquo;s saying, &ldquo;Whether in the body
I cannot tell, or out of the body I cannot tell: God knoweth.&rdquo;&nbsp;
But Paul was caught up into the third heaven, and, having heard unspeakable
words, descended again; but Antony saw himself rapt in the air, and
wrestling till he seemed to be free.</p>
<p>Again, he had this grace, that as he was sitting alone in the mountain,
if at any time he was puzzled in himself, the thing was revealed to
him by Providence as he prayed; and the blessed man was, as Scripture
says, taught of God.&nbsp; After this, at all events, when he had been
talking with some who came to him concerning the departure of the soul,
and what would be its place after this life, the next night some one
called him from without, and said, &ldquo;Rise up, Antony; come out
and see.&rdquo;&nbsp; So coming out (for he knew whom he ought to obey),
he beheld a tall being, shapeless and terrible, standing and reaching
to the clouds, and as it were winged beings ascending; and him stretching
out his hands; and some of them hindered by him, and others flying above
him, and when they had once passed him, borne upwards without trouble.&nbsp;
But against them that tall being gnashed his teeth, while over those
who fell, he rejoiced.&nbsp; And there came a voice to Antony, &ldquo;Consider
what thou seest.&rdquo;&nbsp; And when his understanding was opened,
he perceived that it was the enemy who envies the faithful, and that
those who were in his power he mastered and hindered from passing; but
that those who had not obeyed him, over them, as over conquerors, he
had no power.&nbsp; Having seen this, and as it were made mindful by
it, he struggled more and more daily to improve.&nbsp; Now these things
he did not tell of his own accord; but when he was long in prayer, and
astonished in himself, those who were with him questioned him and urged
him; and he was forced to tell; unable, as a father, to hide anything
from his children; and considering, too, that his own conscience was
clear, and the story would be profitable for them, when they learned
that the life of training bore good fruit, and that visions often came
as a solace of their toils.</p>
<p>But how tolerant was his temper, and how humble his spirit; for though
he was so great, he both honoured exceedingly the canon of the Church,
and wished to put every ecclesiastic before himself in honour.&nbsp;
For to the bishops and presbyters he was not ashamed to bow his head;
and if a deacon ever came to him for the sake of profit, he discoursed
with him on what was profitable, but in prayer he gave place to him,
not being ashamed even himself to learn from him. <a name="citation65"></a><a href="#footnote65">{65}</a>&nbsp;
For he often asked questions, and deigned to listen to all present,
confessing that he was profited if any one said aught that was useful.&nbsp;
Moreover, his countenance had great and wonderful grace; and this gift
too he had from the Saviour.&nbsp; For if he was present among the multitude
of monks, and any one who did not previously know him wished to see
him, as soon as he came he passed by all the rest, and ran to Antony
himself, as if attracted by his eyes.&nbsp; He did not differ from the
rest in stature or in stoutness, but in the steadiness of his temper,
and purity of his soul; for as his soul was undisturbed, his outward
senses were undisturbed likewise, so that the cheerfulness of his soul
made his face cheerful, and from the movements of his body the stedfastness
of his soul could be perceived, according to the Scripture, &ldquo;When
the heart is cheerful the countenance is glad; but when sorrow comes
it scowleth.&rdquo; . . . And he was altogether wonderful in faith,
and pious, for he never communicated with the Meletian <a name="citation66a"></a><a href="#footnote66a">{66a}</a>
schismatics, knowing their malice and apostasy from the beginning; nor
did he converse amicably with Manich&aelig;ans or any other heretics,
save only to exhort them to be converted to piety.&nbsp; For he held
that their friendship and converse was injury and ruin to the soul.&nbsp;
So also he detested the heresy of the Arians, and exhorted all not to
approach them, nor hold their misbelief. <a name="citation66b"></a><a href="#footnote66b">{66b}</a>&nbsp;
In fact, when certain of the Ariomanites came to him, having discerned
them and found them impious, he chased them out of the mountain, saying
that their words were worse than serpent&rsquo;s poison; and when the
Arians once pretended that he was of the same opinion as they, he was
indignant and fierce against them.&nbsp; Then being sent for by the
bishops and all the brethren, he went down from the mountain, and entering
Alexandria he denounced the Arians, saying, that that was the last heresy,
and the forerunner of Antichrist; and he taught the people that the
Son of God was not a created thing, neither made from nought, but that
he is the Eternal Word and Wisdom of the Essence of the Father; wherefore
also it is impious to say there was a time when he was not, for he was
always the Word co-existent with the Father.&nbsp; Wherefore he said,
&ldquo;Do not have any communication with these most impious Arians;
for there is no communion between light and darkness.&nbsp; For you
are pious Christians: but they, when they say that the Son of God and
the Word, who is from the Father, is a created being, differ nought
from the heathen, because they worship the creature instead of God the
Creator. <a name="citation67"></a><a href="#footnote67">{67}</a>&nbsp;
Believe rather that the whole creation itself is indignant against them,
because they number the Creator and Lord of all, in whom all things
are made, among created things.&rdquo;&nbsp; All the people therefore
rejoiced at hearing that Christ-opposing heresy anathematized by such
a man; and all those in the city ran together to see Antony and the
Greeks, <a name="citation68a"></a><a href="#footnote68a">{68a}</a> and
those who are called their priests <a name="citation68b"></a><a href="#footnote68b">{68b}</a>
came into the church, wishing to see the man of God; for all called
him by that name, because there the Lord cleansed many by him from d&aelig;mons,
and healed those who were out of their mind.&nbsp; And many heathens
wished only to touch the old man, believing that it would be of use
to them; and in fact as many became Christians in those few days, as
would have been usually converted in a year.&nbsp; And when some thought
that the crowd troubled him, and therefore turned all away from him,
he quietly said that they were not more numerous than the fiends with
whom he wrestled on the mountain.&nbsp; But when he left the city, and
we were setting him on his journey, when we came to the gate a certain
woman called to him: &ldquo;Wait, man of God, my daughter is grievously
vexed with a devil; wait, I beseech thee, lest I too harm myself with
running after thee.&rdquo;&nbsp; The old man hearing it, and being asked
by us, waited willingly.&nbsp; But when the woman drew near, the child
dashed itself on the ground; and when Antony prayed and called on the
name of Christ, it rose up sound, the unclean spirit having gone out;
and the mother blessed God, and we all gave thanks: and he himself rejoiced
at leaving the city for the mountain, as for his own home.</p>
<p>Now he was very prudent; and what was wonderful, though he had never
learnt letters, he was a shrewd and understanding man.&nbsp; Once, for
example, two Greek philosophers came to him, thinking that they could
tempt Antony.&nbsp; And he was in the outer mountain; and when he went
out to them, understanding the men from their countenances, he said
through an interpreter, &ldquo;Why have you troubled yourselves so much,
philosophers, to come to a foolish man?&rdquo;&nbsp; And when they answered
that he was not foolish, but rather very wise, he said, &ldquo;If you
have come to a fool, your labour is superfluous, but if ye think me
to be wise, become as I am; for we ought to copy what is good, and if
I had come to you, I should have copied you; but if you come to me,
copy me, for I am a Christian.&rdquo;&nbsp; And they wondering went
their way, for they saw that even d&aelig;mons were afraid of Antony.</p>
<p>And again when others of the same class met him in the outer mountain,
and thought to mock him, because he had not learnt letters, Antony answered,
&ldquo;But what do you say? which is first, the sense or the letters?&nbsp;
And which is the cause of the other, the sense of the letters, or the
letters of the sense?&rdquo;&nbsp; And when they said that the sense
came first, and invented the letters, Antony replied, &ldquo;If then
the sense be sound, the letters are not needed.&rdquo;&nbsp; Which struck
them, and those present, with astonishment.&nbsp; So they went away
wondering, when they saw so much understanding in an unlearned man.&nbsp;
For though he had lived and grown old in the mountain, his manners were
not rustic, but graceful and urbane; and his speech was seasoned with
the divine salt, so that no man grudged at him, but rather rejoiced
over him, as many as came. . . .</p>
<p>[Here follows a long sermon against the heathen worship, attributed
to St. Antony, but of very questionable authenticity: the only point
about it which is worthy of note is that Antony confutes the philosophers
by challenging them to cure some possessed persons, and, when they are
unable to do so, casts out the d&aelig;mons himself by the sign of the
cross.]</p>
<p>The fame of Antony reached even the kings, for Constantinus the Augustus,
and his sons, Constantius and Constans, the Augusti, hearing of these
things, wrote to him as to a father, and begged to receive an answer
from him.&nbsp; But he did not make much of the letters, nor was puffed
up by their messages; and he was just the same as he was before the
kings wrote to him.&nbsp; And he called his monks and said, &ldquo;Wonder
not if a king writes to us, for he is but a man: but wonder rather that
God has written his law to man, and spoken to us by his own Son.&rdquo;&nbsp;
So he declined to receive their letters, saying he did not know how
to write an answer to such things; but being admonished by the monks
that the kings were Christians, and that they must not be scandalized
by being despised, he permitted the letters to be read, and wrote an
answer; accepting them because they worshipped Christ, and counselling
them, for their salvation, not to think the present life great, but
rather to remember judgment to come; and to know that Christ was the
only true and eternal king; and he begged them to be merciful to men,
and to think of justice and the poor.&nbsp; And they, when they received
the answer, rejoiced.&nbsp; Thus was he kindly towards all, and all
looked on him as their father.&nbsp; He then betook himself again into
the inner mountain, and continued his accustomed training.&nbsp; But
often, when he was sitting and walking with those who came unto him,
he was astounded, as is written in Daniel.&nbsp; And after the space
of an hour, he told what had befallen to the brethren who were with
him, and they perceived that he had seen some vision.&nbsp; Often he
saw in the mountain what was happening in Egypt, and told it to Serapion
the bishop, who saw him occupied with a vision.&nbsp; Once, for instance,
as he sat, he fell as it were into an ecstasy, and groaned much at what
he saw.&nbsp; Then, after an hour, turning to those who were with him,
he groaned and fell into a trembling, and rose up and prayed, and bending
his knees, remained so a long while; and then the old man rose up and
wept.&nbsp; The bystanders, therefore, trembling and altogether terrified,
asked him to tell them what had happened, and tormented him much, that
he was forced to speak.&nbsp; And he groaning greatly&mdash;&ldquo;Ah!
my children,&rdquo; he said, &ldquo;it were better to be dead before
what I have seen shall come to pass.&rdquo;&nbsp; And when they asked
him again, he said with tears, that &ldquo;Wrath will seize on the Church,
and she will be given over to men like unto brutes, which have no understanding;
for I saw the table of the Lord&rsquo;s house, and mules standing all
around it in a ring and kicking inwards, as a herd does when it leaps
in confusion; and ye all perceived how I groaned, for I heard a voice
saying, &lsquo;My sanctuary shall be defiled.&rsquo;&rdquo;</p>
<p>This the old man saw, and after two years there befell the present
inroad of the Arians, <a name="citation72a"></a><a href="#footnote72a">{72a}</a>
and the plunder of the churches, when they carried off the holy vessels
by violence, and made the heathen carry them: and when too they forced
the heathens from the prisons to join them, and in their presence did
on the holy table what they would. <a name="citation72b"></a><a href="#footnote72b">{72b}</a>&nbsp;
Then we all perceived that the kicks of those mules presignified to
Antony what the Arians are now doing without understanding, like the
brutes.&nbsp; But when Antony saw this sight, he exhorted those about
him, saying, &ldquo;Lose not heart, children; for as the Lord has been
angry, so will he again be appeased, and the Church shall soon receive
again her own order and shine forth as she is wont; and ye shall see
the persecuted restored to their place, and impiety retreating again
into its own dens, and the pious faith speaking boldly everywhere with
all freedom.&nbsp; Only defile not yourselves with the Arians, for this
teaching is not of the Apostle but of the d&aelig;mons, and of their
father the devil: barren and irrational and of an unsound mind, like
the irrational deeds of those mules.&rdquo;&nbsp; Thus spoke Antony.</p>
<p>But we must not doubt whether so great wonders have been done by
a man; for the Saviour&rsquo;s promise is, &ldquo;If ye have faith as
a grain of mustard-seed, ye shall say to this mountain, Pass over from
hence, it shall pass over, and nothing shall be impossible to you;&rdquo;
and again, &ldquo;Verily, verily, I say unto you, if ye shall ask my
Father in my name, he shall give it you.&nbsp; Ask, and ye shall receive.&rdquo;&nbsp;
And he himself it is who said to his disciples and to all who believe
in him, &ldquo;Heal the sick, cast out devils; freely ye have received,
freely give.&rdquo;&nbsp; And certainly Antony did not heal by his own
authority, but by praying and calling on Christ; so that it was plain
to all that it was not he who did it, but the Lord, who through Antony
showed love to men, and healed the sufferers.&nbsp; But Antony&rsquo;s
part was only the prayer and the training, for the sake whereof, sitting
in the mountain, he rejoiced in the sight of divine things, and grieved
when he was tormented by many, and dragged to the outer mountain.</p>
<p>For all the magistrates asked him to come down from the mountain,
because it was impossible for them to go in thither to him on account
of the litigants who followed him; so they begged him to come, that
they might only behold him.&nbsp; And when he declined they insisted,
and even sent in to him prisoners under the charge of soldiers, that
at least on their account he might come down.&nbsp; So being forced
by necessity, and seeing them lamenting, he came to the outer mountain.&nbsp;
And his labour this time too was profitable to many, and his coming
for their good.&nbsp; To the magistrates, too, he was of use, counselling
them to prefer justice to all things, and to fear God, and to know that
with what judgment they judged they should be judged in turn.&nbsp;
But he loved best of all his life in the mountain.&nbsp; Once again,
when he was compelled in the same way to leave it, by those who were
in want, and by the general of the soldiers, who entreated him earnestly,
he came down, and having spoken to them somewhat of the things which
conduced to salvation, he was pressed also by those who were in need.&nbsp;
But being asked by the general to lengthen his stay, he refused, and
persuaded him by a graceful parable, saying, &ldquo;Fishes, if they
lie long on the dry land, die; so monks who stay with you lose their
strength.&nbsp; As the fishes then hasten to the sea, so must we to
the mountain, lest if we delay we should forget what is within.&rdquo;&nbsp;
The general, hearing this and much more from him, said with surprise
that he was truly a servant of God, for whence could an unlearned man
have so great sense if he were not loved by God?</p>
<p>Another general, named Balacius, bitterly persecuted us Christians
on account of his affection for those abominable Arians.&nbsp; His cruelty
was so great that he even beat nuns, and stripped and scourged monks.&nbsp;
Antony sent him a letter to this effect:&mdash;&ldquo;I see wrath coming
upon thee.&nbsp; Cease, therefore, to persecute the Christians, lest
the wrath lay hold upon thee, for it is near at hand.&rdquo;&nbsp; But
Balacius, laughing, threw the letter on the ground and spat on it; and
insulted those who brought it, bidding them tell Antony, &ldquo;Since
thou carest for monks, I will soon come after thee likewise.&rdquo;&nbsp;
And not five days had passed, when the wrath laid hold on him.&nbsp;
For Balacius himself, and Nestorius, the Eparch of Egypt, went out to
the first station from Alexandria, which is called Ch&aelig;reas&rsquo;s.&nbsp;
Both of them were riding on horses belonging to Balacius, and the most
gentle in all his stud: but before they had got to the place, the horses
began playing with each other, as is their wont, and suddenly the more
gentle of the two, on which Nestorius was riding, attacked Balacius
and pulled him off with his teeth, and so tore his thigh that he was
carried back to the city, and died in three days.&nbsp; And all wondered
that what Antony had so wonderfully foretold was so quickly fulfilled.&nbsp;
These were his warnings to the more cruel.&nbsp; But the rest who came
to him he so instructed that they gave up at once their lawsuits, and
blessed those who had retired from this life.&nbsp; And those who had
been unjustly used he so protected that you would think he and not they
was the sufferer.&nbsp; And he was so able to be of use to all; so that
many who were serving in the army, and many wealthy men, laid aside
the burdens of life and became thenceforth monks; and altogether he
was like a physician given by God to Egypt.&nbsp; For who met him grieving,
and did not go away rejoicing?&nbsp; Who came mourning over his dead,
and did not forthwith lay aside his grief?&nbsp; Who came wrathful,
and was not converted to friendship?&nbsp; What poor man came wearied
out, and when he saw and heard him did not despise wealth and comfort
himself in his poverty?&nbsp; What monk who had grown remiss, was not
strengthened by coming to him?&nbsp; What young man coming to the mountain
and looking upon Antony, did not forthwith renounce pleasure and love
temperance?&nbsp; Who came to him tempted by devils, and did not get
rest?&nbsp; Who came troubled by doubts, and did not get peace of mind?&nbsp;
For this was the great thing in Antony&rsquo;s asceticism, that (as
I have said before), having the gift of discerning spirits, he understood
their movements, and knew in what direction each of them turned his
endeavours and his attacks.&nbsp; And not only he was not deceived by
them himself, but he taught those who were troubled in mind how they
might turn aside the plots of d&aelig;mons, teaching them the weakness
and the craft of their enemies.&nbsp; How many maidens, too, who had
been already betrothed, and only saw Antony from afar, remained unmarried
for Christ&rsquo;s sake!&nbsp; Some, too, came from foreign parts to
him, and all, having gained some benefit, went back from him as from
a father.&nbsp; And now he has fallen asleep, all are as orphans who
have lost a parent, consoling themselves with his memory alone, keeping
his instructions and exhortations.&nbsp; But what the end of his life
was like, it is fit that I should relate, and you hear eagerly.&nbsp;
For it too is worthy of emulation.&nbsp; He was visiting, according
to his wont, the monks in the outer mountain, and having learned from
Providence concerning his own end, he said to the brethren, &ldquo;This
visit to you is my last, and I wonder if we shall see each other again
in this life.&nbsp; It is time for me to set sail, for I am near a hundred
and five years old.&rdquo;&nbsp; And when they heard that they wept,
and embraced and kissed the old man.&nbsp; And he, as if he was setting
out from a foreign city to his own, spoke joyfully, and exhorted them
not to grow idle in their labours or cowardly in their training, but
to live as those who died daily, and (as I said before) to be earnest
in keeping their souls from foul thoughts, and to emulate the saints,
and not to draw near the Meletian schismatics, for &ldquo;ye know their
evil and profane determinations, nor to have any communion with the
Arians, for their impiety also is manifest to all.&nbsp; Neither if
ye shall see the magistrates patronising them, be troubled, for their
phantasy shall have an end, and is mortal and only for a little while.&nbsp;
Keep yourselves therefore rather clean from them, and hold that which
has been handed down to you by the fathers, and especially the faith
in our Lord Jesus Christ which ye have learned from Scripture, and of
which ye have often been reminded by me.&rdquo;&nbsp; And when the brethren
tried to force him to stay with them and make his end there, he would
not endure it, on many accounts, as he showed by his silence; and especially
on this:&mdash;The Egyptians are wont to wrap in linen the corpses of
good persons, and especially of the holy martyrs, but not to bury them
underground, but to lay them upon benches and keep them in their houses;
<a name="citation77"></a><a href="#footnote77">{77}</a> thinking that
by this they honour the departed.&nbsp; Now Antony had often asked the
bishops to exhort the people about this, and in like manner he himself
rebuked the laity and terrified the women; saying that it was a thing
neither lawful nor in any way holy; for that the bodies of the patriarchs
and prophets are to this day preserved in sepulchres, and that the very
body of our Lord was laid in a sepulchre, and a stone placed over it
to hide it, till he rose the third day.&nbsp; And thus saying he showed
that those broke the law who did not bury the corpses of the dead, even
if they were holy; for what is greater or more holy than the Lord&rsquo;s
body?&nbsp; Many, then, when they heard him, buried thenceforth underground;
and blessed the Lord that they had been taught rightly.&nbsp; Being
then aware of this, and afraid lest they should do the same by his body,
he hurried himself, and bade farewell to the monks in the outer mountain;
and coming to the inner mountain, where he was wont to abide, after
a few months he grew sick, and calling those who were by&mdash;and there
were two of them who had remained there within fifteen years, exercising
themselves and ministering to him on account of his old age&mdash;he
said to them, &ldquo;I indeed go the way of the fathers, as it is written,
for I perceive that I am called by the Lord.&rdquo; . . .</p>
<p>[Then follows a general exhortation to the monk, almost identical
with much that has gone before, and ending by a command that his body
should be buried in the ground.]</p>
<p>&ldquo;And let this word of mine be kept by you, so that no one shall
know the place, save you alone, for I shall receive it (my body) incorruptible
from my Saviour in the resurrection of the dead.&nbsp; And distribute
my garments thus.&nbsp; To Athanasius the bishop give one of my sheepskins,
and the cloak under me, which was new when he gave it me, and has grown
old by me; and to Serapion the bishop give the other sheepskin; and
do you have the hair-cloth garment.&nbsp; And for the rest, children,
farewell, for Antony is going, and is with you no more.&rdquo;</p>
<p>Saying thus, when they had embraced him, he stretched out his feet,
and, as if he saw friends coming to him, and grew joyful on their account
(for, as he lay, his countenance was bright), he departed and was gathered
to his fathers.&nbsp; And they forthwith, as he had commanded them,
preparing the body and wrapping it up, hid it under ground: and no one
knows to this day where it is hidden, save those two servants only.&nbsp;
And each (<i>i.e</i>.&nbsp; Athanasius and Serapion) having received
the sheepskin of the blessed Antony, and the cloak which he had worn
out, keeps them as a great possession.&nbsp; For he who looks on them,
as it were, sees Antony; and he who puts them on, wears them with joy,
as he does Antony&rsquo;s counsels.</p>
<p>Such was the end of Antony in the body, and such the beginning of
his training.&nbsp; And if these things are small in comparison with
his virtue, yet reckon up from these things how great was Antony, the
man of God, who kept unchanged, from his youth up to so great an age,
the earnestness of his training; and was neither worsted in his old
age by the desire of more delicate food, nor on account of the weakness
of his body altered the quality of his garment, nor even washed his
feet with water; and yet remained uninjured in all his limbs: for his
eyes were undimmed and whole, so that he saw well; and not one of his
teeth had fallen out, but they were only worn down to his gums on account
of his great age; and he remained sound in hand and foot; and, in a
word, appeared ruddier and more ready for exertion than all who use
various meats and baths, and different dresses.&nbsp; But that this
man should be celebrated everywhere and wondered at by all, and regretted
even by those who never saw him, is a proof of his virtue, and that
his soul was dear to God.&nbsp; For Antony became known not by writings,
not from the wisdom that is from without, not by any art, but by piety
alone; and that this was the gift of God, none can deny.&nbsp; For how
as far as Spain, as Gaul, as Rome, as Africa, could he have been heard,
hidden as he was in a mountain, if it had not been for God, who makes
known his own men everywhere, and who had promised Antony this from
the beginning?&nbsp; For even if they do their deeds in secret, and
wish to be concealed, yet the Lord shows them as lights to all, that
so those who hear of them may know that the commandments suffice to
put men in the right way, and may grow zealous of the path of virtue.</p>
<p>Read then these things to the other brethren, that they may learn
what the life of monks should be, and may believe that the Lord Jesus
Christ our Saviour will glorify those who glorify him, and that those
who serve him to the end he will not only bring to the kingdom of heaven,
but that even if on earth they hide themselves and strive to get out
of the way, he will make them manifest and celebrated everywhere, for
the sake of their own virtue, and for the benefit of others.&nbsp; But
if need be, read this also to the heathens, that even thus they may
learn that our Lord Jesus Christ is not only Lord and the Son of God,
but that those who truly serve him, and believe piously on him, not
only prove that those d&aelig;mons whom the Greeks think are gods to
be no gods, but even tread them under foot, and chase them out as deceivers
and corrupters of men, through Jesus Christ our Lord, to whom be glory
and honour for ever and ever.&nbsp; Amen.</p>
<div class="GutenbergBlankLines1"><br /></div>
<p>Thus ends this strange story.&nbsp; What we are to think of the miracles
and wonders contained in it, will be discussed at a later point in this
book.&nbsp; Meanwhile there is a stranger story still connected with
the life of St. Antony.&nbsp; It professes to have been told by him
himself to his monks; and whatever groundwork of fact there may be in
it is doubtless his.&nbsp; The form in which we have it was given it
by the famous St. Jerome, who sends the tale as a letter to Asella,
one of the many noble Roman ladies whom he persuaded to embrace the
monastic life.&nbsp; The style is as well worth preserving as the matter.&nbsp;
Its ruggedness and awkwardness, its ambition and affectation, contrasted
with the graceful simplicity of Athanasius&rsquo;s &ldquo;Life of Antony,&rdquo;
mark well the difference between the cultivated Greek and the ungraceful
and half-barbarous Roman of the later Empire.&nbsp; I have, therefore,
given it as literally as possible, that readers may judge for themselves
how some of the Great Fathers of the fifth century wrote, and what they
believed.</p>
<div class="GutenbergBlankLines2"><br /><br /></div>
<h2>THE LIFE OF SAINT PAUL, THE FIRST HERMIT</h2>
<div class="GutenbergBlankLines2"><br /><br /></div>
<p>BY THE DIVINE HIERONYMUS THE PRIEST.&nbsp; (ST.&nbsp; JEROME.)</p>
<div class="GutenbergBlankLines1"><br /></div>
<h3>PROLOGUE</h3>
<div class="GutenbergBlankLines1"><br /></div>
<p>Many have often doubted by which of the monks the desert was first
inhabited.&nbsp; For some, looking for the beginnings of Monachism in
earlier ages, have deduced it from the blessed Elias and John; of whom
Elias seems to us to have been rather a prophet than a monk; and John
to have begun to prophesy before he was born.&nbsp; But others (an opinion
in which all the common people are agreed) assert that Antony was the
head of this rule of life, which is partly true.&nbsp; For he was not
so much himself the first of all, as the man who excited the earnestness
of all.&nbsp; But Amathas and Macarius, Antony&rsquo;s disciples (the
former of whom buried his master&rsquo;s body), even now affirm that
a certain Paul, a Theban, was the beginner of the matter; which (not
so much in name as in opinion) we also hold to be true.&nbsp; Some scatter
about, as the fancy takes them, both this and other stories; inventing
incredible tales of a man in a subterranean cave, hairy down to his
heels, and many other things, which it is tedious to follow out.&nbsp;
For, as their lie is shameless, their opinion does not seem worth refuting.</p>
<p>Therefore, because careful accounts of Antony, both in Greek and
Roman style, have been handed down, I have determined to write a little
about the beginning and end of Paul&rsquo;s life; more because the matter
has been omitted, than trusting to my own wit.&nbsp; But how he lived
during middle life, or what stratagems of Satan he endured, is known
to none.</p>
<div class="GutenbergBlankLines1"><br /></div>
<h3>THE LIFE OF PAUL</h3>
<div class="GutenbergBlankLines1"><br /></div>
<p>Under Decius and Valerius, the persecutors, at the time when Cornelius
at Rome, and Cyprian at Carthage, were condemned in blessed blood, a
cruel tempest swept over many Churches in Egypt and the Thebaid.</p>
<p>Christian subjects in those days longed to be smitten with the sword
for the name of Christ.&nbsp; But the crafty enemy, seeking out punishments
which delayed death, longed to slay souls, not bodies.&nbsp; And as
Cyprian himself (who suffered by him) says: &ldquo;When they longed
to die, they were not allowed to be slain.&rdquo;&nbsp; In order to
make his cruelty better known, we have set down two examples for remembrance.</p>
<p>A martyr, persevering in the faith, and conqueror amid racks and
red-hot irons, he commanded to be anointed with honey and laid on his
back under a burning sun, with his hands tied behind him; in order,
forsooth, that he who had already conquered the fiery gridiron, might
yield to the stings of flies.</p>
<p>* * *</p>
<p>In those days, in the Lower Thebaid, was Paul left at the death of
both his parents, in a rich inheritance, with a sister already married;
being about fifteen years old, well taught in Greek and Egyptian letters,
gentle tempered, loving God much; and, when the storm of persecution
burst, he withdrew into a distant city.&nbsp; But</p>
<div class="GutenbergBlankLines1"><br /></div>
<p>&ldquo;To what dost thou not urge the human breast<br />Curst hunger
after gold?&rdquo;</p>
<div class="GutenbergBlankLines1"><br /></div>
<p>His sister&rsquo;s husband was ready to betray him whom he should
have concealed.&nbsp; Neither the tears of his wife, the tie of blood,
or God who looks on all things from on high, could call him back from
his crime.&nbsp; He was at hand, ready to seize him, making piety a
pretext for cruelty.&nbsp; The boy discovered it, and fled into the
desert hills.&nbsp; Once there he changed need into pleasure, and going
on, and then stopping awhile, again and again, reached at last a stony
cliff, at the foot whereof was, nigh at hand, a great cave, its mouth
closed with a stone.&nbsp; Having moved which away (as man&rsquo;s longing
is to know the hidden), exploring more greedily, he sees within a great
hall, open to the sky above, but shaded by the spreading boughs of an
ancient palm; and in it a clear spring, the rill from which, flowing
a short space forth, was sucked up again by the same soil which had
given it birth.&nbsp; There were besides in that cavernous mountain
not a few dwellings, in which he saw rusty anvils and hammers, with
which coin had been stamped of old.&nbsp; For this place (so books say)
was the workshop for base coin in the days when Antony lived with Cleopatra.</p>
<p>Therefore, in this beloved dwelling, offered him as it were by God,
he spent all his life in prayer and solitude, while the palm-tree gave
him food and clothes; which lest it should seem impossible to some,
I call Jesus and his holy angels to witness that I have seen monks one
of whom, shut up for thirty years, lived on barley bread and muddy water;
another in an old cistern, which in the country speech they call the
Syrian&rsquo;s bed, was kept alive on five figs each day.&nbsp; These
things, therefore, will seem incredible to those who do not believe;
for to those who do believe all things are possible.</p>
<p>But to return thither whence I digressed.&nbsp; When the blessed
Paul had been leading the heavenly life on earth for 113 years, and
Antony, ninety years old, was dwelling in another solitude, this thought
(so Antony was wont to assert) entered his mind&mdash;that no monk more
perfect than he had settled in the desert.&nbsp; But as he lay still
by night, it was revealed to him that there was another monk beyond
him far better than he, to visit whom he must set out.&nbsp; So when
the light broke, the venerable old man, supporting his weak limbs on
a staff, began to will to go, he knew not whither.&nbsp; And now the
mid day, with the sun roasting above, grew fierce; and yet he was not
turned from the journey he had begun, saying, &ldquo;I trust in my God,
that he will show his servant that which he has promised.&rdquo;&nbsp;
And as he spake, he sees a man half horse, to whom the poets have given
the name of Hippocentaur.&nbsp; Seeing whom, he crosses his forehead
with the salutary impression of the Cross, and, &ldquo;Here!&rdquo;
he says, &ldquo;in what part here does a servant of God dwell?&rdquo;&nbsp;
But he, growling I know not what barbarous sound, and grinding rather
than uttering, the words, attempted a courteous speech from lips rough
with bristles, and, stretching out his right hand, pointed to the way;
then, fleeing swiftly across the open plains, vanished from the eyes
of the wondering Antony.&nbsp; But whether the devil took this form
to terrify him; or whether the desert, fertile (as is its wont) in monstrous
animals, begets that beast likewise, we hold as uncertain.</p>
<p>So Antony, astonished, and thinking over what he had seen, goes forward.&nbsp;
Soon afterwards, he sees in a stony valley a short manikin, with crooked
nose and brow rough with horns, whose lower parts ended in goat&rsquo;s
feet.&nbsp; Undismayed by this spectacle likewise, Antony seized, like
a good warrior, the shield of faith and habergeon of hope; the animal,
however, was bringing him dates, as food for his journey, and a pledge
of peace.&nbsp; When he saw that, Antony pushed on, and, asking him
who he was, was answered, &ldquo;I am a mortal, and one of the inhabitants
of the desert, whom the Gentiles, deluded by various errors, worship
by the name of Fauns, Satyrs, and Incubi.&nbsp; I come as ambassador
from our herd, that thou mayest pray for us to the common God, who,
we know, has come for the salvation of the world, and his sound is gone
out into all lands.&rdquo;&nbsp; As he spoke thus, the aged wayfarer
bedewed his face plenteously with tears, which the greatness of his
joy had poured forth as signs of his heart.&nbsp; For he rejoiced at
the glory of Christ, and the destruction of Satan; and, wondering at
the same time that he could understand the creature&rsquo;s speech,
he smote on the ground with his staff, and said, &ldquo;Woe to thee,
Alexandria, who worshippest portents instead of God!&nbsp; Woe to thee,
harlot city, into which all the demons of the world have flowed together!&nbsp;
What wilt thou say now?&nbsp; Beasts talk of Christ, and thou worshippest
portents instead of God.&rdquo;&nbsp; He had hardly finished his words,
when the swift beast fled away as upon wings.&nbsp; Lest this should
move a scruple in any one on account of its incredibility, it was corroborated,
in the reign of Constantine, by the testimony of the whole world.&nbsp;
For a man of that kind, being led alive to Alexandria, afforded a great
spectacle to the people; and afterwards the lifeless carcase, being
salted lest it should decay in the summer heat, was brought to Antioch,
to be seen by the Emperor.</p>
<p>But&mdash;to go on with my tale&mdash;Antony went on through that
region, seeing only the tracks of wild beasts, and the wide waste of
the desert.&nbsp; What he should do, or whither turn, he knew not.&nbsp;
A second day had now run by.&nbsp; One thing remained, to be confident
that he could not be deserted by Christ.&nbsp; All night through he
spent a second darkness in prayer, and while the light was still dim,
he sees afar a she-wolf, panting with heat and thirst, creeping in at
the foot of the mountain.&nbsp; Following her with his eyes, and drawing
nigh to the cave when the beast was gone, he began to look in: but in
vain; for the darkness stopped his view.&nbsp; However, as the Scripture
saith, perfect love casteth out fear; with gentle step and bated breath
the cunning explorer entered, and going forward slowly, and stopping
often, watched for a sound.&nbsp; At length he saw afar off a light
through the horror of the darkness; hastened on more greedily; struck
his foot against a stone; and made a noise, at which the blessed Paul
shut and barred his door, which had stood open.</p>
<p>Then Antony, casting himself down before the entrance, prayed there
till the sixth hour, and more, to be let in, saying, &ldquo;Who I am,
and whence, and why I am come, thou knowest.&nbsp; I know that I deserve
not to see thy face; yet, unless I see thee, I will not return.&nbsp;
Thou who receivest beasts, why repellest thou a man?&nbsp; I have sought,
and I have found.&nbsp; I knock, that it may be opened to me: which
if I win not, here will I die before thy gate.&nbsp; Surely thou shalt
at least bury my corpse.&rdquo;</p>
<div class="GutenbergBlankLines1"><br /></div>
<p>&ldquo;Persisting thus he spoke, and stood there fixed:<br />To whom
the hero shortly thus replied.&rdquo;</p>
<div class="GutenbergBlankLines1"><br /></div>
<p>&ldquo;No one begs thus to threaten.&nbsp; No one does injury with
tears.&nbsp; And dost thou wonder why I do not let thee in, seeing thou
art a mortal guest?&rdquo;</p>
<p>Then Paul, smiling, opened the door.&nbsp; They mingled mutual embraces,
and saluted each other by their names, and committed themselves in common
to the grace of God.&nbsp; And after the holy kiss, Paul sitting down
with Antony thus began&mdash;</p>
<p>&ldquo;Behold him, whom thou hast sought with such labour; with limbs
decayed by age, and covered with unkempt white hair.&nbsp; Behold, thou
seest but a mortal, soon to become dust.&nbsp; But, because charity
bears all things, tell me, I pray thee, how fares the human race? whether
new houses are rising in the ancient cities? by what emperor is the
world governed? whether there are any left who are led captive by the
deceits of the devil?&rdquo;&nbsp; As they spoke thus, they saw a raven
settle on a bough; who, flying gently down, laid, to their wonder, a
whole loaf before them.&nbsp; When he was gone, &ldquo;Ah,&rdquo; said
Paul, &ldquo;the Lord, truly loving, truly merciful, hath sent us a
meal.&nbsp; For sixty years past I have received daily half a loaf,
but at thy coming Christ hath doubled his soldiers&rsquo; allowance.&rdquo;&nbsp;
Then, having thanked God, they sat down on the brink of the glassy spring.</p>
<p>But here a contention arising as to which of them should break the
loaf, occupied the day till well-nigh evening.&nbsp; Paul insisted,
as the host; Antony declined, as the younger man.&nbsp; At last it was
agreed that they should take hold of the loaf at opposite ends, and
each pull towards himself, and keep what was left in his hand.&nbsp;
Next they stooped down, and drank a little water from the spring; then,
immolating to God the sacrifice of praise, passed the night watching.</p>
<p>And when day dawned again, the blessed Paul said to Antony, &ldquo;I
knew long since, brother, that thou wert dwelling in these lands; long
since God had promised thee to me as a fellow servant: but because the
time of my falling asleep is now come, and (because I always longed
to depart, and to be with Christ) there is laid up for me when I have
finished my course a crown of righteousness; therefore thou art sent
from the Lord to cover my corpse with mould, and give back dust to dust.&rdquo;</p>
<p>Antony, hearing this, prayed him with tears and groans not to desert
him, but take him as his companion on such a journey.&nbsp; But he said,
&ldquo;Thou must not seek the things which are thine own, but the things
of others.&nbsp; It is expedient for thee, indeed, to cast off the burden
of the flesh, and to follow the Lamb: but it is expedient for the rest
of the brethren that they should be still trained by thine example.&nbsp;
Wherefore go, unless it displease thee, and bring the cloak which Athanasius
the bishop gave thee, to wrap up my corpse.&rdquo;&nbsp; But this the
blessed Paul asked, not because he cared greatly whether his body decayed
covered or bare (as one who for so long a time was used to clothe himself
with woven palm leaves), but that Antony&rsquo;s grief at his death
might be lightened when he left him.&nbsp; Antony astounded that he
had heard of Athanasius and his own cloak, seeing as it were Christ
in Paul, and venerating the God within his breast, dared answer nothing:
but keeping in silence, and kissing his eyes and hands, returned to
the monastery, which afterwards was occupied by the Saracens.&nbsp;
His steps could not follow his spirit; but, although his body was empty
with fastings, and broken with old age, yet his courage conquered his
years.&nbsp; At last, tired and breathless, he arrived at home.&nbsp;
There two disciples met him, who had been long sent to minister to him,
and asked him, &ldquo;Where hast thou tarried so long, father?&rdquo;&nbsp;
He answered, &ldquo;Woe to me a sinner, who falsely bear the name of
a monk.&nbsp; I have seen Elias; I have seen John in the desert; I have
truly seen Paul in Paradise;&rdquo; and so, closing his lips, and beating
his breast, he took the cloak from his cell, and when his disciples
asked him to explain more fully what had befallen, he said, &ldquo;There
is a time to be silent, and a time to speak.&rdquo;&nbsp; Then going
out, and not taking even a morsel of food, he returned by the way he
had come.&nbsp; For he feared&mdash;what actually happened&mdash;lest
Paul in his absence should render up the soul he owed to Christ.</p>
<p>And when the second day had shone, and he had retraced his steps
for three hours, he saw amid hosts of angels, amid the choirs of prophets
and apostles, Paul shining white as snow, ascending up on high; and
forthwith falling on his face, he cast sand on his head, and weeping
and wailing, said, &ldquo;Why dost thou dismiss me, Paul?&nbsp; Why
dost thou depart without a farewell?&nbsp; So late known, dost thou
vanish so soon?&rdquo;&nbsp; The blessed Antony used to tell afterwards,
how he ran the rest of the way so swiftly that he flew like a bird.&nbsp;
Nor without cause.&nbsp; For entering the cave he saw, with bended knees,
erect neck, and hands spread out on high, a lifeless corpse.&nbsp; And
at first, thinking that it still lived, he prayed in like wise.&nbsp;
But when he heard no sighs (as usual) come from the worshipper&rsquo;s
breast, he fell to a tearful kiss, understanding how the very corpse
of the saint was praying, in seemly attitude, to that God to whom all
live.</p>
<p>So, having wrapped up and carried forth the corpse, and chanting
hymns of the Christian tradition, Antony grew sad, because he had no
spade, wherewith to dig the ground; and thinking over many plans in
his mind, said, &ldquo;If I go back to the monastery, it is a three
days&rsquo; journey.&nbsp; If I stay here, I shall be of no more use.&nbsp;
I will die, then, as it is fit; and, falling beside thy warrior, Christ,
breathe my last breath.&rdquo;</p>
<p>As he was thinking thus to himself, lo! two lions came running from
the inner part of the desert, their manes tossing on their necks; seeing
whom he shuddered at first; and then, turning his mind to God, remained
fearless, as though he were looking upon doves.&nbsp; They came straight
to the corpse of the blessed old man, and crouched at his feet, wagging
their tails, and roaring with mighty growls, so that Antony understood
them to lament, as best they could.&nbsp; Then not far off they began
to claw the ground with their paws, and, carrying out the sand eagerly,
dug a place large enough to hold a man: then at once, as if begging
a reward for their work, they came to Antony, drooping their necks,
and licking his hands and feet.&nbsp; But he perceived that they prayed
a blessing from him; and at once, bursting into praise of Christ, because
even dumb animals felt that he was God, he saith, &ldquo;Lord, without
whose word not a leaf of the tree drops, nor one sparrow falls to the
ground, give to them as thou knowest how to give.&rdquo;&nbsp; And,
signing to them with his hand, he bade them go.</p>
<p>And when they had departed, he bent his aged shoulders to the weight
of the holy corpse; and laying it in the grave, heaped earth on it,
and raised a mound as is the wont.&nbsp; And when another dawn shone,
lest the pious heir should not possess aught of the goods of the intestate
dead, he kept for himself the tunic which Paul had woven, as baskets
are made, out of the leaves of the palm; and returning to the monastery,
told his disciples all throughout; and, on the solemn days of Easter
and Pentecost, always clothed himself in Paul&rsquo;s tunic.</p>
<p>I am inclined, at the end of my treatise, to ask those who know not
the extent of their patrimonies; who cover their houses with marbles;
who sew the price of whole farms into their garments with a single thread&mdash;What
was ever wanting to this naked old man?&nbsp; Ye drink from a gem; he
satisfied nature from the hollow of his hands.&nbsp; Ye weave gold into
your tunics; he had not even the vilest garment of your bond-slave.&nbsp;
But, on the other hand, to that poor man Paradise is open; you, gilded
as you are, Gehenna will receive.&nbsp; He, though naked, kept the garment
of Christ; you, clothed in silk, have lost Christ&rsquo;s robe.&nbsp;
Paul lies covered with the meanest dust, to rise in glory; you are crushed
by wrought sepulchres of stone, to burn with all your works.&nbsp; Spare,
I beseech you, yourselves; spare, at least, the riches which you love.&nbsp;
Why do you wrap even your dead in golden vestments?&nbsp; Why does not
ambition stop amid grief and tears?&nbsp; Cannot the corpses of the
rich decay, save in silk?&nbsp; I beseech thee, whosoever thou art that
readest this, to remember Hieronymus the sinner, who, if the Lord gave
him choice, would much sooner choose Paul&rsquo;s tunic with his merits,
than the purple of kings with their punishments.</p>
<div class="GutenbergBlankLines1"><br /></div>
<p>This is the story of Paul and Antony, as told by Jerome.&nbsp; But,
in justice to Antony himself, it must be said that the sayings recorded
of him seem to show that he was not the mere visionary ascetic which
his biographers have made him.&nbsp; Some twenty sermons are attributed
to him, seven of which only are considered to be genuine.&nbsp; A rule
for monks, too, is called his: but, as it is almost certain that he
could neither read nor write, we have no proof that any of these documents
convey his actual language.&nbsp; If the seven sermons attributed to
him be really his, it must be said for them that they are full of sound
doctrine and vital religion, and worthy, as wholes, to be preached in
any English church, if we only substitute for the word &ldquo;monk,&rdquo;
the word &ldquo;man.&rdquo;</p>
<p>But there are records of Antony which represent him as a far more
genial and human personage; full of a knowledge of human nature, and
of a tenderness and sympathy, which account for his undoubted power
over the minds of men; and showing, too, at times, a certain covert
and &ldquo;pawky&rdquo; humour which puts us in mind, as does the humour
of many of the Egyptian hermits, of the old-fashioned Scotch.&nbsp;
These reminiscences are contained in the &ldquo;Words of the Elders,&rdquo;
a series of anecdotes of the desert fathers collected by various hands;
which are, after all, the most interesting and probably the most trustworthy
accounts of them and their ways.&nbsp; I shall have occasion to quote
them later.&nbsp; I insert here some among them which relate to Antony.</p>
<div class="GutenbergBlankLines1"><br /></div>
<p>SAYINGS OF ANTONY, FROM THE &ldquo;WORDS OF THE ELDERS.&rdquo;</p>
<div class="GutenbergBlankLines1"><br /></div>
<p>A monk gave away his wealth to the poor, but kept back some for himself.&nbsp;
Antony said to him, &ldquo;Go to the village and buy meat, and bring
it to me on thy bare back.&rdquo;&nbsp; He did so: and the dogs and
birds attacked him, and tore him as well as the meat.&nbsp; Quoth Antony,
&ldquo;So are those who renounce the world, and yet must needs have
money, torn by d&aelig;mons.&rdquo;</p>
<p>Antony heard high praise of a certain brother; but, when he tested
him, he found that he was impatient under injury.&nbsp; Quoth Antony,
&ldquo;Thou art like a house which has a gay porch, but is broken into
by thieves through the back door.&rdquo;</p>
<p>Antony, as he sat in the desert, was weary in heart, and said, &ldquo;Lord,
I long to be saved, but my wandering thoughts will not let me.&nbsp;
Show me what I shall do.&rdquo;&nbsp; And looking up, he saw one like
himself twisting ropes, and rising up to pray.&nbsp; And the angel (for
it was one) said to him, &ldquo;Work like me, Antony, and you shall
be saved.&rdquo;</p>
<p>One asked him how he could please God.&nbsp; Quoth Antony, &ldquo;Have
God always before thine eyes; whatever work thou doest, take example
for it out of Holy Scripture: wherever thou stoppest, do not move thence
in a hurry, but abide there in patience.&nbsp; If thou keepest these
three things, thou shalt be saved.&rdquo;</p>
<p>Quoth Antony, &ldquo;If the baker did not cover the mill-horse&rsquo;s
eyes he would eat the corn, and take his own wages.&nbsp; So God covers
our eyes, by leaving us to sordid thoughts, lest we should think of
our own good works, and be puffed up in spirit.&rdquo;</p>
<p>Quoth Antony, &ldquo;I saw all the snares of the enemy spread over
the whole earth.&nbsp; And I sighed, and said, &lsquo;Who can pass through
these?&rsquo;&nbsp; And a voice came to me, saying, &lsquo;Humility
alone can pass through, Antony, where the proud can in no wise go.&rsquo;&rdquo;</p>
<p>Antony was sitting in his cell, and a voice said to him, &ldquo;Thou
hast not yet come to the stature of a currier, who lives in Alexandria.&rdquo;&nbsp;
Then he took his staff, and went down to Alexandria; and the currier,
when he found him, was astonished at seeing so great a man.&nbsp; Said
Antony, &ldquo;Tell me thy works; for on thy account have I come out
of the desert.&rdquo;&nbsp; And he answered, &ldquo;I know not that
I ever did any good; and, therefore, when I rise in the morning, I say
that this whole city, from the greatest to the least, will enter into
the kingdom of God for their righteousness: while I, for my sins, shall
go to eternal pain.&nbsp; And this I say over again, from the bottom
of my heart, when I lie down at night.&rdquo;&nbsp; When Antony heard
that, he said, &ldquo;Like a good goldsmith, thou hast gained the kingdom
of God sitting still in thy house; while I, as one without discretion,
have been haunting the desert all my time, and yet not arrived at the
measure of thy saying.&rdquo;</p>
<p>Quoth Antony, &ldquo;If a monk could tell his elders how many steps
he walks, or how many cups of water he drinks, in his cell, he ought
to tell them, for fear of going wrong therein.&rdquo;</p>
<p>At Alexandria, Antony met one Didymus, most learned in the Scriptures,
witty, and wise: but he was blind.&nbsp; Antony asked him, &ldquo;Art
thou not grieved at thy blindness?&rdquo;&nbsp; He was silent: but being
pressed by Antony, he confessed that he was sad thereat.&nbsp; Quoth
Antony, &ldquo;I wonder that a prudent man grieves over the loss of
a thing which ants, and flies, and gnats have, instead of rejoicing
in that possession which the holy Apostles earned.&nbsp; For it is better
to see with the spirit than with the flesh.&rdquo;</p>
<p>A Father asked Antony, &ldquo;What shall I do?&rdquo;&nbsp; Quoth
the old man, &ldquo;Trust not in thine own righteousness; regret not
the thing which is past; bridle thy tongue and thy stomach.&rdquo;</p>
<p>Quoth Antony, &ldquo;He who sits still in the desert is safe from
three enemies: from hearing, from speech, from sight: and has to fight
against only one, his own heart.&rdquo;</p>
<p>A young monk came and told Antony how he had seen some old men weary
on their journey, and had bidden the wild asses to come and carry him,
and they came.&nbsp; Quoth Antony, &ldquo;That monk looks to me like
a ship laden with a precious cargo; but whether it will get into port
is uncertain.&rdquo;&nbsp; And after some days he began to tear his
hair and weep; and when they asked him why, he said, &ldquo;A great
pillar of the Church has just fallen;&rdquo; and he sent brothers to
see the young man, and found him sitting on his mat, weeping over a
great sin which he had done; and he said, &ldquo;Tell Antony to give
me ten days&rsquo; truce, and I hope I shall satisfy him;&rdquo; and
in five days he was dead.</p>
<p>Abbot Elias fell into temptation, and the brethren drove him out.&nbsp;
Then he went to the mountain to Antony.&nbsp; After awhile, Antony sent
him home to his brethren; but they would not receive him.&nbsp; Then
the old man sent to them, and saying, &ldquo;A ship has been wrecked
at sea, and lost all its cargo; and, with much toil, the ship is come
empty to land.&nbsp; Will you sink it again in the sea?&rdquo;&nbsp;
So they took Elias back.</p>
<p>Quoth Antony, &ldquo;There are some who keep their bodies in abstinence:
but, because they have no discretion, they are far from God.&rdquo;</p>
<p>A hunter came by, and saw Antony rejoicing with the brethren, and
it displeased him.&nbsp; Quoth Antony, &ldquo;Put an arrow in thy bow,
and draw;&rdquo; and he did.&nbsp; Quoth Antony, &ldquo;Draw higher;&rdquo;
and again, &ldquo;Draw higher still.&rdquo;&nbsp; And he said, &ldquo;If
I overdraw, I shall break my bow.&rdquo;&nbsp; Quoth Antony, &ldquo;So
it is in the work of God.&nbsp; If we stretch the brethren beyond measure,
they fail.&rdquo;</p>
<p>A brother said to Antony, &ldquo;Pray for me.&rdquo;&nbsp; Quoth
he, &ldquo;I cannot pity thee, nor God either, unless thou pitiest thyself,
and prayest to God.&rdquo;</p>
<p>Quoth Antony, &ldquo;The Lord does not permit wars to arise in this
generation, because he knows that men are weak, and cannot bear them.&rdquo;</p>
<p>Antony, as he considered the depths of the judgments of God, failed;
and said, &ldquo;Lord, why do some die so early, and some live on to
a decrepit age?&nbsp; Why are some needy, and others rich?&nbsp; Why
are the unjust wealthy, and the just poor?&rdquo;&nbsp; And a voice
came to him, &ldquo;Antony, look to thyself.&nbsp; These are the judgments
of God, which are not fit for thee to know.&rdquo;</p>
<p>Quoth Antony to Abbot Pastor, &ldquo;This is a man&rsquo;s great
business&mdash;to lay each man his own fault on himself before the Lord,
and to expect temptation to the last day of his life.&rdquo;</p>
<p>Quoth Antony, &ldquo;If a man works a few days, and then is idle,
and works again and is idle again, he does nothing, and will not possess
the perseverance of patience.&rdquo;</p>
<p>Quoth Antony to his disciples, &ldquo;If you try to keep silence,
do not think that you are exercising a virtue, but that you are unworthy
to speak.&rdquo;</p>
<p>Certain old men came once to Antony; and he wished to prove them,
and began to talk of holy Scripture, and to ask them, beginning at the
youngest, what this and that text meant.&nbsp; And each answered as
best they could.&nbsp; But he kept on saying, &ldquo;You have not yet
found it out.&rdquo;&nbsp; And at last he asked Abbot Joseph, &ldquo;And
what dost thou think this text means?&rdquo;&nbsp; Quoth Abbot Joseph,
&ldquo;I do not know.&rdquo;&nbsp; Quoth Antony, &ldquo;Abbot Joseph
alone has found out the way, for he says he does not know it.&rdquo;</p>
<p>Quoth Antony, &ldquo;I do not now fear God, but love Him, for love
drives out fear.&rdquo;</p>
<p>He said again, &ldquo;Life and death are very near us; for if we
gain our brother, we gain God: but if we cause our brother to offend,
we sin against Christ.&rdquo;</p>
<p>A philosopher asked Antony, &ldquo;How art thou content, father,
since thou hast not the comfort of books?&rdquo;&nbsp; Quoth Antony,
&ldquo;My book is the nature of created things.&nbsp; In it, when I
choose, I can read the words of God.&rdquo;</p>
<p>Brethren came to Antony, and asked of him a saying by which they
might be saved.&nbsp; Quoth he, &ldquo;Ye have heard the Scriptures,
and know what Christ requires of you.&rdquo;&nbsp; But they begged that
he would tell them something of his own.&nbsp; Quoth he, &ldquo;The
Gospel says, &lsquo;If a man smite you on one cheek, turn to him the
other.&rsquo;&rdquo;&nbsp; But they said that they could not do that.&nbsp;
Quoth he, &ldquo;You cannot turn the other cheek to him?&nbsp; Then
let him smite you again on the same one.&rdquo;&nbsp; But they said
they could not do that either.&nbsp; Then said he, &ldquo;If you cannot,
at least do not return evil for evil.&rdquo;&nbsp; And when they said
that neither could they do that, quoth Antony to his disciples, &ldquo;Go,
get them something to eat, for they are very weak.&rdquo;&nbsp; And
he said to them, &ldquo;If you cannot do the one, and will not have
the other, what do you want?&nbsp; As I see, what you want is prayer.&nbsp;
That will heal your weakness.&rdquo;</p>
<p>Quoth Antony, &ldquo;He who would be free from his sins must be so
by weeping and mourning; and he who would be built up in virtue must
be built up by tears.&rdquo;</p>
<p>Quoth Antony, &ldquo;When the stomach is full of meat, forthwith
the great vices bubble out, according to that which the Saviour says:
&lsquo;That which entereth into the mouth defileth not a man; but that
which cometh out of the heart sinks a man in destruction.&rsquo;&rdquo;</p>
<p>[This may be a somewhat paradoxical application of the text: but
the last anecdote of Antony which I shall quote is full of wisdom and
humanity.]</p>
<p>A monk came from Alexandria, Eulogius by name, bringing with him
a man afflicted with elephantiasis.&nbsp; Now Eulogius had been a scholar,
learned, and rich, and had given away all he had save a very little,
which he kept because he could not work with his own hands.</p>
<p>And he told Antony how he had found that wretched man lying in the
street fifteen years before, having lost then nearly every member save
his tongue, and how he had taken him home to his cell, nursed him, bathed
him, physicked him, fed him; and how the man had returned him nothing
save slanders, curses, and insults; how he had insisted on having meat,
and had had it; and on going out in public, and had company brought
to him; and how he had at last demanded to be put down again whence
he had been taken, always cursing and slandering.&nbsp; And now Eulogius
could bear the man no longer, and was minded to take him at his word.</p>
<p>Then said Antony with an angry voice, &ldquo;Wilt thou cast him out,
Eulogius?&nbsp; He who remembers that he made him, will not cast him
out.&nbsp; If thou cast him out, he will find a better friend than thee.&nbsp;
God will choose some one who will take him up when he is cast away.&rdquo;&nbsp;
Eulogius was terrified at these words, and held his peace.</p>
<p>Then went Antony to the sick man, and shouted at him, &ldquo;Thou
elephantiac, foul with mud and dirt, not worthy of the third heaven,
wilt thou not stop shouting blasphemies against God?&nbsp; Dost thou
not know that he who ministers to thee is Christ?&nbsp; How darest thou
say such things against Christ?&rdquo;&nbsp; And he bade Eulogius and
the sick man go back to their cell, and live in peace, and never part
more.&nbsp; Both went back, and, after forty days, Eulogius died, and
the sick man shortly after, &ldquo;altogether whole in spirit.&rdquo;</p>
<div class="GutenbergBlankLines2"><br /><br /></div>
<h2>HILARION</h2>
<div class="GutenbergBlankLines2"><br /><br /></div>
<p>I would gladly, did space allow, give more biographies from among
those of the Egyptian hermits: but it seems best, having shown the reader
Antony as the father of Egyptian monachism, to go on to his great pupil
Hilarion, the father of monachism in Palestine.&nbsp; His life stands
written at length by St. Jerome, who himself died a monk at Bethlehem;
and is composed happily in a less ambitious and less rugged style than
that of Paul, not without elements of beauty, even of tragedy.</p>
<div class="GutenbergBlankLines1"><br /></div>
<h3>PROLOGUE</h3>
<div class="GutenbergBlankLines1"><br /></div>
<p>Remember me in thy holy prayers, glory and honour of virgins, nun
Asella.&nbsp; Before beginning to write the life of the blessed Hilarion,
I invoke the Holy Spirit which dwelt in him, that, as he largely bestowed
virtues on Hilarion, he may give to me speech wherewith to relate them;
so that his deeds may be equalled by my language.&nbsp; For those who
(as Crispus says) &ldquo;have wrought virtues&rdquo; are held to have
been worthily praised in proportion to the words in which famous intellects
have been able to extol them.&nbsp; Alexander the Great, the Macedonian
(whom Daniel calls either the brass, or the leopard, or the he-goat),
on coming to the tomb of Achilles, &ldquo;Happy art thou, youth,&rdquo;
he said, &ldquo;who hast been blest with a great herald of thy worth&rdquo;&mdash;meaning
Homer.&nbsp; But I have to tell the conversation and life of such and
so great a man, that even Homer, were he here, would either envy my
matter, or succumb under it.</p>
<p>For although St. Epiphanius, bishop of Salamina in Cyprus, who had
much intercourse with Hilarion, has written his praise in a short epistle,
which is commonly read, yet it is one thing to praise the dead in general
phrases, another to relate his special virtues.&nbsp; We therefore set
to work rather to his advantage than to his injury; and despise those
evil-speakers who lately carped at Paul, and will perhaps now carp at
my Hilarion, unjustly blaming the former for his solitary life, and
the latter for his intercourse with men; in order that the one, who
was never seen, may be supposed not to have existed; the other, who
was seen by many, may be held cheap.&nbsp; This was the way of their
ancestors likewise, the Pharisees, who were neither satisfied with John&rsquo;s
desert life and fasting, nor with the Lord Saviour&rsquo;s public life,
eating and drinking.&nbsp; But I shall lay my hand to the work which
I have determined, and pass by, with stopped ears, the hounds of Scylla.&nbsp;
I pray that thou mayest persevere in Christ, and be mindful of me in
thy prayers, most sacred virgin.</p>
<div class="GutenbergBlankLines1"><br /></div>
<h3>THE LIFE</h3>
<div class="GutenbergBlankLines1"><br /></div>
<p>Hilarion was born in the village of Thabatha, which lies about five
miles to the south of Gaza, in Palestine.&nbsp; He had parents given
to the worship of idols, and blossomed (as the saying is) a rose among
the thorns.&nbsp; Sent by them to Alexandria, he was entrusted to a
grammarian, and there, as far as his years allowed, gave proof of great
intellect and good morals.&nbsp; He was soon dear to all, and skilled
in the art of speaking.&nbsp; And, what is more than all, he believed
in the Lord Jesus, and delighted neither in the madness of the circus,
in the blood of the arena, or in the luxury of the theatre: but all
his heart was in the congregation of the Church.</p>
<p>But hearing the then famous name of Antony, which was carried throughout
all Egypt, he was fired with a longing to visit him, and went to the
desert.&nbsp; As soon as he saw him he changed his dress, and stayed
with him about two months, watching the order of his life, and the purity
of his manner; how frequent he was in prayers, how humble in receiving
brethren, severe in reproving them, eager in exhorting them; and how
no infirmity ever broke through his continence, and the coarseness of
his food.&nbsp; But, unable to bear longer the crowd which assembled
round Antony, for various diseases and attacks of devils, he said that
it was not consistent to endure in the desert the crowds of cities,
but that he must rather begin where Antony had begun.&nbsp; Antony,
as a valiant man, was receiving the reward of victory: he had not yet
begun to serve as a soldier.&nbsp; He returned, therefore, with certain
monks to his own country; and, finding his parents dead, gave away part
of his substance to the brethren, part to the poor, and kept nothing
at all for himself, fearing what is told in the Acts of the Apostles,
the example or punishment, of Ananias and Sapphira; and especially mindful
of the Lord&rsquo;s saying&mdash;&ldquo;He that leaveth not all that
he hath, he cannot be my disciple.&rdquo;</p>
<p>He was then fifteen years old.&nbsp; So, naked, but armed in Christ,
he entered the desert, which, seven miles from Maiuma, the port of Gaza,
turns away to the left of those who go along the shore towards Egypt.&nbsp;
And though the place was blood-stained by robbers, and his relations
and friends warned him of the imminent danger, he despised death, in
order to escape death.&nbsp; All wondered at his spirit, wondered at
his youth.&nbsp; Save that a certain fire of the bosom and spark of
faith glittered in his eyes, his cheeks were smooth, his body delicate
and thin, unable to bear any injury, and liable to be overcome by even
a light chill or heat.</p>
<p>So, covering his limbs only with a sackcloth, and having a cloak
of skin, which the blessed Antony had given him at starting, and a rustic
cloak, between the sea and the swamp, he enjoyed the vast and terrible
solitude, feeding on only fifteen figs after the setting of the sun;
and because the region was, as has been said above, of ill-repute from
robberies, no man had ever stayed before in that place.&nbsp; The devil,
seeing what he was doing and whither he had gone, was tormented.&nbsp;
And though he, who of old boasted, saying, &ldquo;I shall ascend into
heaven, I shall sit above the stars of heaven, and shall be like unto
the Most High,&rdquo; now saw that he had been conquered by a boy, and
trampled under foot by him, ere, on account of his youth, he could commit
sin.&nbsp; He therefore began to tempt his senses; but he, enraged with
himself, and beating his breast with his fist, as if he could drive
out thoughts by blows, &ldquo;I will force thee, mine ass,&rdquo; said
he, &ldquo;not to kick; and feed thee with straw, not barley.&nbsp;
I will wear thee out with hunger and thirst; I will burden thee with
heavy loads; I will hunt thee through heat and cold, till thou thinkest
more of food than of play.&rdquo;&nbsp; He therefore sustained his fainting
spirit with the juice of herbs and a few figs, after each three or four
days, praying frequently, and singing psalms, and digging the ground
with a mattock, to double the labour of fasting by that of work.&nbsp;
At the same time, by weaving baskets of rushes, he imitated the discipline
of the Egyptian monks, and the Apostle&rsquo;s saying&mdash;&ldquo;He
that will not work, neither let him eat&rdquo;&mdash;till he was so
attenuated, and his body so exhausted, that it scarce clung to his bones.</p>
<p>One night he began to hear the crying <a name="citation108"></a><a href="#footnote108">{108}</a>
of infants, the bleating of sheep, the wailing of women, the roaring
of lions, the murmur of an army, and utterly portentous and barbarous
voices; so that he shrank frightened by the sound ere he saw aught.&nbsp;
He understood these to be the insults of devils; and, falling on his
knees, he signed the cross of Christ on his forehead, and armed with
that helmet, and girt with the breastplate of faith, he fought more
valiantly as he lay, longing somehow to see what he shuddered to hear,
and looking round him with anxious eyes: when, without warning, by the
bright moonshine he saw a chariot with fiery horses rushing upon him.&nbsp;
But when he had called on Jesus, the earth opened suddenly, and the
whole pomp was swallowed up before his eyes.&nbsp; Then said he, &ldquo;The
horse and his rider he hath drowned in the sea;&rdquo; and &ldquo;Some
glory themselves in chariots, and some in horses: but we in the name
of the Lord our God.&rdquo;&nbsp; Many were his temptations, and various,
by day and night, the snares of the devils.&nbsp; If we were to tell
them all, they would make the volume too long.&nbsp; How often did women
appear to him; how often plenteous banquets when he was hungry.&nbsp;
Sometimes as he prayed, a howling wolf ran past him, or a barking fox;
or as he sang, a fight of gladiators made a show for him: and one of
them, as if slain, falling at his feet, prayed for sepulture.&nbsp;
He prayed once with his head bowed to the ground, and&mdash;as is the
nature of man&mdash;his mind wandered from his prayer, and thought of
I know not what, when a mocking rider leaped on his back, and spurring
his sides, and whipping his neck, &ldquo;Come,&rdquo; he cries, &ldquo;come,
run! why do you sleep?&rdquo; and, laughing loudly over him, asked him
if he were tired, or would have a feed of barley.</p>
<p>So from his sixteenth to his twentieth year, he was sheltered from
the heat and rain in a tiny cabin, which he had woven of rush and sedge.&nbsp;
Afterwards he built a little cell, which remains to this day, four feet
wide and five feet high&mdash;that is, lower than his own stature&mdash;and
somewhat longer than his small body needed, so that you would believe
it to be a tomb rather than a dwelling.&nbsp; He cut his hair only once
a year, on Easter-day, and lay till his death on the bare ground and
a layer of rushes, never washing the sack in which he was clothed, and
saying that it was superfluous to seek for cleanliness in haircloth.&nbsp;
Nor did he change his tunic, till the first was utterly in rags.&nbsp;
He knew the Scriptures by heart, and recited them after his prayers
and psalms as if God were present.&nbsp; And, because it would take
up too much time to tell his great deeds one by one, I will give a short
account of them.</p>
<p>[Then follows a series of miracles, similar to those attributed to
St. Antony, and, indeed, to all these great Hermit Fathers.&nbsp; But
it is unnecessary to relate more wonders which the reader cannot be
expected to believe.&nbsp; These miracles, however, according to St.
Jerome, were the foundations of Hilarion&rsquo;s fame and public career.&nbsp;
For he says, &ldquo;When they were noised abroad, people flowed to him
eagerly from Syria to Egypt, so that many believed in Christ, and professed
themselves to be monks&mdash;for no one had known of a monk in Syria
before the holy Hilarion.&nbsp; He was the first founder and teacher
of this conversation and study in the province.&nbsp; The Lord Jesus
had in Egypt the old man Antony; he had in Palestine the young Hilarion
. . .&nbsp; He was raised, indeed, by the Lord to such a glory, that
the blessed Antony, hearing of his conversation, wrote to him, and willingly
received his letters; and if rich people came to him from the parts
of Syria, he said to them, &lsquo;Why have you chosen to trouble yourselves
by coming so far, when you have at home my son Hilarion?&rsquo;&nbsp;
So by his example innumerable monasteries arose throughout all Palestine,
and all monks came eagerly to him . . . But what a care he had, not
to pass by any brother, however humble or however poor, may be shown
by this; that once going into the Desert of Kadesh, to visit one of
his disciples, he came, with an infinite crowd of monks, to Elusa, on
the very day, as it chanced, on which a yearly solemnity had gathered
all the people of the town to the Temple of Venus; for they honour her
on account of the morning star, to the worship of which the nation of
the Saracens is devoted.&nbsp; The town itself too is said to be in
great part semi-barbarous, on account of its remote situation.&nbsp;
Hearing, then, that the holy Hilarion was passing by&mdash;for he had
often cured Saracens possessed with d&aelig;mons&mdash;they came out
to meet him in crowds, with their wives and children, bowing their necks,
and crying in the Syrian tongue, &lsquo;Barech!&rsquo; that is, &lsquo;Bless!&rsquo;&nbsp;
He received them courteously and humbly, entreating them to worship
God rather than stones, and wept abundantly, looking up to heaven, and
promising them that, if they would believe in Christ, he would come
oftener to them.&nbsp; Wonderful was the grace of the Lord.&nbsp; They
would not let him depart till he had laid the foundations of a future
church, and their priest, crowned as he was, had been consecrated with
the sign of Christ.</p>
<p>*******</p>
<p>He was now sixty-three years old.&nbsp; He saw about him a great
monastery, a multitude of brethren, and crowds who came to be healed
of diseases and unclean spirits, filling the solitude around; but he
wept daily, and remembered with incredible regret his ancient life.&nbsp;
&ldquo;I have returned to the world,&rdquo; he said, &ldquo;and received
my reward in this life.&nbsp; All Palestine and the neighbouring provinces
think me to be worth somewhat; while I possess a farm and household
goods, under the pretext of the brethren&rsquo;s advantage.&rdquo;&nbsp;
On which the brethren, and especially Hesychius, who bore him a wondrous
love, watched him narrowly.</p>
<p>When he had lived thus sadly for two years, Arist&aelig;neta, the
Prefect&rsquo;s wife, came to him, wishing him to go with her to Antony,
&ldquo;I would go,&rdquo; he said, weeping, &ldquo;if I were not held
in the prison of this monastery, and if it were of any use.&nbsp; For
two days since, the whole world was robbed of such a father.&rdquo;&nbsp;
She believed him, and stopped.&nbsp; And Antony&rsquo;s death was confirmed
a few days after.&nbsp; Others may wonder at the signs and portents
which he did, at his incredible abstinence, his silence, his miracles:
I am astonished at nothing so much as that he was able to trample under
foot that glory and honour.</p>
<p>Bishops and clergy, monks and Christian matrons (a great temptation),
people of the common sort, great men, too, and judges crowded to him,
to receive from him blessed bread or oil.&nbsp; But he was thinking
of nothing but the desert, till one day he determined to set out, and
taking an ass (for he was so shrunk with fasting that he could hardly
walk), he tried to go his way.&nbsp; The news got wind; the desolation
and destruction of Palestine would ensue; ten thousand souls, men and
women, tried to stop his way; but he would not hear them.&nbsp; Smiting
on the ground with his staff, he said, &ldquo;I will not make my God
a liar.&nbsp; I cannot bear to see churches ruined, the altars of Christ
trampled down, the blood of my sons spilt.&rdquo;&nbsp; All who heard
thought that some secret revelation had been made to him: but yet they
would not let him go.&nbsp; Whereon he would neither eat nor drink,
and for seven days he persevered fasting, till he had his wish, and
set out for Bethulia, with forty monks, who could march without food
till sundown.&nbsp; On the fifth day he came to Pelusium, then to the
camp Thebatrum, to see Dracontius; and then to Babylon to see Philo.&nbsp;
These two were bishops and confessors exiled by Constantius, who favoured
the Arian heresy.&nbsp; Then he came to Aphroditon, where he met Barsanes
the deacon, who used to carry water to Antony on dromedaries, and heard
from him that the anniversary Antony&rsquo;s death was near, and would
be celebrated by a vigil at his tomb.&nbsp; Then through a vast and
horrible wilderness, he went for three days to a very high mountain,
and found there two monks, Isaac and Pelusianus, of whom Isaac had been
Antony&rsquo;s interpreter.</p>
<p>A high and rocky hill it was, with fountains gushing out at its foot.&nbsp;
Some of them the sand sucked up; some formed a little rill, with palms
without number on its banks.&nbsp; There you might have seen the old
man wandering to and fro with Antony&rsquo;s disciples.&nbsp; &ldquo;Here,&rdquo;
they said, &ldquo;he used to sing, here to pray, here to work, here
to sit when tired.&nbsp; These vines, these shrubs, he planted himself;
that plot he laid out with his own hands.&nbsp; This pond to water the
garden he made with heavy toil; that hoe he kept for many years.&rdquo;&nbsp;
Hilarion lay on his bed, and kissed the couch, as if it were still warm.&nbsp;
Antony&rsquo;s cell was only large enough to let a man lie down in it;
and on the mountain top, reached by a difficult and winding stair, were
two other cells of the same size, cut in the stony rock, to which he
used to retire from the visitors and disciples, when they came to the
garden.&nbsp; &ldquo;You see,&rdquo; said Isaac, &ldquo;this orchard,
with shrubs and vegetables.&nbsp; Three years since a troop of wild
asses laid it waste.&nbsp; He bade one of their leaders stop; and beat
it with his staff.&nbsp; &lsquo;Why do you eat,&rsquo; he asked it,
&lsquo;what you did not sow?&rsquo;&nbsp; And after that the asses,
though they came to drink the waters, never touched his plants.&rdquo;</p>
<p>Then Hilarion asked them to show him Antony&rsquo;s grave.&nbsp;
They led him apart; but whether they showed it to him, no man knows.&nbsp;
They hid it, they said, by Antony&rsquo;s command, lest one Pergamius,
who was the richest man of those parts, should take the corpse to his
villa, and build a chapel over it.</p>
<p>Then he went back to Aphroditon, and with only two brothers, dwelt
in the desert, in such abstinence and silence that (so he said) he then
first began to serve Christ.&nbsp; Now it was then three years since
the heaven had been shut, and the earth dried up: so that they said
commonly, the very elements mourned the death of Antony.&nbsp; But Hilarion&rsquo;s
fame spread to them; and a great multitude, brown and shrunken with
famine, cried to him for rain, as to the blessed Antony&rsquo;s successor.&nbsp;
He saw them, and grieved over them; and lifting up his hand to heaven,
obtained rain at once.&nbsp; But the thirsty and sandy land, as soon
as it was watered by showers, sent forth such a crowd of serpents and
venomous animals that people without number were stung, and would have
died, had they not run together to Hilarion.&nbsp; With oil blessed
by him, the husbandmen and shepherds touched their wounds, and all were
surely healed.</p>
<p>But when he saw that he was marvellously honoured, he went to Alexandria,
meaning to cross the desert to the further oasis.&nbsp; And because
since he was a monk he had never stayed in a city, he turned aside to
some brethren known to him in the Brucheion <a name="citation115"></a><a href="#footnote115">{115}</a>
not far from Alexandria.&nbsp; They received him with joy: but, when
night came on, they suddenly heard him bid his disciples saddle the
ass.&nbsp; In vain they entreated, threw themselves across the threshold.&nbsp;
His only answer was, that he was hastening away, lest he should bring
them into trouble; they would soon know that he had not departed without
good reason.&nbsp; The next day, men of Gaza came with the Prefect&rsquo;s
lictors, burst into the monastery, and when they found him not&mdash;&ldquo;Is
it not true,&rdquo; they said, &ldquo;what we heard?&nbsp; He is a sorcerer,
and knows the future.&rdquo;&nbsp; For the citizens of Gaza, after Hilarion
was gone, and Julian had succeeded to the empire, had destroyed his
monastery, and begged from the Emperor the death of Hilarion and Hesychius.&nbsp;
So letters had been sent forth, to seek them throughout the world.</p>
<p>So Hilarion went by the pathless wilderness into the Oasis; <a name="citation116"></a><a href="#footnote116">{116}</a>
and after a year, more or less&mdash;because his fame had gone before
him even there, and he could not lie hid in the East&mdash;he was minded
to sail away to lonely islands, that the sea at least might hide what
the land would not.</p>
<p>But just then Hadrian, his disciple, came from Palestine, telling
him that Julian was slain, and that a Christian emperor was reigning;
so that he ought to return to the relics of his monastery.&nbsp; But
he abhorred the thought; and, hiring a camel, went over the vast desert
to Par&aelig;tonia, a sea town of Libya.&nbsp; Then the wretched Hadrian,
wishing to go back to Palestine and get himself glory under his master&rsquo;s
name, packed up all that the brethren had sent by him to his master,
and went secretly away.&nbsp; But&mdash;as a terror to those who despise
their masters&mdash;he shortly after died of jaundice.</p>
<p>Then, with Zananas alone, Hilarion went on board ship to sail for
Sicily.&nbsp; And when, almost in the middle of Adria, <a name="citation117a"></a><a href="#footnote117a">{117a}</a>
he was going to sell the Gospels which he had written out with his own
hand when young, to pay his fare withal, then the captain&rsquo;s son
was possessed with a devil, and cried out, &ldquo;Hilarion, servant
of God, why can we not be safe from thee even at sea?&nbsp; Give me
a little respite till I come to the shore, lest, if I be cast out here,
I fall headlong into the abyss.&rdquo;&nbsp; Then said he, &ldquo;If
my God lets thee stay, stay.&nbsp; But if he cast thee out, why dost
thou lay the blame on me, a sinner and a beggar?&rdquo;&nbsp; Then he
made the captain and the crew promise not to betray him: and the devil
was cast out.&nbsp; But the captain would take no fare when he saw that
they had nought but those Gospels, and the clothes on their backs.&nbsp;
And so Hilarion came to Pachynum, a cape of Sicily, <a name="citation117b"></a><a href="#footnote117b">{117b}</a>
and fled twenty miles inland into a deserted farm; and there every day
gathered a bundle of firewood, and put it on Zananas&rsquo;s back, who
took it to the town, and bought a little bread thereby.</p>
<p>But it happened, according to that which is written, &ldquo;A city
set on an hill cannot be hid,&rdquo; one Scutarius was tormented by
a devil in the Basilica of St. Peter at Rome; and the unclean spirit
cried out in him, &ldquo;A few days since Hilarion, the servant of Christ,
landed in Sicily, and no man knows him, and he thinks himself hid.&nbsp;
I will go and betray him.&rdquo;&nbsp; And forthwith he took ship with
his slaves, and came to Pachynum, and, by the leading of the devil,
threw himself down before the old man&rsquo;s hut, and was cured.</p>
<p>The frequency of his signs in Sicily drew to him sick people and
religious men in multitudes; and one of the chief men was cured of dropsy
the same day that he came, and offered Hilarion boundless gifts: but
he obeyed the Saviour&rsquo;s saying, &ldquo;Freely ye have received;
freely give.&rdquo;</p>
<p>While this was happening in Sicily, Hesychius, his disciple, was
seeking the old man through the world, searching the shores, penetrating
the desert, and only certain that, wherever he was, he could not long
be hid.&nbsp; So, after three years were past, he heard at Methone <a name="citation118"></a><a href="#footnote118">{118}</a>
from a Jew, who was selling old clothes, that a prophet of the Christians
had appeared in Sicily, working such wonders that he was thought to
be one of the old saints.&nbsp; But he could give no description of
him, having only heard common report.&nbsp; He sailed for Pachynum,
and there, in a cottage on the shore, heard of Hilarion&rsquo;s fame&mdash;that
which most surprised all being that, after so many signs and miracles,
he had not accepted even a bit of bread from any man.</p>
<p>So, &ldquo;not to make the story too long,&rdquo; as says St. Jerome,
Hesychius fell at his master&rsquo;s knees, and watered his feet with
tears, till at last he raised him up.&nbsp; But two or three days after
he heard from Zananas, how the old man could dwell no longer in these
regions, but was minded to go to some barbarous nation, where both his
name and his speech should be unknown.&nbsp; So he took him to Epidaurus,
<a name="citation119a"></a><a href="#footnote119a">{119a}</a> a city
of Dalmatia, where he lay a few days in a little farm, and yet could
not be hid; for a dragon of wondrous size&mdash;one of those which,
in the country speech, they call boas, because they are so huge that
they can swallow an ox&mdash;laid waste the province, and devoured not
only herds and flocks, but husbandmen and shepherds, which he drew to
him by the force of his breath. <a name="citation119b"></a><a href="#footnote119b">{119b}</a>&nbsp;
Hilarion commanded a pile of wood to be prepared, and having prayed
to Christ, and called the beast forth, commanded him to ascend the pile,
and having put fire under, burnt him before all the people.&nbsp; Then
fretting over what he should do, or whither he should turn, he went
alone over the world in imagination, and mourned that, when his tongue
was silent, his miracles still spoke.</p>
<p>In those days, at the earthquake over the whole world, which befell
after Julian&rsquo;s death, the sea broke its bounds; and, as if God
was threatening another flood, or all was returning to the prim&aelig;val
chaos, ships were carried up steep rocks, and hung there.&nbsp; But
when the Epidauritans saw roaring waves and mountains of water borne
towards the shore, fearing lest the town should be utterly overthrown,
they went out to the old man, and, as if they were leading him out to
battle, stationed him on the shore.&nbsp; And when he had marked three
signs of the Cross upon the sand, and stretched out his hands against
the waves, it is past belief to what a height the sea swelled, and stood
up before him, and then, raging long as if indignant at the barrier,
fell back little by little into itself.</p>
<p>All Epidaurus, and all that region, talk of this to this day; and
mothers teach it their children, that they may hand it down to posterity.&nbsp;
Truly, that which was said to the Apostles, &ldquo;If ye believe, ye
shall say to this mountain, Be removed, and cast into the sea; and it
shall be done,&rdquo; can be fulfilled even to the letter, if we have
the faith of the Apostles, and such as the Lord commanded them to have.&nbsp;
For which is more strange, that a mountain should descend into the sea;
or that mountains of water should stiffen of a sudden, and, firm as
a rock only at an old man&rsquo;s feet, should flow softly everywhere
else?&nbsp; All the city wondered; and the greatness of the sign was
bruited abroad even at Salo.</p>
<p>When the old man discovered that, he fled secretly by night in a
little boat, and finding a merchantman after two days, sailed for Cyprus.&nbsp;
Between Male&aelig; and Cythera <a name="citation121"></a><a href="#footnote121">{121}</a>
they were met by pirates, who had left their vessels under the shore,
and came up in two large galleys, worked not with sails, but oars.&nbsp;
As the rowers swept the billows, all on board began to tremble, weep,
run about, get handspikes ready, and, as if one messenger was not enough,
vie with each other in telling the old man that pirates were at hand.&nbsp;
He looked out at them and smiled.&nbsp; Then turning to his disciples,
&ldquo;O ye of little faith,&rdquo; he said; &ldquo;wherefore do ye
doubt?&nbsp; Are these more in number than Pharaoh&rsquo;s army?&nbsp;
Yet they were all drowned when God so willed.&rdquo;&nbsp; While he
spoke, the hostile keels, with foaming beaks, were but a short stone&rsquo;s
throw off.&nbsp; He then stood on the ship&rsquo;s bow, and stretching
out his hand against them, &ldquo;Let it be enough,&rdquo; he said,
&ldquo;to have come thus far.&rdquo;</p>
<p>O wondrous faith!&nbsp; The boats instantly sprang back, and made
stern-way, although the oars impelled them in the opposite direction.&nbsp;
The pirates were astonished, having no wish to return back-foremost,
and struggled with all their might to reach the ship; but were carried
to the shore again, much faster than they had come.</p>
<p>I pass over the rest, lest by telling every story I make the volume
too long.&nbsp; This only I will say, that, while he sailed prosperously
through the Cyclades, he heard the voices of foul spirits, calling here
and there out of the towns and villages, and running together on the
beaches.&nbsp; So he came to Paphos, the city of Cyprus, famous once
in poets&rsquo; songs, which now, shaken down by frequent earthquakes,
only shows what it has been of yore by the foundations of its ruins.&nbsp;
There he dwelt meanly near the second milestone out of the city, rejoicing
much that he was living quietly for a few days.&nbsp; But not three
weeks were past, ere throughout the whole island whosoever had unclean
spirits began to cry that Hilarion the servant of Christ was come, and
that they must hasten to him.&nbsp; Salonica, Curium, Lapetha, and the
other towns, all cried this together, most saying that they knew Hilarion,
and that he was truly a servant of God; but where he was they knew not.&nbsp;
Within a month, nearly 200 men and women were gathered together to him.&nbsp;
Whom when he saw, grieving that they would not suffer him to rest, raging,
as it were to revenge himself, he scourged them with such an instancy
of prayer, that some were cured at once, some after two or three days,
and all within a week.</p>
<p>So staying there two years, and always meditating flight, he sent
Hesychius to Palestine, to salute the brethren, visit the ashes of the
monastery, and return in the spring.&nbsp; When he returned, and Hilarion
was longing to sail again to Egypt,&mdash;that is, to the cattle pastures,
<a name="citation123a"></a><a href="#footnote123a">{123a}</a> because
there is no Christian there, but only a fierce and barbarous folk,&mdash;he
persuaded the old man rather to withdraw into some more secret spot
in the island itself.&nbsp; And looking round it long till he had examined
it all over, he led him away twelve miles from the sea, among lonely
and rough mountains, where they could hardly climb up, creeping on hands
and knees.&nbsp; When they were within, they beheld a spot terrible
and very lonely, surrounded with trees, which had, too, waters falling
from the brow of a cliff, and a most pleasant little garden, and many
fruit-trees&mdash;the fruit of which, however, Hilarion never ate&mdash;and
near it the ruin of a very ancient temple, <a name="citation123b"></a><a href="#footnote123b">{123b}</a>
out of which (so he and his disciples averred) the voices of so many
d&aelig;mons resounded day and night, that you would have fancied an
army there.&nbsp; With which he was exceedingly delighted, because he
had his foes close to him; and dwelt therein five years; and (while
Hesychius often visited him) he was much cheered up in this last period
of his life, because owing to the roughness and difficulty of the ground,
and the multitude of ghosts (as was commonly reported), few, or none,
ever dare climb up to him.</p>
<p>But one day, going out of the little garden, he saw a man paralytic
in all his limbs, lying before the gate; and having asked Hesychius
who he was, and how he had come, he was told that the man was the steward
of a small estate, and that to him the garden, in which they were, belonged.&nbsp;
Hilarion, weeping over him, and stretching a hand to him as he lay,
said, &ldquo;I say to thee, in the name of Jesus Christ our Lord, arise
and walk.&rdquo;&nbsp; Wonderful was the rapidity of the effect.&nbsp;
The words were yet in his mouth, when the limbs, strengthened, raised
the man upon his feet.&nbsp; As soon as it was known, the needs of many
conquered the difficulty of the ground, and the want of a path, while
all in the neighbourhood watched nothing so carefully, as that he should
not by some plan slip away from them.&nbsp; For the report had been
spread about him, that he could not remain long in the same place; which
nevertheless he did not do from any caprice, or childishness, but to
escape honour and importunity; for he always longed after silence, and
an ignoble life.</p>
<p>So, in the eightieth year of his age, while Hesychius was absent,
he wrote a short letter, by way of testament, with his own hand, leaving
to Hesychius all his riches; namely, his Gospel-book, and a sackcloth-shirt,
hood, and mantle.&nbsp; For his servant had died a few days before.&nbsp;
Many religious men came to him from Paphos while he was sick, especially
because they had heard that he had said that now he was going to migrate
to the Lord, and be freed from the chains of the body.&nbsp; There came
also Constantia, a high-born lady, whose son-in-law and daughter he
had delivered from death by anointing them with oil.&nbsp; And he made
them all swear, that he should not be kept an hour after his death,
but covered up with earth in that same garden, clothed, as he was, in
his haircloth shirt, hood, and rustic cloak.&nbsp; And now little heat
was left in his body, and nothing of a living man was left, except his
reason: and yet, with open eyes, he went on saying, &ldquo;Go forth,
what fearest thou?&nbsp; Go forth, my soul, what doubtest thou?&nbsp;
Nigh seventy years hast thou served Christ, and dost thou fear death?&rdquo;&nbsp;
With these words, he breathed out his soul.&nbsp; They covered him forthwith
in earth, and told them in the city that he was buried, before it was
known that he was dead.</p>
<p>The holy man Hesychius heard this in Palestine; reached Cyprus; and
pretending, in order to prevent suspicion on the part of the neighbours,
who guarded the spot diligently, that he wished to dwell in that same
garden, he, after some ten months, with extreme peril of his life, stole
the corpse.&nbsp; He carried it to Maiuma, followed by whole crowds
of monks and townsfolk, and placed it in the old monastery, with the
shirt, hood, and cloak unhurt; the whole body perfect, as if alive,
and fragrant with such strong odour, that it seemed to have had unguents
poured over it.</p>
<p>I think that I ought not, in the end of my book, to be silent about
the devotion of that most holy woman Constantia, who, hearing that the
body of Hilarion, the servant of God, was gone to Palestine, straightway
gave up the ghost, proving by her very death her true love for the servant
of God.&nbsp; For she was wont to pass nights in watching his sepulchre,
and to converse with him as if he were present, in order to assist her
prayers.&nbsp; You may see, even to this day, a wonderful contention
between the folk of Palestine and the Cypriots, the former saying that
they have the body, the latter that they have the soul, of Hilarion.&nbsp;
And yet, in both places, great signs are worked daily; but most in the
little garden in Cyprus; perhaps because he loved that place the best.</p>
<div class="GutenbergBlankLines1"><br /></div>
<p>Such is the story of Hilarion.&nbsp; His name still lingers in &ldquo;the
place he loved the best.&rdquo;&nbsp; &ldquo;To this day,&rdquo; I quote
this fact from M. de Montalembert&rsquo;s work, &ldquo;the Cypriots,
confounding in their memories legends of good and of evil, the victories
of the soul and the triumph of the senses, give to the ruins of one
of those strong castles built by the Lusignans, which command their
isle, the double name of the Castle of St. Hilarion, and the Castle
of the God of Love.&rdquo;&nbsp; But how intense must have been the
longing for solitude which drove the old man to travel on foot from
Syria to the Egyptian desert, across the pathless westward waste, even
to the Oasis and the utmost limits of the Egyptian province; and then
to Sicily, to the Adriatic, and at last to a distant isle of Greece.&nbsp;
And shall we blame him for that longing?&nbsp; He seems to have done
his duty earnestly, according to his own light, towards his fellow-creatures
whenever he met them.&nbsp; But he seems to have found that noise and
crowd, display and honour, were not altogether wholesome for his own
soul; and in order that he might be a better man he desired again and
again to flee, that he might collect himself, and be alone with Nature
and with God.&nbsp; We, here in England, like the old Greeks and Romans,
dwellers in the busy mart of civilized life, have got to regard mere
bustle as so integral an element of human life, that we consider a love
of solitude a mark of eccentricity, and, if we meet any one who loves
to be alone, are afraid that he must needs be going mad: and that with
too great solitude comes the danger of too great self-consciousness,
and even at last of insanity, none can doubt.&nbsp; But still we must
remember, on the other hand, that without solitude, without contemplation,
without habitual collection and re-collection of our own selves from
time to time, no great purpose is carried out, and no great work can
be done; and that it is the bustle and hurry of our modern life which
causes shallow thought, unstable purpose, and wasted energy, in too
many who would be better and wiser, stronger and happier, if they would
devote more time to silence and meditation; if they would commune with
their own heart in their chamber, and be still.&nbsp; Even in art and
in mechanical science, those who have done great work upon the earth
have been men given to solitary meditation.&nbsp; When Brindley, the
engineer, it is said, had a difficult problem to solve, he used to go
to bed, and stay there till he had worked it out.&nbsp; Turner, the
greatest nature-painter of this or any other age, spent hours upon hours
in mere contemplation of nature, without using his pencil at all.&nbsp;
It is said of him that he was seen to spend a whole day, sitting upon
a rock, and throwing pebbles into a lake; and when at evening his fellow
painters showed their day&rsquo;s sketches, and rallied him upon having
done nothing, he answered them, &ldquo;I have done this at least: I
have learnt how a lake looks when pebbles are thrown into it.&rdquo;&nbsp;
And if this silent labour, this steadfast thought are required even
for outward arts and sciences, how much more for the highest of all
arts, the deepest of all sciences, that which involves the questions&mdash;who
are we? and where are we? who is God? and what are we to God, and He
to us?&mdash;namely, the science of being good, which deals not with
time merely, but with eternity.&nbsp; No retirement, no loneliness,
no period of earnest and solemn meditation, can be misspent which helps
us towards that goal.</p>
<p>And therefore it was that Hilarion longed to be alone; alone with
God; and with Nature, which spoke to him of God.&nbsp; For these old
hermits, though they neither talked nor wrote concerning scenery, nor
painted pictures of it as we do now, had many of them a clear and intense
instinct of the beauty and the meaning of outward Nature; as Antony
surely had when he said that the world around was his book, wherein
he read the mysteries of God.&nbsp; Hilarion seems, from his story,
to have had a special craving for the sea.&nbsp; Perhaps his early sojourn
on the low sandhills of the Philistine shore, as he watched the tideless
Mediterranean, rolling and breaking for ever upon the same beach, had
taught him to say with the old prophet as he thought of the wicked and
still half idolatrous cities of the Philistine shore, &ldquo;Fear ye
not? saith the Lord; Will ye not tremble at my presence who have placed
the sand for the bound of the sea, for a perpetual decree, that it cannot
pass it?&nbsp; And though the waves thereof toss themselves, yet can
they not prevail; though they roar, yet can they not pass over.&nbsp;
But this people has a revolted and rebellious heart, they are revolted
and gone.&rdquo;&nbsp; Perhaps again, looking down from the sunny Sicilian
cliffs of Taormino, or through the pine-clad gulfs and gullies of the
Cypriote hills upon the blue Mediterranean below,</p>
<div class="GutenbergBlankLines1"><br /></div>
<p>&ldquo;And watching from his mountain wall<br />The wrinkled sea
beneath him crawl,&rdquo;</p>
<div class="GutenbergBlankLines1"><br /></div>
<p>he had enjoyed and profited by all those images which that sight
has called up in so many minds before and since.&nbsp; To him it may
be, as to the Psalmist, the storm-swept sea pictured the instability
of mortal things, while secure upon his cliff he said with the Psalmist,
&ldquo;The Lord hath set my feet upon a rock, and ordered my goings;&rdquo;
and again, &ldquo;The wicked are like a troubled sea, casting up mire
and dirt.&rdquo;&nbsp; Often, again, looking upon that far horizon,
must his soul have been drawn, as many a soul has been drawn since,
to it, and beyond it, as it were into a region of boundless freedom
and perfect peace, while he said again with David, &ldquo;Oh that I
had wings like a dove; then would I flee away and be at rest!&rdquo;
and so have found, in the contemplation of the wide ocean, a substitute
at least for the contemplation of those Eastern deserts which seemed
the proper home for the solitary and meditative philosopher.</p>
<p>For indeed in no northern country can such situations be found for
the monastic cell as can be found in those great deserts which stretch
from Syria to Arabia, from Arabia to Egypt, from Egypt to Africa properly
so called.&nbsp; Here and there a northern hermit found, as Hilarion
found, a fitting home by the seaside, on some lonely island or storm-beat
rock, like St. Cuthbert, off the coast of Northumberland; like St. Rule,
on his rock at St. Andrew&rsquo;s; and St. Columba, with his ever-venerable
company of missionaries, on Iona.&nbsp; But inland, the fens and the
forests were foul, unwholesome, depressing, the haunts of fever, ague,
delirium, as St. Guthlac found at Crowland, and St. Godric at Finkhale.
<a name="citation130"></a><a href="#footnote130">{130}</a>&nbsp; The
vast pine-woods which clothe the Alpine slopes, the vast forests of
beech and oak which then spread over France and Germany, gave in time
shelter to many a holy hermit.&nbsp; But their gloom, their unwholesomeness,
and the severity of the climate, produced in them, as in most northern
ascetics, a temper of mind more melancholy, and often more fierce; more
given to passionate devotion, but more given also to dark superstition
and cruel self-torture, than the genial climate of the desert produced
in old monks of the East.&nbsp; When we think of St. Antony upon his
mountain, we must not picture to ourselves, unless we, too, have been
in the East, such a mountain as we have ever seen.&nbsp; We must not
think of a brown northern moorland, sad, savage, storm-swept, snow-buried,
save in the brief and uncertain summer months.&nbsp; We must not picture
to ourselves an Alp, with thundering avalanches, roaring torrents, fierce
alternations of heat and cold, uninhabitable by mortal man, save during
that short period of the year when the maidens in the sennhutt watch
the cattle upon the upland pastures.&nbsp; We must picture to ourselves
mountains blazing day after day, month after month, beneath the glorious
sun and cloudless sky, in an air so invigorating that the Arabs can
still support life there upon a few dates each day; and where, as has
been said,&mdash;&ldquo;Man needs there hardly to eat, drink, or sleep,
for the act of breathing will give life enough;&rdquo; an atmosphere
of such telescopic clearness as to explain many of the strange stories
which have been lately told of Antony&rsquo;s seemingly preternatural
powers of vision; a colouring, which, when painters dare to put it on
canvas, seems to our eyes, accustomed to the quiet greys and greens
of England, exaggerated and impossible&mdash;distant mountains, pink
and lilac, quivering in pale blue haze&mdash;vast sheets of yellow sand,
across which the lonely rock or a troop of wild asses or gazelles throw
intense blue-black shadows&mdash;rocks and cliffs not shrouded, as here,
in soil, much less in grass and trees, or spotted with lichens and stained
with veins; but keeping each stone its natural colour, as it wastes&mdash;if,
indeed, it wastes at all&mdash;under the action of the all but rainless
air, which has left the paintings on the old Egyptian temples fresh
and clear for thousands of years; rocks, orange and purple, black, white,
and yellow; and again and again beyond them <a name="citation131"></a><a href="#footnote131">{131}</a>
glimpses, it may be, of the black Nile, and of the long green garden
of Egypt, and of the dark blue sea.&nbsp; The eastward view from Antony&rsquo;s
old home must be one of the most glorious in the world, save for its
want of verdure and of life.&nbsp; For Antony, as he looked across the
blue waters of the Gulf of Akaba, across which, far above, the Israelites
had passed in old times, could see the sacred goal of their pilgrimage,
the red granite peaks of Sinai, flaming against the blue sky with that
intensity of hue which is scarcely exaggerated, it is said, by the bright
scarlet colour in which Sinai is always painted in medi&aelig;val illuminations.</p>
<p>But the gorgeousness of colouring, though it may interest us, was
not, of course, what produced the deepest effect upon the minds of those
old hermits.&nbsp; They enjoyed Nature, not so much for her beauty,
as for her perfect peace.&nbsp; Day by day the rocks remained the same.&nbsp;
Silently out of the Eastern desert, day by day, the rising sun threw
aloft those arrows of light, which the old Greeks had named &ldquo;the
rosy fingers of the dawn.&rdquo;&nbsp; Silently he passed in full blaze
almost above their heads throughout the day; and silently he dipped
behind the western desert in a glory of crimson and orange, green and
purple; and without an interval of twilight, in a moment, all the land
was dark, and the stars leapt out, not twinkling as in our damper climate
here, but hanging like balls of white fire in that purple southern night,
through which one seems to look beyond the stars into the infinite abyss,
and towards the throne of God himself.&nbsp; Day after day, night after
night, that gorgeous pageant passed over the poor hermit&rsquo;s head
without a sound; and though sun and moon and planet might change their
places as the year rolled round, the earth beneath his feet seemed not
to change.&nbsp; Every morning he saw the same peaks in the distance,
the same rocks, the same sand-heaps around his feet.&nbsp; He never
heard the tinkle of a running stream.&nbsp; For weeks together he did
not even hear the rushing of the wind.&nbsp; Now and then a storm might
sweep up the pass, whirling the sand in eddies, and making the desert
for a while literally a &ldquo;howling wilderness;&rdquo; and when that
was passed all was as it had been before.&nbsp; The very change of seasons
must have been little marked to him, save by the motions, if he cared
to watch them, of the stars above; for vegetation there was none to
mark the difference between summer and winter.&nbsp; In spring of course
the solitary date-palm here and there threw out its spathe of young
green leaves, to add to the number of those which, grey or brown, hung
drooping down the stem, withering but not decaying for many a year in
that dry atmosphere; or perhaps the accacia bushes looked somewhat gayer
for a few weeks, and the Retama broom, from which as well as from the
palm leaves he plaited his baskets, threw out its yearly crop of twigs;
but any greenness there might be in the vegetation of spring, turned
grey in a few weeks beneath that burning sun; and be rest of the year
was one perpetual summer of dust and glare and rest.&nbsp; Amid such
scenes they had full time for thought.&nbsp; Nature and man alike left
it in peace; while the labour required for sustaining life (and the
monk wished for nothing more than to sustain mere life) was very light.&nbsp;
Wherever water could be found, the hot sun and the fertile soil would
repay by abundant crops, perhaps twice in the year, the toil of scratching
the ground and putting in the seed.&nbsp; Moreover, the labour of the
husbandman, so far from being adverse to the contemplative life, is
of all occupations, it may be, that which promotes most quiet and wholesome
meditation in the mind which cares to meditate.&nbsp; The life of the
desert, when once the passions of youth were conquered, seems to have
been not only a happy, but a healthy one.&nbsp; And when we remember
that the monk, clothed from head to foot in woollen, and sheltered,
too, by his sheepskin cape, escaped those violent changes of temperature
which produce in the East so many fatal diseases, and which were so
deadly to the linen-clothed inhabitants of the green lowlands of the
Nile, we need not be surprised when we read of the vast longevity of
many of the old abbots; and of their death, not by disease, but by gentle,
and as it were wholesome natural decay.</p>
<p>But if their life was easy, it was surely not ill-spent.&nbsp; If
having few wants, and those soon supplied, they found too much time
for the luxury of quiet thought, those need not blame them, who having
many wants, and those also easily supplied, are wont to spend their
superfluous leisure in any luxury save that of thought, above all save
that of thought concerning God.&nbsp; For it was upon God that these
men, whatever their defects or ignorances may have been, had set their
minds.&nbsp; That man was sent into the world to know and to love, to
obey and thereby to glorify, the Maker of his being, was the cardinal
point of their creed, as it has been of every creed which ever exercised
any beneficial influence on the minds of men.&nbsp; Dean Milman in his
&ldquo;History of Christianity,&rdquo; vol. iii. page 294, has, while
justly severe upon the failings and mistakes of the Eastern monks, pointed
out with equal justice that the great desire of knowing God was the
prime motive in the mind of all their best men:&mdash;</p>
<p>&ldquo;In some regions of the East, the sultry and oppressive heat,
the general relaxation of the physical system, dispose constitutions
of a certain temperament to a dreamy inertness.&nbsp; The indolence
and prostration of the body produce a kind of activity in the mind,
if that may properly be called activity which is merely giving loose
to the imagination and the emotions as they follow out the wild train
of incoherent thought, or are agitated by impulses of spontaneous and
ungoverned feeling.&nbsp; Ascetic Christianity ministered new aliment
to this common propensity.&nbsp; It gave an object, both vague and determinate
enough to stimulate, yet never to satisfy or exhaust.&nbsp; The regularity
of stated hours of prayer, and of a kind of idle industry, weaving mats
or plaiting baskets, alternated with periods of morbid reflection on
the moral state of the soul, and of mystic communion with the Deity.&nbsp;
It cannot indeed be wondered that this new revelation, as it were, of
the Deity, this profound and rational certainty of his existence, this
infelt consciousness of his perpetual presence, these as yet unknown
impressions of his infinity, his power, and his love, should give a
higher character to this eremitical enthusiasm, and attract men of loftier
and more vigorous minds within its sphere.&nbsp; It was not merely the
pusillanimous dread of encountering the trials of life which urged the
humbler spirits to seek a safe retirement; or the natural love of peace,
and the weariness and satiety of life, which commended this seclusion
to those who were too gentle to mingle in, or who were exhausted with,
the unprofitable turmoil of the world; nor was it always the anxiety
to mortify the rebellious and refractory body with more advantage.&nbsp;
The one absorbing idea of the Majesty of the Godhead almost seemed to
swallow up all other considerations.&nbsp; The transcendent nature of
the Triune Deity, the relation of the different persons of the Godhead
to each other, seemed the only worthy object of men&rsquo;s contemplative
faculties.&rdquo;</p>
<p>And surely the contemplation of the Godhead is no unworthy occupation
for the immortal soul of any human being.&nbsp; But it would be unjust
to these hermits did we fancy that their religion consisted merely even
in this; much less that it consisted merely in dreams and visions, or
in mere stated hours of prayer.&nbsp; That all did not fulfil the ideal
of their profession is to be expected, and is frankly confessed by the
writers of the Lives of the Fathers; that there were serious faults,
even great crimes, among them is not denied.&nbsp; Those who wrote concerning
them were so sure that they were on the whole good men, that they were
not at all afraid of saying that some of them were bad,&mdash;not afraid,
even, of recording, though only in dark hints, the reason why the Arab
tribes around once rose and laid waste six churches with their monasteries
in the neighbourhood of Scetis.&nbsp; St. Jerome in like manner does
not hesitate to pour out bitter complaints against many of the monks
in the neighbourhood of Bethlehem.&nbsp; It is notorious, too, that
many became monks merely to escape slavery, hunger, or conscription
into the army: Unruly and fanatical spirits, too, grew fond of wandering.&nbsp;
Bands of monks on the great roads and public places of the empire, Massalians
or Gyrovagi, as they were called, wandered from province to province,
and cell to cell, living on the alms which they extorted from the pious,
and making up too often for protracted fasts by outbursts of gluttony
and drunkenness.&nbsp; And doubtless the average monk, even when well-conducted
himself and in a well-conducted monastery, was, like average men of
every creed, rank, or occupation, a very common-place person, acting
from very mixed and often very questionable motives; and valuing his
shaven crown and his sheepskin cloak, his regular hours of prayer and
his implicit obedience to his abbot, more highly than he valued the
fear and the love of God.</p>
<p>It is so in every creed.&nbsp; With some, even now, the strict observance
of the Sabbath; with others, outward reverence at the Holy Communion;
with others, the frequent hearing of sermons which suit heir own views;
with others, continual reading of pious books (on the lessons of which
they do not act), covers, instead of charity, a multitude of sins.&nbsp;
But the saint, abbot, or father among these hermits was essentially
the man who was not a common-place person; who was more than an ascetic,
and more than a formalist; who could pierce beyond the letter to the
spirit, and see, beyond all forms of doctrine or modes of life, that
virtue was the one thing needful.</p>
<p>The Historia Lausiaca and the Pratum Spirituale have many a story
and many a saying as weighty, beautiful, and instructive now as they
were fifteen hundred years ago; stories which show that graces and virtues
such as the world had never seen before, save in the persecuted and
half-unknown Christians of the first three centuries, were cultivated
to noble fruitfulness by the monks of the East.&nbsp; For their humility,
obedience, and reverence for their superiors it is not wise to praise
them just now; for those are qualities which are not at present considered
virtues, but rather (save by the soldier) somewhat abject vices; and
indeed they often carried them, as they did their abstinence, to an
extravagant pitch.&nbsp; But it must be remembered, in fairness, that
if they obeyed their supposed superiors, they had first chosen their
superiors themselves; that as the becoming a monk at all was an assertion
of self-will and independence, whether for good or evil, so their reverence
for their abbots was a voluntary loyalty to one who they fancied had
a right to rule them, because he was wiser and better than they; a feeling
which some have found not degrading, but ennobling; and the parent,
not of servility, but of true freedom.&nbsp; And as for the obsolete
virtue of humility, that still remains true which a voice said to Antony,
when he saw the snares which were spread over the whole earth, and asked,
sighing, &ldquo;Who can pass safely over these?&rdquo; and the voice
answered, &ldquo;Humility alone.&rdquo;</p>
<p>For the rest, if the Sermon on the Mount mean anything, as a practical
rule of life for Christian men, then these monks were surely justified
in trying to obey it, for to obey it they surely tried.</p>
<p>The Words of the Elders, to which I have already alluded, and the
Lausiaca of Palladius likewise, are full of precious scraps of moral
wisdom, sayings, and anecdotes, full of nobleness, purity, pathos, insight
into character, and often instinct with a quiet humour, which seems
to have been, in the Old world, peculiar to the Egyptians, as it is,
in the New, almost peculiar to the old-fashioned God-fearing Scotsman.</p>
<p>Take these examples, chosen almost at random.</p>
<p>Serapion the Sindonite was so called because he wore nothing but
a sindon, or linen shirt.&nbsp; Though he could not read, he could say
all the Scriptures by heart.&nbsp; He could not (says Palladius) sit
quiet in his cell, but wandered over the world in utter poverty, so
that he &ldquo;attained to perfect impassibility, for with that nature
he was born; for there are differences of natures, not of substances.&rdquo;</p>
<p>So says Palladius, and goes on to tell how Serapion sold himself
to certain play-actors for twenty gold pieces, and laboured for them
as a slave till he had won them to Christ, and made them renounce the
theatre; after which he made his converts give the money to the poor,
and went his way.</p>
<p>On one of his journeys he came to Athens, and, having neither money
nor goods, starved there for three days.&nbsp; But on the fourth he
went up, seemingly to the Areopagus, and cried, &ldquo;Men of Athens,
help!&rdquo;&nbsp; And when the crowd questioned him, he told them that
he had, since he left Egypt, fallen into the hands of three usurers,
two of whom he had satisfied, but the third would not leave him.</p>
<p>On being promised assistance, he told them that his three usurers
were avarice, sensuality, and hunger.&nbsp; Of the two first he was
rid, having neither money nor passions: but, as he had eaten nothing
for three days, the third was beginning to be troublesome, and demanded
its usual debt, without paying which he could not well live; whereon
certain philosophers, seemly amused by his apologue, gave him a gold
coin.&nbsp; He went to a baker&rsquo;s shop, laid down the coin, took
up a loaf, and went out of Athens for ever.&nbsp; Then the philosophers
knew that he was endowed with true virtue; and when they had paid the
baker the price of the loaf, got back their gold.</p>
<p>When he went into Laced&aelig;mon, he heard that a great man there
was a Manich&aelig;an, with all his family, though otherwise a good
man.&nbsp; To him Serapion sold himself as a slave, and within two years
converted him and his wife, who thenceforth treated him not as a slave,
but as their own brother.</p>
<p>After awhile, this &ldquo;Spiritual adamant,&rdquo; as Palladius
calls him, bought his freedom of them, and sailed for Rome.&nbsp; At
sundown first the sailors, and then the passengers, brought out each
man his provisions, and ate.&nbsp; Serapion sat still.&nbsp; The crew
fancied that he was sea-sick; but when he had passed a second, third,
and fourth day fasting, they asked, &ldquo;Man, why do you not eat?&rdquo;&nbsp;
&ldquo;Because I have nothing to eat.&rdquo;&nbsp; They thought that
some one had stolen his baggage: but when they found that the man had
absolutely nothing, they began to ask him not only how he would keep
alive, but how he would pay his fare.&nbsp; He only answered, &ldquo;That
he had nothing; that they might cast him out of the ship where they
had found him.&rdquo;</p>
<p>But they answered, &ldquo;Not for a hundred gold pieces, so favourable
was the wind,&rdquo; and fed him all the way to Rome, where we lose
sight of him and his humour.</p>
<p>To go on with almost chance quotations:&mdash;</p>
<p>Some monks were eating at a festival, and one said to the serving
man, &ldquo;I eat nothing cooked; tell them to bring me salt.&rdquo;&nbsp;
The serving man began to talk loudly: &ldquo;That brother eats no cooked
meat; bring him a little salt.&rdquo;&nbsp; Quoth Abbot Theodore: &ldquo;It
were more better for thee, brother, to eat meat in thy cell than to
hear thyself talked about in the presence of thy brethren.&rdquo;</p>
<p>Again: a brother came to Abbot Silvanus, in Mount Sinai, and found
the brethren working, and said, &ldquo;Why labour you for the meat which
perisheth?&nbsp; Mary chose the good part.&rdquo;&nbsp; The abbot said,
&ldquo;Give him a book to read, and put him in an empty cell.&rdquo;&nbsp;
About the ninth hour the brother looked out, to see if he would be called
to eat, and at last came to the abbot, and asked, &ldquo;Do not the
brethren eat to-day, abbot?&rdquo;&nbsp; &ldquo;Yes.&rdquo;&nbsp; &ldquo;Then
why was not I called?&rdquo;&nbsp; Then quoth Abbot Silvanus: &ldquo;Thou
art a spiritual man: and needest not their food.&nbsp; We are carnal,
and must eat, because we work: but thou hast chosen the better part.&rdquo;&nbsp;
Whereat the monk was ashamed.</p>
<p>As was also John the dwarf, who wanted to be &ldquo;without care
like the angels, doing nothing but praise God.&rdquo;&nbsp; So he threw
away his cloak, left his brother the abbot, and went into the desert.&nbsp;
But after seven days he came back, and knocked at the door.&nbsp; &ldquo;Who
is there?&rdquo; asked his brother.&nbsp; &ldquo;John.&rdquo;&nbsp;
&ldquo;Nay, John is turned into an angel, and is no more among men.&rdquo;&nbsp;
So he left him outside all night; and in the morning gave him to understand
that if he was a man he must work, but that if he was an angel, he had
no need to live in a cell.</p>
<p>Consider again the saying of the great Antony, when some brethren
were praising another in his presence.&nbsp; But Antony tried him, and
found that he could not bear an injury.&nbsp; Then said the old man,
&ldquo;Brother, thou art like a house with an ornamented porch, while
the thieves break into it by the back door.&rdquo;</p>
<p>Or this, of Abbot Isidore, when the devil tempted him to despair,
and told him that he would be lost after all: &ldquo;If I do go into
torment, I shall still find you below me there.&rdquo;</p>
<p>Or this, of Zeno the Syrian, when some Egyptian monks came to him
and began accusing themselves: &ldquo;The Egyptians hide the virtues
which they have, and confess vices which they have not.&nbsp; The Syrians
and Greeks boast of virtues which they have not, and hide vices which
they have.&rdquo;</p>
<p>Or this: One old man said to another, &ldquo;I am dead to this world.&rdquo;&nbsp;
&ldquo;Do not trust yourself,&rdquo; quoth the other, &ldquo;till you
are out of this world.&nbsp; If you are dead, the devil is not.&rdquo;</p>
<p>Two old men lived in the same cell, and had never disagreed.&nbsp;
Said one to the other, &ldquo;Let us have just one quarrel, like other
men.&rdquo;&nbsp; Quoth the other: &ldquo;I do not know what a quarrel
is like.&rdquo;&nbsp; Quoth the first: &ldquo;Here&mdash;I will put
a brick between us, and say that it is mine: and you shall say it is
not mine; and over that let us have a contention and a squabble.&rdquo;&nbsp;
But when they put the brick between them, and one said, &ldquo;It is
mine,&rdquo; the other said, &ldquo;I hope it is mine.&rdquo;&nbsp;
And when the first said, &ldquo;It is mine, it is not yours,&rdquo;
he answered, &ldquo;If it is yours, take it.&rdquo;&nbsp; So they could
not find out how to have a quarrel.</p>
<p>Anger, malice, revenge, were accursed things in the eyes of these
men.&nbsp; There was enough of them, and too much, among their monks;
but far less, doubt not, than in the world outside.&nbsp; For within
the monastery it was preached against, repressed, punished; and when
repented of, forgiven, with loving warnings and wise rules against future
transgression.</p>
<p>Abbot Agathon used to say, &ldquo;I never went to sleep with a quarrel
against any man; nor did I, as far as lay in me, let one who had a quarrel
against me sleep till he had made peace.&rdquo;</p>
<p>Abbot Isaac was asked why the devils feared him so much.&nbsp; &ldquo;Since
I was made a monk,&rdquo; he said, &ldquo;I settled with myself that
no angry word should come out of my mouth.&rdquo;</p>
<p>An old man said, &ldquo;Anger arises from these four things: from
the lust of avarice, in giving and receiving; from loving one&rsquo;s
own opinion; from wishing to be honoured; and from fancying oneself
a teacher and hoping to be wiser than everybody.&nbsp; And anger obscures
human reason by these four ways: if a man hate his neighbour; or if
he envy him; or if he look on him as nought; or if he speak evil of
him.&rdquo;</p>
<p>A brother being injured by another, came to Abbot Sidonius, told
his story, and said, &ldquo;I wish to avenge myself, father.&rdquo;&nbsp;
The abbot begged him to leave vengeance to God: but when he refused,
said, &ldquo;Then let us pray.&rdquo;&nbsp; Whereon the old man rose,
and said, &ldquo;God, thou art not necessary to us any longer, that
thou shouldest be careful of us: for we, as this brother says, both
will and can avenge ourselves.&rdquo;&nbsp; At which that brother fell
at his feet, and begged pardon, promising never to strive with his enemy.</p>
<p>Abbot P&oelig;men said often, &ldquo;Let malice never overcome thee.&nbsp;
If any man do thee harm, repay him with good, that thou mayest conquer
evil with good.&rdquo;</p>
<p>In a congregation at Scetis, when many men&rsquo;s lives and conversation
had been talked over, Abbot Pior held his tongue.&nbsp; After it was
over, he went out, and filled a sack with sand, and put it on his back.&nbsp;
Then he took a little bag, filled it likewise with sand, and carried
it before him.&nbsp; And when the brethren asked him what he meant,
he said, &ldquo;The sack behind is my own sins, which are very many:
yet I have cast them behind my back, and will not see them, nor weep
over them.&nbsp; But I have put these few sins of my brother&rsquo;s
before my eyes, and am tormenting myself over them, and condemning my
brother.&rdquo;</p>
<p>A brother having committed a fault, went to Antony, and his brethren
followed, upbraiding him, and wanting to bring him back; while he denied
having done the wrong.&nbsp; Abbot Paphnutius was there, and spoke a
parable to them:&mdash;</p>
<p>&ldquo;I saw on the river bank a man sunk in the mud up to his knees.&nbsp;
And men came to pull him out, and thrust him in up to the neck.&rdquo;</p>
<p>Then said Antony of Paphnutius, &ldquo;Behold a man who can indeed
save souls.&rdquo;</p>
<p>Abbot Macarius was going up to the mountain of Nitria, and sent his
disciple on before.&nbsp; The disciple met an idol-priest hurrying on,
and carrying a great beam: to whom he cried, &ldquo;Where art thou running,
devil?&rdquo;&nbsp; At which he was wroth, and beat him so that he left
him half dead, and then ran on, and met Macarius, who said, &ldquo;Salvation
to thee, labourer, salvation!&rdquo;&nbsp; He answered, wondering, &ldquo;What
good hast thou seen in me that thou salutest me?&rdquo;&nbsp; &ldquo;Because
I saw thee working and running, though ignorantly.&rdquo;&nbsp; To whom
the priest said, &ldquo;Touched by thy salutation, I knew thee to be
a great servant of God; for another&mdash;I know not who&mdash;miserable
monk met me and insulted me, and I gave him blows for his words.&rdquo;&nbsp;
Then laying hold of Macarius&rsquo;s feet he said, &ldquo;Unless thou
make me a monk I will not leave hold of thee.&rdquo;</p>
<p>After all, of the best of these men are told (with much honesty)
many sayings which show that they felt in their minds and hearts that
the spirit was above the letter: sayings which show that they had at
least at times glimpses of a simpler and more possible virtue; foretastes
of a perfection more human, and it may be more divine.</p>
<p>&ldquo;Better,&rdquo; said Abbot Hyperichius, &ldquo;to eat flesh
and drink wine, than to eat our brethren&rsquo;s flesh with bitter words.&rdquo;</p>
<p>A brother asked an elder, &ldquo;Give me, father one thing which
I may keep, and be saved thereby.&rdquo;&nbsp; The elder answered, &ldquo;If
thou canst be injured and insulted, and hear and be silent, that is
a great thing, and above all the other commandments.&rdquo;</p>
<p>One of the elders used to say, &ldquo;Whatever a man shrinks from
let him not do to another.&nbsp; Dost thou shrink if any man detracts
from thee?&nbsp; Speak not ill of another.&nbsp; Dost thou shrink if
any man slanders thee, or if any man takes aught from thee?&nbsp; Do
not that or the like to another man.&nbsp; For he that shall have kept
this saying, will find it suffice for his salvation.&rdquo;</p>
<p>&ldquo;The nearer,&rdquo; said Abbot Muthues, &ldquo;a man approaches
God, the more he will see himself to be a sinner.&rdquo;</p>
<p>Abbot Sisois, when he lay dying, begged to live a little longer,
that he might repent; and when they wondered, he told them that he had
not yet even begun repentance.&nbsp; Whereby they saw that he was perfect
in the fear of the Lord.</p>
<p>But the most startling confession of all must have been that wrung
from the famous Macarius the elder.&nbsp; He had been asked once by
a brother, to tell him a rule by which he might be saved; and his answer
had been this:&mdash;to fly from men, to sit in his cell, and to lament
for his sins continually; and, what was above all virtues, to keep his
tongue in order as well as his appetite.</p>
<p>But (whether before or after that answer is not said) he gained a
deeper insight into true virtue, on the day when (like Antony when he
was reproved by the example of the tanner in Alexandria) he heard a
voice telling him that he was inferior to two women who dwelt in the
nearest town.&nbsp; Catching up his staff, like Antony, he went off
to see the wonder.&nbsp; The women, when questioned by him as to their
works, were astonished.&nbsp; They had been simply good wives for years
past, married to two brothers, and living in the same house.&nbsp; But
when pressed by him, they confessed that they had never said a foul
word to each other, and never quarrelled.&nbsp; At one time they had
agreed together to retire into a nunnery, but could not, for all their
prayers, obtain the consent of their husbands.&nbsp; On which they had
both made an oath, that they would never, to their deaths, speak one
worldly word.</p>
<p>Which when the blessed Macarius had heard, he said, &ldquo;In truth
there is neither virgin, nor married woman, nor monk, nor secular; but
God only requires the intention, and ministers the spirit of life to
all.&rdquo;</p>
<div class="GutenbergBlankLines2"><br /><br /></div>
<h2>ARSENIUS</h2>
<div class="GutenbergBlankLines2"><br /><br /></div>
<p>I shall give one more figure, and that a truly tragical one, from
these &ldquo;Lives of the Egyptian Fathers,&rdquo; namely, that of the
once great and famous Arsenius, the Father (as he was at one time called)
of the Emperors.&nbsp; Theodosius, the great statesman and warrior,
who for some twenty years kept up by his single hand the falling empire
of Rome, heard how Arsenius was at once the most pious and the most
learned of his subjects; and wishing&mdash;half barbarian as he was
himself&mdash;that his sons should be brought up, not only as scholars,
but as Christians, he sent for Arsenius to his court, and made him tutor
to his two young sons Honorius and Arcadius.&nbsp; But the two lads
had neither their father&rsquo;s strength nor their father&rsquo;s nobleness.&nbsp;
Weak and profligate, they fretted Arsenius&rsquo;s soul day by day;
and, at last, so goes the story, provoked him so far that, according
to the fashion of a Roman pedagogue, he took the ferula and administered
to one of the princes a caning, which he no doubt deserved.&nbsp; The
young prince, in revenge, plotted against his life.&nbsp; Among the
parasites of the Palace it was not difficult to find those who would
use steel and poison readily enough in the service of an heir-apparent,
and Arsenius fled for his life: and fled, as men were wont in those
days, to Egypt and the Thebaid.&nbsp; Forty years old he was when he
left the court, and forty years more he spent among the cells at Scetis,
weeping day and night.&nbsp; He migrated afterwards to a place called
Troe, and there died at the age of ninety-five, having wept himself,
say his admirers, almost blind.&nbsp; He avoided, as far as possible,
beholding the face of man; upon the face of woman he would never look.&nbsp;
A noble lady, whom he had known probably in the world, came all the
way from Rome to see him; but he refused himself to her sternly, almost
roughly.&nbsp; He had known too much of the fine ladies of the Roman
court; all he cared for was peace.&nbsp; There is a story of him that,
changing once his dwelling-place, probably from Scetis to Troe, he asked,
somewhat peevishly, of the monks around him, &ldquo;What that noise
was?&rdquo;&nbsp; They told him it was only the wind among the reeds.&nbsp;
&ldquo;Alas!&rdquo; he said, &ldquo;I have fled everywhere in search
of silence, and yet here the very reeds speak.&rdquo;&nbsp; The simple
and comparatively unlearned monks around him looked with a profound
respect on the philosopher, courtier, scholar, who had cast away the
real pomps and vanities of this life, such as they had never known.&nbsp;
There is a story told, plainly concerning Arsenius, though his name
is not actually mentioned in it, how a certain old monk saw him lying
upon a softer mat than his fellows, and indulged with a few more comforts;
and complained indignantly of his luxury, and the abbot&rsquo;s favouritism.&nbsp;
Then asked the abbot, &ldquo;What didst thou eat before thou becamest
a monk?&rdquo; He confessed he had been glad enough to fill his stomach
with a few beans.&nbsp; &ldquo;How wert thou dressed?&rdquo;&nbsp; He
was glad enough, again he confessed, to have any clothes at all on his
back.&nbsp; &ldquo;Where didst thou sleep?&rdquo;&nbsp; &ldquo;Often
enough on the bare ground in the open air,&rdquo; was the answer.&nbsp;
&ldquo;Then,&rdquo; said the abbot, &ldquo;thou art, by thy own confession,
better off as a monk than thou wast as a poor labouring man: and yet
thou grudgest a little comfort to one who has given up more luxury than
thou hast ever beheld.&nbsp; This man slept beneath silken canopies;
he was carried in gilded litters, by trains of slaves; he was clothed
in purple and fine linen; he fed upon all the delicacies of the great
city: and he has given up all for Christ.&nbsp; And what hast thou given
up, that thou shouldst grudge him a softer mat, or a little more food
each day?&rdquo;&nbsp; And so the monk was abashed, and held his peace.</p>
<p>As for Arsenius&rsquo;s tears, it is easy to call his grief exaggerated
or superstitious: but those who look on them with human eyes will pardon
them, and watch with sacred pity the grief of a good man, who felt that
his life had been an utter failure.&nbsp; He saw his two pupils, between
whom, at their father&rsquo;s death, the Roman Empire was divided into
Eastern and Western, grow more and more incapable of governing.&nbsp;
He saw a young barbarian, whom he must have often met at the court in
Byzantium, as Master of the Horse, come down from his native forests,
and sack the Eternal City of Rome.&nbsp; He saw evil and woe unspeakable
fall on that world which he had left behind him, till the earth was
filled with blood, and Antichrist seemed ready to appear, and the day
of judgment to be at hand.&nbsp; And he had been called to do what he
could to stave off this ruin, to make those young princes decree justice
and rule in judgment by the fear of God.&nbsp; But he had failed; and
there was nothing left to him save self-accusation and regret, and dread
lest some, at least, of the blood which had been shed might be required
at his hands.&nbsp; Therefore, sitting upon his palm-mat there in Troe,
he wept his life away; happier, nevertheless, and more honourable in
the sight of God and man than if, like a Mazarin or a Talleyrand, and
many another crafty politician, both in Church and State, he had hardened
his heart against his own mistakes, and, by crafty intrigue and adroit
changing of sides at the right moment, had contrived to secure for himself,
out of the general ruin, honour and power and wealth, and delicate food,
and a luxurious home, and so been one of those of whom the Psalmist
says, with awful irony, &ldquo;So long as thou doest well unto thyself,
men will speak good of thee.&rdquo;</p>
<p>One good deed at least Arsenius had seen done&mdash;a deed which
has lasted to all time, and done, too, to the eternal honour of his
order, by a monk&mdash;namely, the abolition of gladiator shows.&nbsp;
For centuries these wholesale murders had lasted through the Roman Republic
and through the Roman Empire.&nbsp; Human beings in the prime of youth
and health, captives or slaves, condemned malefactors, and even free-born
men, who hired themselves out to death, had been trained to destroy
each other in the amphitheatre for the amusement, not merely of the
Roman mob, but of the Roman ladies.&nbsp; Thousands sometimes, in a
single day, had been</p>
<div class="GutenbergBlankLines1"><br /></div>
<p>&ldquo;Butchered to make a Roman holiday.&rdquo;</p>
<div class="GutenbergBlankLines1"><br /></div>
<p>The training of gladiators had become a science.&nbsp; By their weapons
and their armour, and their modes of fighting, they had been distinguished
into regular classes, of which the antiquaries count up full eighteen:
Andabat&aelig;, who wore helmets without any opening for the eyes, so
that they were obliged to fight blindfold, and thus excited the mirth
of the spectators; Hoplomachi, who fought in a complete suit of armour;
Mirmillones, who had the image of a fish upon their helmets, and fought
in armour with a short sword, matched usually against the Retiarii,
who fought without armour, and whose weapons were a casting-net and
a trident.&nbsp; These, and other species of fighters, were drilled
and fed in &ldquo;families&rdquo; by Lanist&aelig;; or regular trainers,
who let them out to persons wishing to exhibit a show.&nbsp; Women,
even high-born ladies, had been seized in former times with the madness
of fighting, and, as shameless as cruel, had gone down into the arena
to delight with their own wounds and their own gore the eyes of the
Roman people.</p>
<p>And these things were done, and done too often, under the auspices
of the gods, and at their most sacred festivals.&nbsp; So deliberate
and organized a system of wholesale butchery has never perhaps existed
on this earth before or since, not even in the worship of those Mexican
gods whose idols Cortez and his soldiers found fed with human hearts,
and the walls of their temples crusted with human gore.&nbsp; Gradually
the spirit of the Gospel had been triumphing over this abomination.&nbsp;
Ever since the time of Tertullian, in the second century, Christian
preachers and writers had lifted up their voice in the name of humanity.&nbsp;
Towards the end of the third century, the Emperors themselves had so
far yielded to the voice of reason, as to forbid by edicts the gladiatorial
fights.&nbsp; But the public opinion of the mob in most of the great
cities had been too strong both for saints and for emperors.&nbsp; St.
Augustine himself tells us of the horrible joy which he, in his youth,
had seen come over the vast ring of flushed faces at these horrid sights;
and in Arsenius&rsquo;s own time, his miserable pupil, the weak Honorius,
bethought himself of celebrating once more the heathen festival of the
Secular Games, and formally to allow therein an exhibition of gladiators.&nbsp;
But in the midst of that show sprang down into the arena of the Colosseum
of Rome an unknown monk, some said from Nitria, some from Phrygia, and
with his own hands parted the combatants in the name of Christ and God.&nbsp;
The mob, baulked for a moment of their pleasure, sprang on him, and
stoned him to death.&nbsp; But the crime was followed by a sudden revulsion
of feeling.&nbsp; By an edict of the Emperor the gladiatorial sports
were forbidden for ever; and the Colosseum, thenceforth useless, crumbled
slowly away into that vast ruin which remains unto this day, purified,
as men well said, from the blood of tens of thousands, by the blood
of one true and noble martyr.</p>
<div class="GutenbergBlankLines2"><br /><br /></div>
<h2>THE HERMITS OF ASIA</h2>
<div class="GutenbergBlankLines2"><br /><br /></div>
<p>The impulse which, given by Antony, had been propagated in Asia by
his great pupil, Hilarion, spread rapidly far and wide.&nbsp; Hermits
took possession of the highest peaks of Sinai; and driven from thence,
so tradition tells, by fear of those mysterious noises which still haunt
its cliffs, settled at that sheltered spot where now stands the convent
of St. Catharine.&nbsp; Massacred again and again by the wild Arab tribes,
their places were filled up by fresh hermits, and their spiritual descendants
hold the convent to this day.</p>
<p>Through the rich and luxuriant region of Syria, and especially round
the richest and most luxurious of its cities, Antioch, hermits settled,
and bore, by the severity of their lives, a noble witness against the
profligacy of its inhabitants, who had half renounced the paganism of
their forefathers without renouncing in the least, it seems, those sins
which drew down of old the vengeance of a righteous God upon their forefathers,
whether in Canaan or in Syria itself.</p>
<p>At Antioch, about the year 347, was born the famous Chrysostom, John
of the Golden Mouth; and near Antioch he became a hermit, and dwelt,
so legends say, several years alone in the wilderness: till, nerved
by that hard training, he went forth again into the world to become,
whether at Antioch or at Constantinople, the bravest as well as the
most eloquent preacher of righteousness and rebuker of sin which the
world had seen since the times of St. Paul.&nbsp; The labours of Chrysostom
belong not so much to this book as to a general ecclesiastical history:
but it must not be forgotten that he, like all the great men of that
age, had been a monk, and kept up his monastic severity, even in the
midst of the world, until his dying day.</p>
<p>At Nisibis, again, upon the very frontier of Persia, appeared another
very remarkable personage, known as the Great Jacob or Great St. James.&nbsp;
Taking (says his admiring biographer, Theodoret of Cyra) to the peaks
of the loftiest mountains., he passed his life on them, in spring and
summer haunting the woods, with the sky for a roof, but sheltering himself
in winter in a cave.&nbsp; His food was wild fruits and mountain herbs.&nbsp;
He never used a fire, and, clothed in a goats&rsquo; hair garment, was
perhaps the first of those Boscoi, or &ldquo;browsing hermits,&rdquo;
who lived literally like the wild animals in the flesh, while they tried
to live like angels in the spirit.</p>
<p>Some of the stories told of Jacob savour of that vindictiveness which
Giraldus Cambrensis, in after years, attributed to the saints in Ireland.&nbsp;
He was walking one day over the Persian frontier, &ldquo;to visit the
plants of true religion&rdquo; and &ldquo;bestow on them due care,&rdquo;
when he passed at a fountain a troop of damsels washing clothes and
treading them with their feet.&nbsp; They seem, according to the story,
to have stared at the wild man, instead of veiling their faces or letting
down their garments.&nbsp; No act or word of rudeness is reported of
them: but Jacob&rsquo;s modesty or pride was so much scandalized that
he cursed both the fountain and the girls.&nbsp; The fountain of course
dried up forthwith, and the damsels&rsquo; hair turned grey.&nbsp; They
ran weeping into the town.&nbsp; The townsfolk came out, and compelled
Jacob, by their prayers, to restore the water to their fountain; but
the grey hair he refused to restore to its original hue unless the damsels
would come and beg pardon publicly themselves.&nbsp; The poor girls
were ashamed to come, and their hair remained grey ever after.</p>
<p>A story like this may raise a smile in some of my readers, in others
something like indignation or contempt.&nbsp; But as long as such legends
remain in these hermit lives, told with as much gravity as any other
portion of the biography, and eloquently lauded, as this deed is, by
Bishop Theodoret, as proofs of the holiness and humanity of the saint,
an honest author is bound to notice some of them at least, and not to
give an alluring and really dishonest account of these men and their
times, by detailing every anecdote which can elevate them in the mind
of the reader, while he carefully omits all that may justly disgust
him.</p>
<p>Yet, after all, we are not bound to believe this legend, any more
than we are bound to believe that when Jacob saw a Persian judge give
an unjust sentence, he forthwith cursed, not him, but a rock close by,
which instantly crumbled into innumerable fragments, so terrifying that
judge that he at once revoked his sentence, and gave a just decision.</p>
<p>Neither, again, need we believe that it was by sending, as men said
in his own days, swarms of mosquitos against the Persian invaders, that
he put to flight their elephants and horses: and yet it may be true
that, in the famous siege of Nisibis, Jacob played the patriot and the
valiant man.&nbsp; For when Sapor, the Persian king, came against Nisibis
with all his forces, with troops of elephants, and huge machines of
war, and towers full of archers wheeled up to the walls, and at last,
damming the river itself, turned its current against the fortifications
of unburnt brick, until a vast breach was opened in the walls, then
Jacob, standing in the breach, encouraged by his prayers his fellow-townsmen
to stop it with stone, brick, timber, and whatsoever came to hand; and
Sapor, the Persian Sultan, saw &ldquo;that divine man,&rdquo; and his
goats&rsquo;-hair tunic and cloak seemed transformed into a purple robe
and royal diadem.&nbsp; And, whether he was seized with superstitious
fear, or whether the hot sun or the marshy ground had infected his troops
with disease, or whether the mosquito swarms actually became intolerable,
the great King of Persia turned and went away.</p>
<p>So Nisibis was saved for a while; to be shamefully surrendered to
the Persians a few years afterwards by the weak young Emperor Jovian.&nbsp;
Old Ammianus Marcellinus, brave soldier as he was, saw with disgust
the whole body of citizens ordered to quit the city within three days,
and &ldquo;men appointed to compel obedience to the order, with threats
of death to every one who delayed his departure; and the whole city
was a scene of mourning and lamentation, and in every quarter nothing
was heard but one universal wail, matrons tearing their hair, and about
to be driven from the homes in which they had been born and brought
up; the mother who had lost her children, or the wife who had lost her
husband, about to be torn from the place rendered sacred by their shades,
clinging to their doorposts, embracing their thresholds, and pouring
forth floods of tears.&nbsp; Every road was crowded, each person struggling
away as he could.&nbsp; Many, too, loaded themselves with as much of
their property as they thought they could carry, while leaving behind
them abundant and costly furniture, which they could not remove for
want of beasts of burden.&rdquo; <a name="citation159"></a><a href="#footnote159">{159}</a></p>
<p>One treasure, however, they did remove, of which the old soldier
Ammianus says nothing, and which, had he seen it pass him on the road,
he would have treated with supreme contempt.&nbsp; And that, says Theodoret,
was the holy body of &ldquo;their prince and defender,&rdquo; St. James
the mountain hermit, round which the emigrants chanted, says Theodoret,
hymns of regret and praise, &ldquo;for, had he been alive, that city
would have never passed into barbarian hands.&rdquo;</p>
<p>There stood with Jacob in the breach, during that siege of Nisibis,
a man of gentler temperament, a disciple of his, who had received baptism
at his hands, and who was, like himself, a hermit&mdash;Ephraim, or
Ephrem, of Edessa, as he is commonly called, for, though born at Nisibis,
his usual home was at Edessa, the metropolis of a Syrian-speaking race.&nbsp;
Into the Syrian tongue Ephrem translated the doctrines of the Christian
faith and the Gospel history, and spread abroad, among the heathen round,
a number of delicate and graceful hymns, which remain to this day, and
of which some have lately been translated into English. <a name="citation160"></a><a href="#footnote160">{160}</a>&nbsp;
Soft, sad, and dreamy as they were, they had strength and beauty enough
in them to supersede the Gnostic hymns of Bardesanes and his son Harmonius,
which had been long popular among the Syrians; and for centuries afterwards,
till Christianity was swept away by the followers of Mahomet, the Syrian
husbandman beguiled his toil with the pious and plaintive melodies of
St. Ephrem.</p>
<p>But Ephrem was not only a hermit and a poet: he was a preacher and
a missionary.&nbsp; If he wept, as it was said, day and night for his
own sins and the sins of mankind, he did his best at least to cure those
sins.&nbsp; He was a demagogue, or leader of the people, for good and
not for evil, to whom the simple Syrians looked up for many a year as
their spiritual father.&nbsp; He died in peace, as he said himself,
like the labourer who has finished his day&rsquo;s work, like the wandering
merchant who returns to his fatherland, leaving nothing behind him save
prayers and counsels, for &ldquo;Ephrem,&rdquo; he added, &ldquo;had
neither wallet nor pilgrim&rsquo;s staff.&rdquo;</p>
<p>&ldquo;His last utterance&rdquo; (I owe this fact to M. de Montalembert&rsquo;s
book, &ldquo;Moines d&rsquo;Occident&rdquo;) &ldquo;was a protest on
behalf of the dignity of man redeemed by the Son of God.&rdquo;</p>
<p>&ldquo;The young and pious daughter of the Governor of Edessa came
weeping to receive his latest breath.&nbsp; He made her swear never
again to be carried in a litter by slaves, &lsquo;The neck of man,&rsquo;
he said, &lsquo;should bear no yoke save that of Christ.&rsquo;&rdquo;&nbsp;
This anecdote is one among many which go to prove that from the time
that St. Paul had declared the great truth that in Christ Jesus was
neither bond nor free, and had proclaimed the spiritual brotherhood
of all men in Christ, slavery, as an institution, was doomed to slow
but certain death.&nbsp; But that death was accelerated by the monastic
movement, wherever it took root.&nbsp; A class of men who came not to
be ministered unto, but to minister to others; who prided themselves
upon needing fewer luxuries than the meanest slaves; who took rank among
each other and among men not on the ground of race, nor of official
position, nor of wealth, nor even of intellect, but simply on the ground
of virtue, was a perpetual protest against slavery and tyranny of every
kind; a perpetual witness to the world that, whether all men were equal
or not in the sight of God, the only rank among them of which God would
take note, would be their rank in goodness.</p>
<div class="GutenbergBlankLines2"><br /><br /></div>
<h2>BASIL</h2>
<div class="GutenbergBlankLines2"><br /><br /></div>
<p>On the south shore of the Black Sea, eastward of Sinope, there dwelt
in those days, at the mouth of the River Iris, a hermit as gentle and
as pure as Ephrem of Edessa.&nbsp; Beside a roaring waterfall, amid
deep glens and dark forests, with distant glimpses of the stormy sea
beyond, there lived on bread and water a graceful gentleman, young and
handsome; a scholar too, who had drunk deeply at the fountains of Pagan
philosophy and poetry, and had been educated with care at Constantinople
and at Athens, as well as at his native city of C&aelig;sar&aelig;a,
in the heart of Asia Minor, now dwindled under Turkish misrule into
a wretched village.&nbsp; He was heir to great estates; the glens and
forests round him were his own: and that was the use which he made of
them.&nbsp; On the other side of the torrent, his mother and his sister,
a maiden of wonderful beauty, lived the hermit life, on a footing of
perfect equality with their female slaves, and the pious women who had
joined them.</p>
<p>Basil&rsquo;s austerities&mdash;or rather the severe climate of the
Black Sea forests&mdash;brought him to an early grave.&nbsp; But his
short life was spent well enough.&nbsp; He was a poet, with an eye for
the beauty of Nature&mdash;especially for the beauty of the sea&mdash;most
rare in those times; and his works are full of descriptions of scenery
as healthy-minded as they are vivid and graceful.</p>
<p>In his travels through Egypt, Palestine, and Syria, he had seen the
hermits, and longed to emulate them; but (to do him justice) his ideal
of the so-called &ldquo;religious life&rdquo; was more practical than
those of the solitaries of Egypt, who had been his teachers.&nbsp; &ldquo;It
was the life&rdquo; (says Dean Milman <a name="citation163"></a><a href="#footnote163">{163}</a>)
&ldquo;of the industrious religious community, not of the indolent and
solitary anchorite, which to Basil was the perfection of Christianity.
. . .&nbsp; The indiscriminate charity of these institutions was to
receive orphans&rdquo; (of which there were but too many in those evil
days) &ldquo;of all classes, for education and maintenance: but other
children only with the consent or at the request of parents, certified
before witnesses; and vows were by no means to be enforced upon these
youthful pupils.&nbsp; Slaves who fled to the monasteries were to be
admonished and sent back to their owners.&nbsp; There is one reservation&rdquo;
(and that one only too necessary then), &ldquo;that slaves were not
bound to obey their master, if he should order what is contrary to the
law of God.&nbsp; Industry was to be the animating principle of these
settlements.&nbsp; Prayer and psalmody were to have their stated hours,
but by no means to intrude on those devoted to useful labour.&nbsp;
These labours were strictly defined; such as were of real use to the
community, not those which might contribute to vice or luxury.&nbsp;
Agriculture was especially recommended.&nbsp; The life was in no respect
to be absorbed in a perpetual mystic communion with the Deity.&rdquo;</p>
<p>The ideal which Basil set before him was never fulfilled in the East.&nbsp;
Transported to the West by St. Benedict, &ldquo;the father of all monks,&rdquo;
it became that conventual system which did so much during the early
middle age, not only for the conversion and civilization, but for the
arts and the agriculture of Europe.</p>
<p>Basil, like his bosom friend, Gregory of Nazianzen, had to go forth
from his hermitage into the world, and be a bishop, and fight the battles
of the true faith.&nbsp; But, as with Gregory, his hermit-training had
strengthened his soul, while it weakened his body.&nbsp; The Emperor
Valens, supporting the Arians against the orthodox, sent to Basil his
Prefect of the Pr&aelig;torium, an officer of the highest rank.&nbsp;
The prefect argued, threatened; Basil was firm.&nbsp; &ldquo;I never
met,&rdquo; said he at last, &ldquo;such boldness.&rdquo;&nbsp; &ldquo;Because,&rdquo;
said Basil, &ldquo;you never met a bishop.&rdquo;&nbsp; The prefect
returned to his Emperor.&nbsp; &ldquo;My lord, we are conquered; this
bishop is above threats.&nbsp; We can do nothing but by force.&rdquo;&nbsp;
The Emperor shrank from that crime, and Basil and the orthodoxy of his
diocese were saved.&nbsp; The rest of his life and of Gregory&rsquo;s
belongs, like that of Chrysostom, to general history, and we need pursue
it no further here.</p>
<p>I said that Basil&rsquo;s idea of what monks should be was never
carried out in the East, and it cannot be denied that, as the years
went on, the hermit life took a form less and less practical, and more
and more repulsive also.&nbsp; Such men as Antony, Hilarion, Basil,
had valued the ascetic training, not so much because it had, as they
thought, a merit in itself, but because it enabled the spirit to rise
above the flesh; because it gave them strength to conquer their passions
and appetites, and leave their soul free to think and act.</p>
<p>But their disciples, especially in Syria, seem to have attributed
more and more merit to the mere act of inflicting want and suffering
on themselves.&nbsp; Their souls were darkened, besides, more and more,
by a doctrine unknown to the Bible, unknown to the early Christians,
and one which does not seem to have had any strong hold of the mind
of Antony himself&mdash;namely, that sins committed after baptism could
only be washed away by tears, and expiated by penance; that for them
the merits of him who died for the sins of the whole world were of little
or of no avail.</p>
<p>Therefore, in perpetual fear of punishment hereafter, they set their
whole minds to punish themselves on earth, always tortured by the dread
that they were not punishing themselves enough, till they crushed down
alike body, mind, and soul into an abject superstition, the details
of which are too repulsive to be written here.&nbsp; Some of the instances
of this self-invented misery which are recorded, even as early as the
time of Theodoret, bishop of Cyra, in the middle of the fifth century,
make us wonder at the puzzling inconsistencies of the human mind.&nbsp;
Did these poor creatures really believe that God could be propitiated
by the torture of his own creatures?&nbsp; What sense could Theodoret
(who was a good man himself) have put upon the words, &ldquo;God is
good,&rdquo; or &ldquo;God is love,&rdquo; while he was looking with
satisfaction, even with admiration and awe, on practices which were
more fit for worshippers of Moloch?</p>
<p>Those who think these words too strong, may judge for themselves
how far they apply to his story of Marana and Cyra.</p>
<p>Marana, then, and Cyra were two young ladies of Berh&oelig;a, who
had given up all the pleasures of life to settle themselves in a roofless
cottage outside the town.&nbsp; They had stopped up the door with stones
and clay, and allowed it only to be opened at the feast of Pentecost.&nbsp;
Around them lived certain female slaves who had voluntarily chosen the
same life, and who were taught and exhorted through a little window
by their mistresses; or rather, it would seem, by Marana alone: for
Cyra (who was bent double by her &ldquo;training&rdquo;) was never to
speak.&nbsp; Theodoret, as a priest, was allowed to enter the sacred
enclosure, and found them shrouded from head to foot in long veils,
so that neither their faces or hands could be seen; and underneath their
veils, burdened on every limb, poor wretches, with such a load of iron
chains and rings that a strong man, he says, could not have stood under
the weight.&nbsp; Thus had they endured for two-and-forty years, exposed
to sun and wind, to frost and rain, taking no food at times for many
days together.&nbsp; I have no mind to finish the picture, and still
less to record any of the phrases of rapturous admiration with which
Bishop Theodoret comments upon their pitiable superstition.</p>
<div class="GutenbergBlankLines2"><br /><br /></div>
<h2>SIMEON STYLITES</h2>
<div class="GutenbergBlankLines2"><br /><br /></div>
<p>Of all such anchorites of the far East, the most remarkable, perhaps,
was the once famous Simeon Stylites&mdash;a name almost forgotten, save
by antiquaries and ecclesiastics, till Mr. Tennyson made it once more
notorious in a poem as admirable for its savage grandness, as for its
deep knowledge of human nature.&nbsp; He has comprehended thoroughly,
as it seems to me, that struggle between self-abasement and self-conceit,
between the exaggerated sense of sinfulness and the exaggerated ambition
of saintly honour, which must have gone on in the minds of these ascetics&mdash;the
temper which could cry out one moment with perfect honesty&mdash;</p>
<div class="GutenbergBlankLines1"><br /></div>
<p>&ldquo;Although I be the basest of mankind,<br />From scalp to sole
one slough and crust of sin;&rdquo;</p>
<div class="GutenbergBlankLines1"><br /></div>
<p>at the next&mdash;</p>
<div class="GutenbergBlankLines1"><br /></div>
<p>&ldquo;I will not cease to grasp the hope I hold<br />Of saintdom;
and to clamour, mourn, and sob,<br />Battering the gates of heaven with
storms of prayer.<br />Have mercy, Lord, and take away my sin.<br />Let
this avail, just, dreadful, mighty God,<br />This not be all in vain,
that thrice ten years<br />Thrice multiplied by superhuman pangs,<br />*
* * * * *<br />A sign between the meadow and the cloud,<br />Patient
on this tall pillar I have borne<br />Rain, wind, frost, heat, hail,
damp, and sleet, and snow;<br />And I had hoped that ere this period
closed<br />Thou wouldst have caught me up into thy rest,<br />Denying
not these weather-beaten limbs<br />The meed of saints, the white robe
and the palm.<br />O take the meaning, Lord: I do not breathe,<br />Not
whisper any murmur of complaint.<br />Pain heaped ten hundred-fold to
this, were still<br />Less burthen, by ten-hundred-fold, to bear<br />Than
were those lead-like tons of sin, that crush&rsquo;d<br />My spirit
flat before thee.&rdquo;</p>
<div class="GutenbergBlankLines1"><br /></div>
<p>Admirably also has Mr. Tennyson conceived the hermit&rsquo;s secret
doubt of the truth of those miracles, which he is so often told that
he has worked, that he at last begins to believe that he must have worked
them; and the longing, at the same time, to justify himself to himself,
by persuading himself that he has earned miraculous powers.&nbsp; On
this whole question of hermit miracles I shall speak at length hereafter.&nbsp;
I have given specimens enough of them already, and shall give as few
as possible henceforth.&nbsp; There is a sameness about them which may
become wearisome to those who cannot be expected to believe them.&nbsp;
But what the hermits themselves thought of them, is told (at least,
so I suspect) only too truly by Mr. Tennyson&mdash;</p>
<div class="GutenbergBlankLines1"><br /></div>
<p>&nbsp;&nbsp;&nbsp;&ldquo;O Lord, thou knowest what a man I am;<br />A
sinful man, conceived and born in sin:<br />&rsquo;Tis their own doing;
this is none of mine;<br />Lay it not to me.&nbsp; Am I to blame for
this,<br />That here come those who worship me?&nbsp; Ha! ha!<br />The
silly people take me for a saint,<br />And bring me offerings of fruit
and flowers:<br />And I, in truth (thou wilt bear witness here),<br />Have
all in all endured as much, and more<br />Than many just and holy men,
whose names<br />Are register&rsquo;d and calendar&rsquo;d for saints.<br />&nbsp;&nbsp;&nbsp;Good
people, you do ill to kneel to me.<br />What is it I can have done to
merit this?<br />It may be I have wrought some miracles,<br />And cured
some halt and maimed: but what of that?<br />It may be, no one, even
among the saints,<br />Can match his pains with mine: but what of that?<br />Yet
do not rise; for you may look on me,<br />And in your looking you may
kneel to God.<br />Speak, is there any of you halt and maimed?<br />I
think you know I have some power with heaven<br />From my long penance;
let him speak his wish.<br />&nbsp;&nbsp;&nbsp;Yes, I can heal him.&nbsp;
Power goes forth from me.<br />They say that they are heal&rsquo;d.&nbsp;
Ah, hark! they shout,<br />&lsquo;St. Simeon Stylites!&rsquo;&nbsp;
Why, if so,<br />God reaps a harvest in me.&nbsp; O my soul,<br />God
reaps a harvest in thee.&nbsp; If this be,<br />Can I work miracles,
and not be saved?<br />This is not told of any.&nbsp; They were saints.<br />It
cannot be but that I shall be saved;<br />Yea, crowned a saint.&rdquo;
. . .</p>
<div class="GutenbergBlankLines1"><br /></div>
<p>I shall not take the liberty of quoting more: but shall advise all
who read these pages to study seriously Mr. Tennyson&rsquo;s poem if
they wish to understand that darker side of the hermit life which became
at last, in the East, the only side of it.&nbsp; For in the East the
hermits seem to have degenerated, by the time of the Mahomedan conquest,
into mere self-torturing fakeers, like those who may be seen to this
day in Hindostan.&nbsp; The salt lost its savour, and in due tune it
was trampled under foot; and the armies of the Moslem swept out of the
East a superstition which had ended by enervating instead of ennobling
humanity.</p>
<p>But in justice, not only to myself, but to Mr. Tennyson (whose details
of Simeon&rsquo;s asceticism may seem to some exaggerated and impossible),
I have thought fit to give his life at length, omitting only many of
his miracles, and certain stories of his penances, which can only excite
horror and disgust, without edifying the reader.</p>
<p>There were, then, three hermits of this name, often confounded; and
all alike famous (as were Julian, Daniel, and other Stylites) for standing
for many years on pillars.&nbsp; One of the Simeons is said by Moschus
to have been struck by lightning, and his death to have been miraculously
revealed to Julian the Stylite, who lived twenty-four miles off.&nbsp;
More than one Stylite, belonging to the Monophysite heresy of Severus
Acephalus, was to be found, according to Moschus, in the East at the
beginning of the seventh century.&nbsp; This biography is that of the
elder Simeon, who died (according to Cedrenus) about 460, after passing
some forty or fifty years upon pillars of different heights.&nbsp; There
is much discrepancy in the accounts, both of his date and of his age;
but that such a person really existed, and had his imitators, there
can be no doubt.&nbsp; He is honoured as a saint alike by the Latin
and by the Greek Churches.</p>
<p>His life has been written by a disciple of his named Antony, who
professes to have been with him when he died; and also by Theodoret,
who knew him well in life.&nbsp; Both are to be found in Rosweyde, and
there seems no reason to doubt their authenticity.&nbsp; I have therefore
interwoven them both, marking the paragraphs taken from each.</p>
<p>Theodoret, who says that he was born in the village of Gesa, between
Antioch and Cilicia, calls him that &ldquo;famous Simeon&mdash;that
great miracle of the whole world, whom all who obey the Roman rule know;
whom the Persians also know, and the Indians, and &AElig;thiopians;
nay, his fame has even spread to the wandering Scythians, and taught
them his love of toil and love of wisdom;&rdquo; and says that he might
be compared with Jacob the patriarch, Joseph the temperate, Moses the
legislator, David the king and prophet, Micaiah the prophet, and the
divine men who were like them.&nbsp; He tells how Simeon, as a boy,
kept his father&rsquo;s sheep, and, being forced by heavy snow to leave
them in the fold, went with his parents to the church, and there heard
the Gospel which blesses those who mourn and weep, and calls those miserable
who laugh, and those enviable who have a pure heart.&nbsp; And when
he asked a bystander what he would gain who did each of these things,
the man propounded to him the solitary life, and pointed out to him
the highest philosophy.</p>
<p>This, Theodoret says, he heard from the saint&rsquo;s own tongue.&nbsp;
His disciple Antony gives the story of his conversion somewhat differently.</p>
<div class="GutenbergBlankLines1"><br /></div>
<p>St. Simeon (says Antony) was chosen by God from his birth, and used
to study how to obey and please him.&nbsp; Now his father&rsquo;s name
was Susocion, and he was brought up by his parents.</p>
<p>When he was thirteen years old, he was feeding his father&rsquo;s
sheep; and seeing a church he left the sheep and went in, and heard
an epistle being read.&nbsp; And when he asked an elder, &ldquo;Master,
what is that which is read?&rdquo; the old man replied, &ldquo;For the
substance (or very being) of the soul, that a man may learn to fear
God with his whole heart, and his whole mind.&rdquo;&nbsp; Quoth the
blessed Simeon, &ldquo;What is to fear God?&rdquo;&nbsp; Quoth the elder,
&ldquo;Wherefore troublest thou me, my son?&rdquo;&nbsp; Quoth he, &ldquo;I
inquire of thee, as of God.&nbsp; For I wish to learn what I hear from
thee, because I am ignorant and a fool.&rdquo;&nbsp; The elder answered,
&ldquo;If any man shall have fasted continually, and offered prayers
every moment, and shall have humbled himself to every man, and shall
not have loved gold, nor parents, nor garments, nor possessions, and
if he honours his father and mother, and follows the priests of God,
he shall inherit the eternal kingdom: but he who, on the contrary, does
not keep those things, he shall inherit the outer darkness which God
hath prepared for the devil and his angels.&nbsp; All these things,
my son, are heaped together in a monastery.&rdquo;</p>
<p>Hearing this, the blessed Simeon fell at his feet, saying, &ldquo;Thou
art my father and my mother, and my teacher of good works, and guide
to the kingdom of heaven.&nbsp; For thou hast gained my soul, which
was already being sunk in perdition.&nbsp; May the Lord repay thee again
for it.&nbsp; For these are the things which edify.&nbsp; I will now
go into a monastery, where God shall choose; and let his will be done
on me.&rdquo;&nbsp; The elder said, &ldquo;My son, before thou enterest,
hear me.&nbsp; Thou shalt have tribulation; for thou must watch and
serve in nakedness, and sustain ills without ceasing; and again thou
shalt be comforted, thou vessel precious to God.&rdquo;</p>
<p>And forthwith the blessed Simeon, going out of the church, went to
the monastery of the holy Timotheus, a wonder-working man; and falling
down before the gate of the monastery, he lay five days, neither eating
nor drinking.&nbsp; And on the fifth day, the abbot, coming out, asked
him, &ldquo;Whence art thou, my son?&nbsp; And what parents hast thou,
that thou art so afflicted?&nbsp; Or what is thy name, lest perchance
thou hast done some wrong?&nbsp; Or perchance thou art a slave, and
fleest from thy master?&rdquo;&nbsp; Then the blessed Simeon said with
tears, &ldquo;By no means, master; but I long to be a servant of God,
if he so will, because I wish to save my lost soul.&nbsp; Bid me, therefore,
enter the monastery, and leave all; and send me away no more.&rdquo;&nbsp;
Then the Abbot, taking his hand, introduced him into the monastery,
saying to the brethren, &ldquo;My sons, behold I deliver you this brother;
teach him the canons of the monastery.&rdquo;&nbsp; Now he was in the
monastery about four months, serving all without complaint, in which
he learnt the whole Psalter by heart, receiving every day divine food.&nbsp;
But the food which he took with his brethren he gave away secretly to
the poor, not caring for the morrow.&nbsp; So the brethren ate at even:
but he only on the seventh day.</p>
<p>But one day, having gone to the well to draw water, he took the rope
from the bucket with which the brethren drew water, and wound it round
his body from his loins to his neck: and going in, said to the brethren,
&ldquo;I went out to draw water, and found no rope on the bucket.&rdquo;&nbsp;
And they said, &ldquo;Hold thy peace, brother, lest the abbot know it;
till the thing has passed over.&rdquo;&nbsp; But his body was wounded
by the tightness and roughness of the rope, because it cut him to the
bone, and sank into his flesh till it was hardly seen.&nbsp; But one
day, some of the brethren going out, found him giving his food to the
poor; and when they returned, said to the abbot, &ldquo;Whence hast
thou brought us that man?&nbsp; We cannot abstain like him, for he fasts
from Lord&rsquo;s day to Lord&rsquo;s day, and gives away his food.&rdquo;
. . . Then the abbot, going out, found as was told him, and said, &ldquo;Son,
what is it which the brethren tell of thee?&nbsp; Is it not enough for
thee to fast as we do?&nbsp; Hast thou not heard the Gospel, saying
of teachers, that the disciple is not above his master?&rdquo; . . .
The blessed Simeon stood and answered nought.&nbsp; And the abbot, being
angry, bade strip him, and found the rope round him, so that only its
outside appeared; and cried with a loud voice, saying, &ldquo;Whence
has this man come to us, wanting to destroy the rule of the monastery?&nbsp;
I pray thee depart hence, and go whither thou wiliest.&rdquo;&nbsp;
And with great trouble they took off the rope, and his flesh with it,
and taking care of him, healed him.</p>
<p>But after he was healed he went out of the monastery, no man knowing
of it, and entered a deserted tank, in which was no water, where unclean
spirits dwelt.&nbsp; And that very night it was revealed to the abbot,
that a multitude of people surrounded the monastery with clubs and swords,
saying, &ldquo;Give us Simeon the servant of God, Timotheus; else we
will burn thee with thy monastery, because thou hast angered a just
man.&rdquo;&nbsp; And when he woke, he told the brethren the vision,
and how he was much disturbed thereby.&nbsp; And another night he saw
a multitude of strong men standing and saying, &ldquo;Give us Simeon
the servant of God; for he is beloved by God and the angels: why hast
thou vexed him?&nbsp; He is greater than thou before God; for all the
angels are sorry on his behalf.&nbsp; And God is minded to set him on
high in the world, that by him many signs may be done, such as no man
has done.&rdquo;&nbsp; Then the abbot, rising, said with great fear
to the brethren, &ldquo;Seek me that man, and bring him hither, lest
perchance we all die on his account.&nbsp; He is truly a saint of God,
for I have heard and seen great wonders of him.&rdquo;&nbsp; Then all
the monks went out and searched, but in vain, and told the abbot how
they had sought him everywhere, save in the deserted tank. . . .&nbsp;
Then the abbot went, with five brethren, to the tank.&nbsp; And making
a prayer, he went down into it with the brethren.&nbsp; And the blessed
Simeon, seeing him, began to entreat, saying, &ldquo;I beg you, servants
of God, let me alone one hour, that I may render up my spirit; for yet
a little, and it will fail.&nbsp; But my soul is very weary, because
I have angered the Lord.&rdquo;&nbsp; But the abbot said to him, &ldquo;Come,
servant of God, that we may take thee to the monastery; for I know concerning
thee that thou art a servant of God.&rdquo;&nbsp; But when he would
not, they brought him by force to the monastery.&nbsp; And all fell
at his feet, weeping, and saying, &ldquo;We have sinned against thee,
servant of God; forgive us.&rdquo;&nbsp; But the blessed Simeon groaned,
saying, &ldquo;Wherefore do ye burden an unhappy man and a sinner?&nbsp;
You are the servants of God, and my fathers.&rdquo;&nbsp; And he stayed
there about one year.</p>
<div class="GutenbergBlankLines1"><br /></div>
<p>After this (says Theodoret) he came to the Telanassus, under the
peak of the mountain on which he lived till his death; and having found
there a little house, he remained in it shut up for three years.&nbsp;
But eager always to increase the riches of virtue, he longed, in imitation
of the divine Moses and Elias, to fast forty days; and tried to persuade
Bassus, who was then set over the priests in the villages, to leave
nothing within by him, but to close up the door with clay.&nbsp; He
spoke to him of the difficulty, and warned him not to think that a violent
death was a virtue.&nbsp; &ldquo;Put by me then, father,&rdquo; he said,
&ldquo;ten loaves, and a cruse of water, and if I find my body need
sustenance, I will partake of them.&rdquo;&nbsp; At the end of the days,
that wonderful man of God, Bassus, removed the clay, and going in, found
the food and water untouched, and Simeon lying unable to speak or move.&nbsp;
Getting a sponge, he moistened and opened his lips and then gave him
the symbols of the divine mysteries; and, strengthened by them, he arose,
and took some food, chewing little by little lettuces and succory, and
such like.</p>
<p>From that time, for twenty-eight years (says Theodoret), he had remained
fasting continually for forty days at a time.&nbsp; But custom had made
it more easy to him.&nbsp; For on the first days he used to stand and
praise God; after that, when through emptiness he could stand no longer,
he used to sit and perform the divine office; and on the last day, even
lie down.&nbsp; For when his strength failed slowly, he was forced to
lie half dead.&nbsp; But after he stood on the column he could not bear
to lie down, but invented another way by which he could stand.&nbsp;
He fastened a beam to the column, and tied himself to it by ropes, and
so passed the forty days.&nbsp; But afterwards, when he had received
greater grace from on high, he did not want even that help: but stood
for the forty days, taking no food, but strengthened by alacrity of
soul and divine grace.</p>
<p>When he had passed three years in that little house, he took possession
of the peak which has since been so famous; and when he had commanded
a wall to be made round him, and procured an iron chain, twenty cubits
long, he fastened one end of it to a great stone, and the other to his
right foot, so that he could not, if he wished, leave those bounds.&nbsp;
There he lived, continually picturing heaven to himself, and forcing
himself to contemplate things which are above the heavens; for the iron
bond did not check the flight of his thoughts.&nbsp; But when the wonderful
Meletius, to whom the care of the episcopate of Antioch was then commended
(a man of sense and prudence, and adorned with shrewdness of intellect),
told him that the iron was superfluous, since the will is able enough
to impose on the body the chains of reason, he gave way, and obeyed
his persuasion.&nbsp; And having sent for a smith, he bade him strike
off the chain.</p>
<p>[Here follow some painful details unnecessary to be translated.]</p>
<p>When, therefore, his fame was flying far and wide everywhere, all
ran together, not only the neighbours, but those who were many days&rsquo;
journey off, some bringing the palsied, some begging health for the
sick, some that they might become fathers, and all wishing to receive
from him what they had not received from nature; and when they had received,
and gained their request, they went back joyful, proclaiming the benefits
they had obtained, and sending many more to beg the same.&nbsp; So,
as all are coming up from every quarter, and the road is like a river,
one may see gathered in that place an ocean of men, which receives streams
from every side; not only of those who live in our region, but Ishmaelites,
and Persians, and the Armenians who are subject to them, and Iberi,
and Homerites, and those who dwell beyond them.&nbsp; Many have come
also from the extreme west, Spaniards, and Britons, and Gauls who live
between the two.&nbsp; Of Italy it is superfluous to speak; for they
say that at Rome the man has become so celebrated that they have put
little images of him in all the porches of the shops, providing thereby
for themselves a sort of safeguard and security.</p>
<p>When, therefore, they came innumerable (for all tried to touch him,
and receive some blessing from those skin garments of his), thinking
it in the first place absurd and unfit that such exceeding honour should
be paid him, and next, disliking the labour of the business, devised
that station on the pillar, bidding one be built, first of six cubits,
then of twelve, next of twenty-two, and now of thirty-six.&nbsp; For
he longs to fly up to heaven, and be freed from this earthly conversation.</p>
<p>But I believe that this station was made not without divine counsel.&nbsp;
Wherefore I exhort fault-finders to bridle their tongue, and not let
it rashly loose, but rather consider that the Lord has often devised
such things, that he might profit those who were too slothful.</p>
<div class="GutenbergBlankLines1"><br /></div>
<p>In proof of which, Theodoret quotes the examples of Isaiah, Hosea,
and Ezekiel; and then goes on to say how God in like manner ordained
this new and admirable spectacle, by the novelty of it drawing all to
look, and exhibiting to those who came, a lesson which they could trust.&nbsp;
For the novelty of the spectacle (he says) is a worthy warrant for the
teaching; and he who came to see goes away instructed in divine things.&nbsp;
And as those whose lot it is to rule over men, after a certain period
of time, change the impressions on their coins, sometimes stamping them
with images of lions, sometimes of stars, sometimes of angels, and trying,
by a new mark, to make the gold more precious; so the King of all, adding
to piety and true religion these new and manifold modes of living, as
certain stamps on coin, excites to praise the tongues not only of the
children of faith, but of those who are diseased with unbelief.&nbsp;
And that so it is, not only words bear witness, but facts proclaim aloud.&nbsp;
For many myriads of Ishmaelites, who were enslaved in the darkness of
impiety, have been illuminated by that station on the column.&nbsp;
For this most shining lamp, set as it were upon a candlestick, sent
forth all round its rays, like of the sun: and one may see (as I said)
Iberi coming, and Persians, and Armenians, and accepting divine baptism.&nbsp;
But the Ishmaelites, coming by tribes, 200 and 300 at a time, and sometimes
even 1,000, deny, with shouts, the error of their fathers; and breaking
in pieces, before that great illuminator, the images which they had
worshipped, and renouncing the orgies of Venus (for they had received
from ancient times the worship of that d&aelig;mon), they receive the
divine sacraments, and take laws from that holy tongue, bidding farewell
to their ancestral rites, and renouncing the eating of wild asses and
camels.&nbsp; And this I have seen with my own eyes, and have heard
them renouncing the impiety of their fathers, and assenting to the Evangelic
doctrine.</p>
<p>But once I was in the greatest danger: for he himself told them to
go to me, and receive priestly benediction, saying that they would thence
obtain great advantage.&nbsp; But they, having run together in somewhat
too barbarous fashion, some dragged me before, some behind, some sideways;
and those who were further off, scrambling over the others, and stretching
out their hands, plucked my beard, or seized my clothes; and I should
have been stifled by their too warm onset, had not he, shouting out,
dispersed them all.&nbsp; Such usefulness has that column, which is
mocked at by scornful men, poured forth; and so great a ray of the knowledge
of God has it sent forth into the minds of barbarians.</p>
<p>I know also of his having done another thing of this kind:&mdash;One
tribe was beseeching the divine man, that he would send forth some prayer
and blessing for their chief: but another tribe which was present retorted
that he ought not to bless that chief, but theirs; for the one was a
most unjust man, but the other averse to injustice.&nbsp; And when there
had been a great contention and barbaric wrangling between them, they
attacked each other.&nbsp; But I, using many words, kept exhorting them
to be quiet, seeing that the divine man was able enough to give a blessing
to both.&nbsp; But the one tribe kept saying, that the first chief ought
not to have it; and the other tribe trying to deprive the second chief
of it.&nbsp; Then he, by threatening them from above, and calling them
dogs, hardly stilled the quarrel.&nbsp; This I have told, wishing to
show their great faith.&nbsp; For they would not have thus gone mad
against each other, had they not believed that the divine man&rsquo;s
blessing possesses some very great power.</p>
<p>I saw another miracle, which was very celebrated.&nbsp; One coming
up (he, too, was a chief of a Saracen tribe) besought the divine personage
that he would help a man whose limbs had given way in paralysis on the
road; and he said the misfortune had fallen on him in Callinicus, which
is a very large camp.&nbsp; When he was brought into the midst, the
saint bade him renounce the impiety of his forefathers; and when he
willingly obeyed, he asked him if he believed in the Father, the only-begotten
Son, and the Holy Spirit.&nbsp; And when he confessed that he believed&mdash;&ldquo;Believing,&rdquo;
said he, &ldquo;in their names, Arise.&rdquo;&nbsp; And when the man
had risen, he bade him carry away his chief (who was a very large man)
on his shoulders to his tent.&nbsp; He took him up, and went away forthwith;
while those who were present raised their voices in praise of God.&nbsp;
This he commanded, imitating the Lord, who bade the paralytic carry
his bed.&nbsp; Let no man call this imitation tyranny.&nbsp; For his
saying is, &ldquo;He who believeth in me, the works which I do, he shall
do also, and more than these shall he do.&rdquo;&nbsp; And, indeed,
we have seen the fulfilment of this promise.&nbsp; For though the shadow
of the Lord never worked a miracle, the shadow of the great Peter both
loosed death, and drove out diseases, and put d&aelig;mons to flight.&nbsp;
But the Lord it was who did also these miracles by his servants; and
now likewise, using his name, the divine Simeon works his innumerable
wonders.</p>
<p>It befell also that another wonder was worked, by no means inferior
to the last.&nbsp; For among those who had believed in the saving name
of the Lord Christ, an Ishmaelite, of no humble rank, had made a vow
to God, with Simeon as witness.&nbsp; Now his promise was this, that
he would henceforth to the end abstain from animal food.&nbsp; Transgressing
this promise once, I know not how, he slew a bird, and dared to eat
it.&nbsp; But God being minded to bring him by reproof to conversion,
and to honour his servant, who was a witness to the broken vow, the
flesh of the bird was changed into the nature of a stone, so that, even
if he wished, he could not thenceforth eat it.&nbsp; For how could he,
when the body meant for food had turned to stone?&nbsp; The barbarian,
stupified by this unexpected sight, came with great haste to the holy
man, bringing to the light the sin which he had hidden, and proclaimed
his transgression to all, begging pardon from God, and invoking the
help of the saint, that by his all-powerful prayers he might loose him
from the bonds of his sin.&nbsp; Now many saw that miracle, and felt
that the part of the bird about the breast consisted of bone and stone.</p>
<p>But I was not only an ear-witness of his wonders, but also an ear-witness
of his prophecies concerning futurity.&nbsp; For that drought which
came, and the great dearth of that year, and the famine and pestilence
which followed together, he foretold two years before, saying that he
saw a rod which was laid on man, stripes which would be inflicted by
it.&nbsp; Moreover, he at another time foretold an invasion of locusts,
and that it would bring no great harm, because the divine clemency soon
follows punishment.&nbsp; But when thirty days were past, an innumerable
multitude of them hung aloft, so that they even cut off the sun&rsquo;s
rays and threw a shadow; and that we all saw plainly: but it only damaged
the cattle pastures, and in no wise hurt the food of man.&nbsp; To me,
too, who was attacked by a certain person, he signified that the quarrel
would end ere a fortnight was past; and I learned the truth of the prediction
by experience.</p>
<p>Moreover there were seen by him once two rods, which came down from
the skies, and fell on the eastern and western lands.&nbsp; Now the
divine man said that they signified the rising of the Persian and Scythian
nations against the Romans; and told the vision to those who were by,
and with many tears and assiduous prayers, warded that disaster, the
threat whereof hung over the earth.&nbsp; Certainly the Persian nation,
when already armed and prepared to invade the Romans, was kept back
(the divine will being against them) from their attempt, and occupied
at home with their own troubles.&nbsp; But while I know many other cases
of this kind, I shall pass them over to avoid prolixity.&nbsp; These
are surely enough to show the spiritual contemplation of his mind.</p>
<p>His fame was great, also, with the King of the Persians; for as the
ambassadors told, who came to him, he diligently inquired what was his
life, and what his miracles.&nbsp; But they say that the King&rsquo;s
wife also begged oil honoured by his blessing, and accepted it as the
greatest of gifts.&nbsp; Moreover, all the King&rsquo;s courtiers, being
moved by his fame, and having heard many slanders against him from the
Magi, inquired diligently, and having learnt the truth, called him a
divine man; while the rest of the crowd, coming to the muleteers and
servants and soldiers, both offered money, and begged for a share in
the oil of benediction.&nbsp; The Queen, too, of the Ishmaelites, longing
to have a child, sent first some of her most noble subjects to the saint,
beseeching him that she might become a mother.&nbsp; And when her prayer
had been granted, and she had her heart&rsquo;s desire, she took the
son who had been born, and went to the divine old man; and (because
women were not allowed to approach him) sent the babe, entreating his
blessing on it . . . [Here Theodoret puts into the Queen&rsquo;s mouth
words which it is unnecessary to quote.]</p>
<p>But how long do I strive to measure the depths of the Atlantic sea?&nbsp;
For as they are unfathomable by man, so do the things which he does
daily surpass narration.&nbsp; I, however, admire above all these things
his endurance; for night and day he stands, so as to be seen by all.&nbsp;
For as the doors are taken away, and a large part of the wall around
pulled down, he is set forth as a new and wondrous spectacle to all;
now standing long, now bowing himself frequently, and offering adoration
to God.&nbsp; Many of those who stand by count these adorations; and
once a man with me, when he had counted 1,244, and then missed, gave
up counting: but always, when he bows himself, he touches his feet with
his forehead.&nbsp; For as his stomach takes food only once in the week,
and that very little&mdash;no more than is received in the divine sacraments,&mdash;his
back admits of being easily bent. . . .&nbsp; But nothing which happens
to him overpowers his philosophy; he bears nobly both voluntary and
involuntary pains, and conquers both by readiness of will.</p>
<p>There came once from Arabena a certain good man, and honoured with
the ministry of Christ.&nbsp; He, when he had come to that mountain
peak,&mdash;&ldquo;Tell me,&rdquo; he cried, &ldquo;by the very truth
which converts the human race to itself&mdash;Art thou a man, or an
incorporeal nature?&rdquo;&nbsp; But when all there were displeased
with the question, the saint bade them all be silent, and said to him,
&ldquo;Why hast thou asked me this?&rdquo;&nbsp; He answered, &ldquo;Because
I hear every one saying publicly, that thou neither eatest nor sleepest;
but both are properties of man, and no one who has a human nature could
have lived without food and sleep.&rdquo;&nbsp; Then the saint bade
them set a ladder to the column, and him to come up; and first to look
at his hands, and then feel inside his cloak of skins; and to see not
only his feet, but a severe wound.&nbsp; But when he saw that he was
a man, and the size of that wound, and learnt from him how he took nourishment,
he came down and told me all.</p>
<p>At the public festivals he showed an endurance of another kind.&nbsp;
For from the setting of the sun till it had come again to the eastern
horizon, he stood all night with hands uplift to heaven, neither soothed
with sleep nor conquered by fatigue.&nbsp; But in toils so great, and
so great a magnitude of deeds, and multitude of miracles, his self-esteem
is as moderate as if he were in dignity the least of all men.&nbsp;
Beside his modesty, he is easy of access of speech, and gracious, and
answers every man who speaks to him, whether he be handicraftsman, beggar,
or rustic.&nbsp; And from the bounteous God he has received also the
gift of teaching, and making his exhortations twice a day, he delights
the ears of those who hear, discoursing much on grace, and setting forth
the instructions of the Divine Spirit to look up and fly toward heaven,
and depart from the earth, and imagine the kingdom which is expected,
and fear the threats of Gehenna, and despise earthly things, and wait
for things to come.&nbsp; He may be seen, too, acting as judge, and
giving right and just decisions.&nbsp; This, and the like, is done after
the ninth hour.&nbsp; For all night, and through the day to the ninth
hour, he prays perpetually.&nbsp; After that, he first sets forth the
divine teaching to those who are present; then having heard each man&rsquo;s
petition, after he has performed some cures, he settles the quarrels
of those between whom there is any dispute.&nbsp; About sunset he begins
the rest of his converse with God.&nbsp; But though he is employed in
this way, and does all this, he does not give up the care of the holy
Churches, sometimes fighting with the impiety of the Greeks, sometimes
checking the audacity of the Jews, sometimes putting to flight the bands
of heretics, and sometimes sending messages concerning these last to
the Emperor; sometimes, too, stirring up rulers to zeal for God, and
sometimes exhorting the pastors of the Churches to bestow more care
upon their flocks.</p>
<p>I have gone through these facts, trying to show the shower by one
drop, and to give those who meet with my writing a taste on the finger
of the sweetness of the honey.&nbsp; But there remains (as is to be
expected) much more; and if he should live longer, he will probably
add still greater wonders. . . .</p>
<div class="GutenbergBlankLines1"><br /></div>
<p>Thus far Theodoret.&nbsp; Antony gives some other details of Simeon&rsquo;s
life upon the column.</p>
<div class="GutenbergBlankLines1"><br /></div>
<p>The devil, he says, in envy transformed himself into the likeness
of an angel, shining in splendour, with fiery horses, and a fiery chariot,
and appeared close to the column on which the blessed Simeon stood,
and shone with glory like an angel.&nbsp; And the devil said with bland
speeches, &ldquo;Simeon, hear my words, which the Lord hath commanded
thee.&nbsp; He has sent me, his angel, with a chariot and horses of
fire, that I may carry thee away, as I carried Elias.&nbsp; For thy
time is come.&nbsp; Do thou, in like wise, ascend now with me into the
chariot, because the Lord of heaven and earth has sent it down.&nbsp;
Let us ascend together into the heavens, that the angels and archangels
may see thee, with Mary the mother of the Lord, with the Apostles and
martyrs, the confessors and prophets; because they rejoice to see thee,
that thou mayest pray to the Lord, who hast made thee after his own
image.&nbsp; Verily I have spoken to thee: delay not to ascend.&rdquo;&nbsp;
Simeon, having ended his prayer, said, &ldquo;Lord, wilt thou carry
me, a sinner, into heaven?&rdquo;&nbsp; And lifting his right foot that
he might step into the chariot, he lifted also his right hand, and made
the sign of Christ.&nbsp; When he had made the sign of the cross, forthwith
the devil appeared nowhere, but vanished with his device, as dust before
the face of the wind.&nbsp; Then understood Simeon that it was an art
of the devil.</p>
<p>Having recovered himself, therefore, he said to his foot, &ldquo;Thou
shalt not return back hence, but stand here until my death, when the
Lord shall send for me a sinner.&rdquo;</p>
<p>[Here follow more painful stories, which had best be omitted.]</p>
<p>But after much time, his mother, hearing of his fame, came to see
him, but was forbidden, because no woman entered that place.&nbsp; But
when the blessed Simeon heard the voice of his mother, he said to her,
&ldquo;Bear up, my mother, a little while, and we shall see each other,
if God will.&rdquo;&nbsp; But she, hearing this, began to weep, and
tearing her hair, rebuked him, saying, &ldquo;Son, why hast thou done
this?&nbsp; In return for the body in which I bore thee, thou hast filled
me full of grief.&nbsp; For the milk with which I nourished thee, thou
hast given me tears.&nbsp; For the kiss with which I kissed thee, thou
hast given me bitter pangs of heart.&nbsp; For the grief and labour
which I have suffered, thou hast laid on me cruel stripes.&rdquo;&nbsp;
And she spoke so much that she made us all weep.&nbsp; The blessed Simeon,
hearing the voice of her who bore him, put his face in his hands and
wept bitterly; and commanded her, saying, &ldquo;Lady mother, be still
a little time, and we shall see each other in eternal rest.&rdquo;&nbsp;
But she began to say, &ldquo;By Christ, who formed thee, if there is
a probability of seeing thee, who hast been so long a stranger to me,
let me see thee; or if not, let me only hear thy voice and die at once;
for thy father is dead in sorrow because of thee.&nbsp; And now do not
destroy me for very bitterness, my son.&rdquo;&nbsp; Saying this, for
sorrow and weeping she fell asleep; for during three days and three
nights she had not ceased entreating him.&nbsp; Then the blessed Simeon
prayed the Lord for her, and she forthwith gave up the ghost.</p>
<p>But they took up her body, and brought it where he could see it.&nbsp;
And he said, weeping, &ldquo;The Lord receive thee in joy, because thou
hast endured tribulation for me, and borne me, and nursed and nourished
me with labour.&rdquo;&nbsp; And as he said that, his mother&rsquo;s
countenance perspired, and her body was stirred in the sight of us all.&nbsp;
But he, lifting up his eyes to heaven, said, &ldquo;Lord God of virtues,
who sittest above the cherubim, and searchest the foundations of the
abyss, who knewest Adam before he was; who hast promised the riches
of the kingdom of heaven to those who love thee; who didst speak to
Moses in the bush of fire; who blessedst Abraham our father; who bringest
into Paradise the souls of the just, and sinkest the souls of the impious
to perdition; who didst humble the lions, and mitigate for thy servants
the strong fires of the Chaldees; who didst nourish Elisha by the ravens
which brought him food&mdash;receive her soul in peace, and put her
in the place of the holy fathers, for thine is the power for ever and
ever.&rdquo;</p>
<div class="GutenbergBlankLines1"><br /></div>
<p>Antony then goes on to relate the later years of the saint&rsquo;s
life.</p>
<p>He tells how Simeon, some time after this, ascended the column of
forty cubits; how a great dragon (serpent) crawled towards it, and coiled
round it, entreating (so it seemed) to be freed from a spike of wood
which had entered its eye; and how, St. Simeon took pity on it, he caused
the spike (which was a cubit long) to come out.</p>
<p>He tells how a woman, drinking water from a jar at night, swallowed
a snake unawares, which grew within her, till she was brought to the
blessed Simeon, who commanded some of the water of the monastery to
be given her; on which the serpent crawled out of her mouth, three cubits
long, and burst immediately; and was hung up there seven days, as a
testimony to many.</p>
<p>He tells how, when there was great want of water, St. Simeon prayed
till the earth opened on the east of the monastery, and a cave full
of water was discovered, which had never failed them to that day.</p>
<p>He tells how men, sitting beneath a tree, on their way to the saint,
saw a doe go by, and commanded her to stop, &ldquo;by the prayers of
St. Simeon;&rdquo; which when she had done, they killed and ate her,
and came to St. Simeon with the skin.&nbsp; But they were all struck
dumb, and hardly cured after two years.&nbsp; And the skin of the doe
they hung up, for a testimony to many.</p>
<p>He tells of a huge leopard, which slew men and cattle all around;
and how St. Simeon bade sprinkle in his haunts soil or water from the
monastery; and when men went again, they found the leopard dead.</p>
<p>He tells how, when St. Simeon cured any one, he bade him go home,
and honour God who had healed him, and not dare to say that Simeon had
cured him, lest a worse thing should suddenly come to him; and not to
presume to swear by the name of the Lord, for it was a grave sin; but
to swear, &ldquo;whether justly or unjustly, by him, lowly and a sinner.&nbsp;
Wherefore all the Easterns, and barbarous tribes in those regions, swear
by Simeon.&rdquo;</p>
<p>He tells how a robber from Antioch, Jonathan by name, fled to St.
Simeon, and embraced the column, weeping bitterly, and saying how he
had committed every crime, and had come thither to repent.&nbsp; And
how the saint said, &ldquo;Of such is the kingdom of heaven: but do
not try to tempt me, lest thou be found again in the sins which thou
hast cast away.&rdquo;&nbsp; Then came the officials from Antioch, demanding
that he should be given up, to be cast to the wild beasts.&nbsp; But
Simeon answered, &ldquo;My sons, I brought him not hither, but One greater
than I; for he helps such as this man, and of such is the kingdom of
heaven.&nbsp; But if you can enter, carry him hence; I cannot give him
up, for I fear him who has sent the man to me.&rdquo;&nbsp; And they,
struck with fear, went away.&nbsp; Then Jonathan lay for seven days
embracing the column, and then asked the saint leave to go.&nbsp; The
saint asked him if he were going back to sin?&nbsp; &ldquo;No, lord,&rdquo;
he said; &ldquo;but my time is fulfilled,&rdquo; and straightway he
gave up the ghost; and when officials came again from Antioch, demanding
him, Simeon replied: &ldquo;He who brought him came with a multitude
of the heavenly host, and is able to send into Tartarus your city, and
all who dwell in it, who also has reconciled this man to himself; and
I was afraid lest he should slay me suddenly.&nbsp; Therefore weary
me no more, a humble man and poor.&rdquo;</p>
<p>But after a few years (says Antony) it befell one day that he bowed
himself in prayer, and remained so three days&mdash;that is, the Friday,
the Sabbath, and the Lord&rsquo;s day.&nbsp; Then I was terrified, and
went up to him, and stood before his face, and said to him, &ldquo;Master,
arise: bless us; for the people have been waiting three days and three
nights for a blessing from thee.&rdquo;&nbsp; And he answered me not;
and I said again to him: &ldquo;Wherefore dost thou grieve me, lord?
or in what have I offended?&nbsp; I beseech thee, put out thy hand to
me; or, perchance, thou hast already departed from us?&rdquo;</p>
<p>And seeing that he did not answer, I thought to tell no one; for
I feared to touch him: and, standing about half an hour, I bent down,
and put my ear to listen; and there was no breathing: but a fragrance
as of many scents rose from his body.&nbsp; And so I understood that
he rested in the Lord; and, turning faint, I wept most bitterly; and,
bending down, I kissed his eyes, and clasped his beard and hair, and
reproaching him, I said: &ldquo;To whom dost thou leave me, lord? or
where shall I seek thy angelic doctrine?&nbsp; What answer shall I make
for thee? or whose soul will look at this column, without thee, and
not grieve?&nbsp; What answer shall I make to the sick, when they come
here to seek thee, and find thee not?&nbsp; What shall I say, poor creature
that I am?&nbsp; To-day I see thee; to-morrow I shall look right and
left, and not find thee.&nbsp; And what covering shall I put upon thy
column?&nbsp; Woe to me, when folk shall come from afar, seeking thee,
and shall not find thee!&rdquo;&nbsp; And, for much sorrow, I fell asleep.</p>
<p>And forthwith he appeared to me, and said: &ldquo;I will not leave
this column, nor this place, and this blessed mountain, where I was
illuminated.&nbsp; But go down, satisfy the people, and send word secretly
to Antioch, lest a tumult arise.&nbsp; For I have gone to rest, as the
Lord willed: but do thou not cease to minister in this place, and the
Lord shall repay thee thy wages in heaven.&rdquo;</p>
<p>But, rising from sleep, I said, in terror, &ldquo;Master, remember
me in thy holy rest.&rdquo;&nbsp; And, lifting up his garments, I fell
at his feet, and kissed them; and, holding his hands, I laid them on
my eyes, saying, &ldquo;Bless me, I beseech thee, my lord!&rdquo;&nbsp;
And again I wept, and said, &ldquo;What relics shall I carry away from
thee as memorials?&rdquo;&nbsp; And as I said that his body was moved;
therefore I was afraid to touch him.</p>
<p>And, that no one might know, I came down quickly, and sent a faithful
brother to the Bishop at Antioch.&nbsp; He came at once with three Bishops,
and with them Ardaburius, the master of the soldiers, with his people,
and stretched curtains round the column, and fastened their clothes
around it.&nbsp; For they were cloth of gold.</p>
<p>And when they laid him down by the altar before the column, and gathered
themselves together, birds flew round the column, crying, and as it
were lamenting, in all men&rsquo;s sight; and the wailing of the people
and of the cattle resounded for seven miles away; yea, even the hills,
and the fields, and the trees were sad around that place; for everywhere
a dark cloud hung about it.&nbsp; And I watched an angel coming to visit
him; and, about the seventh hour, seven old men talked with that angel,
whose face was like lightning, and his garments as snow.&nbsp; And I
watched his voice, in fear and trembling, as long as I could hear it;
but what he said I cannot tell.</p>
<p>But when the holy Simeon lay upon the bier, the Pope of Antioch,
wishing to take some of his beard for a blessing, stretched out his
hand; and forthwith it was dried up; and prayers were made to God for
him, and so his hand was restored again.</p>
<p>Then, laying the corpse on the bier, they took it to Antioch, with
psalms and hymns.&nbsp; But all the people round that region wept, because
the protection of such mighty relics was taken from them, and because
the Bishop of Antioch had sworn that no man should touch his body.</p>
<p>But when they came to the fifth milestone from Antioch, to the village
which is called Mero&euml;, no one could move him.&nbsp; Then a certain
man, deaf and dumb for forty years, who had committed a very great crime,
suddenly fell down before the bier, and began to cry, &ldquo;Thou art
well come, servant of God; for thy coming will save me: and if I shall
obtain the grace to live, I will serve thee all the days of my life.&rdquo;&nbsp;
And, rising, he caught hold of one of the mules which carried the bier,
and forthwith moved himself from that place.&nbsp; And so the man was
made whole from that hour.</p>
<p>Then all going out of the city of Antioch received the body of the
holy Simeon on gold and silver, with psalms and hymns, and with many
lamps brought it into the greater church, and thence to another church,
which is called Penitence.&nbsp; Moreover, many virtues are wrought
at his tomb, more than in his life; and the man who was made whole served
there till the day of his death.&nbsp; But many offered treasures to
the Bishop of Antioch for the faith, begging relics from the body: but,
on account of his oath, he never gave them.</p>
<p>I, Antony, lowly and a sinner, have set forth briefly, as far as
I could, this lesson.&nbsp; But blessed is he who has this writing in
a book, and reads it in the church and house of God; and when he shall
have brought it to his memory, he shall receive a reward from the Most
High; to whom is honour, power, and virtue, for ever and ever.&nbsp;
Amen.</p>
<div class="GutenbergBlankLines1"><br /></div>
<p>After such a fantastic story as this of Simeon, it is full time (some
readers may have thought that it was full time long since) to give my
own opinion of the miracles, visions, d&aelig;mons, and other portents
which occur in the lives of these saints.&nbsp; I have refrained from
doing so as yet, because I wished to begin by saying everything on behalf
of these old hermits which could honestly be said, and to prejudice
my readers&rsquo; minds in their favour rather than against them; because
I am certain that if we look on them merely with scorn and ridicule,&mdash;if
we do not acknowledge and honour all in them which was noble, virtuous,
and honest,&mdash;we shall never be able to combat their errors, either
in our own hearts or in those of our children: and that we may have
need to do so is but too probable.&nbsp; In this age, as in every other
age of materialism and practical atheism, a revulsion in favour of superstition
is at hand; I may say is taking place round us now.&nbsp; Doctrines
are tolerated as possibly true,&mdash;persons are regarded with respect
and admiration, who would have been looked on, even fifty years ago,
if not with horror, yet with contempt, as beneath the serious notice
of educated English people.&nbsp; But it is this very contempt which
has brought about the change of opinion concerning them.&nbsp; It has
been discovered that they were not altogether so absurd as they seemed;
that the public mind, in its ignorance, has been unjust to them; and,
in hasty repentance for that injustice, too many are ready to listen
to those who will tell them that these things are not absurd at all&mdash;that
there is no absurdity in believing that the leg-bone of St. Simon Stock
may possess miraculous powers, or that the spirits of the departed communicate
with their friends by rapping on the table.&nbsp; The ugly after-crop
of superstition which is growing up among us now is the just and natural
punishment of our materialism&mdash;I may say, of our practical atheism.&nbsp;
For those who will not believe in the real spiritual world, in which
each man&rsquo;s soul stands face to face all day long with Almighty
God, the Father, the Son, and the Holy Ghost, are sure at last to crave
after some false spiritual world, and seek, like the evil and profligate
generation of the Jews, after visible signs and material wonders.&nbsp;
And those who will not believe that the one true and living God is above
their path and about their bed and spieth out all their ways, and that
in him they live and move and have their being, are but too likely at
last to people with fancied saints and d&aelig;mons that void in the
imagination and in the heart which their own unbelief has made.</p>
<p>Are we then to suppose that these old hermits had lost faith in God?&nbsp;
On the contrary, they were the only men in that day who had faith in
God.&nbsp; And, if they had faith in any other things or persons beside
God, they merely shared in the general popular ignorance and mistakes
of their own age; and we must not judge those who, born in an age of
darkness, were struggling earnestly toward the light, as we judge those
who, born in an age of scientific light, are retiring of their own will
back into the darkness.</p>
<p>Before I enter upon the credibility of these alleged saints&rsquo;
miracles, I must guard my readers carefully from supposing that I think
miracles impossible.&nbsp; Heaven forbid.&nbsp; He would be a very rash
person who should do that, in a world which swarms with greater wonders
than those recorded in the biography of a saint.&nbsp; For, after all,
which is more wonderful, that God should be able to restore the dead
to life, or that he should be able to give life at all?&nbsp; Again,
as for these miracles being contrary to our experience, that is no very
valid argument against them; for equally contrary to our experience
is every new discovery of science, every strange phenomenon among plants
and animals, every new experiment in a chemical lecture.</p>
<p>The more we know of science the more we must confess, that nothing
is too strange to be true: and therefore we must not blame or laugh
at those who in old times believed in strange things which were not
true.&nbsp; They had an honest and rational sense of the infinite and
wonderful nature of the universe, and of their own ignorance about it;
and they were ready to believe anything, as the truly wise man will
be ready also.&nbsp; Only, from ignorance of the laws of the universe,
they did not know what was likely to be true and what was not; and therefore
they believed many things which experience has proved to be false; just
as Seba or any of the early naturalists were ready to believe in six-legged
dragons, or in the fatal power of the basilisk&rsquo;s eye; fancies
which, if they had been facts, would not have been nearly as wonderful
as the transformation of the commonest insect, or the fertilization
of the meanest weed: but which are rejected now, not because they are
too wonderful, but simply because experience has proved them to be untrue.&nbsp;
And experience, it must be remembered, is the only sound test of truth.&nbsp;
As long as men will settle beforehand for themselves, without experience,
what they ought to see, so long will they be perpetually fancying that
they or others have seen it; and their faith, as it is falsely called,
will delude not only their reason, but their very hearing, sight, and
touch.</p>
<p>In this age we see no supernatural prodigies, because there are none
to see; and when we are told that the reason why we see no prodigies
is because we have no faith, we answer (if we be sensible), Just so.&nbsp;
As long as people had faith, in plain English believed, that they could
be magically cured of a disease, they thought that they or others were
so cured.&nbsp; As long as they believed that ghosts could be seen,
every silly person saw them.&nbsp; As long as they believed that d&aelig;mons
transformed themselves into an animal&rsquo;s shape, they said, &ldquo;The
devil croaked at me this morning in the shape of a raven; and therefore
my horse fell with me.&rdquo;&nbsp; As long as they believed that witches
could curse them, they believed that an old woman in the next parish
had overlooked them, their cattle, and their crops; and that therefore
they were poor, diseased, and unfortunate.&nbsp; These dreams, which
were common among the peasants in remote districts five-and-twenty years
ago, have vanished, simply from the spread (by the grace of God, as
I hold) of an inductive habit of mind; of the habit of looking coolly,
boldly, carefully, at facts; till now, even among the most ignorant
peasantry, the woman who says that she has seen a ghost is likely not
to be complimented on her assertion.&nbsp; But it does not follow that
that woman&rsquo;s grandmother, when she said that she saw a ghost,
was a consciously dishonest person; on the contrary, so complex and
contradictory is human nature, she would have been, probably, a person
of more than average intellect and earnestness; and her instinct of
the invisible and the infinite (which is that which raises man above
the brutes) would have been, because misinformed, the honourable cause
of her error.&nbsp; And thus we may believe of the good hermits, of
whom prodigies are recorded.</p>
<p>As to the truth of the prodigies themselves, there are several ways
of looking at them.</p>
<p>First, we may neither believe nor disbelieve them; but talk of them
as &ldquo;devout fairy tales,&rdquo; religious romances, and allegories;
and so save ourselves the trouble of judging whether they were true.&nbsp;
That is at least an easy and pleasant method; very fashionable in a
careless, unbelieving age like this: but in following it we shall be
somewhat cowardly; for there is hardly any matter a clear judgment on
which is more important just now than these same saints&rsquo; miracles.</p>
<p>Next, we may believe them utterly and all; and that is also an easy
and pleasant method.&nbsp; But if we follow it, we shall be forced to
believe, among other facts, that St. Paphnutius was carried miraculously
across a river, because he was too modest to undress himself and wade;
that St. Helenus rode a savage crocodile across a river, and then commanded
it to die; and that it died accordingly upon the spot; and that St.
Goar, entering the palace of the Archbishop of Tr&ecirc;ves, hung his
cape on a sunbeam, mistaking it for a peg.&nbsp; And many other like
things we shall be forced to believe, with which this book has no concern.</p>
<p>Or, again, we may believe as much as we can, because we should like,
if we could, to believe all.&nbsp; But as we have not&mdash;no man has
as yet&mdash;any criterion by which we can judge how much of these stories
we ought to believe and how much not, which actually happened and which
did not, therefore we shall end (as not only the most earnest and pious,
but the most clear and logical persons, who have taken up this view,
have ended already) by believing all: which is an end not to be desired.</p>
<p>Or we may believe as few as possible of them, because we should like,
if we could, to believe none.&nbsp; And this method, for the reason
aforesaid (namely, that there is no criterion by which we can settle
what to believe and what not), usually ends in believing none at all.</p>
<p>This, of believing none at all, is the last method; and this, I confess
fairly, I am inclined to think is the right one; and that these good
hermits worked no real miracles and saw no real visions whatsoever.</p>
<p>I confess that this is a very serious assertion.&nbsp; For there
is as much evidence in favour of these hermits&rsquo; miracles and visions
as there is, with most men, of the existence of China; and much more
than there, with most men, is of the earth&rsquo;s going round the sun.</p>
<p>But the truth is, that evidence, in most matters of importance, is
worth very little.&nbsp; Very few people decide a question on its facts,
but on their own prejudices as to what they would like to have happened.&nbsp;
Very few people are judges of evidence; not even of their own eyes and
ears.&nbsp; Very few persons, when they see a thing, know what they
have seen, and what not.&nbsp; They tell you quite honestly, not what
they saw, but what they think they ought to have seen, or should like
to have seen.&nbsp; It is a fact too often conveniently forgotten, that
in every human crowd the majority will be more or less bad, or at least
foolish; the slaves of anger, spite, conceit, vanity, sordid hope, and
sordid fear.&nbsp; But let them be as honest and as virtuous as they
may, pleasure, terror, and the desire of seeming to have seen or heard
more than their neighbours, and all about it, make them exaggerate.&nbsp;
If you take apart five honest men, who all stood by and saw the same
man do anything strange, offensive, or even exciting, no two of them
will give you quite the same account of it.&nbsp; If you leave them
together, while excited, an hour before you question them, they will
have compared notes and made up one story, which will contain all their
mistakes combined; and it will require the skill of a practised barrister
to pick the grain of wheat out of the chaff.</p>
<p>Moreover, when people are crowded together under any excitement,
there is nothing which they will not make each other believe.&nbsp;
They will make each other believe in spirit-rapping, table-turning,
the mesmeric fluid, electro-biology; that they saw the lion on Northumberland
House wagging his tail; <a name="citation203"></a><a href="#footnote203">{203}</a>
that witches have been seen riding in the air; that the Jews had poisoned
the wells; that&mdash;but why go further into the sad catalogue of human
absurdities, and the crimes which have followed them?&nbsp; Every one
is ashamed of not seeing what every one else sees, and persuades himself
against his own eye sight for fear of seeming stupid or ill-conditioned;
and therefore in all evidence, the fewer witnesses, the more truth,
because the evidence of ten men is worth more than that of a hundred
together; and the evidence of a thousand men together is worth still
less.</p>
<p>Now, if people are savage and ignorant, diseased and poverty-stricken;
even if they are merely excited and credulous, and quite sure that something
wonderful must happen, then they will be also quite certain that something
wonderful has happened; and their evidence will be worth nothing at
all.</p>
<p>Moreover, suppose that something really wonderful has happened; suppose,
for instance, that some nervous or paralytic person has been suddenly
restored to strength by the command of a saint or of some other remarkable
man.&nbsp; This is quite possible, I may say common; and it is owing
neither to physical nor to so-called spiritual causes, but simply to
the power which a strong mind has over a weak one, to make it exert
itself, and cure itself by its own will, though but for a time.</p>
<p>When this good news comes to be told, and to pass from mouth to mouth,
it ends of quite a different shape from that in which it began.&nbsp;
It has been added to, taken from, twisted in every direction according
to the fancy or the carelessness of each teller, till what really happened
in the first case no one will be able to say; <a name="citation204"></a><a href="#footnote204">{204}</a>
and this is, therefore, what actually happened, in the case of these
reported wonders.&nbsp; Moreover (and this is the most important consideration
of all) for men to be fair judges of what really happens, they must
have somewhat sound minds in somewhat sound bodies; which no man can
have (however honest and virtuous) who gives himself up, as did these
old hermits, to fasting and vigils.&nbsp; That continued sleeplessness
produces delusions, and at last actual madness, every physician knows;
and they know also, as many a poor sailor has known when starving on
a wreck, and many a poor soldier in such a retreat as that of Napoleon
from Moscow, that extreme hunger and thirst produce delusions also,
very similar to (and caused much in the same way as) those produced
by ardent spirits; so that many a wretched creature ere now has been
taken up for drunkenness, who has been simply starving to death.</p>
<p>Whence it follows that these good hermits, by continual fasts and
vigils, must have put themselves (and their histories prove that they
did put themselves) into a state of mental disease, in which their evidence
was worth nothing; a state in which the mind cannot distinguish between
facts and dreams; in which life itself is one dream; in which (as in
the case of madness, or of a feverish child) the brain cannot distinguish
between the objects which are outside it and the imaginations which
are inside it.&nbsp; And it is plain, that the more earnest and pious,
and therefore the more ascetic, one of these good men was, the more
utterly would his brain be in a state of chronic disease.&nbsp; God
forbid that we should scorn them, therefore, or think the worse of them
in any way.&nbsp; They were animated by a truly noble purpose, the resolution
to be good according to their light; they carried out that purpose with
heroical endurance, and they have their reward: but this we must say,
if we be rational people, that on their method of holiness, the more
holy any one of them was, the less trustworthy was his account of any
matter whatsoever; and that the hermit&rsquo;s peculiar temptations
(quite unknown to the hundreds of unmarried persons who lead quiet and
virtuous, because rational and healthy, lives) are to be attributed,
not as they thought, to a d&aelig;mon, but to a more or less unhealthy
nervous system.</p>
<p>It must be remembered, moreover, in justice to these old hermits,
that they did not invent the belief that the air was full of d&aelig;mons.&nbsp;
All the Eastern nations had believed in Genii (Jinns), Fairies (Peris),
and Devas, Divs, or devils.&nbsp; The Devas of the early Hindus were
beneficent beings: to the eyes of the old Persians (in their hatred
of idolatry and polytheism), they appeared evil beings, Divs, or Devils.&nbsp;
And even so the genii and d&aelig;mons of the Roman Empire became, in
the eyes of the early Christians, wicked and cruel spirits.</p>
<p>And they had their reasons, and on the whole sound ones, for so regarding
them.&nbsp; The educated classes had given up any honest and literal
worship of the old gods.&nbsp; They were trying to excuse themselves
for their lingering half belief in them, by turning them into allegories,
powers of nature, metaphysical abstractions, as did Porphyry and Iamblichus,
Plotinus and Proclus, and the rest of the Neo-Platonist school of aristocratic
philosophers and fine ladies: but the lower classes still, in every
region, kept up their own local beliefs and worships, generally of the
most foul and brutal kind.&nbsp; The animal worship of Egypt among the
lower classes was sufficiently detestable in the time of Herodotus.&nbsp;
It had certainly not improved in that of Juvenal and Persius; and was
still less likely to have improved afterwards.&nbsp; This is a subject
so shocking that it can be only hinted at.&nbsp; But as a single instance&mdash;what
wonder if the early hermits of Egypt looked on the crocodile as something
diabolic, after seeing it, for generations untold, petted and worshipped
in many a city, simply because it was the incarnate symbol of brute
strength, cruelty, and cunning?&nbsp; We must remember, also, that earlier
generations (the old Norsemen and Germans just as much as the old Egyptians)
were wont to look on animals as more miraculous than we do; as more
akin, in many cases, to human beings; as guided, not by a mere blind
instinct, but by an intellect which was allied to, and often surpassed
man&rsquo;s intellect.&nbsp; &ldquo;The bear,&rdquo; said the old Norsemen,
&ldquo;had ten men&rsquo;s strength, and eleven men&rsquo;s wit; &ldquo;and
in some such light must the old hermits have looked on the hy&aelig;na,
&ldquo;bellua,&rdquo; the monster <i>par excellence</i>; or on the crocodile,
the hippopotamus, and the poisonous snakes, which have been objects
of terror and adoration in every country where they have been formidable.&nbsp;
Whether the hy&aelig;nas were d&aelig;mons, or were merely sent by the
d&aelig;mons, St. Antony and St. Athanasius do not clearly define, for
they did not know.&nbsp; It was enough for them that the beasts prowled
at night in those desert cities, which were, according to the opinions,
not only of the Easterns, but of the Romans, the special haunt of ghouls,
witches, and all uncanny things.&nbsp; Their fiendish laughter&mdash;which,
when heard even in a modern menagerie, excites and shakes most person&rsquo;s
nerves&mdash;rang through hearts and brains which had no help or comfort,
save in God alone.&nbsp; The beast tore up the dead from their graves;
devoured alike the belated child and the foulest offal; and was in all
things a type and incarnation of that which man ought not to be.&nbsp;
Why should not he, so like the worst of men, have some bond or kindred
with the evil beings who were not men?&nbsp; Why should not the graceful
and deadly cobra, the horrid cerastes, the huge throttling python, and
even more, the loathly puff-adder, undistinguishable from the gravel
among which he lay coiled, till he leaped furiously and unswerving,
as if shot from a bow, upon his prey&mdash;why should not they too be
kindred to that evil power who had been, in the holiest and most ancient
books, personified by the name of the Serpent?&nbsp; Before we have
a right to say that the hermits&rsquo; view of these deadly animals
was not the most rational, as well as the most natural, which they could
possibly have taken up, we must put ourselves in their places; and look
at nature as they had learnt to look at it, not from Scripture and Christianity,
so much as from the immemorial traditions of their heathen ancestors.</p>
<p>If it be argued, that they ought to have been well enough acquainted
with these beasts to be aware of their merely animal nature, the answer
is&mdash;that they were probably not well acquainted with the beasts
of the desert.&nbsp; They had never, perhaps, before their &ldquo;conversion,&rdquo;
left the narrow valley, well tilled and well inhabited, which holds
the Nile.&nbsp; A climb from it into the barren mountains and deserts
east and west was a journey out of the world into chaos, and the region
of the unknown and the horrible, which demanded high courage from the
unarmed and effeminate Egyptian, who knew not what monster he might
meet ere sundown.&nbsp; Moreover, it is very probable that during these
centuries of decadence, in Egypt, as in other parts of the Roman Empire,
&ldquo;the wild beasts of the field had increased&rdquo; on the population,
and were reappearing in the more cultivated grounds.</p>
<p>But these old hermits appear perpetually in another, and a more humane,
if not more human aspect, as the miraculous tamers of savage beasts.&nbsp;
Those who wish to know all which can be alleged in favour of their having
possessed such a power, should read M. de Montalembert&rsquo;s chapter,
&ldquo;Les Moines et la Nature.&rdquo; <a name="citation209"></a><a href="#footnote209">{209}</a>&nbsp;
All that learning and eloquence can say in favour of the theory is said
there; and with a candour which demands from no man full belief of many
beautiful but impossible stories, &ldquo;travesties of historic verity,&rdquo;
which have probably grown up from ever-varying tradition in the course
of ages.&nbsp; M. de Montalembert himself points out a probable explanation
of many of them:&mdash;An ingenious scholar of our times<a name="citation210"></a><a href="#footnote210">{210}</a>
(he says) has pointed out their true and legitimate origin&mdash;at
least in Ancient Gaul.&nbsp; According to him, after the gradual disappearance
of the Gallo-Roman population, the oxen, the horses, the dogs had returned
to the wild state; and it was in the forest that the Breton missionaries
had to seek these animals, to employ them anew for domestic use.&nbsp;
The miracle was, to restore to man the command and the enjoyment of
those creatures, which God had given him as instruments.</p>
<p>This theory is probable enough, and will explain, doubtless, many
stories.&nbsp; It may even explain those of tamed wolves, who may have
been only feral dogs, <i>i.e</i>. dogs run wild.&nbsp; But it will not
explain those in which (in Ireland as well as in Gaul) the stag appears
as obeying the hermit&rsquo;s commands.&nbsp; The twelve huge stags
who come out of the forest to draw the ploughs for St. Leonor and his
monks, or those who drew to his grave the corpse of the Irish hermit
Kellac, or those who came out of the forest to supply the place of St.
Colodoc&rsquo;s cattle, which the seigneur had carried off in revenge
for his having given sanctuary to a hunted deer, must have been wild
from the beginning; and many another tale must remain without any explanation
whatsoever&mdash;save the simplest of all.&nbsp; Neither can any such
theory apply to the marvels vouched for by St. Athanasius, St. Jerome,
and other contemporaries, which &ldquo;show us (to quote M. de Montalembert)
the most ferocious animals at the feet of such men as Antony, Pachomius,
Macarius, and Hilarion, and those who copied them.&nbsp; At every page
one sees wild asses, crocodiles, hippopotami, hy&aelig;nas, and, above
all, lions, transformed into respectful companions and docile servants
of these prodigies of sanctity; and one concludes thence, not that these
beasts had reasonable souls, but that God knew how to glorify those
who devoted themselves to his glory, and thus show how all Nature obeyed
man before he was excluded from Paradise by his disobedience.&rdquo;</p>
<p>This is, on the whole, the cause which the contemporary biographers
assign for these wonders.&nbsp; The hermits were believed to have returned,
by celibacy and penitence, to &ldquo;the life of angels;&rdquo; to that
state of perfect innocence which was attributed to our first parents
in Eden: and therefore of them our Lord&rsquo;s words were true: &ldquo;He
that believeth in me, greater things than these (which I do) shall he
do.&rdquo;</p>
<p>But those who are of a different opinion will seek for different
causes.&nbsp; They will, the more they know of these stories, admire
often their gracefulness, often their pathos, often their deep moral
significance; they will feel the general truth of M. de Montalembert&rsquo;s
words: &ldquo;There is not one of them which does not honour and profit
human nature, and which does not express a victory of weakness over
force, and of good over evil.&rdquo;&nbsp; But if they look on physical
facts as sacred things, as the voice of God revealed in the phenomena
of matter, their first question will be, &ldquo;Are they true?&rdquo;</p>
<p>Some of them must be denied utterly, like that of St. Helenus, riding
and then slaying the crocodile.&nbsp; It did not happen.&nbsp; Abbot
Ammon <a name="citation212a"></a><a href="#footnote212a">{212a}</a>
did not make two dragons guard his cell against robbers.&nbsp; St. Gerasimus
<a name="citation212b"></a><a href="#footnote212b">{212b}</a> did not
set the lion, out of whose foot he had taken a thorn, to guard his ass;
and when the ass was stolen by an Arabian camel-driver, he did not (fancying
that the lion had eaten the ass) make him carry water in the ass&rsquo;s
stead.&nbsp; Neither did the lion, when next he met the thief and the
ass, bring them up, in his own justification, <a name="citation212c"></a><a href="#footnote212c">{212c}</a>
to St. Gerasimus.&nbsp; St. Costinian did not put a pack-saddle on a
bear, and make him carry a great stone.&nbsp; A lioness did not bring
her five blind whelps to a hermit, that he might give them sight. <a name="citation212d"></a><a href="#footnote212d">{212d}</a>&nbsp;
And, though Sulpicius Severus says that he saw it with his own eyes,
<a name="citation212e"></a><a href="#footnote212e">{212e}</a> it is
hard to believe the latter part of the graceful story which he tells&mdash;of
an old hermit whom he found dwelling alone twelve miles from the Nile,
by a well of vast depth.&nbsp; One ox he had, whose whole work was to
raise the water by a wheel.&nbsp; Around him was a garden of herbs,
kept rich and green amid the burning sand, where neither seed nor root
could live.&nbsp; The old man and the ox fed together on the produce
of their common toil; but two miles off there was a single palm-tree,
to which, after supper, the hermit takes his guests.&nbsp; Beneath the
palm they find a lioness; but instead of attacking them, she moves &ldquo;modestly&rdquo;
away at the old man&rsquo;s command, and sits down to wait for her share
of dates.&nbsp; She feeds out of his hand, like a household animal,
and goes her way, leaving her guests trembling, &ldquo;and confessing
how great was the virtue of the hermit&rsquo;s faith, and how great
their own infirmity.&rdquo;</p>
<p>This last story, which one would gladly believe, were it possible,
I have inserted as one of those which hang on the verge of credibility.&nbsp;
In the very next page, Sulpicius Severus tells a story quite credible,
of a she-wolf, which he saw with his own eyes as tame as any dog.&nbsp;
There can be no more reason to doubt that fact than to ascribe it to
a miracle.&nbsp; We may even believe that the wolf, having gnawed to
pieces the palm basket which the good old man was weaving, went off,
knowing that she had done wrong, and after a week came back, begged
pardon like a rational soul, and was caressed, and given a double share
of bread.&nbsp; Many of these stories which tell of the taming of wild
beasts may be true, and yet contain no miracle.&nbsp; They are very
few in number, after all, in proportion to the number of monks; they
are to be counted at most by tens, while the monks are counted by tens
of thousands.&nbsp; And among many great companies of monks, there may
have been one individual, as there is, for instance, in many a country
parish a bee-taker or a horse-tamer, of quiet temper and strong nerve,
and quick and sympathetic intellect, whose power over animals is so
extraordinary, as to be attributed by the superstitious and uneducated
to some hereditary secret, or some fairy gift.&nbsp; Very powerful to
attract wild animals must have been the good hermits&rsquo; habit of
sitting motionless for hours, till (as with St. Guthlac) the swallows
sat and sang upon his knee; and of moving slowly and gently at his work,
till (as with St. Karilef, while he pruned his vines) the robin came
and built in his hood as it hung upon a tree: very powerful his freedom
from anger, and, yet more important, from fear, which always calls out
rage in wild beasts, while a calm and bold front awes them: and most
powerful of all, the kindliness of heart, the love of companionship,
which brought the wild bison to feed by St. Karilef&rsquo;s side as
he prayed upon the lawn; and the hind to nourish St. Giles with her
milk in the jungles of the Bouches du Rh&ocirc;ne.&nbsp; There was no
miracle; save the moral miracle that, in ages of cruelty and slaughter,
these men had learned (surely by the inspiration of God) how&mdash;</p>
<div class="GutenbergBlankLines1"><br /></div>
<p>&ldquo;He prayeth well who loveth well<br />Both man and bird and
beast;<br />He prayeth best who loveth best<br />All things, both great
and small;<br />For the dear God who loveth us,<br />He made and loveth
all.&rdquo;</p>
<div class="GutenbergBlankLines1"><br /></div>
<p>After all, let these old Lives of the Fathers tell their own tale.&nbsp;
By their own merits let them stand or fall; and stand they will in one
sense: for whatsoever else they are not, this they are&mdash;the histories
of good men.&nbsp; Their physical science and their d&aelig;monology
may have been on a par with those of the world around them: but they
possessed what the world did not possess, faith in the utterly good
and self-sacrificing God, and an ideal of virtue and purity such as
had never been seen since the first Whitsuntide.&nbsp; And they set
themselves to realize that ideal with a simplicity, an energy, an endurance,
which were altogether heroic.&nbsp; How far they were right in &ldquo;giving
up the world&rdquo; depends entirely on what the world was then like,
and whether there was any hope of reforming it.&nbsp; It was their opinion
that there was no such hope; and those who know best the facts which
surrounded them, its utter frivolity, its utter viciousness, the deadness
which had fallen on art, science, philosophy, human life, whether family,
social, or political; the prevalence of slavery, in forms altogether
hideous and unmentionable; the insecurity of life and property, whether
from military and fiscal tyranny, or from perpetual inroads of the so-called
&ldquo;Barbarians:&rdquo; those, I say, who know these facts best will
be most inclined to believe that the old hermits were wise in their
generation; that the world was past salvation; that it was not a wise
or humane thing to marry and bring children into the world; that in
such a state of society, an honest and virtuous man could not exist,
and that those who wished to remain honest and virtuous must flee into
the desert, and be alone with God and their fellows.</p>
<p>The question which had to be settled then and there, at that particular
crisis of the human race, was not&mdash;Are certain wonders true or
false? but&mdash;Is man a mere mortal animal, or an immortal soul?&nbsp;
Is his flesh meant to serve his spirit, or his spirit his flesh?&nbsp;
Is pleasure, or virtue, the end and aim of his existence?</p>
<p>The hermits set themselves to answer that question, not by arguing
or writing about it, but by the only way in which any question can be
settled&mdash;by experiment.&nbsp; They resolved to try whether their
immortal souls could not grow better and better, while their mortal
bodies were utterly neglected; to make their flesh serve their spirit;
to make virtue their only end and aim; and utterly to relinquish the
very notion of pleasure.&nbsp; To do this one thing, and nothing else,
they devoted their lives; and they succeeded.&nbsp; From their time
it has been a received opinion, not merely among a few philosophers
or a few Pharisees, but among the lowest, the poorest, the most ignorant,
who have known aught of Christianity, that man is an immortal soul;
that the spirit, and not the flesh, ought to be master and guide; that
virtue is the highest good; and that purity is a virtue, impurity a
sin.&nbsp; These men were, it has been well said, the very fathers of
purity.&nbsp; And if, in that and in other matters, they pushed their
purpose to an extreme&mdash;if, by devoting themselves utterly to it
alone, they suffered, not merely in wideness of mind or in power of
judging evidence, but even in brain, till they became some of them at
times insane from over-wrought nerves&mdash;it is not for us to blame
the soldier for the wounds which have crippled him, or the physician
for the disease which he has caught himself while trying to heal others.&nbsp;
Let us not speak ill of the bridge which carries us over, nor mock at
those who did the work for us as seemed to them best, and perhaps in
the only way in which it could be done in those evil days.&nbsp; As
a matter of fact, through these men&rsquo;s teaching and example we
have learnt what morality, purity, and Christianity we possess; and
if any answer that we have learnt them from the Scriptures, who but
these men preserved the Scriptures to us?&nbsp; Who taught us to look
on them as sacred and inspired?&nbsp; Who taught us to apply them to
our own daily lives, and find comfort and teaching in every age, in
words written ages ago by another race in a foreign land?&nbsp; The
Scriptures were the book, generally the only book, which they read and
meditated, not merely from morn till night, but, as far as fainting
nature would allow, from night to morn again: and their method of interpreting
them (as far as I can discover) differed in nothing from that common
to all Christians now, save that they interpreted literally certain
precepts of our Lord and of St. Paul which we consider to have applied
only to the &ldquo;temporary necessity&rdquo; of a decayed, dying, and
hopeless age such as that in which they lived.&nbsp; And therefore,
because they knew the Scripture well, and learned in it lessons of true
virtue and true philosophy, though unable to save civilization in the
East, they were able at least to save it in the West.&nbsp; The European
hermits, and the monastic communities which they originated, were indeed
a seed of life, not merely to the conquered Roman population of Gaul
or Spain or Britain, but to the heathen and Arian barbarians who conquered
them.&nbsp; Among those fierce and armed savages, the unarmed hermits
stood, strong only by justice, purity, and faith in God, defying the
oppressor, succouring the oppressed, and awing and softening the new
aristocracy of the middle age, which was founded on mere brute force
and pride of race; because the monk took his stand upon mere humanity;
because he told the wild conqueror, Goth or Sueve, Frank or Burgund,
Saxon or Norseman, that all men were equal in the sight of God; because
he told them (to quote Athanasius&rsquo;s own words concerning Antony)
that &ldquo;virtue is not beyond human nature;&rdquo; that the highest
moral excellence was possible to the most low-born and unlettered peasant
whom they trampled under their horses&rsquo; hoofs, if he were only
renewed and sanctified by the Spirit of God.&nbsp; They accepted the
lowest and commonest facts of that peasant&rsquo;s wretched life; they
outdid him in helplessness, loneliness, hunger, dirt, and slavery; and
then said, &ldquo;Among all these I can yet be a man of God, wise, virtuous,
pure, free, and noble in the sight of God, though not in the sight of
C&aelig;sars, counts, and knights.&rdquo;&nbsp; They went on, it is
true, to glorify the means above the end; to consecrate childlessness,
self-torture, dirt, ignorance, as if they were things pleasing to God
and holy in themselves.&nbsp; But in spite of those errors they wrought
throughout Europe a work which, as far as we can judge, could have been
done in no other way; done only by men who gave up all that makes life
worth having for the sake of being good themselves and making others
good.</p>
<div class="GutenbergBlankLines2"><br /><br /></div>
<h2>THE HERMITS OF EUROPE</h2>
<div class="GutenbergBlankLines2"><br /><br /></div>
<p>Most readers will recollect what an important part in the old ballads
and romances is played by the hermit.</p>
<p>He stands in strongest contrast to the knight.&nbsp; He fills up,
as it were, by his gentleness and self-sacrifice, what is wanting in
the manhood of the knight, the slave too often of his own fierceness
and self-assertion.&nbsp; The hermit rebukes him when he sins, heals
him when he is wounded, stays his hand in some mad murderous duel, such
as was too common in days when any two armed horsemen meeting on road
or lawn ran blindly at each other in the mere lust of fighting, as boars
or stags might run.&nbsp; Sometimes he interferes to protect the oppressed
serf; sometimes to rescue the hunted deer which has taken sanctuary
at his feet.&nbsp; Sometimes, again, his influence is that of intellectual
superiority; of worldly experience; of the travelled man who has seen
many lands and many nations.&nbsp; Sometimes, again, that of sympathy;
for he has been a knight himself, and fought and sinned, and drank of
the cup of vanity and vexation of spirit, like the fierce warrior who
kneels at his feet.</p>
<p>All who have read (and all ought to have read) Spenser&rsquo;s Fairy
Queen, must recollect his charming description of the hermit with whom
Prince Arthur leaves Serena and the squire after they have been wounded
by &ldquo;the blatant beast&rdquo; of Slander; when&mdash;</p>
<div class="GutenbergBlankLines1"><br /></div>
<p>&nbsp;&nbsp;&nbsp;&ldquo;Toward night they came unto a plain<br />By
which a little hermitage there lay<br />Far from all neighbourhood,
the which annoy it may.</p>
<p>&ldquo;And nigh thereto a little chapel stood,<br />Which being all
with ivy overspread<br />Decked all the roof, and shadowing the rood,<br />Seemed
like a grove fair branch&egrave;d overhead;<br />Therein the hermit
which his here led<br />In straight observance of religious vow,<br />Was
wont his hours and holy things to bed;<br />And therein he likewise
was praying now,<br />When as these knights arrived, they wist not where
nor how.</p>
<p>&ldquo;They stayed not there, but straightway in did pass:<br />Who
when the hermit present saw in place,<br />From his devotions straight
he troubled was;<br />Which breaking off, he toward them did pace<br />With
staid steps and grave beseeming grace:<br />For well it seemed that
whilom he had been<br />Some goodly person, and of gentle race,<br />That
could his good to all, and well did ween<br />How each to entertain
with courtesy beseen.</p>
<p>* * * * *</p>
<p>&ldquo;He thence them led into his hermitage,<br />Letting their
steeds to graze upon the green:<br />Small was his house, and like a
little cage,<br />For his own term, yet inly neat and clean,<br />Decked
with green boughs, and flowers gay beseen<br />Therein he them full
fair did entertain,<br />Not with such forg&egrave;d shews, as fitter
been<br />For courting fools that courtesies would feign,<br />But with
entire affection and appearance plain.</p>
<p>* * * * *</p>
<p>How be that careful hermit did his best<br />With many kinds of medicines
meet to tame<br />The poisonous humour that did most infest<br />Their
reakling wounds, and every day them duly dressed.</p>
<p>&ldquo;For he right well in leech&rsquo;s craft was seen;<br />And
through the long experience of his days,<br />Which had in many fortunes
toss&egrave;d been,<br />And passed through many perilous assays:<br />He
knew the divers want of mortal ways,<br />And in the minds of men had
great insight;<br />Which with sage counsel, when they went astray,<br />He
could inform and them reduce aright;<br />And all the passions heal
which wound the weaker sprite.</p>
<p>&ldquo;For whilome he had been a doughty knight,<br />As any one
that liv&egrave;d in his days,<br />And prov&egrave;d oft in many a
perilous fight,<br />In which he grace and glory won always,<br />And
in all battles bore away the bays:<br />But being now attached with
timely age,<br />And weary of this world&rsquo;s unquiet ways,<br />He
took himself unto this hermitage,<br />In which he lived alone like
careless bird in cage.&rdquo;</p>
<div class="GutenbergBlankLines1"><br /></div>
<p>This picture is not poetry alone: it is history.&nbsp; Such men actually
lived, and such work they actually did, from the southernmost point
of Italy to the northernmost point of Scotland, during centuries in
which there was no one else to do the work.&nbsp; The regular clergy
could not have done it.&nbsp; Bishops and priests were entangled in
the affairs of this world, striving to be statesmen, striving to be
landowners, striving to pass Church lands on from father to son, and
to establish themselves as an hereditary caste of priests.&nbsp; The
chaplain or house-priest who was to be found in every nobleman&rsquo;s,
almost every knight&rsquo;s castle, was apt to become a mere upper servant,
who said mass every morning in return for the good cheer which he got
every evening, and fetched and carried at the bidding of his master
and mistress.&nbsp; But the hermit who dwelt alone in the forest glen,
occupied, like an old Hebrew prophet, a superior and an independent
position.&nbsp; He needed nought from any man save the scrap of land
which the lord was only too glad to allow him in return for his counsels
and his prayers.&nbsp; And to him, as to a mysterious and supernatural
personage, the lord went privately for advice in his quarrels with the
neighbouring barons, or with his own kin.&nbsp; To him the lady took
her children when they were sick, to be healed, as she fancied, by his
prayers and blessings; or poured into his ears a hundred secret sorrows
and anxieties which she dare not tell to her fierce lord, who hunted
and fought the livelong day, and drank too much liquor every night.</p>
<p>This class of men sprang up rapidly, by natural causes, and yet by
a Divine necessity, as soon as the Western Empire was conquered by the
German tribes; and those two young officers whom we saw turning monks
at Tr&ecirc;ves, in the time of St. Augustine, may, if they lived to
be old men, have given sage counsel again and again to fierce German
knights and kinglets, who had dispossessed the rich and effeminate landowners
of their estates, and sold them, their wives, and children, in gangs
by the side of their own slaves.&nbsp; Only the Roman who had turned
monk would probably escape that fearful ruin; and he would remain behind,
while the rest of his race was enslaved or swept away, as a seed of
Christianity and of civilization, destined to grow and spread, and bring
the wild conquerors in due time into the kingdom of God.</p>
<p>For the first century or two after the invasion of the barbarians,
the names of the hermits and saints are almost exclusively Latin.&nbsp;
Their biographies represent them in almost every case as born of noble
Roman parents.&nbsp; As time goes on, German names appear, and at last
entirely supersede the Latin ones; showing that the conquering race
had learned from the conquered to become hermits and monks like them.</p>
<div class="GutenbergBlankLines2"><br /><br /></div>
<h2>ST. SEVERINUS, THE APOSTLE OF NORICUM</h2>
<div class="GutenbergBlankLines2"><br /><br /></div>
<p>Of all these saintly civilizers, St. Severinus of Vienna is perhaps
the most interesting, and his story the most historically instructive.
<a name="citation224"></a><a href="#footnote224">{224}</a></p>
<p>A common time, the middle of the fifth century, the province of Noricum
(Austria, as we should now call it) was the very highway of invading
barbarians, the centre of the human Maelstrom in which Huns, Alemanni,
Rugi, and a dozen wild tribes more, wrestled up and down and round the
starving and beleaguered towns of what had once been a happy and fertile
province, each tribe striving to trample the other under foot, and to
march southward over their corpses to plunder what was still left of
the already plundered wealth of Italy and Rome.&nbsp; The difference
of race, in tongue, and in manners, between the conquered and their
conquerors, was made more painful by difference in creed.&nbsp; The
conquering Germans and Huns were either Arians or heathens.&nbsp; The
conquered race (though probably of very mixed blood), who called themselves
Romans, because they spoke Latin and lived under the Roman law, were
orthodox Catholics; and the miseries of religious persecution were too
often added to the usual miseries of invasion.</p>
<p>It was about the year 455-60.&nbsp; Attila, the great King of the
Huns, who called himself&mdash;and who was&mdash;&ldquo;the Scourge
of God,&rdquo; was just dead.&nbsp; His empire had broken up.&nbsp;
The whole centre of Europe was in a state of anarchy and war; and the
hapless Romans along the Danube were in the last extremity of terror,
not knowing by what fresh invader their crops would be swept off up
to the very gates of the walled towers which were their only defence:
when there appeared among them, coming out of the East, a man of God.</p>
<p>Who he was, he would not tell.&nbsp; His speech showed him to be
an African Roman&mdash;a fellow-countryman of St. Augustine&mdash;probably
from the neighbourhood of Carthage.&nbsp; He had certainly at one time
gone to some desert in the East, zealous to learn &ldquo;the more perfect
life.&rdquo;&nbsp; Severinus, he said, was his name; a name which indicated
high rank, as did the manners and the scholarship of him who bore it.&nbsp;
But more than his name he would not tell.&nbsp; &ldquo;If you take me
for a runaway slave,&rdquo; he said, smiling, &ldquo;get ready money
to redeem me with when my master demands me back.&rdquo;&nbsp; For he
believed that they would have need of him; that God had sent him into
that land that he might be of use to its wretched people.&nbsp; And
certainly he could have come into the neighbourhood of Vienna at that
moment for no other purpose than to do good, unless he came to deal
in slaves.</p>
<p>He settled first at a town called by his biographer Casturis; and,
lodging with the warden of the church, lived quietly the hermit life.&nbsp;
Meanwhile the German tribes were prowling round the town; and Severinus,
going one day into the church, began to warn the priests and clergy
and all the people that a destruction was coming on them which they
could only avert by prayer and fasting and the works of mercy.&nbsp;
They laughed him to scorn, confiding in their lofty Roman walls, which
the invaders&mdash;wild horsemen, who had no military engines&mdash;were
unable either to scale or batter down.&nbsp; Severinus left the town
at once, prophesying, it was said, the very day and hour of its fall.&nbsp;
He went on to the next town, which was then closely garrisoned by a
barbarian force, and repeated his warning there: but while the people
were listening to him, there came an old man to the gate, and told them
how Casturis had been already sacked, as the man of God had foretold;
and, going into the church, threw himself at the feet of St. Severinus,
and said that he had been saved by his merits from being destroyed with
his fellow-townsmen.</p>
<p>Then the dwellers in the town hearkened to the man of God, and gave
themselves up to fasting and almsgiving and prayer for three whole days.</p>
<p>And on the third day, when the solemnity of the evening sacrifice
was fulfilled, a sudden earthquake happened, and the barbarians, seized
with panic fear, and probably hating and dreading&mdash;like all those
wild tribes&mdash;confinement between four stone walls instead of the
free open life of the tent and the stockade, forced the Romans to open
their gates to them, rushed out into the night, and in their madness
slew each other.</p>
<p>In those days a famine fell upon the people of Vienna; and they,
as their sole remedy, thought good to send for the man of God from the
neighbouring town.&nbsp; He went, and preached to them, too, repentance
and almsgiving.&nbsp; The rich, it seems, had hidden up their stores
of corn, and left the poor to starve.&nbsp; At least St. Severinus discovered
(by Divine revelation, it was supposed), that a widow named Procula
had done as much.&nbsp; He called her out into the midst of the people,
and asked her why she, a noble woman and free-born, had made herself
a slave to avarice, which is idolatry.&nbsp; If she would not give her
corn to Christ&rsquo;s poor, let her throw it into the Danube to feed
the fish, for any gain from it she would not have.&nbsp; Procula was
abashed, and served out her hoards thereupon willingly to the poor;
and a little while afterwards, to the astonishment of all, vessels came
down the Danube, laden with every kind of merchandise.&nbsp; They had
been frozen up for many days near Passau, in the thick ice of the river
Enns: but the prayers of God&rsquo;s servant (so men believed) had opened
the ice-gates, and let them down the stream before the usual time.</p>
<p>Then the wild German horsemen swept around the walls, and carried
off human beings and cattle, as many as they could find.&nbsp; Severinus,
like some old Hebrew prophet, did not shrink from advising hard blows,
where hard blows could avail.&nbsp; Mamertinus, the tribune, or officer
in command, told him that he had so few soldiers, and those so ill-armed,
that he dare not face the enemy.&nbsp; Severinus answered, that they
should get weapons from the barbarians themselves; the Lord would fight
for them, and they should hold their peace: only if they took any captives
they should bring them safe to him.&nbsp; At the second milestone from
the city they came upon the plunderers, who fled at once, leaving their
arms behind.&nbsp; Thus was the prophecy of the man of God fulfilled.&nbsp;
The Romans brought the captives back to him unharmed.&nbsp; He loosed
their bonds, gave them food and drink, and let them go.&nbsp; But they
were to tell their comrades that, if ever they came near that spot again,
celestial vengeance would fall on them, for the God of the Christians
fought from heaven in his servants&rsquo; cause.</p>
<p>So the barbarians trembled, and went away.&nbsp; And the fear of
St. Severinus fell on all the Goths, heretic Arians though they were;
and on the Rugii, who held the north bank of the Danube in those evil
days.&nbsp; St. Severinus, meanwhile, went out of Vienna, and built
himself a cell at a place called &ldquo;At the Vineyards.&rdquo;&nbsp;
But some benevolent impulse&mdash;Divine revelation, his biographer
calls it&mdash;prompted him to return, and build himself a cell on a
hill close to Vienna, round which other cells soon grew up, tenanted
by his disciples.&nbsp; &ldquo;There,&rdquo; says his biographer, &ldquo;he
longed to escape the crowds of men who were wont to come to him, and
cling closer to God in continual prayer: but the more he longed to dwell
in solitude, the more often he was warned by revelations not to deny
his presence to the afflicted people.&rdquo;&nbsp; He fasted continually;
he went barefoot even in the midst of winter, which was so severe, the
story continues, in those days around Vienna, that wagons crossed the
Danube on the solid ice: and yet, instead of being puffed-up by his
own virtues, he set an example of humility to all, and bade them with
tears to pray for him, that the Saviour&rsquo;s gifts to him might not
heap condemnation on his head.</p>
<p>Over the wild Rugii St. Severinus seems to have acquired unbounded
influence.&nbsp; Their king, Flaccitheus, used to pour out his sorrows
to him, and tell him how the princes of the Goths would surely slay
him; for when he had asked leave of him to pass on into Italy, he would
not let him go.&nbsp; But St. Severinus prophesied to him that the Goths
would do him no harm.&nbsp; Only one warning he must take: &ldquo;Let
it not grieve him to ask peace even for the least of men.&rdquo;</p>
<p>The friendship which had thus begun between the barbarian king and
the cultivated saint was carried on by his son Feva: but his &ldquo;deadly
and noxious wife&rdquo; Gisa, who appears to have been a fierce Arian,
always, says his biographer, kept him back from clemency.&nbsp; One
story of Gisa&rsquo;s misdeeds is so characteristic both of the manners
of the time and of the style in which the original biography is written,
that I shall take leave to insert it at length.</p>
<p>&ldquo;The King Feletheus (who is also Feva), the son of the aforementioned
Flaccitheus, following his father&rsquo;s devotion, began, at the commencement
of his reign, often to visit the holy man.&nbsp; His deadly and noxious
wife, named Gisa, always kept him back from the remedies of clemency.&nbsp;
For she, among the other plague-spots of her iniquity, even tried to
have certain Catholics re-baptized: but when her husband did not consent,
on account of his reverence for St. Severinus, she gave up immediately
her sacrilegious intention, burdening the Romans, nevertheless, with
hard conditions, and commanding some of them to be exiled to the Danube.&nbsp;
For when one day, she, having come to the village next to Vienna, had
ordered some of them to be sent over the Danube, and condemned to the
most menial offices of slavery, the man of God sent to her, and begged
that they might be let go.&nbsp; But she, blazing up in a flame of fury,
ordered the harshest of answers to be returned.&nbsp; &lsquo;I pray
thee,&rsquo; she said, &lsquo;servant of God, hiding there within thy
cell, allow us to settle what we choose about our own slaves.&rsquo;&nbsp;
But the man of God hearing this, &lsquo;I trust,&rsquo; he said, &lsquo;in
my Lord Jesus Christ, that she will be forced by necessity to fulfil
that which in her wicked will she has despised.&rsquo;&nbsp; And forthwith
a swift rebuke followed, and brought low the soul of the arrogant woman.&nbsp;
For she had confined in close custody certain barbarian goldsmiths,
that they might make regal ornaments.&nbsp; To them the son of the aforesaid
king, Frederic by name, still a little boy, had gone in, in childish
levity, on the very day on which the queen had despised the servant
of God.&nbsp; The goldsmiths put a sword to the child&rsquo;s breast,
saying, that if any one attempted to enter without giving them an oath
that they should be protected, he should die; and that they would slay
the king&rsquo;s child first, and themselves afterwards, seeing that
they had no hope of life left, being worn out with long prison.&nbsp;
When she heard that, the cruel and impious queen, rending her garments
for grief, cried out, &lsquo;O servant of God, Severinus, are the injuries
which I did thee thus avenged?&nbsp; Hast thou obtained by the earnest
prayer thou hast poured out this punishment for my contempt, that thou
shouldst avenge it on my own flesh and blood?&rsquo;&nbsp; Then, running
up and down with manifold contrition and miserable lamentation, she
confessed that for the act of contempt which she had committed against
the servant of God she was struck by the vengeance of the present blow;
and forthwith she sent knights to ask for forgiveness, and sent across
the river the Romans his prayers for whom she had despised.&nbsp; The
goldsmiths, having received immediately a promise of safety, and giving
up the child, were in like manner let go.</p>
<p>&ldquo;The most reverend Severinus, when he heard this, gave boundless
thanks to the Creator, who sometimes puts off the prayers of suppliants
for this end, that as faith, hope, and charity grow, while lesser things
are sought, He may concede greater things.&nbsp; Lastly, this did the
mercy of the Omnipotent Saviour work, that while it brought to slavery
a woman free, but cruel overmuch, she was forced to restore to liberty
those who were enslaved.&nbsp; This having been marvellously gained,
the queen hastened with her husband to the servant of God, and showed
him her son, who, she confessed, had been freed from the verge of death
by his prayers, and promised that she would never go against his commands.&rdquo;</p>
<p>To this period of Severinus&rsquo;s life belongs the once famous
story of his interview with Odoacer, the first barbarian king of Italy,
and brother of the great Onulph or Wolf, who was the founder of the
family of the Guelphs, Counts of Altorf, and the direct ancestors of
Victoria, Queen of England.&nbsp; Their father was &AElig;decon, secretary
at one time of Attila, and chief of the little tribe of Turklings, who,
though German, had clung faithfully to Attila&rsquo;s sons, and came
to ruin at the great battle of Netad, when the empire of the Huns broke
up once and for ever.&nbsp; Then Odoacer and his brother started over
the Alps to seek their fortunes in Italy, and take service, after the
fashion of young German adventurers, with the Romans; and they came
to St. Severinus&rsquo;s cell, and went in, heathens as they probably
were, to ask a blessing of the holy man; and Odoacer had to stoop and
to stand stooping, so huge he was.&nbsp; The saint saw that he was no
common lad, and said, &ldquo;Go to Italy, clothed though thou be in
ragged sheepskins: thou shalt soon give greater gifts to thy friends.&rdquo;&nbsp;
So Odoacer went on into Italy, deposed the last of the C&aelig;sars,
a paltry boy, Romulus Augustulus by name, and found himself, to his
own astonishment, and that of all the world, the first German king of
Italy; and, when he was at the height of his power, he remembered the
prophecy of Severinus, and sent to him, offering him any boon he chose
to ask.&nbsp; But all that the saint asked was, that he should forgive
some Romans whom he had banished.&nbsp; St. Severinus meanwhile foresaw
that Odoacer&rsquo;s kingdom would not last, as he seems to have foreseen
many things, by no miraculous revelation, but simply as a far-sighted
man of the world.&nbsp; For when certain German knights were boasting
before him of the power and glory of Odoacer, he said that it would
last some thirteen, or at most fourteen years; and the prophecy (so
all men said in those days) came exactly true.</p>
<p>There is no need to follow the details of St. Severinus&rsquo;s labours
through some five-and-twenty years of perpetual self-sacrifice&mdash;and,
as far as this world was concerned, perpetual disaster.&nbsp; Eugippius&rsquo;s
chapters are little save a catalogue of towns sacked one after the other,
from Passau to Vienna, till the miserable survivors of the war seemed
to have concentrated themselves under St. Severinus&rsquo;s guardianship
in the latter city.&nbsp; We find, too, tales of famine, of locust-swarms,
of little victories over the barbarians, which do not arrest wholesale
defeat: but we find through all St. Severinus labouring like a true
man of God, conciliating the invading chiefs, redeeming captives, procuring
for the cities which were still standing supplies of clothes for the
fugitives, persuading the husbandmen, seemingly through large districts,
to give even in time of dearth a tithe of their produce to the poor;&mdash;a
tale of noble work which one regrets to see defaced by silly little
prodigies, more important seemingly in the eyes of the monk Eugippius
than the great events which were passing round him.&nbsp; But this is
a fault too common with monk chroniclers.&nbsp; The only historians
of the early middle age, they have left us a miserably imperfect record
of it, because they were looking always rather for the preternatural
than for the natural.&nbsp; Many of the saints&rsquo; lives, as they
have come down to us, are mere catalogues of wonders which never happened,
from among which the antiquary must pick, out of passing hints and obscure
allusions, the really important facts of the time,&mdash;changes political
and social, geography, physical history, the manners, speech, and look
of nations now extinct, and even the characters and passions of the
actors in the story.&nbsp; How much can be found among such a list of
wonders, by an antiquary who has not merely learning but intellectual
insight, is proved by the admirable notes which Dr. Reeves has appended
to Adamnan&rsquo;s life of St. Columba: but one feels, while studying
his work, that, had Adamnan thought more of facts and less of prodigies,
he might have saved Dr. Reeves the greater part of his labour, and preserved
to us a mass of knowledge now lost for ever.</p>
<p>And so with Eugippius&rsquo;s life of St. Severinus.&nbsp; The reader
finds how the man who had secretly celebrated a heathen sacrifice was
discovered by St. Severinus, because, while the tapers of the rest of
the congregation were lighted miraculously from heaven, his taper alone
would not light; and passes on impatiently, with regret that the biographer
omits to mention what the heathen sacrifice was like.&nbsp; He reads
how the Danube dared not rise above the mark of the cross which St.
Severinus had cut upon the posts of a timber chapel; how a poor man,
going out to drive the locusts off his little patch of corn instead
of staying in the church all day to pray, found the next morning that
his crop alone had been eaten, while all the fields around remained
untouched.&nbsp; Even the well-known story, which has a certain awfulness
about it, how St. Severinus watched all night by the bier of the dead
priest Silvinus, and ere the morning dawned bade him in the name of
God speak to his brethren; and how the dead man opened his eyes, and
Severinus asked him whether he wished to return to life, and he answered
complainingly, &ldquo;Keep me no longer here; nor cheat me of that perpetual
rest which I had already found,&rdquo; and so, closing his eyes once
more, was still for ever:&mdash;even such a story as this, were it true,
would be of little value in comparison with the wisdom, faith, charity,
sympathy, industry, utter self-sacrifice, which formed the true greatness
of such a man as Severinus.</p>
<p>At last the noble life wore itself out.&nbsp; For two years Severinus
had foretold that his end was near; and foretold, too, that the people
for whom he had spent himself should go forth in safety, as Israel out
of Egypt, and find a refuge in some other Roman province, leaving behind
them so utter a solitude, that the barbarians, in their search for the
hidden treasures of the civilization which they had exterminated, should
dig up the very graves of the dead.&nbsp; Only, when the Lord willed
that people to deliver them, they must carry away his bones with them,
as the children of Israel carried the bones of Joseph.</p>
<p>Then Severinus sent for Feva, the Rugian king, and Gisa, his cruel
wife; and when he had warned them how they must render an account to
God for the people committed to their charge, he stretched his hand
out to the bosom of the king.&nbsp; &ldquo;Gisa,&rdquo; he asked, &ldquo;dost
thou love most the soul within that breast, or gold and silver?&rdquo;&nbsp;
She answered that she loved her husband above all.&nbsp; &ldquo;Cease
then,&rdquo; he said, &ldquo;to oppress the innocent: lest their affliction
be the ruin of your power.&rdquo;</p>
<p>Severinus&rsquo; presage was strangely fulfilled.&nbsp; Feva had
handed over the city of Vienna to his brother Frederic,&mdash;&ldquo;poor
and impious,&rdquo; says Eugippius.&nbsp; Severinus, who knew him well,
sent for him, and warned him that he himself was going to the Lord;
and that if, after his death, Frederic dared touch aught of the substance
of the poor and the captive, the wrath of God would fall on him.&nbsp;
In vain the barbarian pretended indignant innocence; Severinus sent
him away with fresh warnings.</p>
<p>&ldquo;Then on the nones of January he was smitten slightly with
a pain in the side.&nbsp; And when that had continued for three days,
at midnight he bade the brethren come to him.&rdquo;&nbsp; He renewed
his talk about the coming emigration, and entreated again that his bones
might not be left behind; and having bidden all in turn come near and
kiss him, and having received the sacrament of communion, he forbade
them to weep for him, and commanded them to sing a psalm.&nbsp; They
hesitated, weeping.&nbsp; He himself gave out the psalm, &ldquo;Praise
the Lord in his saints, and let all that hath breath praise the Lord;&rdquo;
and so went to rest in the Lord.</p>
<p>No sooner was he dead than Frederic seized on the garments kept in
the monastery for the use of the poor, and even commanded his men to
carry off the vessels of the altar.&nbsp; Then followed a scene characteristic
of the time.&nbsp; The steward sent to do the deed shrank from the crime
of sacrilege.&nbsp; A knight, Anicianus by name, went in his stead,
and took the vessels of the altar.&nbsp; But his conscience was too
strong for him.&nbsp; Trembling and delirium fell on him, and he fled
away to a lonely island, and became a hermit there.&nbsp; Frederic,
impenitent, swept away all in the monastery, leaving nought but the
bare walls, &ldquo;which he could not carry over the Danube.&rdquo;&nbsp;
But on him, too, vengeance fell.&nbsp; Within a month he was slain by
his own nephew.&nbsp; Then Odoacer attacked the Rugii, and carried off
Feva and Gisa captive to Rome.&nbsp; And then the long-promised emigration
came.&nbsp; Odoacer, whether from mere policy (for he was trying to
establish a half-Roman kingdom in Italy), or for love of St. Severinus
himself, sent his brother Onulf to fetch away into Italy the miserable
remnant of the Danubian provincials, to be distributed among the wasted
and unpeopled farms of Italy.&nbsp; And with them went forth the corpse
of St. Severinus, undecayed, though he had been six years dead, and
giving forth exceeding fragrance, though (says Eugippius) no embalmer&rsquo;s
hand had touched it.&nbsp; In a coffin, which had been long prepared
for it, it was laid on a wagon, and went over the Alps into Italy, working
(according to Eugippius) the usual miracles on the way, till it found
a resting-place near Naples, in that very villa of Lucullus at Misenum,
to which Odoacer had sent the last Emperor of Rome to dream his ignoble
life away in helpless luxury.</p>
<p>So ends this tragic story.&nbsp; Of its substantial truth there can
be no doubt.&nbsp; The miracles recorded in it are fewer and less strange
than those of the average legends&mdash;as is usually the case when
an eye-witness writes.&nbsp; And that Eugippius was an eye-witness of
much which he tells, no one accustomed to judge of the authenticity
of documents can doubt, if he studies the tale as it stands in Pez.
<a name="citation238"></a><a href="#footnote238">{238}</a>&nbsp; As
he studies, too, he will perhaps wish with me that some great dramatist
may hereafter take Eugippius&rsquo;s quaint and rough legend, and shape
it into immortal verse.&nbsp; For tragic, in the very nighest sense,
the story is throughout.&nbsp; M. Ozanam has well said of that death-bed
scene between the saint and the barbarian king and queen&mdash;&ldquo;The
history of invasions has many a pathetic scene: but I know none more
instructive than the dying agony of that old Roman expiring between
two barbarians, and less touched with the ruin of the empire than with
the peril of their souls.&rdquo;&nbsp; But even more instructive, and
more tragic also, is the strange coincidence that the wonder-working
corpse of the starved and barefooted hermit should rest beside the last
Emperor of Rome.&nbsp; It is the symbol of a new era.&nbsp; The kings
of this world have been judged and cast out.&nbsp; The empire of the
flesh is to perish, and the empire of the spirit to conquer thenceforth
for evermore.</p>
<p>But if St. Severinus&rsquo;s labours in Austria were in vain, there
were other hermits, in Gaul and elsewhere, whose work endured and prospered,
and developed to a size of which they had never dreamed.&nbsp; The stories
of these good men may be read at length in the Bollandists and Surius:
in a more accessible and more graceful form in M. de Montalembert&rsquo;s
charming pages.&nbsp; I can only sketch, in a few words, the history
of a few of the more famous.&nbsp; Pushing continually northward and
westward from the shores of the Mediterranean, fresh hermits settled
in the mountains and forests, collected disciples round them, and founded
monasteries, which, during the sanguinary and savage era of the Merovingian
kings, were the only retreats for learning, piety, and civilization.&nbsp;
St. Martin (the young soldier who may be seen in old pictures cutting
his cloak in two with a sword, to share it with a beggar) left, after
twenty campaigns, the army into which he had been enrolled against his
will, a conscript of fifteen years old, to become a hermit, monk, and
missionary.&nbsp; In the desert isle of Gallinaria, near Genoa, he lived
on roots, to train himself for the monastic life; and then went north-west,
to Poitiers, to found Ligug&eacute; (said to be the most ancient monastery
in France), to become Bishop of Tours, and to overthrow throughout his
diocese, often at the risk of his life, the sacred oaks and Druid stones
of the Gauls, and the temples and idols of the Romans.&nbsp; But he&mdash;like
many more&mdash;longed for the peace of the hermit&rsquo;s cell; and
near Tours, between the river Loire and lofty cliffs, he hid himself
in a hut of branches, while his eighty disciples dwelt in caves of the
rocks above, clothed only in skins of camels.&nbsp; He died in A.D.
397, at the age of eighty-one, leaving behind him, not merely that famous
monastery of Marmontier (Martini Monasterium), which endured till the
Revolution of 1793, but, what is infinitely more to his glory, his solemn
and indignant protest against the first persecution by the Catholic
Church&mdash;the torture and execution of those unhappy Priscillianist
fanatics, whom the Spanish Bishops (the spiritual forefathers of the
Inquisition) had condemned in the name of the God of love.&nbsp; Martin
wept over the fate of the Priscillianists.&nbsp; Happily he was no prophet,
or his head would have become (like Jeremiah&rsquo;s) a fount of tears,
could he have foreseen that the isolated atrocity of those Spanish Bishops
would have become the example and the rule, legalized and formulized
and commanded by Pope after Pope, for every country in Christendom.</p>
<p>Sulpicius Severus, again (whose Lives of the Desert Fathers I have
already quoted), carried the example of these fathers into his own estates
in Aquitaine.&nbsp; Selling his lands, he dwelt among his now manumitted
slaves, sleeping on straw, and feeding on the coarsest bread and herbs;
till the hapless neophytes found that life was not so easily sustained
in France as in Egypt; and complained to him that it was in vain to
try &ldquo;to make them live like angels, when they were only Gauls.&rdquo;</p>
<p>Another centre of piety and civilization was the rocky isle of Lerins,
off the port of Toulon.&nbsp; Covered with the ruins of an ancient Roman
city, and swarming with serpents, it was colonized again, in A.D. 410,
by a young man of rank named Honoratus, who gathered round him a crowd
of disciples, converted the desert isle into a garden of flowers and
herbs, and made the sea-girt sanctuary of Lerins one of the most important
spots of the then world.</p>
<p>&ldquo;The West,&rdquo; says M. de Montalembert, &ldquo;had thenceforth
nothing to envy the East; and soon that retreat, destined by its founder
to renew on the shores of Provence the austerities of the Thebaid, became
a celebrated school of Christian theology and philosophy, a citadel
inaccessible to the waves of the barbarian invasion, an asylum for the
letters and sciences which were fleeing from Italy, then overrun by
the Goths; and, lastly, a nursery of bishops and saints, who spread
through Gaul the knowledge of the Gospel and the glory of Lerins.&nbsp;
We shall soon see the rays of his light flash even into Ireland and
England, by the blessed hands of Patrick and Augustine.&rdquo;</p>
<p>In the year 425, Romanus, a young monk from the neighbourhood of
Lyons, had gone up into the forests of the Jura, carrying with him the
&ldquo;Lives of the Hermits,&rdquo; and a few seeds and tools; and had
settled beneath an enormous pine; shut out from mankind by precipices,
torrents, and the tangled trunks of prim&aelig;val trees, which had
fallen and rotted on each other age after age.&nbsp; His brother Lupicinus
joined him; then crowds of disciples; then his sister, and a multitude
of women.&nbsp; The forests were cleared, the slopes planted; a manufacture
of box-wood articles&mdash;chairs among the rest&mdash;was begun; and
within the next fifty years the Abbey of Condat, or St. Claude, as it
was afterwards called, had become, not merely an agricultural colony,
or even merely a minster for the perpetual worship of God, but the first
school of that part of Gaul; in which the works of Greek as well as
Latin orators were taught, not only to the young monks, but to young
laymen likewise.</p>
<p>Meanwhile the volcanic peaks of the Auvergne were hiding from their
Arian invaders the ruined gentry of Central France.&nbsp; Effeminate
and luxurious slave-holders, as they are painted by Sidonius Appolineris,
bishop of Clermont, in that same Auvergne, nothing was left for them
when their wealth was gone but to become monks: and monks they became.&nbsp;
The lava grottoes held hermits, who saw visions and d&aelig;mons, as
St. Antony had seen them in Egypt; while near Tr&ecirc;ves, on the Moselle,
a young hermit named Wolflaich tried to imitate St. Simeon Stylites&rsquo;
penance on the pillar; till his bishop, foreseeing that in that severe
climate he would only kill himself, wheedled him away from his station,
pulled down the pillar in his absence, and bade him be a wiser man.&nbsp;
Another figure, and a more interesting one, is the famous St. Goar;
a Gaul, seemingly (from the recorded names of his parents) of noble
Roman blood, who took his station on the Rhine, under the cliffs of
that Lurlei so famous in legend and ballad as haunted by some fair fiend,
whose treacherous song lured the boatmen into the whirlpool at their
foot.&nbsp; To rescue the shipwrecked boatmen, to lodge, feed, and if
need be clothe, the travellers along the Rhine bank, was St. Goar&rsquo;s
especial work; and Wandelbert, the monk of Prum, in the Eifel, who wrote
his life at considerable length, tells us how St. Goar was accused to
the Archbishop of Tr&ecirc;ves as a hypocrite and a glutton, because
he ate freely with his guests; and how his calumniators took him through
the forest to Tr&ecirc;ves; and how he performed divers miracles, both
on the road and in the palace of the Archbishop, notably the famous
one of hanging his cape upon a sunbeam, mistaking it for a peg.&nbsp;
And other miracles of his there are, some of them not altogether edifying:
but no reader is bound to believe them, as Wandelbert is evidently writing
in the interests of the Abbey of Prum as against those of the Prince-Bishops
of Tr&ecirc;ves; and with a monk&rsquo;s or regular&rsquo;s usual jealousy
of the secular or parochial clergy and their bishops.</p>
<p>A more important personage than any of these is the famous St. Benedict,
father of the Benedictine order, and &ldquo;father of all monks,&rdquo;
as he was afterwards called, who, beginning himself as a hermit, caused
the hermit life to fall, not into disrepute, but into comparative disuse;
while the c&oelig;nobitic life&mdash;that is, life, not in separate
cells, but in corporate bodies, with common property, and under one
common rule&mdash;was accepted as the general form of the religious
life in the West.&nbsp; As the author of this organization, and of the
Benedictine order, to whose learning, as well as to whose piety, the
world has owed so much, his life belongs rather to a history of the
monastic orders than to that of the early hermits.&nbsp; But it must
be always remembered that it was as a hermit that his genius was trained;
that in solitude he conceived his vast plans; in solitude he elaborated
the really wise and noble rules of his, which he afterwards carried
out as far as he could during his lifetime in the busy world; and which
endured for centuries, a solid piece of practical good work.&nbsp; For
the existence of monks was an admitted fact; even an admitted necessity:
St. Benedict&rsquo;s work was to tell them, if they chose to be monks,
what sort of persons they ought to be, and how they ought to live, in
order to fulfil their own ideal.&nbsp; In the solitude of the hills
of Subiaco, above the ruined palace of Nero, above, too, the town of
Nurscia, of whose lords he was the last remaining scion, he fled to
the mountain grotto, to live the outward life of a wild beast, and,
as he conceived, the inward life of an angel.&nbsp; How he founded twelve
monasteries; how he fled with some of his younger disciples, to withdraw
them from the disgusting persecutions and temptations of the neighbouring
secular clergy; how he settled himself on the still famous Monte Cassino,
which looks down upon the Gulf of Gaeta, and founded there the &ldquo;Archi-Monasterium
of Europe,&rdquo; whose abbot was in due time first premier baron of
the kingdom of Naples,&mdash;which counted among its dependencies <a name="citation245"></a><a href="#footnote245">{245}</a>
four bishoprics, two principalities, twenty earldoms, two hundred and
fifty castles, four hundred and forty towns or villages, three hundred
and thirty-six manors, twenty-three seaports, three isles, two hundred
mills, three hundred territories, sixteen hundred and sixty-two churches,
and at the end of the sixteenth century an annual revenue of 1,500,000
ducats,&mdash;are matters which hardly belong to this volume, which
deals merely with the lives of hermits.</p>
<div class="GutenbergBlankLines2"><br /><br /></div>
<h2>THE CELTIC HERMITS</h2>
<div class="GutenbergBlankLines2"><br /><br /></div>
<p>It is not necessary to enter into the vexed question whether any
Christianity ever existed in these islands of an earlier and purer type
than that which was professed and practised by the saintly disciples
of St. Antony.&nbsp; It is at least certain that the earliest historic
figures which emerge from the haze of barbarous antiquity in both the
Britains and in Ireland, are those of hermits, who, in celibacy and
poverty, gather round them disciples, found a convent, convert and baptize
the heathen, and often, like Antony and Hilarion, escape from the bustle
and toil of the world into their beloved desert.&nbsp; They work the
same miracles, see the same visions, and live in the same intimacy with
the wild animals, as the hermits of Egypt, or of Roman Gaul: but their
history, owing to the wild imagination and (as the legends themselves
prove) the gross barbarism of the tribes among whom they dwell, are
so involved in fable and legend, that it is all but impossible to separate
fact from fiction; all but impossible, often, to fix the time at which
they lived.</p>
<p>Their mode of life, it must always be remembered, is said to be copied
from that of the Roman hermits of Gaul.&nbsp; St. Patrick, the apostle
of Ireland, seems to have been of Roman or Roman British lineage.&nbsp;
In his famous &ldquo;Confession&rdquo; (which many learned antiquaries
consider as genuine) he calls his father, Calphurnius a deacon; his
grandfather, Potitus a priest&mdash;both of these names being Roman.&nbsp;
He is said to have visited, at some period of his life, the monastery
of St. Martin at Tours; to have studied with St. Germanus at Auxerre;
and to have gone to one of the islands of the Tuscan sea, probably Lerins
itself; and, whether or not we believe the story that he was consecrated
bishop by Pope Celestine at Rome, we can hardly doubt that he was a
member of that great spiritual succession of ascetics who counted St.
Antony as their father.</p>
<p>Such another must that Palladius have been, who was sent, says Prosper
of Aquitaine, by Pope Celestine to convert the Irish Scots, and who
(according to another story) was cast on shore on the north-east coast
of Scotland, founded the church of Fordun, in Kincardineshire, and became
a great saint among the Pictish folk.</p>
<p>Another prim&aelig;val figure, almost as shadowy as St. Patrick,
is St. Ninian, a monk of North Wales, who (according to Bede) first
attempted the conversion of the Southern Picts, and built himself, at
Whithorn in Galloway, the Candida Casa, or White House, a little church
of stone,&mdash;a wonder in those days of &ldquo;creel houses&rdquo;
and wooden stockades.&nbsp; He too, according to Bede, who lived some
250 years after his time, went to Rome; and he is said to have visited
and corresponded with St. Martin of Tours.</p>
<p>Dubricius, again, whom legend makes the contemporary both of St.
Patrick and of King Arthur, appears in Wales, as bishop and abbot of
Llandaff.&nbsp; He too is ordained by a Roman bishop, St. Germanus of
Auxerre; and he too ends his career, according to tradition, as a hermit,
while his disciples spread away into Armorica (Brittany) and Ireland.</p>
<p>We need not, therefore, be surprised to find Ireland, Wales, Cornwall,
Scotland, and Brittany, during the next three centuries, swarming with
saints, who kept up, whether in company or alone, the old hermit-life
of the Thebaid; or to find them wandering, whether on missionary work,
or in search of solitude, or escaping, like St. Cadoc the Wise, from
the Saxon invaders.&nbsp; Their frequent journeys to Rome, and even
to Jerusalem, may perhaps be set down as a fable, invented in after
years by monks who were anxious to prove their complete dependence on
the Holy See, and their perfect communion with the older and more civilized
Christianity of the Roman Empire.</p>
<p>It is probable enough, also, that Romans from Gaul, as well as from
Britain, often men of rank and education, who had fled before the invading
Goths and Franks, and had devoted themselves (as we have seen that they
often did) to the monastic life, should have escaped into those parts
of these islands which had not already fallen into the hands of the
Saxon invaders.&nbsp; Ireland, as the most remote situation, would be
especially inviting to the fugitives; and we can thus understand the
story which is found in the Acts of St. Senanus, how fifty monks, &ldquo;Romans
born,&rdquo; sailed to Ireland to learn the Scriptures, and to lead
a stricter life; and were distributed between St. Senan, St. Finnian,
St. Brendan, St. Barry, and St. Kieran.&nbsp; By such immigrations as
this, it may be, Ireland became&mdash;as she certainly was for a while&mdash;the
refuge of what ecclesiastical civilization, learning, and art the barbarian
invaders had spared; a sanctuary from whence, in after centuries, evangelists
and teachers went forth once more, not only to Scotland and England,
but to France and Germany.&nbsp; Very fantastic, and often very beautiful,
are the stories of these men; and sometimes tragical enough, like that
of the Welsh St. Iltut, cousin of the mythic Arthur, and founder of
the great monastery of Bangor, on the banks of the Dee, which was said&mdash;though
we are not bound to believe the fact&mdash;to have held more than two
thousand monks at the time of the Saxon invasion.&nbsp; The wild warrior
was converted, says this legend, by seeing the earth open and swallow
up his comrades, who had extorted bread, beer, and a fat pig from St.
Cadoc of Llancarvan, a princely hermit and abbot, who had persuaded
his father and mother to embrace the hermit life as the regular, if
not the only, way of saving their souls.&nbsp; In a paroxysm of terror
he fled from his fair young wife into the forest; would not allow her
to share with him even his hut of branches; and devoted himself to the
labour of making an immense dyke of mud and stones to keep out the inundations
of a neighbouring river.&nbsp; His poor wife went in search of him once
more, and found him in the bottom of a dyke, no longer a gay knight,
but poorly dressed, and covered with mud.&nbsp; She went away, and never
saw him more; &ldquo;fearing to displease God and one so beloved by
God.&rdquo;&nbsp; Iltut dwelt afterwards for four years in a cave, sleeping
on the bare rock, and seems at last to have crossed over to Brittany,
and died at Dol.</p>
<p>We must not forget&mdash;though he is not strictly a hermit&mdash;St.
David, the popular saint of the Welsh, son of a nephew of the mythic
Arthur, and educated by one Paulinus, a disciple, it is said, of St.
Germanus of Auxerre.&nbsp; He is at once monk and bishop: he gathers
round him young monks in the wilderness, makes them till the ground,
drawing the plough by their own strength, for he allows them not to
own even an ox.&nbsp; He does battle against &ldquo;satraps&rdquo; and
&ldquo;magicians&rdquo;&mdash;probably heathen chieftains and Druids;
he goes to the Holy Land, and is made archbishop by the Patriarch of
Jerusalem: he introduces, it would seem, into this island the right
of sanctuary for criminals in any field consecrated to himself.&nbsp;
He restores the church of Glastonbury over the tomb of his cousin, King
Arthur, and dies at 100 years of age, &ldquo;the head of the whole British
nation, and honour of his fatherland.&rdquo;&nbsp; He is buried in one
of his own monasteries at St. David&rsquo;s, near the headland whence
St. Patrick had seen, in a vision, all Ireland stretched out before
him, waiting to be converted to Christ; and the Celtic people go on
pilgrimage to his tomb, even from Brittany and Ireland: and, canonized
in 1120, he becomes the patron saint of Wales.</p>
<p>From that same point, in what year is not said, an old monk of St.
David&rsquo;s monastery, named Modonnoc, set sail for Ireland, after
a long life of labour and virtue.&nbsp; A swarm of bees settled upon
the bow of his boat, and would not be driven away.&nbsp; He took them,
whether he would or not, with him into Ireland, and introduced there,
says the legend, the culture of bees and the use of honey.</p>
<p>Ireland was then the &ldquo;Isle of Saints.&rdquo;&nbsp; Three orders
of them were counted by later historians: the bishops (who seem not
to have had necessarily territorial dioceses), with St. Patrick at their
head, shining like the sun; the second, of priests, under St. Columba,
shining like the moon; and the third, of bishops, priests, and hermits,
under Colman and Aidan, shining like the stars.&nbsp; Their legends,
full of Irish poetry and tenderness, and not without touches here and
there of genuine Irish humour, lie buried now, to all save antiquaries,
in the folios of the Bollandists and Colgan: but the memory of their
virtue and beneficence, as well as of their miracles, shadowy and distorted
by the lapse of centuries, is rooted in the heart and brain of the Irish
peasantry; and who shall say altogether for evil?&nbsp; For with the
tradition of their miracles has been entwined the tradition of their
virtues, as an enduring heirloom for the whole Irish race, through the
sad centuries which part the era of saints from the present time.&nbsp;
We see the Irish women kneeling beside some well, whose waters were
hallowed, ages since, by the fancied miracle of some mythic saint, and
hanging gaudy rags (just as do the half savage Buddhists of the Himalayas)
upon the bushes round.&nbsp; We see them upon holy days crawling on
bare and bleeding knees around St. Patrick&rsquo;s cell, on the top
of Croagh Patrick, the grandest mountain, perhaps, with the grandest
outlook, in these British Isles, where stands still, I believe, an ancient
wooden image, said to have belonged to St. Patrick himself; and where,
too, hung till late years (it is now preserved in Dublin) an ancient
bell; such a strange little oblong bell as the Irish saints carried
with them to keep off d&aelig;mons; one of those magic bells which appear,
so far as I am aware, in no country save Ireland and Scotland till we
come to Tartary and the Buddhists: such a bell as came down from heaven
to St. Senan: such a bell as St. Fursey sent flying through the air
to greet St. Cuandy at his devotions when he could not come himself:
such a bell as another saint, wandering in the woods, rang till a stag
came out of the covert, and carried it for him on his horns.&nbsp; On
that peak, so legends tell, St. Patrick stood once, in the spirit and
power of Elias&mdash;after whom the mountain was long named; fasting,
like Elias, forty days and forty nights, and wrestling with the d&aelig;mons
of the storm, and the snakes of the fen, and the Peishta-More, the gigantic
monster of the lakes, till he smote the evil things with the golden
rod of Jesus, and they rolled over the cliff in hideous rout, and perished
in the Atlantic far below.&nbsp; We know that these tales are but the
dreams of children: but shall we sneer at the devotion of those poor
Irish?&nbsp; Not if we remember (what is an undoubted fact) that the
memory of these same saints has kept up in their minds an ideal of nobleness
and purity, devotion and beneficence, which, down-trodden slaves as
they have been, they would otherwise have inevitably lost; that it has
helped to preserve them from mere brutality, and mere ferocity; and
that the thought that these men were of their own race and their own
kin has given them a pride in their own race, a sense of national unity
and of national dignity, which has endured&mdash;and surely for their
benefit, for reverence for ancestors and the self-respect which springs
from it is a benefit to every human being&mdash;through all the miseries,
deserved or undeserved, which have fallen upon the Irish since Pope
Adrian IV. (the true author of all the woes of Ireland), in the year
1155, commissioned Henry II. to conquer Ireland and destroy its prim&aelig;val
Church, on consideration of receiving his share of the booty in the
shape of Peter&rsquo;s Pence.</p>
<p>Among these Irish saints, two names stand out as especially interesting:
that of St. Brendan, and that of St. Columba&mdash;the former as the
representative of the sailor monks of the early period, the other as
the great missionary who, leaving his monastery at Durrow, in Ireland,
for the famous island of Hy, Iona, or Icolumbkill, off the western point
of Mull, became the apostle of Scotland and the north of England.&nbsp;
I shall first speak of St. Brendan, and at some length.&nbsp; His name
has become lately familiar to many, through the medium of two very beautiful
poems, one by Mr. Matthew Arnold, and the other by Mr. Sebastian Evans;
and it may interest those who have read their versions of the story
to see the oldest form in which the story now exists.</p>
<p>The Celts, it must be remembered, are not, in general, a sea-going
folk.&nbsp; They have always neglected the rich fisheries of their coasts;
and in Ireland every seaport owes its existence, not to the natives,
but to Norse colonists.&nbsp; Even now, the Irishman or Western Highlander,
who emigrates to escape the &ldquo;Saxons,&rdquo; sails in a ship built
and manned by those very &ldquo;Saxons,&rdquo; to lands which the Saxons
have discovered and civilized.&nbsp; But in the seventh and eighth centuries,
and perhaps earlier, many Celts were voyagers and emigrants, not to
discover new worlds, but to flee from the old one.&nbsp; There were
deserts in the sea, as well as on land; in them they hoped to escape
from men, and, yet more, from women.</p>
<p>They went against their carnal will.&nbsp; They had no liking for
the salt water.&nbsp; They were horribly frightened, and often wept
bitterly, as they themselves confess.&nbsp; And they had reason for
fear; for their vessels were, for the most part, only &ldquo;curachs&rdquo;
(coracles) of wattled twigs, covered with tanned hides.&nbsp; They needed
continual exhortation and comfort from the holy man who was their captain;
and needed often miracles likewise for their preservation.&nbsp; Tempests
had to be changed into calm, and contrary winds into fair ones, by the
prayers of a saint; and the spirit of prophecy was needed, to predict
that a whale would be met between Iona and Tiree, who appeared accordingly,
to the extreme terror of St. Berach&rsquo;s crew, swimming with open
jaws, and (intent on eating, not monks, but herrings) nearly upsetting
them by the swell which he raised.&nbsp; And when St. Baithenius met
the same whale on the same day, it was necessary for him to rise, and
bless, with outspread hands, the sea and the whale, in order to make
him sink again, after having risen to breathe.&nbsp; But they sailed
forth, nevertheless, not knowing whither they went; true to their great
principle, that the spirit must conquer the flesh: and so showed themselves
actually braver men than the Norse pirates, who sailed afterwards over
the same seas without fear, and without the need of miracles, and who
found everywhere on desert islands, on sea-washed stacks and skerries,
round Orkney, Shetland, and the Faro&euml;s, even to Iceland, the cells
of these &ldquo;Papas&rdquo; or Popes; and named them after the old
hermits, whose memory still lingers in the names of Papa Strona and
Papa Westra, in the Orkneys, and in that of Papey, off the coast of
Iceland, where the first Norse settlers found Irish books, bells, and
crosiers, the relics of old hermits who had long since fasted and prayed
their last, and migrated to the Lord.</p>
<p>Adanman, in his life of St. Columba, tells of more than one such
voyage.&nbsp; He tells how one Baitanus, with the saint&rsquo;s blessing,
sailed forth to find &ldquo;a desert&rdquo; in the sea; and how when
he was gone, the saint prophesied that he should be buried, not in a
desert isle, but where a woman should drive sheep over his grave, the
which came true in the oak-wood of Calgaich, now Londonderry, whither
he came back again.&nbsp; He tells, again, of one Cormac, &ldquo;a knight
of Christ,&rdquo; who three times sailed forth in a coracle to find
some desert isle, and three times failed of his purpose; and how, in
his last voyage, he was driven northward by the wind fourteen days&rsquo;
sail, till he came where the summer sea was full of foul little stinging
creatures, of the size of frogs, which beat against the sides of the
frail boat, till all expected them to be stove in.&nbsp; They clung,
moreover, to the oar blades; <a name="citation256"></a><a href="#footnote256">{256}</a>
and Cormac was in some danger of never seeing land again, had not St.
Columba, at home in Iona far away, seen him in a vision, him and his
fellows, praying and &ldquo;watering their cheeks with floods of tears,&rdquo;
in the midst of &ldquo;perturbations monstrous, horrific, never seen
before, and almost unspeakable.&rdquo;&nbsp; Calling together his monks,
he bade them pray for a north wind, which came accordingly, and blew
Cormac safe back to Iona, to tempt the waves no more.&nbsp; &ldquo;Let
the reader therefore perpend how great and what manner of man this same
blessed personage was, who, having so great prophetic knowledge, could
command, by invoking the name of Christ, the winds and ocean.&rdquo;</p>
<p>Even as late as the year 891, says the Anglo-Saxon Chronicle: &ldquo;Three
Scots came to King Alfred, in a boat without any oars, from Ireland,
whence they had stolen away, because for the love of God they desired
to be on pilgrimage, they recked not where.&nbsp; The boat in which
they came was made of two hides and a half; and they took with them
provisions for seven days; and about the seventh day they came on shore
in Cornwall, and soon after went to King Alfred.&nbsp; Thus they were
named, Dubslane, and Macbeth, and Maelinmun.&rdquo;</p>
<p>Out of such wild feats as these; out of dim reports of fairy islands
in the west; of the Canaries and Azores; of that Vinland, with its wild
corn and wild grapes which Leif, the son of Eirek Rauda, had found beyond
the ocean a thousand years and one after the birth of Christ; of icebergs
and floes sailing in the far northern sea, upon the edge of the six-months&rsquo;
night; out of Edda stories of the Midgard snake, which is coiled round
the world; out of reports, it may be, of Indian fakirs and Buddhist
shamans; out of scraps of Greek and Arab myth, from the Odyssey or the
Arabian Nights, brought home by &ldquo;Jorsala Farar,&rdquo; vikings
who had been for pilgrimage and plunder up the Straits of Gibraltar
into the far East;&mdash;out of all these materials were made up, as
years rolled on, the famous legend of St. Brendan and his seven years&rsquo;
voyage in search of the &ldquo;land promised to the saints.&rdquo;</p>
<p>This tale was so popular in the middle age, that it appears, in different
shapes, in almost every early European language. <a name="citation257"></a><a href="#footnote257">{257}</a>&nbsp;
It was not only the delight of monks, but it stirred up to wild voyages
many a secular man in search of St. Brendan&rsquo;s Isle, &ldquo;which
is not found when it is sought,&rdquo; but was said to be visible at
times, from Palma in the Canaries.&nbsp; The myth must have been well
known to Columbus, and may have helped to send him forth in search of
&ldquo;Cathay.&rdquo;&nbsp; Thither (so the Spanish peasants believed)
Don Roderic had retired from the Moorish invaders.&nbsp; There (so the
Portuguese fancied) King Sebastian was hidden from men, after his reported
death in the battle of Alcazar.&nbsp; The West Indies, when they were
first seen, were surely St. Brendan&rsquo;s Isle: and the Mississippi
may have been, in the eyes of such old adventurers as Don Ferdinando
da Soto, when he sought for the Fountain of Perpetual Youth, the very
river which St. Brendan found parting in two the Land of Promise.&nbsp;
From the year 1526 (says M. Jubinal), till as late as 1721, armaments
went forth from time to time into the Atlantic, and went forth in vain.</p>
<p>For the whole tale, from whatever dim reports of fact they may have
sprung, is truly (as M. Jubinal calls it) a monkish Odyssey, and nothing
more.&nbsp; It is a dream of the hermit&rsquo;s cell.&nbsp; No woman,
no city, nor nation, are ever seen during the seven years&rsquo; voyage.&nbsp;
Ideal monasteries and ideal hermits people the &ldquo;deserts of the
ocean.&rdquo;&nbsp; All beings therein (save d&aelig;mons and Cyclops)
are Christians, even to the very birds, and keep the festivals of the
Church as eternal laws of nature.&nbsp; The voyage succeeds, not by
seamanship, or geographic knowledge, nor even by chance: but by the
miraculous prescience of the saint, or of those whom he meets; and the
wanderings of Ulysses, or of Sinbad, are rational and human in comparison
with those of St. Brendan.</p>
<p>Yet there are in them, as was to be expected, elements in which the
Greek or the Arab legends are altogether deficient; perfect innocence,
patience, and justice; utter faith in a God who prospers the innocent
and punishes the guilty; ennobling obedience to the saint, who stands
out a truly heroic figure above his trembling crew; and even more valuable
still, the belief in, the craving for, an ideal, even though that ideal
be that of a mere earthly Paradise; the &ldquo;divine discontent,&rdquo;
as it has been well called, which is the root of all true progress;
which leaves (thank God) no man at peace save him who has said, &ldquo;Let
us eat and drink, for to-morrow we die.&rdquo;</p>
<p>And therefore I have written at some length the story of St. Brendan;
because, though it be but a monk-ideal, it is an ideal still: and therefore
profitable for all who are not content with this world, and its paltry
ways.</p>
<p>Saint Brendan, we read, the son of Finnloga, and great grandson of
Alta, son of Ogaman, of the race of Ciar son of Fergus, was born at
Tralee, and founded, in 559, the Abbey of Clonfert, <a name="citation260a"></a><a href="#footnote260a">{260a}</a>
and was a man famous for his great abstinence and virtues, and the father
of nearly 3,000 monks. <a name="citation260b"></a><a href="#footnote260b">{260b}</a>&nbsp;
And while he was &ldquo;in his warfare,&rdquo; there came to him one
evening a holy hermit named &ldquo;Barintus,&rdquo; of the royal race
of Neill; and when he was questioned, he did nought but cast himself
on the ground, and weep and pray.&nbsp; And when St. Brendan asked him
to make better cheer for him and his monks, he told him a strange tale.&nbsp;
How a nephew of his had fled away to be a solitary, and found a delicious
island, and established a monastery therein; and how he himself had
gone to see his nephew, and sailed with him to the eastward to an island,
which was called &ldquo;the land of promise of the saints,&rdquo; wide
and grassy, and bearing all manner of fruits; wherein was no night,
for the Lord Jesus Christ was the light thereof; and how they abode
there for a long while without eating and drinking; and when they returned
to his nephew&rsquo;s monastery, the brethren knew well where they had
been, for the fragrance of Paradise lingered on their garments for nearly
forty days.</p>
<p>So Barintus told his story, and went back to his cell.&nbsp; But
St. Brendan called together his most loving fellow-warriors, as he called
them, and told them how he had set his heart on seeking that Promised
Land.&nbsp; And he went up to the top of the hill in Kerry, which is
still called Mount Brendan, with fourteen chosen monks; and there, at
the utmost corner of the world, he built him a coracle of wattle, and
covered it with hides tanned in oak-bark and softened with butter, and
set up in it a mast and a sail, and took forty days&rsquo; provision,
and commanded his monks to enter the boat, in the name of the Holy Trinity.&nbsp;
And as he stood alone, praying on the shore, three more monks from his
monastery came up, and fell at his feet, and begged to go too, or they
would die in that place of hunger and thirst; for they were determined
to wander with him all the days of their life.&nbsp; So he gave them
leave.&nbsp; But two of them, he prophesied, would come to harm and
to judgment.&nbsp; So they sailed away toward the summer solstice, with
a fair wind, and had no need to row.&nbsp; But after twelve days the
wind fell to a calm, and they had only light airs at night, till forty
days were past, and all their victual spent.&nbsp; Then they saw toward
the north a lofty island, walled round with cliffs, and went about it
three days ere they could find a harbour.&nbsp; And when they landed,
a dog came fawning on them, and they followed it up to a great hall
with beds and seats, and water to wash their feet.&nbsp; But St. Brendan
said, &ldquo;Beware, lest Satan bring you into temptation.&nbsp; For
I see him busy with one of those three who followed us.&rdquo;&nbsp;
Now the hall was hung all round with vessels of divers metals, and bits
and horns overlaid with silver.&nbsp; Then St. Brendan told his servant
to bring the meal which God had prepared; and at once a table was laid
with napkins, and loaves wondrous white, and fishes.&nbsp; Then they
blessed God, and ate, and took likewise drink as much as they would,
and lay down to sleep.&nbsp; Then St. Brendan saw the devil&rsquo;s
work; namely, a little black boy holding a silver bit, and calling the
brother aforementioned.&nbsp; So they rested three days and three nights.&nbsp;
But when they went to the ship, St. Brendan charged them with theft,
and told what was stolen, and who had stolen it.&nbsp; Then the brother
cast out of his bosom a silver bit, and prayed for mercy.&nbsp; And
when he was forgiven and raised up from the ground, behold, a little
black boy flew out of his bosom, howling aloud, and crying, &ldquo;Why,
O man of God, dost thou drive me from my habitation, where I have dwelt
for seven years?&rdquo;</p>
<p>Then the brother received the Holy Eucharist, and died straightway,
and was buried in that isle, and the brethren saw the angels carry his
soul aloft, for St. Brendan had told him that so it should be: but that
the brother who came with him should have his sepulchre in hell.&nbsp;
And as they went on board, a youth met them with a basket of loaves
and a bottle of water, and told them that it would not fail till Pentecost.</p>
<p>Then they sailed again many days, till they came to an isle full
of great streams and fountains swarming with fish; and sheep there all
white, as big as oxen, so many that they hid the face of the earth.&nbsp;
And they stayed there till Easter Eve, and took one of the sheep (which
followed them as if it had been tame) to eat for the Paschal feast.&nbsp;
Then came a man with loaves baked in the ashes, and other victual, and
fell down before St. Brendan and cried, &ldquo;How have I merited this,
O pearl of God, that thou shouldest be fed at this holy tide from the
labours of my hand?&rdquo;</p>
<p>And they learned from that man that the sheep grew there so big because
they were never milked, nor pinched with winter, but they fed in those
pastures all the year round.&nbsp; Moreover, he told them that they
must keep Easter in an isle hard by, opposite a shore to the west, which
some called the Paradise of Birds.</p>
<p>So to the nearest island they sailed.&nbsp; It had no harbour, nor
sandy shore, and there was no turf on it, and very little wood.&nbsp;
Now the Saint knew what manner of isle it was, but he would not tell
the brethren, lest they should be terrified.&nbsp; So he bade them make
the boat fast stem and stern, and when morning came he bade those who
were priests to celebrate each a mass, and then to take the lamb&rsquo;s
fleece on shore and cook it in the caldron with salt, while St. Brendan
remained in the boat.</p>
<p>But when the fire blazed up, and the pot began to boil, that island
began to move like water.&nbsp; Then the brethren ran to the boat imploring
St. Brendan&rsquo;s aid; and he helped them each in by the hand, and
cast off.&nbsp; After which the island sank in the ocean.&nbsp; And
when they could see their fire burning more than two miles off, St.
Brendan told them how that God had revealed to him that night the mystery;
that this was no isle, but the biggest of all fishes which swam in the
ocean, always it tries to make its head and its tail meet, but cannot,
by reason of its length; and its name is Jasconius.</p>
<p>Then, across a narrow strait, they saw another isle, very grassy
and wooded, and full of flowers.&nbsp; And they found a little stream,
and towed the boat up it (for the stream was of the same width as the
boat), with St. Brendan sitting on board, till they came to the fountain
thereof.&nbsp; Then said the holy father, &ldquo;See, brethren, the
Lord has given us a place wherein to celebrate his holy Resurrection.&nbsp;
And if we had nought else, this fountain, I think, would serve for food
as well as drink.&rdquo;&nbsp; For the fountain was too admirable.&nbsp;
Over it was a huge tree of wonderful breadth, but no great height, covered
with snow-white birds, so that its leaves and boughs could scarce be
seen.</p>
<p>And when the man of God saw that, he was so desirous to know the
cause of that assemblage of birds, that he besought God upon his knees,
with tears, saying, &ldquo;God, who knowest the unknown, and revealest
the hidden, thou knowest the anxiety of my heart. . . .&nbsp; Deign
of thy great mercy to reveal to me thy secret. . . .&nbsp; But not for
the merit of my own dignity, but regarding thy clemency, do I presume
to ask.&rdquo;</p>
<p>Then one of those birds flew from off the tree, and his wings sounded
like bells over the boat.&nbsp; And he sat on the prow, and spread his
wings joyfully, and looked quietly on St. Brendan.&nbsp; And when the
man of God questioned that bird, it told how they were of the spirits
which fell in the great ruin of the old enemy; not by sin or by consent,
but predestined by the piety of God to fall with those with whom they
were created.&nbsp; But they suffered no punishment; only they could
not, in part, behold the presence of God.&nbsp; They wandered about
this world, like other spirits of the air, and firmament, and earth.&nbsp;
But on holy days they took those shapes of birds, and praised their
Creator in that place.</p>
<p>Then the bird told him, how he and his monks had wandered one year
already, and should wander for six more; and every year should celebrate
their Easter in that place, and after find the Land of Promise; and
so flew back to its tree.</p>
<p>And when the eventide was come, the birds began all with one voice
to sing, and clap their wings, crying, &ldquo;Thou, O God, art praised
in Zion, and unto Thee shall the vow be performed in Jerusalem.&rdquo;&nbsp;
And always they repeated that verse for an hour, and their melody and
the clapping of their wings was like music which drew tears by its sweetness.</p>
<p>And when the man of God wakened his monks at the third watch of the
night with the verse, &ldquo;Thou shalt open my lips, O Lord,&rdquo;
all the birds answered, &ldquo;Praise the Lord, all his angels; praise
him, all his virtues.&rdquo;&nbsp; And when the dawn shone, they sang
again, &ldquo;The splendour of the Lord God is over us;&rdquo; and at
the third hour, &ldquo;Sing psalms to our God, sing; sing to our King,
sing with wisdom.&rdquo;&nbsp; And at the sixth, &ldquo;The Lord hath
lifted up the light of his countenance upon us, and had mercy on us.&rdquo;&nbsp;
And at the ninth, &ldquo;Behold how good and pleasant it is for brethren
to dwell in unity.&rdquo;&nbsp; So day and night those birds gave praise
to God.&nbsp; St. Brendan, therefore, seeing these things, gave thanks
to God for all his marvels, and the brethren were refreshed with that
spiritual food till the octave of Easter.</p>
<p>After which, St. Brendan advised to take of the water of the fountain;
for till then they had only used it to wash their feet and hands.&nbsp;
But there came to him the same man who had been with them three days
before Easter, and with his boat full of meat and drink, and said, &ldquo;My
brothers, here you have enough to last till Pentecost: but do not drink
of that fountain.&nbsp; For its nature is, that whosoever drinks will
sleep for four-and-twenty hours.&rdquo;&nbsp; So they stayed till Pentecost,
and rejoiced in the song of the birds.&nbsp; And after mass at Pentecost,
the man brought them food again, and bade them take of the water of
the fountain and depart.&nbsp; Then the birds came again, and sat upon
the prow, and told them how they must, every year, celebrate Easter
in the Isle of Birds, and Easter Eve upon the back of the fish Jasconius;
and how, after eight months, they should come to the isle called Ailbey,
and keep their Christmas there.</p>
<p>After which they were on the ocean for eight months, out of sight
of land, and only eating after every two or three days, till they came
to an island, along which they sailed for forty days, and found no harbour.&nbsp;
Then they wept and prayed, for they were almost worn out with weariness;
and after they had fasted and prayed for three days, they saw a narrow
harbour, and two fountains, one foul, one clear.&nbsp; But when the
brethren hurried to draw water, St. Brendan (as he had done once before)
forbade them, saying that they must take nought without leave from the
elders who were in that isle.</p>
<p>And of the wonders which they saw in that isle it were too long to
tell: how there met them an exceeding old man, with snow-white hair,
who fell at St. Brendan&rsquo;s feet three times, and led him in silence
up to a monastery of four-and-twenty silent monks, who washed their
feet, and fed them with bread and water, and roots of wonderful sweetness;
and then at last, opening his mouth, told them how that bread was sent
them perpetually, they knew not from whence; and how they had been there
eighty years, since the times of St. Patrick, and how their father Ailbey
and Christ had nourished them; and how they grew no older, nor ever
fell sick, nor were overcome by cold or heat; and how brother never
spoke to brother, but all things were done by signs; and how he led
them to a square chapel, with three candles before the mid-altar, and
two before each of the side altars; and how they, and the chalices and
patens, and all the other vessels, were of crystal; and how the candles
were lighted always by a fiery arrow, which came in through the window,
and returned; and how St. Brendan kept his Christmas there, and then
sailed away till Lent, and came to a fruitful island where he found
fish; and how when certain brethren drank too much of the charmed water
they slept, some three days, and some one; and how they sailed north,
and then east, till they came back to the Isle of Sheep at Easter, and
found on the shore their caldron, which they had lost on Jasconius&rsquo;s
back; and how, sailing away, they were chased by a mighty fish which
spouted foam, but was slain by another fish which spouted fire; and
how they took enough of its flesh to last them three months; and how
they came to an island flat as the sea, without trees, or aught that
waved in the wind; and how on that island were three troops of monks
(as the holy man had foretold), standing a stone&rsquo;s throw from
each other: the first of boys, robed in snow-white; the second of young
men, dressed in hyacinthine; the third of old men, in purple dalmatics,
singing alternately their psalms, all day and night: and how when they
stopped singing, a cloud of wondrous brightness overshadowed the isle;
and how two of the young men, ere they sailed away, brought baskets
of grapes, and asked that one of the monks (as had been prophesied)
should remain with them, in the Isle of Strong Men; and how St. Brendan
let him go, saying, &ldquo;In a good hour did thy mother conceive thee,
because thou hast merited to dwell with such a congregation;&rdquo;
and how those grapes were so big, that a pound of juice ran out of each
of them, and an ounce thereof fed each brother for a whole day, and
was as sweet as honey; and how a magnificent bird dropped into the ship
the bough of an unknown tree, with a bunch of grapes thereon; and how
they came to a land where the trees were all bowed down with vines,
and their odour as the odour of a house full of pomegranates; and how
they fed forty days on those grapes, and strange herbs and roots; and
how they saw flying against them the bird which is called gryphon; and
how that bird who had brought the bough tore out the gryphon&rsquo;s
eyes, and slew him; and how they looked down into the clear sea, and
saw all the fishes sailing round and round, head to tail, innumerable
as flocks in the pastures, and were terrified, and would have had the
man of God celebrate mass in silence, lest the fish should hear, and
attack them; and how the man of God laughed at their folly; and how
they came to a column of clear crystal in the sea, with a canopy round
it of the colour of silver, harder than marble, and sailed in through
an opening, and found it all light within; <a name="citation269"></a><a href="#footnote269">{269}</a>
and how they found in that hall a chalice of the same stuff as the canopy,
and a paten of that of the column, and took them, that they might make
many believe; and how they sailed out again, and past a treeless island,
covered with slag and forges; and how a great hairy man, fiery and smutty,
came down and shouted after them; and how when they made the sign of
the Cross and sailed away, he and his fellows brought down huge lumps
of burning slag in tongs, and hurled them after the ship; and how they
went back, and blew their forges up, till the whole island flared, and
the sea boiled, and the howling and stench followed them, even when
they were out of sight of that evil isle; and how St. Brendan bade them
strengthen themselves in faith and spiritual arms, for they were now
on the confines of hell, therefore they must watch, and play the man.&nbsp;
All this must needs be hastened over, that we may come to the famous
legend of Judas Iscariot.</p>
<p>They saw a great and high mountain toward the north, with smoke about
its peak.&nbsp; And the wind blew them close under the cliffs, which
were of immense height, so that they could hardly see their top, upright
as walls, and black as coal. <a name="citation270"></a><a href="#footnote270">{270}</a>&nbsp;
Then he who remained of the three brethren who had followed St. Brendan
sprang out of the ship, and waded to the cliff foot, groaning, and crying,
&ldquo;Woe to me, father, for I am carried away from you; and cannot
turn back.&rdquo;&nbsp; Then the brethren backed the ship, and cried
to the Lord for mercy.&nbsp; But the blessed Father Brendan saw how
that wretch was carried off by a multitude of devils, and all on fire
among them.&nbsp; Then a fair wind blew them away southward; and when
they looked back they saw the peak of the isle uncovered, and flame
spouting from it up to heaven, and sinking back again, till the whole
mountain seemed one burning pile.</p>
<p>After that terrible vision they sailed seven days to the south, till
Father Brendan saw a dense cloud; when they neared it, a form as of
a man sitting, and before him a veil, as big as a sack, hanging between
two iron tongs, and rocking on the waves like a boat in a whirlwind.&nbsp;
Which when the brethren saw some thought was a bird, and some a boat;
but the man of God bade them give over arguing, and row thither.&nbsp;
And when they got near, the waves were still, as if they had been frozen;
and they found a man sitting on a rough and shapeless rock, and the
waves beating over his head; and when they fell back, the bare rock
appeared on which that wretch was sitting.&nbsp; And the cloth which
hung before him the wind moved, and beat him with it on the eyes and
brow.&nbsp; But when the blessed man asked him who he was, and how he
had earned that doom, he said, &ldquo;I am that most wretched Judas,
who made the worst of all bargains.&nbsp; But I hold not this place
for any merit of my own, but for the ineffable mercy of Christ.&nbsp;
I expect no place of repentance: but for the indulgence and mercy of
the Redeemer of the world, and for the honour of His holy resurrection,
I have this refreshment; for it is the Lord&rsquo;s-day now, and as
I sit here I seem to myself in a paradise of delight, by reason of the
pains which will be mine this evening; for when I am in my pains I burn
day and night like lead melted in a pot.&nbsp; But in the midst of that
mountain which you saw, is Leviathan with his satellites, and I was
there when he swallowed your brother; and therefore the king of hell
rejoiced, and sent forth huge flames, as he doth always when he devours
the souls of the impious.&rdquo;&nbsp; Then he told them how he had
his refreshings there every Lord&rsquo;s-day from even to even, and
from Christmas to Epiphany, and from Easter to Pentecost, and from the
Purification of the Blessed Virgin to her Assumption: but the rest of
his time he was tormented with Herod and Pilate, Annas and Caiaphas;
and so adjured them to intercede for him with the Lord that he might
be there at least till sunrise in the morn.&nbsp; To whom the man of
God said, &ldquo;The will of the Lord be done.&nbsp; Thou shalt not
be carried off by the d&aelig;mons till to-morrow.&rdquo;&nbsp; Then
he asked him of that clothing, and he told how he had given it to a
leper when he was the Lord&rsquo;s chamberlain; &ldquo;but because it
was no more mine than it was the Lord&rsquo;s and the other brethren&rsquo;s,
therefore it is of no comfort to me, but rather a hurt.&nbsp; And these
forks I gave to the priests to hang their caldrons on.&nbsp; And this
stone on which I always sit I took off the road, and threw it into a
ditch for a stepping-stone, before I was a disciple of the Lord.&rdquo;
<a name="citation272"></a><a href="#footnote272">{272}</a></p>
<p>But when the evening hour had covered the face of Thetis,&rdquo;
behold a multitude of d&aelig;mons shouting in a ring, and bidding the
man of God depart, for else they could not approach; and they dared
not behold their prince&rsquo;s face unless they brought back their
prey.&nbsp; But the man of God bade them depart.&nbsp; And in the morning
an infinite multitude of devils covered the face of the abyss, and cursed
the man of God for coming thither; for their prince had scourged them
cruelly that night for not bringing back the captive.&nbsp; But the
man of God returned their curses on their own heads, saying that &ldquo;cursed
was he whom they blest, and blessed he whom they cursed;&rdquo; and
when they threatened Judas with double torments because he had not come
back, the man of God rebuked them.</p>
<p>&ldquo;Art thou, then, Lord of all,&rdquo; they asked, &ldquo;that
we should obey thee?&rdquo;&nbsp; &ldquo;I am the servant,&rdquo; said
he, &ldquo;of the Lord of all; and whatsoever I command in his name
is done; and I have no ministry save what he concedes to me.&rdquo;</p>
<p>So they blasphemed him till he left Judas, and then returned, and
carried off that wretched soul with great rushing and howling.</p>
<p>After which they saw a little isle; and the holy man told them that
now seven years were nigh past; and that in that isle they should soon
see a hermit, named Paul the Spiritual, who had lived for sixty years
without any corporeal food, but for thirty years before that he had
received food from a certain beast.</p>
<p>The isle was very small, about a furlong round; a bare rock, so steep
that they could find no landing-place.&nbsp; But at last they found
a creek, into which they thrust the boat&rsquo;s bow, and then discovered
a very difficult ascent.&nbsp; Up that the man of God climbed, bidding
them wait for him, for they must not enter the isle without the hermit&rsquo;s
leave; and when he came to the top he saw two caves, with their mouths
opposite each other, and a very small round well before the cave mouth,
whose waters, as fast as they ran out, were sucked in again by the rock.
<a name="citation274"></a><a href="#footnote274">{274}</a>&nbsp; As
he went to one entrance, the old man came out of the other, saying,
&ldquo;Behold how good and pleasant it is, brethren, to dwell together
in unity,&rdquo; and bade him call up the brethren from the boat; and
when they came, he kissed them, and called them each by his name.&nbsp;
Whereat they marvelled, not only at his spirit of prophecy, but also
at his attire; for he was all covered with his locks and beard, and
with the other hair of his body, down to his feet.&nbsp; His hair was
white as snow for age, and none other covering had he.&nbsp; When St.
Brendan saw that, he sighed again and again, and said within himself,
&ldquo;Woe is me, sinner that I am, who wear a monk&rsquo;s habit, and
have many monks under me, when I see a man of angelic dignity sitting
in a cell, still in the flesh, and unhurt by the vices of the flesh.&rdquo;&nbsp;
To whom the man of God answered, &ldquo;Venerable father, what great
and many wonders God hath showed thee, which he hath manifested to none
of the fathers, and thou sayest in thy heart that thou art not worthy
to wear a monk&rsquo;s habit.&nbsp; I tell thee, father, that thou art
greater than a monk; for a monk is fed and clothed by the work of his
own hands: but God has fed and clothed thee and thy family for seven
years with his secret things, while wretched I sit here on this rock
like a bird, naked save the hair of my body.&rdquo;</p>
<p>Then St. Brendan asked him how and whence he came thither; and he
told how he was nourished in St. Patrick&rsquo;s monastery for fifty
years, and took care of the cemetery; and how when the dean had bidden
him dig a grave, an old man, whom he knew not, appeared to him, and
forbade him, for that grave was another man&rsquo;s.&nbsp; And how he
revealed to him that he was St. Patrick, his own abbot, who had died
the day before, and bade him bury that brother elsewhere, and go down
to the sea and find a boat, which would take him to the place where
he should wait for the day of his death; and how he landed on that rock,
and thrust the boat off with his foot, and it went swiftly back to its
own land; and how, on the very first day, a beast came to him, walking
on its hind paws, and between its fore paws a fish, and grass to make
a fire, and laid them at his feet; and so every third day for twenty
years; and every Lord&rsquo;s day a little water came out of the rock,
so that he could drink and wash his hands; and how after thirty years
he had found these caves and that fountain, and had fed for the last
sixty years on nought but the water thereof.&nbsp; For all the years
of his life were 150, and henceforth he awaited the day of his judgment
in that his flesh.</p>
<p>Then they took of that water, and received his blessing, and kissed
each other in the peace of Christ, and sailed southward: but their food
was the water from the isle of the man of God.&nbsp; Then (as Paul the
Hermit had foretold) they came back on Easter Eve to the Isle of Sheep,
and to him who used to give them victuals; and then went on to the fish
Jasconius, and sang praises on his back all night, and mass at morn.&nbsp;
After which the fish carried them on his back to the Paradise of Birds,
and there they stayed till Pentecost.&nbsp; Then the man who always
tended them, bade them fill their skins from the fountain, and he would
lead them to the land promised to the saints.&nbsp; And all the birds
wished them a prosperous voyage in God&rsquo;s name; and they sailed
away, with forty days&rsquo; provision, the man being their guide, till
after forty days they came at evening to a great darkness which lay
round the Promised Land.&nbsp; But after they had sailed through it
for an hour, a great light shone round them, and the boat stopped at
a shore.&nbsp; And when they landed they saw a spacious land, full of
trees bearing fruit as in autumn time.&nbsp; And they walked about that
land for forty days, eating of the fruit and drinking of the fountains,
and found no end thereof.&nbsp; And there was no night there, but the
light shone like the light of the sun.&nbsp; At last they came to a
great river, which they could not cross, so that they could not find
out the extent of that land.&nbsp; And as they were pondering over this,
a youth, with shining face and fair to look upon, met them, and kissed
them with great joy, calling them each by his name, and said, &ldquo;Brethren,
peace be with you, and with all that follow the peace of Christ.&rdquo;&nbsp;
And after that, &ldquo;Blessed are they who dwell in thy house, O Lord;
they shall be for ever praising thee.&rdquo;</p>
<p>Then he told St. Brendan that that was the land which he had been
seeking for seven years, and that he must now return to his own country,
taking of the fruits of that land, and of its precious gems, as much
as his ship could carry; for the days of his departure were at hand,
when he should sleep in peace with his holy brethren.&nbsp; But after
many days that land should be revealed to his successors, and should
be a refuge for Christians in persecution.&nbsp; As for the river that
they saw, it parted that island; and the light shone there for ever,
because Christ was the light thereof.</p>
<p>Then St. Brendan asked if that land would ever be revealed to men:
and the youth answered, that when the most high Creator should have
put all nations under his feet, then that land should be manifested
to all his elect.</p>
<p>After which St. Brendan, when the youth had blessed him, took of
the fruits and of the gems, and sailed back through the darkness, and
returned to his monastery; whom when the brethren saw, they glorified
God for the miracles which he had heard and seen.&nbsp; After which
he ended his life in peace.&nbsp; Amen.</p>
<p>Here ends (says the French version) concerning St. Brendan, and the
marvels which he found in the sea of Ireland.</p>
<div class="GutenbergBlankLines2"><br /><br /></div>
<h2>ST. MALO</h2>
<div class="GutenbergBlankLines2"><br /><br /></div>
<p>Intermingled, fantastically and inconsistently, with the story of
St. Brendan, is that of St. Maclovius or Machutus, who has given his
name to the seaport of St. Malo, in Brittany.&nbsp; His life, written
by Sigebert, a monk of Gembloux, about the year 1100, tells us how he
was a Breton, who sailed with St. Brendan in search of the fairest of
all islands, in which the citizens of heaven were said to dwell.&nbsp;
With St. Brendan St. Malo celebrated Easter on the whale&rsquo;s back,
and with St. Brendan he returned.&nbsp; But another old hagiographer,
Johannes &agrave; Bosco, tells a different story, making St. Malo an
Irishman brought up by St. Brendan, and preserved by his prayers from
a wave of the sea.&nbsp; He gives, moreover, to the Isle of Paradise
the name of Inga, and says that St. Brendan and his companions never
reached it after all, but came home after sailing round the Orkneys
and other Northern isles.&nbsp; The fact is, that the same saints reappear
so often on both sides of the British and the Irish Channels, that we
must take the existence of many of them as mere legend, which has been
carried from land to land by monks in their migrations, and taken root
upon each fresh soil which it has reached.&nbsp; One incident in St.
Malo&rsquo;s voyage is so fantastic, and so grand likewise, that it
must not be omitted.&nbsp; The monks come to an island whereon they
find the barrow of some giant of old time.&nbsp; St. Malo, seized with
pity for the lost soul of the heathen, opens the mound and raises the
dead to life.&nbsp; Then follows a strange conversation between the
giant and the saint.&nbsp; He was slain, he says, by his kinsmen, and
ever since has been tormented in the other world.&nbsp; In that nether
pit they know (he says) of the Holy Trinity: but that knowledge is rather
harm than gain to them, because they did not choose to know it when
alive on earth.&nbsp; Therefore he begs to be baptized, and so delivered
from his pain.&nbsp; He is therefore instructed, catechised, and in
due time baptized, and admitted to the Holy Communion.&nbsp; For fifteen
days more he remains alive: and then, dying once more, is again placed
in his sepulchre, and left in peace.</p>
<p>From fragmentary recollections of such tales as these (it may be
observed in passing) may have sprung the strange fancy of the modern
Cornishmen, which identifies these very Celtic saints of their own race
with the giants who, according to Geoffrey of Monmouth, inhabited the
land before Brutus and his Trojans founded the Arthuric dynasty.&nbsp;
St. Just, for instance, who is one of the guardian saints of the Land&rsquo;s
End, and St. Kevern, one of the guardian saints of the Lizard, are both
giants; and Cornishmen a few years since would tell how St. Just came
from his hermitage by Cape Cornwall to visit St. Kevern in his cave
on the east side of Goonhilly Downs; and how they took the Holy Communion
together; and how St. Just, tempted by the beauty of St. Kevern&rsquo;s
paten and chalice, arose in the night and fled away with the holy vessels,
wading first the Looe Pool, and then Mount&rsquo;s Bay itself; and how
St. Kevern pursued him, and hurled after him three great boulders of
porphyry, two of which lie on the slates and granites to this day; till
St. Just, terrified at the might of his saintly brother, tossed the
stolen vessels ashore opposite St. Michael&rsquo;s Mount, and, fleeing
back to his own hermitage, never appeared again in the neighbourhood
of St. Kevern.</p>
<p>But to return.&nbsp; St. Malo, coming home with St. Brendan, craves
for peace, and solitude, and the hermit&rsquo;s cell, and goes down
to the sea-shore, to find a vessel which may carry him out once more
into the infinite unknown.&nbsp; Then there comes by a boat with no
one in it but a little boy, who takes him on board, and carries him
to the isle of the hermit Aaron, near the town of Aletha, which men
call St. Malo now; and then the little boy vanishes away, and St. Malo
knows that he was Christ himself.&nbsp; There he lives with Aaron, till
the Bretons of the neighbourhood make him their bishop.&nbsp; He converts
the idolaters around, and performs the usual miracles of hermit saints.&nbsp;
He changes water into wine, and restores to life not only a dead man,
but a dead sow likewise, over whose motherless litter a wretched slave,
who has by accident killed the sow with a stone, is weeping and wringing
his hands in dread of his master&rsquo;s fury.&nbsp; While St. Malo
is pruning vines, he lays his cape upon the ground, and a redbreast
comes and lays an egg on it.&nbsp; He leaves it there, for the bird&rsquo;s
sake, till the young are hatched, knowing, says his biographer, that
without God the Father not a sparrow falls to the ground.&nbsp; Hailoch,
the prince of Brittany, destroys his church, and is struck blind.&nbsp;
Restored to sight by the saint, he bestows large lands on the Church.&nbsp;
&ldquo;The impious generation,&rdquo; who, with their children after
them, have lost their property by Hailoch&rsquo;s gift, rise against
St. Malo.&nbsp; They steal his horses, and in mockery leave him only
a mare.&nbsp; They beat his baker, tie his feet under the horse&rsquo;s
body, and leave him on the sand to be drowned by the rising tide.&nbsp;
The sea by a miracle stops a mile off, and the baker is saved.</p>
<p>St. Malo, weary of the wicked Bretons, flees to Saintonge in Aquitaine,
where he performs yet more miracles.&nbsp; Meanwhile, a dire famine
falls on the Bretons, and a thousand horrible diseases.&nbsp; Penitent,
they send for St. Malo, who delivers them and their flocks.&nbsp; But,
at the command of an angel, he returns to Saintonge and dies there,
and Saintonge has his relics, and the innumerable miracles which they
work, even to the days of Sigebert, of Gembloux.</p>
<div class="GutenbergBlankLines1"><br /></div>
<h2>ST. COLUMBA</h2>
<div class="GutenbergBlankLines2"><br /><br /></div>
<p>The famous St. Columba cannot perhaps be numbered among the hermits:
but as the spiritual father of many hermits, as well as many monks,
and as one whose influence upon the Christianity of these islands is
notorious and extensive, he must needs have some notice in these pages.&nbsp;
Those who wish to study his life and works at length will of course
read Dr. Reeves&rsquo;s invaluable edition of Adamnan.&nbsp; The more
general reader will find all that he need know in Mr. Hill Burton&rsquo;s
excellent &ldquo;History of Scotland,&rdquo; chapters vii. and viii.;
and also in Mr. Maclear&rsquo;s &ldquo;History of Christian Missions
during the Middle Ages&rdquo;&mdash;a book which should be in every
Sunday library.</p>
<p>St. Columba, like St. David and St. Cadoc of Wales, and like many
great Irish saints, is a prince and a statesman as well as a monk.&nbsp;
He is mixed up in quarrels between rival tribes.&nbsp; He is concerned,
according to antiquaries, in three great battles, one of which sprang,
according to some, from Columba&rsquo;s own misdeeds.&nbsp; He copies
by stealth the Psalter of St. Finnian.&nbsp; St. Finnian demands the
copy, saying it was his as much as the original.&nbsp; The matter is
referred to King Dermod, who pronounces, in high court at Tara, the
famous decision which has become a proverb in Ireland, that &ldquo;to
every cow belongs her own calf.&rdquo; <a name="citation283"></a><a href="#footnote283">{283}</a>&nbsp;
St. Columba, who does not seem at this time to have possessed the dove-like
temper which his name, according to his disciples, indicates, threatens
to avenge upon the king his unjust decision.&nbsp; The son of the king&rsquo;s
steward and the son of the King of Connaught, a hostage at Dermod&rsquo;s
court, are playing hurley on the green before Dermod&rsquo;s palace.&nbsp;
The young prince strikes the other boy, kills him, and flies for protection
to Columba.&nbsp; He is nevertheless dragged away, and slain upon the
spot.&nbsp; Columba leaves the palace in a rage, goes to his native
mountains of Donegal, and returns at the head of an army of northern
and western Irish to fight the great battle of Cooldrevny in Sligo.&nbsp;
But after a while public opinion turns against him; and at the Synod
of Teltown, in Meath, it is proclaimed that Columba, the man of blood,
shall quit Ireland, and win for Christ out of heathendom as many souls
as have perished in that great fight.&nbsp; Then Columba, with twelve
comrades, sails in a coracle for the coast of Argyleshire; and on the
eve of Pentecost, A.D. 563, lands upon that island which, it may be,
will be famous to all times as Iona, Hy, or Icolumkill,&mdash;Hy of
Columb of the Cells.</p>
<p>Thus had Columba, if the tale be true, undertaken a noble penance;
and he performed it like a noble man.&nbsp; If, according to the fashion
of those times, he bewailed his sins with tears, he was no morbid or
selfish recluse, but a man of practical power, and of wide humanity.&nbsp;
Like one of Homer&rsquo;s old heroes, St. Columba could turn his hand
to every kind of work.&nbsp; He could turn the hand-mill, work on the
farm, heal the sick, and command as a practised sailor the little fleet
of coracles which lay hauled up on the strand of Iona, ready to carry
him and his monks on their missionary voyages to the mainland or the
isles.&nbsp; Tall, powerful, handsome, with a face which, as Adamnan
said, made all who saw him glad, and a voice so stentorian that it could
be heard at times a full mile off, and coming too of royal race, it
is no wonder if he was regarded as a sort of demigod, not only by his
own monks, but by the Pictish chiefs to whom he preached the Cross.&nbsp;
We hear of him at Craig Phadrick, near Inverness; at Skye, at Tiree,
and other islands; we hear of him receiving visits from his old monks
of Derry and Durrow; returning to Ireland to decide between rival chiefs;
and at last dying at the age of seventy-seven, kneeling before the altar
in his little chapel of Iona&mdash;a death as beautiful as had been
the last thirty-four years of his life; and leaving behind him disciples
destined to spread the light of Christianity over the whole of Scotland
and the northern parts of England.</p>
<p>St. Columba, at one period or other of his life, is said to have
visited a missionary hermit, whose name still lingers in Scotland as
St. Kentigern, or more commonly St. Mungo, the patron saint of Glasgow.&nbsp;
The two men, it is said (but the story belongs to the twelfth century,
and can hardly be depended on), exchanged their crooked staves or crosiers
in token of Christian brotherhood, and that which St. Columba is said
to have given to St. Kentigern was preserved in Ripon Cathedral to the
beginning of the fifteenth century.&nbsp; But who St. Kentigern was,
or what he really did, is hard to say; for all his legends, like most
of these early ones, are as tangled as a dream.&nbsp; He dies in the
year 601: and yet he is the disciple of the famous St. Servanus or St.
Serf, who lived in the times of St. Palladius and St. Patrick, 180 years
before.&nbsp; This St. Serf is a hermit of the true old type; and even
if his story be, as Dr. Reeves thinks, a fabrication throughout, it
is at least a very early one, and true to the ideal which had originated
with St. Antony.&nbsp; He is brought up in a monastery at Culross: he
is tempted by the devil in a cave in the parish of Dysart (the Desert),
in Fifeshire, which still retains that name.&nbsp; The d&aelig;mon,
fleeing from him, enters an unfortunate man, who is forthwith plagued
with a wolfish appetite.&nbsp; St. Serf cures him by putting his thumb
into his mouth.&nbsp; A man is accused of stealing and eating a lamb,
and denies the theft.&nbsp; St. Serf, however, makes the lamb bleat
in the robber&rsquo;s stomach, and so substantiates the charge beyond
all doubt.&nbsp; He works other wonders; among them the slaying of a
great dragon in the place called &ldquo;Dunyne;&rdquo; sails for the
Orkneys, and converts the people there; and vanishes thenceforth into
the dream-land from which he sprung.</p>
<p>Two great disciples he has, St. Ternan and St. Kentigern; mystery
and miracle hang round the boyhood of the latter.&nbsp; His father is
unknown.&nbsp; His mother is condemned to be cast from the rock of &ldquo;Dunpelder,&rdquo;
but is saved and absolved by a miracle.&nbsp; Before the eyes of the
astonished Picts, she floats gently down through the air, and arrives
at the cliff foot unhurt.&nbsp; St. Kentigern is thenceforth believed
to be virgin-born, and is reverenced as a miraculous being from his
infancy.&nbsp; He goes to school to the mythic St. Serf, who calls him
Mungo, or the Beloved; which name he bears in Glasgow until this day.&nbsp;
His fellow-scholars envy his virtue and learning, and try to ruin him
with their master.&nbsp; St. Serf has a pet robin, which is wont to
sit and sing upon his shoulder.&nbsp; The boys pull off its head, and
lay the blame upon Kentigern.&nbsp; The saint comes in wrathful, tawse
in hand, and Kentigern is for the moment in serious danger; but, equal
to the occasion then as afterwards, he puts the robin&rsquo;s head on
again, sets it singing, and amply vindicates his innocence.&nbsp; To
this day the robin figures in the arms of the good city of Glasgow,
with the tree which St. Kentigern, when his enemies had put out his
fire, brought in from the frozen forest and lighted with his breath,
and the salmon in whose mouth a ring which had been cast into the Clyde
had been found again by St. Kentigern&rsquo;s prophetic spirit.</p>
<p>The envy of his fellow-scholars, however, is too much for St. Kentigern&rsquo;s
peace of mind.&nbsp; He wanders away to the spot where Glasgow city
now stands, lives in a rock hollowed out into a tomb, is ordained by
an Irish bishop (according to a Celtic custom, of which antiquaries
have written learnedly and dubiously likewise), and has ecclesiastical
authority over all the Picts from the Frith of Forth to the Roman Wall.&nbsp;
But all these stories, as I said before, are tangled as a dream; for
the twelfth century monks, in their loyal devotion to the see of Rome,
are apt to introduce again and again ecclesiastical customs which belonged
to their own time, and try to represent these prim&aelig;val saints
as regular and well-disciplined servants of the Pope.</p>
<p>It may be remarked that St. Serf is said to have come into a &ldquo;dysart&rdquo;
or desert.&nbsp; So did many monks of the school of St. Columba and
his disciples, who wished for a severer and a more meditative life than
could be found in the busy society of a convent.&nbsp; &ldquo;There
was a &lsquo;disert,&rsquo;&rdquo; says Dr. Reeves, &ldquo;for such
men to retire to, besides the monastery of Derry, and another at Iona
itself, situate near the shore in the low ground, north of the Cathedral,
as may be inferred from Portandisiart, the name of a little bay in this
situation.&rdquo;&nbsp; A similar &ldquo;disert&rdquo; or collection
of hermit cells was endowed at Cashel in 1101; and a &ldquo;disert columkill,&rdquo;
with two townland mills and a vegetable garden, was endowed at Kells,
at a somewhat earlier period, for the use of &ldquo;devout pilgrims,&rdquo;
as those were called who left the society of men to worship God in solitude.</p>
<p>The Venerable Bede speaks of as many as three personages, Saxons
by their names, who in the Isle of Ireland led the &ldquo;Pilgrim&rdquo;
or anchoritic life, to obtain a country in heaven; and tells of a Drycthelm
of the monastery at Melrose, who went into a secret dwelling therein
to give himself more utterly to prayer, and who used to stand for hours
in the cold waters of the Tweed, as St. Godric did centuries afterwards
in those of the Wear.&nbsp; Solitaries, &ldquo;recluses,&rdquo; are
met with again and again in these old records, who more than once became
Abbots of Iona itself.&nbsp; But there is no need to linger on over
instances which are only quoted to show that some of the noblest spirits
of the Celtic Church kept up wherever they could the hermit&rsquo;s
ideal, the longing for solitude, for passive contemplation, for silence
and perpetual prayer, which they had inherited from St. Antony and the
Fathers of the Egyptian Desert.</p>
<p>The same ideal was carried by them over the Border into England.&nbsp;
Off its extreme northern coast, for instance, nearly half-way between
Berwick and Bamborough Castle, lies, as travellers northward may have
seen for themselves, the &ldquo;Holy Island,&rdquo; called in old times
Lindisfarne.&nbsp; A monk&rsquo;s chapel on that island was the mother
of all the churches between Tyne and Tweed, as well as of many between
Tyne and Humber.&nbsp; The Northumbrians had been nominally converted,
according to Bede, A.D. 627, under their King Edwin, by Paulinus, one
of the Roman monks who had followed in the steps of St. Augustine, the
apostle of Kent.&nbsp; Evil times had fallen on them.&nbsp; Penda, at
the head of the idolatrous Mercians (the people of Mid-England), and
Ceadwalla, at the head of the Western Britons, had ravaged the country
north of Tweed with savage cruelty, slain King Edwin, at Hatfield, near
Doncaster, and exterminated Christianity; while Paulinus had fled to
Kent, and become Bishop of Rochester.&nbsp; The invaders had been driven
out, seemingly by Oswald, who knew enough of Christianity to set up,
ere he engaged the enemy, a cross of wood on the &ldquo;Heavenfield,&rdquo;
near Hexham.&nbsp; That cross stood till the time of Bede, some 150
years after; and had become, like Moses&rsquo; brazen serpent, an object
of veneration.&nbsp; For if chips cut off from it were put into water,
that water cured men or cattle of their diseases.</p>
<p>Oswald, believing that it was through the mercy of him whom that
cross symbolized he had conquered the Mercians and the Britons, would
needs reconvert his people to the true faith.&nbsp; He had been in exile
during Edwin&rsquo;s lifetime among the Scots, and had learned from
them something of Christianity.&nbsp; So out of Iona a monk was sent
to him, Aidan by name, to be a bishop over the Northumbrians; and he
settled himself upon the isle of Lindisfarne, and began to convert it
into another Iona.&nbsp; &ldquo;A man he was,&rdquo; says Bede, &ldquo;of
singular sweetness, piety, and moderation; zealous in the cause of God,
though not altogether according to knowledge, for he was wont to keep
Easter after the fashion of his country;&rdquo; <i>i.e</i>. of the Picts
and Northern Scots. . . . &ldquo;From that time forth many Scots came
daily into Britain, and with great devotion preached the word to these
provinces of the English over whom King Oswald reigned. . . .&nbsp;
Churches were built, money and lands were given of the king&rsquo;s
bounty to build monasteries; the English, great and small, were by their
Scottish masters instructed in the rules and observance of regular discipline;
for most of those who came to preach were monks.&rdquo; <a name="citation290"></a><a href="#footnote290">{290}</a></p>
<p>So says the Venerable Bede, the monk of Jarrow, and the father (as
he has been well called) of English history.&nbsp; He tells us too,
how Aidan, wishing, it may be supposed, for greater solitude, went away
and lived on the rocky isle of Farne, some two miles out at sea, off
Bamborough Castle; and how, when he saw Penda and his Mercians, in a
second invasion of Northumbria, trying to burn down the walls of Bamborough&mdash;which
were probably mere stockades of timber&mdash;he cried to God, from off
his rock, to &ldquo;behold the mischief:&rdquo; whereon the wind changed
suddenly, and blew the flames back on the besiegers, discomfiting them,
and saving the town.</p>
<p>Bede tells us, too, how Aidan wandered, preaching from place to place,
haunting King Oswald&rsquo;s court, but owning nothing of his own save
his church, and a few fields about it; and how, when death came upon
him, they set up a tent for him close by the wall at the west end of
the church, so that it befell that he gave up the ghost leaning against
a post, which stood outside to strengthen the wall.</p>
<p>A few years after, Penda came again and burned the village, with
the church; and yet neither could that fire, nor one which happened
soon after, destroy that post.&nbsp; Wherefore the post was put inside
the church, as a holy thing, and chips of it, like those of the Cross
of Heaven Field, healed many folk of their distempers.</p>
<p>. . . A tale at which we may look in two different humours.&nbsp;
We may pass it by with a sneer, and a hypothesis (which will be probably
true) that the post was of old heart-of-oak, which is burnt with extreme
difficulty; or we may pause a moment in reverence before the noble figure
of the good old man, ending a life of unselfish toil without a roof
beneath which to lay his head; penniless and comfortless in this world:
but sure of his reward in the world to come.</p>
<p>A few years after Aidan&rsquo;s death another hermit betook him to
the rocks of Farne, who rose to far higher glory; who became, in fact,
the tutelar saint of the fierce Northern men; who was to them, up to
the time even of the Tudor monarchs, what Pallas Athene was to Athens,
or Diana to the Ephesians.&nbsp; St. Cuthbert&rsquo;s shrine, in Durham
Cathedral (where his biographer Bede also lay in honour), was their
rallying point, not merely for ecclesiastical jurisdiction or for miraculous
cures, but for political movements.&nbsp; Above his shrine rose the
noble pile of Durham.&nbsp; The bishop, who ruled in his name, was a
Count Palatine, and an almost independent prince.&nbsp; His sacred banner
went out to battle before the Northern levies, or drove back again and
again the flames which consumed the wooden houses of Durham.&nbsp; His
relics wrought innumerable miracles; and often he himself appeared with
long countenance, ripened by abstinence, his head sprinkled with grey
hairs, his casule of cloth of gold, his mitre of glittering crystal,
his face brighter than the sun, his eyes mild as the stars of heaven,
the gems upon his hand and robes rattling against his pastoral staff
beset with pearls. <a name="citation292"></a><a href="#footnote292">{292}</a>&nbsp;
Thus glorious the demigod of the Northern men appeared to his votaries,
and steered with his pastoral staff, as with a rudder, the sinking ship
in safety to Lindisfarne; received from the hands of St. Brendan, as
from a saint of inferior powers, the innocent yeoman, laden with fetters,
whom he had delivered out of the dungeon of Brancepeth, and, smiting
asunder the massive Norman walls, led him into the forest, and bade
him flee to sanctuary in Durham, and be safe; or visited the little
timber vine-clad chapel of Lixtune, on the Cheshire shore, to heal the
sick who watched all night before his altar, or to forgive the lad who
had robbed the nest which his sacred raven had built upon the roof,
and, falling with the decayed timber, had broken his bones, and maimed
his sacrilegious hand.</p>
<p>Originally, says Bede, a monk at Melrose, and afterward abbot of
the same place, he used to wander weeks together out of his monastery,
seemingly into Ettrick and the Lammermuirs, and preach in such villages
as &ldquo;being seated high up among craggy, uncouth mountains, were
frightful to others even to look at, and whose poverty and barbarity
rendered them inaccessible to other teachers.&rdquo;&nbsp; &ldquo;So
skilful an orator was he, so fond of enforcing his subject, and such
a brightness appeared in his angelic face, that no man presumed to conceal
from him the most hidden secrets of their hearts, but all openly confessed
what they had done.&rdquo;</p>
<p>So he laboured for many years, till his old abbot Eata, who had become
bishop and abbot at Lindisfarne, sent for him thither, and made him
prior of the monks for several years.&nbsp; But at last he longed, like
so many before him, for solitude.&nbsp; He considered (so he said afterwards
to the brethren) that the life of the disciplined and obedient monk
was higher than that of the lonely and independent hermit: but yet he
longed to be alone; longed, it may be, to recall at least upon some
sea-girt rock thoughts which had come to him in those long wanderings
on the heather moors, with no sound to distract him save the hum of
the bee and the wail of the curlew; and so he went away to that same
rock of Farne, where Aidan had taken refuge some ten or fifteen years
before, and there, with the deep sea rolling at his feet and the gulls
wailing about his head, he built himself one of those &ldquo;Picts&rsquo;
Houses,&rdquo; the walls of which remain still in many parts of Scotland&mdash;a
circular hut of turf and rough stone&mdash;and dug out the interior
to a depth of some feet, and thatched it with sticks and grass; and
made, it seems, two rooms within; one for an oratory, one for a dwelling-place:
and so lived alone, and worshipped God.&nbsp; He grew his scanty crops
of barley on the rock (men said, of course, by miracle): he had tried
wheat, but, as was to be expected, it failed.&nbsp; He found (men said,
of course, by miracle) a spring upon the rock.&nbsp; Now and then brethren
came to visit him.&nbsp; And what did man need more, save a clear conscience
and the presence of his Creator?&nbsp; Certainly not Cuthbert.&nbsp;
When he asked the brethren to bring him a beam that he might prop up
his cabin where the sea had eaten out the floor, and when they forgot
the commission, the sea itself washed one up in the very cove where
it was needed: when the choughs from the cliff stole his barley and
the straw from the roof of his little hospice, he had only to reprove
them, and they never offended again; on one occasion, indeed, they atoned
for their offence by bringing him a lump of suet, wherewith he greased
his shoes for many a day.&nbsp; We are not bound to believe this story;
it is one of many which hang about the memory of St. Cuthbert, and which
have sprung out of that love of the wild birds which may have grown
up in the good man during his long wanderings through woods and over
moors.&nbsp; He bequeathed (so it was believed) as a sacred legacy to
the wild-fowl of the Farne islands, &ldquo;St. Cuthbert&rsquo;s peace;&rdquo;
above all to the eider-ducks, which swarmed there in his days, but are
now, alas! growing rarer and rarer, from the intrusion of vulgar sportsmen
who never heard St. Cuthbert&rsquo;s name, or learnt from him to spare
God&rsquo;s creatures when they need them not.&nbsp; On Farne, in Reginald&rsquo;s
time, they bred under your very bed, got out of your way if you made
a sign to them, let you take up them or their young ones, and nestled
silently in your bosom, and croaked joyfully with fluttering wings when
stroked.&nbsp; &ldquo;Not to nature, but to grace; not to hereditary
tendency, but only to the piety and compassion of the blessed St. Cuthbert,&rdquo;
says Reginald, &ldquo;is so great a miracle to be ascribed.&nbsp; For
the Lord who made all things in heaven and earth has subjected them
to the nod of his saints, and prostrated them under the feet of obedience.&rdquo;&nbsp;
Insufficient induction (the cause of endless mistakes, and therefore
of endless follies and crimes) kept Reginald unaware of the now notorious
fact that the female eider, during the breeding season, is just as tame,
allowing for a little exaggeration, as St. Cuthbert&rsquo;s own ducks
are, while the male eider is just as wild and wary as any other sea-bird:
a mistake altogether excusable in one who had probably never seen or
heard of eider-ducks in any other spot.&nbsp; It may be, nevertheless,
that St. Cuthbert&rsquo;s special affection for the eider may have been
called out by another strange and well-known fact about them of which
Reginald oddly enough takes no note&mdash;namely, that they line their
nests with down plucked from their own bosom; thus realizing the fable
which has made the pelican for so many centuries the type of the Church.&nbsp;
It is a question, indeed, whether the pelican, which is always represented
in medi&aelig;val paintings and sculptures with a short bill, instead
of the enormous bill and pouch which is the especial mark of the &ldquo;Onocrotalus&rdquo;
of the ancients, now miscalled pelican, be not actually the eider-duck
itself, confounded with the true <i>pelecanus</i>, which was the medi&aelig;val,
and is still the scientific, name of the cormorant.&nbsp; Be that as
it may, ill befell any one who dare touch one of St. Cuthbert&rsquo;s
birds, as was proved in the case of Liveing, servant to &AElig;lric,
who was a hermit in Farne after the time of St. Cuthbert.&nbsp; For
he, tired it may be of barley and dried fish, killed and ate an eider-duck
in his master&rsquo;s absence, scattering the bones and feathers over
the cliffs.&nbsp; But when the hermit came back, what should he find
but those same bones and feathers rolled into a lump and laid inside
the door of the little chapel; the very sea, says Reginald, not having
dared to swallow them up.&nbsp; Whereby the hapless Liveing being betrayed,
was soundly flogged, and put on bread and water for many a day; the
which story Liveing himself told to Reginald.</p>
<p>Not only the eider, but all birds in Farne, were protected by St.
Cuthbert&rsquo;s peace.&nbsp; Bartholomew, who was a famous hermit there
in after years, had a tame bird, says the chronicler, who ate from his
hand, and hopped about the table among him and his guests, till some
thought it a miracle; and some, finding, no doubt, the rocks of Farne
weary enough, derived continual amusement from the bird.&nbsp; But when
he one day went off to another island, and left his bird to keep the
house, a hawk came in and ate it up.&nbsp; Cuthbert, who could not save
the bird, at least could punish the murderer.&nbsp; The hawk flew round
and round the island, imprisoned, so it was thought, by some mysterious
power, till, terrified and worn out, it flew into the chapel, and lay,
cowering and half dead, in a corner by the altar.&nbsp; Bartholomew
came back, found his bird&rsquo;s feathers, and the tired hawk.&nbsp;
But even the hawk must profit by St. Cuthbert&rsquo;s peace.&nbsp; He
took it up, carried it to the harbour, and there bade it depart in St.
Cuthbert&rsquo;s name, whereon it flew off free, and was no more seen.&nbsp;
Such tales as these may be explained, even to their most minute details,
by simply natural causes: and yet, in this age of wanton destruction
of wild birds, one is tempted at moments to wish for the return of some
such graceful and humane superstition which could keep down, at least
in the name of mercy and humanity, the needless cruelty of man.</p>
<p>But to return.&nbsp; After St. Cuthbert, says Bede, had served God
in the solitude of Farne for many years, the mound which encompassed
his habitation being so high that he could see nothing from thence but
heaven, to which he so ardently aspired, he was compelled by tears and
entreaties&mdash;King Egfrid himself coming to the island, with bishops
and religious and great men&mdash;to become himself bishop in Holy Island.&nbsp;
There, as elsewhere, he did his duty.&nbsp; But after two years he went
again to Farne, knowing that his end was near.&nbsp; For when, in his
episcopal labours, he had gone across to Lugubalia&mdash;old Penrith,
in Cumberland&mdash;there came across to him a holy hermit, Herebert
by name, who dwelt upon an island in Derwentwater, and talked with him
a long while on heavenly things; and Cuthbert bade him ask him then
all the questions which he wished to have resolved, for they should
see each other no more in this world.&nbsp; Herebert, who seems to have
been one of his old friends, fell at Cuthbert&rsquo;s feet, and bade
him remember that whenever he had done wrong he had submitted himself
to him utterly, and always tried to live according to his rules; and
all he wished for now was that, as they had served God together upon
earth, they might depart for ever to see his bliss in heaven: the which
befell; for a few months afterwards, that is, on the 20th of March,
their souls quitted their mortal bodies on the same day, and they were
re-united in spirit.</p>
<p>St. Cuthbert wished to have been buried on his rock in Farne: but
the brethren had persuaded him to allow his corpse to be removed to
Holy Island.&nbsp; He begged them, said Bede, should they be forced
to leave that place, to carry his bones along with them; and so they
were forced to do at last; for in the year 875; whilst the Danes were
struggling with Alfred in Wessex, an army of them, with Halfdene at
their head, went up into Northumbria, burning towns, destroying churches,
tossing children on their pike-points, and committing all those horrors
which made the Norsemen terrible and infamous for so many years.&nbsp;
Then the monks fled from the monastery, bearing the shrine of St. Cuthbert,
and all their treasures, and followed by their retainers, men, women,
and children, and their sheep and oxen: and behold! the hour of their
flight was that of an exceedingly high spring tide.&nbsp; The Danes
were landing from their ships in their rear; in their front was some
two miles of sea.&nbsp; Escape seemed hopeless; when, says the legend,
the water retreated before the holy relics as they advanced; and became,
as to the children of Israel of old, a wall on their right hand and
on their left; and so St. Cuthbert came safe to shore, and wandered
in the woods, borne upon his servants&rsquo; shoulders, and dwelling
in tents for seven years, and found rest at last in Durham, till at
the Reformation his shrine, and that of the Venerable Bede, were robbed
of their gold and jewels; and no trace of them (as far as I know) is
left, save that huge slab, whereon is written the monkish rhyme:&mdash;</p>
<div class="GutenbergBlankLines1"><br /></div>
<p>Hic jacet in foss&acirc;<br />Bed&aelig; Venerabilis ossa. <a name="citation299"></a><a href="#footnote299">{299}</a></p>
<div class="GutenbergBlankLines2"><br /><br /></div>
<h2>ST. GUTHLAC</h2>
<div class="GutenbergBlankLines2"><br /><br /></div>
<p>Hermits dwelling in the wilderness, as far as I am aware, were to
be seen only in the northern and western parts of the island, where
not only did the forest afford concealment, but the crags and caves
shelter.&nbsp; The southern and eastern English seldom possess the vivid
imagination of the Briton, the Northumbrian, and the Scot; while the
rich lowlands of central, southern, and eastern England, well peopled
and well tilled, offered few spots lonely enough for the hermit&rsquo;s
cell.</p>
<p>One district only was desolate enough to attract those who wished
to be free from the world,&mdash;namely, the great fens north of Cambridge;
and there, accordingly, as early as the seventh century, hermits settled
in morasses now so utterly transformed that it is difficult to restore
in one&rsquo;s imagination the original scenery.</p>
<p>The fens in the seventh century were probably very like the forests
at the mouth of the Mississippi, or the swampy shores of the Carolinas.&nbsp;
Their vast plain is now, in summer, one sea of golden corn; in winter,
a black dreary fallow, cut into squares by stagnant dykes, and broken
only by unsightly pumping mills and doleful lines of poplar-trees.&nbsp;
Of old it was a labyrinth of black wandering streams; broad lagoons;
morasses submerged every spring-tide; vast beds of reed and sedge and
fern; vast copses of willow, alder, and grey poplar, rooted in the floating
peat, which was swallowing up slowly, all-devouring, yet all-preserving,
the forests of fir and oak, ash and poplar, hazel and yew, which had
once grown on that low, rank soil, sinking slowly (so geologists assure
us) beneath the sea from age to age.&nbsp; Trees, torn down by flood
and storm, floated and lodged in rafts, damming the waters back upon
the land.&nbsp; Streams, bewildered in the flats, changed their channels,
mingling silt and sand with the peat moss.&nbsp; Nature, left to herself,
ran into wild riot and chaos more and more, till the whole fen became
one &ldquo;Dismal Swamp,&rdquo; in which, at the time of the Norman
Conquest, the &ldquo;Last of the English,&rdquo; like Dred in Mrs. Stowe&rsquo;s
tale, took refuge from their tyrants, and lived, like him, a free and
joyous life awhile.</p>
<p>For there are islands in the sea which have escaped the destroying
deluge of peat-moss,&mdash;outcrops of firm and fertile land, which
in the early Middle Age were so many natural parks, covered with richest
grass and stateliest trees, swarming with deer and roe, goat and boar,
as the streams around swarmed with otter and beaver, and with fowl of
every feather, and fish of every scale.</p>
<p>Beautiful after their kind were those far isles in the eyes of the
monks who were the first settlers in the wilderness.&nbsp; The author
of the &ldquo;History of Ramsey&rdquo; grows enthusiastic, and somewhat
bombastic also, as he describes the lovely isle, which got its name
from the solitary ram who had wandered thither, either in extreme drought
or over the winter ice, and, never able to return, was found feeding
among the wild deer, fat beyond the wont of rams.&nbsp; He tells of
the stately ashes, most of them cut in his time, to furnish mighty beams
for the church roof; of the rich pastures painted with all gay flowers
in spring; of the &ldquo;green crown&rdquo; of reed and alder which
encircled the isle; of the fair wide mere (now drained) with its &ldquo;sandy
beach&rdquo; along the forest side; &ldquo;a delight,&rdquo; he says,
&ldquo;to all who look thereon.&rdquo;</p>
<p>In like humour William of Malmesbury, writing in the first half of
the twelfth century, speaks of Thorney Abbey and its isle.&nbsp; &ldquo;It
represents,&rdquo; says he, &ldquo;a very paradise; for that in pleasure
and delight it resembles heaven itself.&nbsp; These marshes abound in
trees, whose length, without a knot, doth emulate the stars.&nbsp; The
plain there is as level as the sea, alluring the eye with its green
grass, and so smooth that there is nought to trip the foot of him who
runs through it.&nbsp; Neither is there any waste place; for in some
parts are apples, in others vines, which are either spread on the ground,
or raised on poles.&nbsp; A mutual strife there is between Nature and
Art; so that what one produces not the other supplies.&nbsp; What shall
I say of those fair buildings, which &rsquo;tis so wonderful to see
the ground among those fens upbear?&rdquo;</p>
<p>So wrote William of Malmesbury, after the industry and wisdom of
the monks, for more than four centuries, had been at work to civilize
and cultivate the wilderness.&nbsp; Yet even then there was another
side to the picture; and Thorney, Ramsey, or Crowland would have seemed,
for nine months every year, sad places enough to us comfortable folk
of the nineteenth century.&nbsp; But men lived hard in those days, even
the most high-born and luxurious nobles and ladies; under dark skies,
in houses which we should think, from darkness, draught, and want of
space, unfit for felons&rsquo; cells.&nbsp; Hardly they lived; and easily
were they pleased; and thanked God for the least gleam of sunshine,
the least patch of green, after the terrible and long winters of the
Middle Ages.&nbsp; And ugly enough those winters must have been, what
with snow and darkness, flood and ice, ague and rheumatism; while through
the dreary winter&rsquo;s night the whistle of the wind and the wild
cries of the waterfowl were translated into the howls of witches and
d&aelig;mons; and (as in St. Guthlac&rsquo;s case), the delirious fancies
of marsh fever made those fiends take hideous shapes before the inner
eye, and act fantastic horrors round the fen-man&rsquo;s bed of sedge.</p>
<p>Concerning this St. Guthlac full details remain, both in Latin and
Anglo-Saxon; the author of the original document professing to be one
Felix, a monk of Ramsey near by, who wrote possibly as early as the
eighth century. <a name="citation303"></a><a href="#footnote303">{303}</a></p>
<p>There we may read how the young warrior-noble Guthlac (&ldquo;The
Battle-Play,&rdquo; the &ldquo;Sport of War&rdquo;), tired of slaying
and sinning, bethought him to fulfil the prodigies seen at his birth;
how he wandered into the fen, where one Tatwin (who after became a saint
likewise) took him in his canoe to a spot so lonely as to be almost
unknown, buried in reeds and alders, and how he found among the trees
nought but an old &ldquo;law,&rdquo; as the Scots still call a mound,
which men of old had broken into seeking for treasure, and a little
pond; and how he built himself a hermit&rsquo;s cell thereon, and saw
visions and wrought miracles; and how men came to him, as to a fakir
or shaman of the East; notably one Beccel, who acted as his servant;
and how as Beccel was shaving the saint one day there fell on him a
great temptation: Why should he not cut St. Guthlac&rsquo;s throat,
and instal himself in his cell, that he might have the honour and glory
of sainthood?&nbsp; But St. Guthlac perceived the inward temptation
(which is told with the naive honesty of those half-savage times), and
rebuked the offender into confession, and all went well to the end.</p>
<p>There we may read, too, a detailed account of the Fauna now happily
extinct in the fens; of the creatures who used to hale St. Guthlac out
of his hut, drag him through the bogs, carry him aloft through frost
and fire&mdash;&ldquo;Develen and luther gostes&rdquo;&mdash;such as
tormented in like wise St. Botolph (from whom Botulfston = Boston, has
its name), and who were supposed to haunt the meres and fens, and to
have an especial fondness for old heathen barrows with their fancied
treasure-hoards: how they &ldquo;filled the house with their coming,
and poured in on every side, from above, and from beneath, and everywhere.&nbsp;
They were in countenance horrible, and they had great heads, and a long
neck, and a lean visage; they were filthy and squalid in their beards,
and they had rough ears, and crooked &lsquo;nebs,&rsquo; and fierce
eyes, and foul mouths; and their teeth were like horses&rsquo; tusks;
and their throats were filled with flame, and they were grating in their
voice; they had crooked shanks, and knees big and great behind, and
distorted toes, and cried hoarsely with their voices; and they came
with immoderate noise and immense horror, that he thought that all between,
heaven and earth resounded with their voices. . . .&nbsp; And they tugged
and led him out of the cot, and led him to the swart fen, and threw
and sunk him in the muddy waters.&nbsp; After that they brought him
into the wild places of the wilderness, among the thick beds of brambles,
that all his body was torn. . . .&nbsp; After that they took him and
beat him with iron whips, and after that they brought him on their creaking
wings between the cold regions of the air.&rdquo;</p>
<p>But there are gentler and more human touches in that old legend.&nbsp;
You may read in it how all the wild birds of the fen came to St. Guthlac,
and he fed them after their kind; how the ravens tormented him, stealing
letters, gloves, and what not, from his visitors; and then, seized with
compunction at his reproofs, brought them back, or hanged them on the
reeds; and how, as Wilfrid, a holy visitant, was sitting with him, discoursing
of the contemplative life, two swallows came flying in, and lifted up
their song, sitting now on the saint&rsquo;s hand, now on his shoulder,
now on his knee; and how, when Wilfrid wondered thereat, Guthlac made
answer, &ldquo;Know you not that he who hath led his life according
to God&rsquo;s will, to him the wild beasts and the wild birds draw
the more near?&rdquo;</p>
<p>After fifteen years of such a life, in fever, ague, and starvation,
no wonder if St. Guthlac died.&nbsp; They buried him in a leaden coffin
(a grand and expensive luxury in the seventh century) which had been
sent to him during his life by a Saxon princess; and then, over his
sacred and wonder-working corpse, as over that of a Buddhist saint,
there arose a chapel, with a community of monks, companies of pilgrims
who came to worship, sick who came to be healed; till at last, founded
on great piles driven into the bog, arose the lofty wooden Abbey of
Crowland; in &ldquo;sanctuary of the four rivers,&rdquo; with its dykes,
parks, vineyards, orchards, rich ploughlands, from which, in time of
famine, the monks of Crowland fed all people of the neighbouring fens;
with its tower with seven bells, which had not their like in England;
its twelve altars rich with the gifts of Danish vikings and princes,
and even with twelve white bear-skins, the gift of Canute&rsquo;s self;
while all around were the cottages of the corrodiers, or folk who, for
a corrody, or life pittance from the abbey, had given away their lands,
to the wrong and detriment of their heirs.</p>
<p>But within those four rivers, at least, were neither tyranny nor
slavery.&nbsp; Those who took refuge in St Guthlac&rsquo;s place from
cruel lords must keep his peace toward each other, and earn their living
like honest men, safe while they so did: for between those four rivers
St. Guthlac and his abbot were the only lords; and neither summoner,
nor sheriff of the king, nor armed force of knight or earl, could enter&mdash;&ldquo;the
inheritance of the Lord, the soil of St. Mary and St. Bartholomew, the
most holy sanctuary of St. Guthlac and his monks; the minister free
from worldly servitude; the special almshouse of most illustrious kings;
the sole refuge of any one in worldly tribulation; the perpetual abode
of the saints; the possession of religious men, specially set apart
by the common council of the realm; by reason of the frequent miracles
of the holy confessor St. Guthlac, an ever-fruitful mother of camphire
in the vineyards of Engedi; and, by reason of the privileges granted
by the kings, a city of grace and safety to all who repent.&rdquo;</p>
<p>Does not all this sound like a voice from another planet?&nbsp; It
is all gone; and it was good and right that it should go when it had
done its work, and that the civilization of the fen should be taken
up and carried out by men like the good knight, Richard of Rulos, who,
two generations after the Conquest, marrying Hereward&rsquo;s grand-daughter,
and becoming Lord of Deeping (the deep meadow), thought that he could
do the same work from the hall of Bourne as the monks did from their
cloisters; got permission from the Crowland monks, for twenty marks
of silver, to drain as much as he could of the common marshes; and then
shut out the Welland by strong dykes, built cottages, marked out gardens,
and tilled fields, till &ldquo;out of slough and bogs accursed he made
a garden of pleasure.&rdquo;</p>
<p>Yet one lasting work those monks of Crowland seem to have done, besides
those firm dykes and rich corn-lands of the Porsand, which endure unto
this day.&nbsp; For within two generations of the Norman conquest, while
the old wooden abbey, destroyed by fire, was being replaced by that
noble pile of stone whose ruins are still standing, the French abbot
of Crowland (so runs the legend) sent French monks to open a school
under the new French donjon, in the little Roman town of Grante-brigge;
whereby&mdash;so does all earnest work, however mistaken, grow and spread
in this world, infinitely and for ever&mdash;St. Guthlac, by his canoe-voyage
into Crowland Island, became the spiritual father of the University
of Cambridge in the old world; and therefore of her noble daughter,
the University of Cambridge, in the new world which fen-men sailing
from Boston deeps colonized and Christianized 800 years after St. Guthlac&rsquo;s
death.</p>
<div class="GutenbergBlankLines2"><br /><br /></div>
<h2>ST. GODRIC OF FINCHALE</h2>
<div class="GutenbergBlankLines2"><br /><br /></div>
<p>A personage quite as interesting, though not as famous, as Cuthbert
or Guthlac, is St. Godric; the hermit around whose cell rose the Priory
of Finchale.&nbsp; In a loop of the river Wear, near Durham, there settled
in the days of Bishop Flambard, between 1099 and 1128, a man whose parentage
and history was for many years unknown to the good folks of the neighbourhood.&nbsp;
He had come, it seems, from a hermitage in Eskdale, in the parish of
Whitby, whence he had been driven by the Percys, lords of the soil.&nbsp;
He had gone to Durham, become the doorkeeper of St. Giles&rsquo;s church,
and gradually learnt by heart (he was no scholar) the whole Psalter.&nbsp;
Then he had gone to St. Mary&rsquo;s church, where (as was the fashion
of the times) there was a children&rsquo;s school; and, listening to
the little ones at their lessons, picked up such hymns and prayers as
he thought would suffice his spiritual wants.&nbsp; And then, by leave
of the bishop, he had gone away into the woods, and devoted himself
to the solitary life in Finchale.&nbsp; Buried in the woods and crags
of the &ldquo;Royal Park,&rdquo; as it was then called, which swarmed
with every kind of game, there was a little flat meadow, rough with
sweet-gale and bramble and willow, beside a teeming salmon-pool.&nbsp;
Great wolves haunted the woods; but Godric cared nought for them; and
the shingles swarmed with snakes,&mdash;probably only the harmless collared
snakes of wet meadows, but reputed, as all snakes are by the vulgar,
venomous: but he did not object to become &ldquo;the companion of serpents
and poisonous asps.&rdquo;&nbsp; He handled them, caressed them, let
them lie by the fire in swarms on winter nights, in the little cave
which he had hollowed in the ground and thatched with turf.&nbsp; Men
told soon how the snakes obeyed him; how two especially huge ones used
to lie twined about his legs; till after many years, annoyed by their
importunity, he turned them all gently out of doors, with solemn adjurations
never to return, and they, of course, obeyed.</p>
<p>His austerities knew no bounds.&nbsp; He lived on roots and berries,
flowers and leaves; and when the good folk found him out, and put gifts
of food near his cell, he carried them up to the crags above, and, offering
them solemnly up to the God who feeds the ravens when they call on him,
left them there for the wild birds.&nbsp; He watched, fasted, and scourged
himself, and wore always a hair shirt and an iron cuirass.&nbsp; He
sat, night after night, even in mid-winter, in the cold Wear, the waters
of which had hollowed out a rock near by into a natural bath, and afterwards
in a barrel sunk in the floor of a little chapel of wattle, which he
built and dedicated to the blessed Virgin Mary.&nbsp; He tilled a scrap
of ground, and ate the grain from it, mingled with ashes.&nbsp; He kept
his food till it was decayed before he tasted it; and led a life the
records of which fill the reader with astonishment, not only at the
man&rsquo;s iron strength of will, but at the iron strength of the constitution
which could support such hardships, in such a climate, for a single
year.</p>
<p>A strong and healthy man must Godric have been, to judge from the
accounts (there are two, both written by eye-witnesses) of his personal
appearance&mdash;a man of great breadth of chest and strength of arm;
black-haired, hook-nosed, deep-browed, with flashing grey eyes; altogether
a personable and able man, who might have done much work and made his
way in many lands.&nbsp; But what his former life had been he would
not tell.&nbsp; Mother-wit he had in plenty, and showed insight into
men and things which the monks of Durham were ready enough to call the
spirit of prophecy.&nbsp; After awhile it was whispered that he wrought
miraculous cures: that even a bit of the bread which he was wont to
eat had healed a sick woman; that he fought with d&aelig;mons in visible
shape; that he had seen (just as one of the old Egyptian hermits had
seen) a little black boy running about between two monks who had quarrelled
and come to hard blows and bleeding faces because one of them had made
mistakes in the evening service: and, in short, there were attributed
to him, during his lifetime, and by those who knew him well, a host
of wonders which would be startling and important were they not exactly
the same as those which appear in the life of every hermit since St.
Antony.&nbsp; It is impossible to read the pages of Reginald of Durham
(for he, the biographer of St. Cuthbert, is also the biographer of St.
Godric) without feeling how difficult it is to obtain anything like
the truth, even from eye-witnesses, if only men are (as they were in
those days) in a state of religious excitement, at a period of spiritual
revivals.&nbsp; The ignorant populace were ready to believe, and to
report, anything of the Fakeer of Finchale.&nbsp; The monks of Durham
were glad enough to have a wonder-working man belonging to them; for
Ralph Flambard, in honour of Godric, had made over to them the hermitage
of Finchale, with its fields and fisheries.&nbsp; The lad who, in after
years, waited on the hermit, would have been ready enough to testify
that his master saw d&aelig;mons and other spiritual beings; for he
began to see them on his own account; <a name="citation312"></a><a href="#footnote312">{312}</a>
fell asleep in the forest coming home from Durham with some bottles;
was led in a vision by St. John the Baptist to the top of a hill, and
shown by him wonders unspeakable; saw, on another occasion, a d&aelig;mon
in St. Godric&rsquo;s cell, hung all over with bottles of different
liquors, offering them to the saint, who bade the lad drive him out
of the little chapel, with a holy water sprinkle, but not go outside
it himself.&nbsp; But the lad, in the fury of successful pursuit, overstepped
the threshold; whereon the d&aelig;mon, turning in self-defence, threw
a single drop of one of his liquors into the lad&rsquo;s mouth, and
vanished with a laugh of scorn.&nbsp; The boy&rsquo;s face and throat
swelled horribly for three days; and he took care thenceforth to obey
the holy man more strictly: a story which I have repeated, like the
one before it, only to show the real worth of the evidence on which
Reginald has composed his book.&nbsp; Ailred, Abbot of Rievaux (for
Reginald&rsquo;s book, though dedicated to Hugh Pudsey, his bishop,
was prompted by Ailred) was capable (as his horrible story of the nun
of Watton proves) of believing anything and everything which fell in
with his fanatical, though pious and gentle, temper.</p>
<p>And here a few words must be said to persons with whose difficulties
I deeply sympathise, but from whose conclusions I differ utterly: those,
namely, who say that if we reject the miracles of these saints&rsquo;
lives, we must reject also the miracles of the New Testament.&nbsp;
The answer is, as I believe, that the Apostles and Evangelists were
sane men: men in their right minds, wise, calm; conducting themselves
(save in the matter of committing sins) like other human beings, as
befitted the disciples of that Son of Man who came eating and drinking,
and was therefore called by the ascetics of his time a gluttonous man,
and a wine-bibber: whereas these monks were not (as I have said elsewhere)
in their right minds at all.</p>
<p>This is, or ought to be, patent to any one who will compare the style
of the Apostles and Evangelists with that of the monkish hagiologists.&nbsp;
The calm, the simplicity, the brevity, the true grandeur of the former
is sufficient evidence of their healthy-mindedness and their trustworthiness.&nbsp;
The affectation, the self-consciousness, the bombast, the false grandeur
of the latter is sufficient evidence that they are neither healthy-minded
or trustworthy.&nbsp; Let students compare any passage of St. Luke or
St. John, however surprising the miracle which it relates, with St.
Jerome&rsquo;s life of Paul the First Hermit, or with that famous letter
of his to Eustochium, which (although historically important) is unfit
for the eyes of pure-minded readers and does not appear in this volume;
and let them judge for themselves.&nbsp; Let them compare, again, the
opening sentences of the Four Gospels, or of the Acts of the Apostles,
with the words with which Reginald begins this life of St. Godric.&nbsp;
&ldquo;By the touch of the Holy Spirit&rsquo;s finger the chord of the
harmonic human heart resounds melodiously.&nbsp; For when the vein of
the heart is touched by the grace of the Holy Spirit, forthwith, by
the permirific sweetness of the harmony, an exceeding operation of sacred
virtue is perceived more manifestly to spring forth.&nbsp; With this
sweetness of spirit, Godric, the man of God, was filled from the very
time of his boyhood, and grew famous for many admirable works of holy
work (<i>sic</i>), because the harmonic teaching of the Holy Spirit
fired the secrets of his very bosom with a wondrous contact of spiritual
grace:&rdquo;&mdash;and let them say, after the comparison, if the difference
between the two styles is not that which exists between one of God&rsquo;s
lilies, fresh from the field, and a tawdry bunch of artificial flowers?</p>
<p>But to return.&nbsp; Godric himself took part in the history of his
own miracles and life.&nbsp; It may be that he so overworked his brain
that he believed that he was visited by St. Peter, and taught a hymn
by the blessed Virgin Mary, and that he had taken part in a hundred
other prodigies; but the Prologue to the Harleian manuscript (which
the learned Editor, Mr. Stevenson, believes to be an early edition of
Reginald&rsquo;s own composition) confesses that Reginald, compelled
by Ailred of Rievaux, tried in vain for a long while to get the hermit&rsquo;s
story from him.</p>
<p>&ldquo;You wish to write my life?&rdquo; he said.&nbsp; &ldquo;Know
then that Godric&rsquo;s life is such as this:&mdash;Godric, at first
a gross rustic, an unclean liver, an usurer, a cheat, a perjurer, a
flatterer, a wanderer, pilfering and greedy; now a dead flea, a decayed
dog, a vile worm, not a hermit, but a hypocrite; not a solitary, but
a gad-about in mind; a devourer of alms, dainty over good things, greedy
and negligent, lazy and snoring, ambitious and prodigal, one who is
not worthy to serve others, and yet every day beats and scolds those
who serve him: this, and worse than this, you may write of Godric.&rdquo;&nbsp;
&ldquo;Then he was silent as one indignant,&rdquo; says Reginald, &ldquo;and
I went off in some confusion,&rdquo; and the grand old man was left
to himself and to his God.</p>
<p>The ecclesiastical Boswell dared not mention the subject again to
his hero for several years, though he came after from Durham to visit
him, and celebrate mass for him in his little chapel.&nbsp; After some
years, however, he approached the matter again; and whether a pardonable
vanity had crept over Godric, or whether he had begun at last to believe
in his miracles, or whether the old man had that upon his mind of which
he longed to unburthen himself, he began to answer questions, and Reginald
delighted to listen and note down till he had finished, he says, that
book of his life and miracles; <a name="citation316"></a><a href="#footnote316">{316}</a>
and after a while brought it to the saint, and falling on his knees,
begged him to bless, in the name of God, and for the benefit of the
faithful, the deeds of a certain religious man, who had suffered much
for God in this life which he (Reginald) had composed accurately.&nbsp;
The old man perceived that he himself was the subject, blessed the book
with solemn words (what was written therein he does not seem to have
read), and bade Reginald conceal it till his death, warning him that
a time would come when he should suffer rough and bitter things on account
of that book, from those who envied him.&nbsp; That prophecy, says Reginald,
came to pass; but how, or why, he does not tell.&nbsp; There may have
been, among those shrewd Northumbrian heads, even then, incredulous
men, who used their common sense.</p>
<p>But the story which Godric told was wild and beautiful; and though
we must not depend too much on the accuracy of the old man&rsquo;s recollections,
or on the honesty of Reginald&rsquo;s report, who would naturally omit
all incidents which made against his hero&rsquo;s perfection, it is
worth listening to, as a vivid sketch of the doings of a real human
being, in that misty distance of the Early Middle Age.</p>
<p>He was born, he said, at Walpole, in Norfolk, on the old Roman sea-bank,
between the Wash and the deep Fens.&nbsp; His father&rsquo;s name was
&AElig;ilward; his mother&rsquo;s, &AElig;dwen&mdash;&ldquo;the Keeper
of Blessedness,&rdquo; and &ldquo;the Friend of Blessedness,&rdquo;
as Reginald translates them&mdash;poor and pious folk; and, being a
sharp boy, he did not take to field-work, but preferred wandering the
fens as a pedlar, first round the villages, then, as he grew older,
to castles and to towns, buying and selling&mdash;what, Reginald does
not tell us: but we should be glad to know.</p>
<p>One day he had a great deliverance, which Reginald thinks a miracle.&nbsp;
Wandering along the great tide-flats near Spalding and the old Well-stream,
in search of waifs, and strays, of wreck or eatables, he saw three porpoises
stranded far out upon the banks.&nbsp; Two were alive, and the boy took
pity on them (so he said) and let them be: but one was dead, and off
it (in those days poor folks ate anything) he cut as much flesh and
blubber as he could carry, and toiled back towards the high-tide mark.&nbsp;
But whether he lost his way among the banks, or whether he delayed too
long, the tide came in on him up to his knees, his waist, his chin,
and at last, at times, over his head.&nbsp; The boy made the sign of
the cross (as all men in danger did then) and struggled on valiantly
a full mile through the sea, like a brave lad never loosening his hold
of his precious porpoise-meat till he reached the shore at the very
spot from which he had set out.</p>
<p>As he grew, his pedlar journeys became longer.&nbsp; Repeating to
himself, as he walked, the Creeds and the Lord&rsquo;s Prayer&mdash;his
only lore&mdash;he walked for four years through Lindsey; then went
to St. Andrew&rsquo;s in Scotland; after that, for the first time, to
Rome.&nbsp; Then the love of a wandering sea life came on him, and he
sailed with his wares round the east coasts; not merely as a pedlar,
but as a sailor himself, he went to Denmark and to Flanders, buying
and selling, till he owned (in what port we are not told, but probably
in Lynn or Wisbeach) half one merchant ship and the quarter of another.&nbsp;
A crafty steersman he was, a wise weather-prophet, a shipman stout in
body and in heart, probably such a one as Chaucer tells us of 350 years
after:&mdash;</p>
<div class="GutenbergBlankLines1"><br /></div>
<p>&ldquo;&mdash;A dagger hanging by a las hadde hee<br />About his
nekke under his arm adoun.<br />The hote summer hadde made his hewe
al broun.<br />And certainly he was a good felaw;<br />Full many a draught
of wine he hadde draw,<br />From Burdeaux ward, while that the chapmen
slepe,<br />Of nice conscience took he no kepe.<br />If that he fought,
and hadde the higher hand,<br />By water he sent hem home to every land.<br />But
of his craft to recken wel his tides,<br />His stremes and his strandes
him besides,<br />His herberwe, his mone, and his lode manage,<br />There
was none swiche, from Hull unto Carthage.<br />Hardy he was, and wise,
I undertake:<br />With many a tempest hadde his berd be shake.<br />He
knew wel alle the havens, as they were,<br />From Gotland to the Cape
de Finisterre,<br />And every creke in Bretagne and in Spain.&rdquo;</p>
<div class="GutenbergBlankLines1"><br /></div>
<p>But gradually there grew on the stout merchantman the thought that
there was something more to be done in the world than making money.&nbsp;
He became a pious man after the fashion of those days.&nbsp; He worshipped
at the famous shrine of St. Andrew.&nbsp; He worshipped, too, at St.
Cuthbert&rsquo;s hermitage at Farne, and there, he said afterwards,
he longed for the first time for the rest and solitude of the hermitage.&nbsp;
He had been sixteen years a seaman now, with a seaman&rsquo;s temptations&mdash;it
may be (as he told Reginald plainly) with some of a seaman&rsquo;s vices.&nbsp;
He may have done things which lay heavy on his conscience.&nbsp; But
it was getting time to think about his soul.&nbsp; He took the cross,
and went off to Jerusalem, as many a man did then, under difficulties
incredible, dying, too often, on the way.&nbsp; But Godric not only
got safe thither, but went out of his way home by Spain to visit the
sanctuary of St. James of Compostella, a see which Pope Calixtus II.
had just raised to metropolitan dignity.</p>
<p>Then he appears as steward to a rich man in the Fens, whose sons
and young retainers, after the lawless fashion of those Anglo-Norman
times, rode out into the country round to steal the peasants&rsquo;
sheep and cattle, skin them on the spot, and pass them off to the master
of the house as venison taken in hunting.&nbsp; They ate and drank,
roystered and rioted, like most other young Normans; and vexed the staid
soul of Godric, whose nose told him plainly enough, whenever he entered
the kitchen, that what was roasting had never come off a deer.&nbsp;
In vain he protested and warned them, getting only insults for his pains.&nbsp;
At last he told his lord.&nbsp; The lord, as was to be expected, cared
nought about the matter.&nbsp; Let the lads rob the English villains:
for what other end had their grandfathers conquered the land?&nbsp;
Godric punished himself, as he could not punish them, for the unwilling
share which he had had in the wrong.&nbsp; It may be that he, too, had
eaten of that stolen food.&nbsp; So away he went into France, and down
the Rhone, on pilgrimage to the hermitage of St. Giles, the patron saint
of the wild deer; and then on to Rome a second time, and back to his
poor parents in the Fens.</p>
<p>And now follows a strange and beautiful story.&nbsp; All love of
seafaring and merchandise had left the deep-hearted sailor.&nbsp; The
heavenly and the eternal, the salvation of his sinful soul, had become
all in all to him; and yet he could not rest in the little dreary village
on the Roman bank.&nbsp; He would go on pilgrimage again.&nbsp; Then
his mother would go likewise, and see St. Peter&rsquo;s church, and
the Pope, and all the wonders of Rome, and have her share in all the
spiritual blessings which were to be obtained (so men thought then)
at Rome alone.&nbsp; So off they set on foot; and when they came to
ford or ditch, Godric carried his mother on his back, until they came
to London town.&nbsp; And there &AElig;dwen took off her shoes, and
vowed out of devotion to the holy apostles Peter and Paul (who, so she
thought, would be well pleased at such an act) to walk barefoot to Rome
and barefoot back again.</p>
<p>Now just as they went out of London, on the Dover Road, there met
them in the way the loveliest maiden they had ever seen, and asked to
bear them company in their pilgrimage.&nbsp; And when they agreed, she
walked with them, sat with them, and talked with them with superhuman
courtesy and grace; and when they turned into an inn, she ministered
to them herself, and washed and kissed their feet, and then lay down
with them to sleep, after the simple fashion of those days.&nbsp; But
a holy awe of her, as of some saint and goddess, fell on the wild seafarer;
and he never, so he used to aver, treated her for a moment save as a
sister.&nbsp; Never did either ask the other who they were, and whence
they came; and Godric reported (but this was long after the event) that
no one of the company of pilgrims could see that fair maid, save he
and his mother alone.&nbsp; So they came safe to Rome, and back to London
town; and when they were at the place outside Southwark, where the fair
maid had met them first, she asked permission to leave them, for she
&ldquo;must go to her own land, where she had a tabernacle of rest,
and dwelt in the house of her God.&rdquo;&nbsp; And then, bidding them
bless God, who had brought them safe over the Alps, and across the sea,
and all along that weary road, she went on her way, and they saw her
no more.</p>
<p>Then with this fair mysterious face clinging to his memory, and it
may be never leaving it, Godric took his mother safe home, and delivered
her to his father, and bade them both after awhile farewell, and wandered
across England to Penrith, and hung about the churches there, till some
kinsmen of his recognised him, and gave him a psalter (he must have
taught himself to read upon his travels), which he learnt by heart.&nbsp;
Then, wandering ever in search of solitude, he went into the woods and
found a cave, and passed his time therein in prayer, living on green
herbs and wild honey, acorns and crabs; and when he went about to gather
food, he fell down on his knees every few yards and said a prayer, and
rose and went on.</p>
<p>After awhile he wandered on again, until at Wolsingham, in Durham,
he met with another holy hermit, who had been a monk at Durham, living
in a cave in forests in which no man dare dwell, so did they swarm with
packs of wolves; and there the two good men dwelt together till the
old hermit fell sick, and was like to die.&nbsp; Godric nursed him,
and sat by him, to watch for his last breath.&nbsp; For the same longing
had come over him which came over Marguerite d&rsquo;Angoul&ecirc;me
when she sat by the dying bed of her favourite maid of honour&mdash;to
see if the spirit, when it left the body, were visible, and what kind
of thing it was: whether, for instance, it was really like the little
naked babe which is seen in medi&aelig;val illuminations flying out
of the mouths of dying men.&nbsp; But, worn out with watching, Godric
could not keep from sleep.&nbsp; All but despairing of his desire, he
turned to the dying man, and spoke, says Reginald, some such words as
these:&mdash;&ldquo;O spirit! who art diffused in that body in the likeness
of God, and art still inside that breast, I adjure thee by the Highest,
that thou leave not the prison of this thine habitation while I am overcome
by sleep, and know not of it.&rdquo;&nbsp; And so he fell asleep: but
when he woke, the old hermit lay motionless and breathless.&nbsp; Poor
Godric wept, called on the dead man, called on God; his simple heart
was set on seeing this one thing.&nbsp; And, behold, he was consoled
in a wondrous fashion.&nbsp; For about the third hour of the day the
breath returned.&nbsp; Godric hung over him, watching his lips.&nbsp;
Three heavy sighs he drew, then a shudder, another sigh: <a name="citation323"></a><a href="#footnote323">{323}</a>
and then (so Godric was believed to have said in after years) he saw
the spirit flit.</p>
<p>What it was like, he did not like to say, for the most obvious reason&mdash;that
he saw nothing, and was an honest man.&nbsp; A monk teased him much
to impart to him this great discovery, which seemed to the simple untaught
sailor a great spiritual mystery, and which was, like some other medi&aelig;val
mysteries which were miscalled spiritual (transubstantiation above all),
altogether material and gross imaginations.&nbsp; Godric answered wisely
enough, that &ldquo;no man could perceive the substance of the spiritual
soul.&rdquo;</p>
<p>But the monk insisting, and giving him no rest, he answered,&mdash;whether
he wished to answer a fool according to his folly, or whether he tried
to fancy (as men will who are somewhat vain&mdash;and if a saint was
not vain, it was no fault of the monks who beset him) that he had really
seen something.&nbsp; He told how it was like a dry, hot wind rolled
into a sphere, and shining like the clearest glass, but that what it
was really like no one could express.&nbsp; Thus much, at least, may
be gathered from the involved bombast of Reginald.</p>
<p>Another pilgrimage to the Holy Sepulchre did Godric make before he
went to the hermitage in Eskdale, and settled finally at Finchale.&nbsp;
And there about the hills of Jud&aelig;a he found, says Reginald, hermits
dwelling in rock-caves, as they had dwelt since the time of St. Jerome.&nbsp;
He washed himself, and his hair shirt and little cross, in the sacred
waters of the Jordan, and returned, after incredible suffering, to become
the saint of Finchale.</p>
<p>His hermitage became, in due time, a stately priory, with its community
of monks, who looked up to the memory of their holy father Godric as
to that of a demigod.&nbsp; The place is all ruinate now; the memory
of St. Godric gone; and not one in ten thousand, perhaps, who visit
those crumbling walls beside the rushing Wear, has heard of the sailor-saint,
and his mother, and that fair maid who tended them on their pilgrimage.</p>
<p>Meanwhile there were hermits for many years in that same hermitage
in Eskdale, from which a Percy expelled St. Godric, possibly because
he interfered with the prior claim of some <i>prot&eacute;g&eacute;</i>
of their own; for they had, a few years before Godric&rsquo;s time,
granted that hermitage to the monks of Whitby, who were not likely to
allow a stranger to establish himself on their ground.</p>
<p>About that hermitage hung one of those stories so common in the Middle
Ages, in which the hermit appears as the protector of the hunted wild
beast; a story, too, which was probably authentic, as the curious custom
which was said to perpetuate its memory lasted at least till the year
1753.&nbsp; I quote it at length from Burton&rsquo;s &ldquo;Monasticon
Eboracense,&rdquo; p. 78, knowing no other authority.</p>
<p>&ldquo;In the fifth year of the reign of King Henry II. after the
conquest of England by William, duke of Normandy, the Lord of Uglebardby,
then called William de Bruce, and the Lord of Sneton, called Ralph de
Perci, with a gentleman and a freeholder called Allatson, did on the
16th day of October appoint to meet and hunt the wild boar, in a certain
wood or desert place belonging to the abbot of the monastery of Whitby;
the place&rsquo;s name is Eskdale-side; the abbot&rsquo;s name was Sedman.&nbsp;
Then these gentlemen being met, with their hounds and boar-staves, in
the place before-named, and there having found a great wild boar, the
hounds ran him well near about the chapel and hermitage of Eskdale-side,
where was a monk of Whitby, who was a hermit.&nbsp; The boar being very
sore, and very hotly pursued, and dead run, took in at the chapel door,
and there died: whereupon the hermit shut the hounds out of the chapel,
and kept himself within at his meditations and prayers, the hounds standing
at bay without.&nbsp; The gentlemen in the thick of the wood, being
put behind their game, followed the cry of their hounds, and so came
to the hermitage, calling on the hermit, who opened the door and came
forth, and within they found the boar lying dead, for which the gentlemen
in very great fury (because their hounds were put from their game) did
most violently and cruelly run at the hermit with their boar-staves,
whereby he died soon after: thereupon the gentlemen, perceiving and
knowing that they were in peril of death, took sanctuary at Scarborough.&nbsp;
But at that time the abbot, being in very great favour with King Henry,
removed them out of the sanctuary, whereby they came in danger of the
law, and not to be privileged, but likely to have the severity of the
law, which was death.&nbsp; But the hermit, being a holy and devout
man, at the point of death sent for the abbot, and desired him to send
for the gentlemen who had wounded him: the abbot so doing, the gentlemen
came, and the hermit, being very sick and weak, said unto them, &lsquo;I
am sure to die of those wounds you have given me.&rsquo;&nbsp; The abbot
answered, &lsquo;They shall as surely die for the same;&rsquo; but the
hermit answered, &lsquo;Not so, for I will freely forgive them my death,
if they will be contented to be enjoined this penance for the safeguard
of their souls.&rsquo;&nbsp; The gentlemen being present, and terrified
with the fear of death, bade him enjoin what penance he would, so that
he would but save their lives.&nbsp; Then said the hermit, &lsquo;You
and yours shall hold your lands of the Abbot of Whitby and his successors
in this manner: That upon Ascension Eve, you or some of you shall come
to the woods of the Strag Heads, which is in Eskdale-side, the same
day at sun-rising, and there shall the abbot&rsquo;s officer blow his
horn, to the intent that you may know how to find him; and he shall
deliver unto you, William de Bruce, ten stakes, eleven strut-towers,
and eleven yethers, to be cut by you or some for you, with a knife of
one penny price; and you, Ralph de Perci, shall take twenty and one
of each sort, to be cut in the same manner; and you, Allatson, shall
take nine of each sort, to be cut as aforesaid, and to be taken on your
backs, and carried to the town of Whitby, and to be there before nine
of the clock the same day before-mentioned; at the same hour of nine
of the clock (if it be full sea) your labour or service shall cease;
but if it be not full sea, each of you shall set your stakes at the
brim, each stake one yard from the other, and so yether them on each
side of your yethers, and so stake on each side with your strut-towers,
that they may stand three tides without removing by the force thereof:
each of you shall do, make, and execute the said service at that very
hour every year, except it shall be full sea at that hour: but when
it shall so fall out, this service shall cease.&nbsp; You shall faithfully
do this in remembrance that you did most cruelly slay me; and that you
may the better call to God for mercy, repent unfeignedly for your sins,
and do good works, the officers of Eskdale-side shall blow, <i>Out on
you, out on you, out on you</i>, for this heinous crime.&nbsp; If you
or your successors shall refuse this service, so long as it shall not
be full sea at the aforesaid hour, you or yours shall forfeit your lands
to the Abbot of Whitby, or his successors.&nbsp; This I intreat, and
earnestly beg that you may have lives and goods preserved for this service;
and I request of you to promise by your parts in heaven that it shall
be done by you and your successors, as it is aforesaid requested, and
I will confirm it by the faith of an honest man.&rsquo;&nbsp; Then the
hermit said: &lsquo;My soul longeth for the Lord, and I do as freely
forgive these men my death as Christ forgave the thieves upon the cross;&rsquo;
and in the presence of the abbot and the rest he said, moreover, these
words: &lsquo;Into thy hands, O Lord, I commend my spirit, for from
the bonds of death Thou hast redeemed me, O Lord of truth.&nbsp; Amen.&rsquo;&nbsp;
So he yielded up the ghost the eighth day of December, A.D. 1160, upon
whose soul God have mercy.&nbsp; Amen.&rdquo;</p>
<div class="GutenbergBlankLines2"><br /><br /></div>
<h2>ANCHORITES, STRICTLY SO CALLED</h2>
<div class="GutenbergBlankLines2"><br /><br /></div>
<p>The fertile and peaceable lowlands of England, as I have just said,
offered few spots sufficiently wild and lonely for the habitation of
a hermit; those, therefore, who wished to retire from the world into
a more strict and solitary life than that which the monastery afforded
were in the habit of immuring themselves, as anchorites, or in old English
&ldquo;Ankers,&rdquo; in little cells of stone, built usually against
the wall of a church.&nbsp; There is nothing new under the sun; and
similar anchorites might have been seen in Egypt, 500 years before the
time of St. Antony, immured in cells in the temples of Isis or Serapis.&nbsp;
It is only recently that antiquaries have discovered how common this
practice was in England, and how frequently the traces of these cells
are to be found about our parish churches.&nbsp; They were so common
in the Diocese of Lincoln in the thirteenth century, that in 1233 the
archdeacon is ordered to inquire whether any Anchorites&rsquo; cells
had been built without the Bishop&rsquo;s leave; and in many of our
parish churches may be seen, either on the north or the south side of
the chancel, a narrow slit in the wall, or one of the lights of a window
prolonged downwards, the prolongation, if not now walled up, being closed
with a shutter.&nbsp; Through these apertures the &ldquo;incluse,&rdquo;
or anker, watched the celebration of mass, and partook of the Holy Communion.&nbsp;
Similar cells were to be found in Ireland, at least in the diocese of
Ossory; and doubtless in Scotland also.&nbsp; Ducange, in his Glossary,
on the word &ldquo;inclusi,&rdquo; lays down rules for the size of the
anker&rsquo;s cell, which must be twelve feet square, with three windows,
one opening into the church, one for taking in his food, and one for
light; and the &ldquo;Salisbury Manual&rdquo; as well as the &ldquo;Pontifical&rdquo;
of Lacy, bishop of Exeter, in the first half of the fifteenth century,
contains a regular &ldquo;service&rdquo; for the walling in of an anchorite.
<a name="citation330"></a><a href="#footnote330">{330}</a>&nbsp; There
exists too a most singular and painful book, well known to antiquaries,
but to them alone, &ldquo;The Ancren Riwle,&rdquo; addressed to three
young ladies who had immured themselves (seemingly about the beginning
of the thirteenth century) at Kingston Tarrant, in Dorsetshire.</p>
<p>For women as well as men entered these living tombs; and there spent
their days in dirt and starvation, and such prayer and meditation doubtless
as the stupified and worn-out intellect could compass; their only recreation
being the gossip of the neighbouring women, who came to peep in through
the little window&mdash;a recreation in which (if we are to believe
the author of &ldquo;The Ancren Riwle&rdquo;) they were tempted to indulge
only too freely; till the window of the recluse&rsquo;s cell, he says,
became what the smith&rsquo;s forge or the alehouse has become since&mdash;the
place where all the gossip and scandal of the village passed from one
ear to another.&nbsp; But we must not believe such scandals of all.&nbsp;
Only too much in earnest must those seven young maidens have been, whom
St. Gilbert of Sempringham persuaded to immure themselves, as a sacrifice
acceptable to God, in a den along the north wall of his church; or that
St. Hutta, or Huetta, in the beginning of the thirteenth century, who
after ministering to lepers, and longing and even trying to become a
leper herself, immured herself for life in a cell against the church
of Huy near Li&egrave;ge.</p>
<p>Fearful must have been the fate of these incluses if any evil had
befallen the building of which (one may say) they had become a part.&nbsp;
More than one in the stormy Middle Age may have suffered the fate of
the poor women immured beside St. Mary&rsquo;s church at Mantes, who,
when town and church were burnt by William the Conqueror, unable to
escape (or, according to William of Malmesbury, thinking it unlawful
to quit their cells even in that extremity), perished in the flames;
and so consummated once and for all their long martyrdom.</p>
<p>How long the practice of the hermit life was common in these islands
is more than my learning enables me to say.&nbsp; Hermits seem, from
the old Chartularies, <a name="citation331"></a><a href="#footnote331">{331}</a>
to have been not unfrequent in Scotland and the North of England during
the whole Middle Age.&nbsp; We have seen that they were frequent in
the times of Malcolm Canmore and the old Celtic Church; and the Latin
Church, which was introduced by St. Margaret, seems to have kept up
the fashion.&nbsp; In the middle of the thirteenth century, David de
Haigh conveyed to the monks of Cupar the hermitage which Gilmichael
the Hermit once held, with three acres of land.&nbsp; In 1329 the Convent
of Durham made a grant of a hermitage to Roger Eller at Norham on the
Tweed, in order that he might have a &ldquo;fit place to fight with
the old enemy and bewail his sins, apart from the turmoil of men.&rdquo;&nbsp;
In 1445 James the Second, king of Scots, granted to John Smith the hermitage
in the forest of Kilgur, &ldquo;which formerly belonged in heritage
to Hugh Cominch the Hermit, and was resigned by him, with the croft
and the green belonging to it, and three acres of arable land.&rdquo;</p>
<p>I have quoted these few instances, to show how long the custom lingered;
and doubtless hermits were to be found in the remoter parts of these
realms when the sudden tempest of the Reformation swept away alike the
palace of the rich abbot and the cell of the poor recluse, and exterminated
throughout England the ascetic life.&nbsp; The two last hermits whom
I have come across in history are both figures which exemplify very
well those times of corruption and of change.&nbsp; At Loretto (not
in Italy, but in Musselburgh, near Edinburgh) there lived a hermit who
pretended to work miracles, and who it seems had charge of some image
of &ldquo;Our Lady of Loretto.&rdquo;&nbsp; The scandals which ensued
from the visits of young folks to this hermit roused the wrath of that
terrible scourge of monks, Sir David Lindsay of the Mount: yet as late
as 1536, James the Fifth of Scotland made a pilgrimage from Stirling
to the shrine, in order to procure a propitious passage to France in
search of a wife.&nbsp; But in 1543, Lord Hertford, during his destructive
voyage to the Forth, destroyed, with other objects of greater consequence,
the chapel of the &ldquo;Lady of Lorett,&rdquo; which was not likely
in those days to be rebuilt; and so the hermit of Musselburgh vanishes
from history.</p>
<p>A few years before, in 1537, says Mr. Froude, <a name="citation333"></a><a href="#footnote333">{333}</a>
while the harbours, piers, and fortresses were rising in Dover, &ldquo;an
ancient hermit tottered night after night from his cell to a chapel
on the cliff, and the tapers on the altar before which he knelt in his
lonely orisons made a familiar beacon far over the rolling waters.&nbsp;
The men of the rising world cared little for the sentiment of the past.&nbsp;
The anchorite was told sternly by the workmen that his light was a signal
to the King&rsquo;s enemies&rdquo; (a Spanish invasion from Flanders
was expected), &ldquo;and must burn no more; and, when it was next seen,
three of them waylaid the old man on his way home, threw him down and
beat him cruelly.&rdquo;</p>
<p>So ended, in an undignified way, as worn-out institutions are wont
to end, the hermit life in the British Isles.&nbsp; Will it ever reappear?&nbsp;
Who can tell?&nbsp; To an age of luxury and unbelief has succeeded,
more than once in history, an age of remorse and superstition.&nbsp;
Gay gentlemen and gay ladies may renounce the world, as they did in
the time of St Jerome, when the world is ready to renounce them.&nbsp;
We have already our nunneries, our monasteries, of more creeds than
one; and the mountains of Kerry, or the pine forests of the Highlands,
may some day once more hold hermits, persuading themselves to believe,
and at last succeeding in believing, the teaching of St. Antony, instead
of that of our Lord Jesus Christ, and of that Father of the spirits
of all flesh, who made love, and marriage, and little children, sunshine
and flowers, the wings of butterflies and the song of birds; who rejoices
in his own works, and bids all who truly reverence him rejoice in them
with him.&nbsp; The fancy may seem impossible.&nbsp; It is not more
impossible than many religious phenomena seemed forty years ago, which
are now no fancies, but powerful facts.</p>
<p>The following books should be consulted by those who wish to follow
out this curious subject in detail:&mdash;</p>
<p>The &ldquo;Vit&aelig; Patrum Eremiticorum.&rdquo;</p>
<p>The &ldquo;Acta Sanctorum.&rdquo;&nbsp; The Bollandists are, of course,
almost exhaustive of any subject on which they treat.&nbsp; But as they
are difficult to find, save in a few public libraries, the &ldquo;Acta
Sanctorum&rdquo; of Surius, or of Aloysius Lipommasius, may be profitably
consulted.&nbsp; Butler&rsquo;s &ldquo;Lives of the Saints&rdquo; is
a book common enough, but of no great value.</p>
<p>M. de Montalembert&rsquo;s &ldquo;Moines d&rsquo;Occident,&rdquo;
and Ozanam&rsquo;s &ldquo;Etudes Germaniques,&rdquo; may be read with
much profit.</p>
<p>Dr. Reeves&rsquo; edition of Adamnan&rsquo;s &ldquo;Life of St. Columba,&rdquo;
published by the Irish Arch&aelig;ological and Celtic Society, is a
treasury of learning, which needs no praise of mine.</p>
<p>The lives of St. Cuthbert and St. Godric may be found among the publications
of the Surtees Society.</p>
<div class="GutenbergBlankLines2"><br /><br /></div>
<p>Footnotes:</p>
<p><a name="footnote12"></a><a href="#citation12">{12}</a>&nbsp; About
A.D. 368.&nbsp; See the details in Ammianus Marcellinus, lib. xxviii.</p>
<p><a name="footnote15"></a><a href="#citation15">{15}</a>&nbsp; In
the Celtic Irish Church, there seems to have been no other pattern.&nbsp;
The hermits who became abbots, with their monks, were the only teachers
of the people&mdash;one had almost said, the only Christians.&nbsp;
Whence, as early as the sixth century, if not the fifth, they, and their
disciples of Iona and Scotland, derived their peculiar tonsure, their
use of bells, their Eastern mode of keeping the Paschal feast, and other
peculiarities, seemingly without the intervention of Rome, is a mystery
still unsolved.</p>
<p><a name="footnote17a"></a><a href="#citation17a">{17a}</a>&nbsp;
A book which, from its bearing on present problems, well deserves translation.</p>
<p><a name="footnote17b"></a><a href="#citation17b">{17b}</a>&nbsp;
&ldquo;Vit&aelig; Patrum.&rdquo;&nbsp; Published at Antwerp, 1628.</p>
<p><a name="footnote23"></a><a href="#citation23">{23}</a>&nbsp; He
is addressing our Lord.</p>
<p><a name="footnote24"></a><a href="#citation24">{24}</a>&nbsp; &ldquo;Agentes
in rebus.&rdquo;&nbsp; On the Emperor&rsquo;s staff?</p>
<p><a name="footnote27"></a><a href="#citation27">{27}</a>&nbsp; St.
Augustine says, that Potitianus&rsquo;s adventure at Tr&ecirc;ves happened
&ldquo;I know not when.&rdquo;&nbsp; His own conversation with Potitianus
must have happened about A.D. 385, for he was baptized April 25, A.D.
387.&nbsp; He does not mention the name of Potitianus&rsquo;s emperor:
but as Gratian was Augustus from A.D. 367 to A.D. 375, and actual Emperor
of the West till A.D. 383, and as Tr&ecirc;ves was his usual residence,
he is most probably the person meant: but if not, then his father Valentinian.</p>
<p><a name="footnote29"></a><a href="#citation29">{29}</a>&nbsp; See
the excellent article on Gratian in Smith&rsquo;s Dictionary, by Mr.
Means.</p>
<p><a name="footnote30"></a><a href="#citation30">{30}</a>&nbsp; I cannot
explain this fact: but I have seen it with my own eyes.</p>
<p><a name="footnote32"></a><a href="#citation32">{32}</a>&nbsp; I use
throughout the text published by Heschelius, in 1611.</p>
<p><a name="footnote33"></a><a href="#citation33">{33}</a>&nbsp; He
is said to have been born at Coma, near Heracleia, in Middle Egypt,
A.D. 251.</p>
<p><a name="footnote34"></a><a href="#citation34">{34}</a>&nbsp; Seemingly
the Greek language and literature.</p>
<p><a name="footnote35"></a><a href="#citation35">{35}</a>&nbsp; I have
thought it more honest to translate &alpha;&sigma;&kappa;&eta;&sigma;&iota;&sigmaf;
by &ldquo;training,&rdquo; which is now, as then, its true equivalent;
being a metaphor drawn from the Greek games by St. Paul, 1 Tim. iv.
8.</p>
<p><a name="footnote41"></a><a href="#citation41">{41}</a>&nbsp; I give
this passage as it stands in the Greek version.&nbsp; In the Latin,
attributed to Evagrius, it is even more extravagant and rhetorical.</p>
<p><a name="footnote42"></a><a href="#citation42">{42}</a>&nbsp; Surely
the imagery painted on the inner walls of Egyptian tombs, and probably
believed by Antony and his compeers to be connected with devil-worship,
explain these visions.&nbsp; In the &ldquo;Words of the Elders&rdquo;
a monk complains of being troubled with &ldquo;pictures, old and new.&rdquo;&nbsp;
Probably, again, the pain which Antony felt was the agony of a fever;
and the visions which he saw, its delirium.</p>
<p><a name="footnote44"></a><a href="#citation44">{44}</a>&nbsp; Here
is an instance of the original use of the word &ldquo;monastery,&rdquo;
viz. a cell in which a single person dwelt.</p>
<p><a name="footnote45"></a><a href="#citation45">{45}</a>&nbsp; An
allusion to the heathen mysteries.</p>
<p><a name="footnote49"></a><a href="#citation49">{49}</a>&nbsp; A.D.
311.&nbsp; Galerius Valerius Maximinus (his real name was Daza) had
been a shepherd-lad in Illyria, like his uncle Galerius Valerius Maximianus;
and rose, like him, through the various grades of the army to be co-Emperor
of Rome, over Syria, Egypt, and Asia Minor; a furious persecutor of
the Christians, and a brutal and profligate tyrant.&nbsp; Such were
the &ldquo;kings of the world&rdquo; from whom those old monks fled.</p>
<p><a name="footnote52a"></a><a href="#citation52a">{52a}</a>&nbsp;
The lonely alluvial flats at the mouths of the Nile.&nbsp; &ldquo;Below
the cliffs, beside the sea,&rdquo; as one describes them.</p>
<p><a name="footnote52b"></a><a href="#citation52b">{52b}</a>&nbsp;
Now the monastery of Deir Antonios, over the Wady el Arabah, between
the Nile and the Red Sea, where Antony&rsquo;s monks endure to this
day.</p>
<p><a name="footnote60"></a><a href="#citation60">{60}</a>&nbsp; This
most famous monastery, <i>i.e</i>. collection of monks&rsquo; cells,
in Egypt is situate forty miles from Alexandria, on a hill where nitre
was gathered.&nbsp; The hospitality and virtue of its inmates are much
praised by Ruffinus and Palladius.&nbsp; They were, nevertheless, the
chief agents in the fanatical murder of Hypatia.</p>
<p><a name="footnote65"></a><a href="#citation65">{65}</a>&nbsp; It
appears from this and many other passages, that extempore prayer was
usual among these monks, as it was afterwards among the Puritans (who
have copied them in so many other things), whenever a godly man visited
them.</p>
<p><a name="footnote66a"></a><a href="#citation66a">{66a}</a>&nbsp;
Meletius, bishop of Lycopolis, was the author of an obscure schism calling
itself the &ldquo;Church of the Martyrs,&rdquo; which refused to communicate
with the rest of the Eastern Church.&nbsp; See Smith&rsquo;s &ldquo;Dictionary,&rdquo;
on the word &ldquo;Meletius.&rdquo;</p>
<p><a name="footnote66b"></a><a href="#citation66b">{66b}</a>&nbsp;
Arius (whose most famous and successful opponent was Athanasius, the
writer of this biography) maintained that the Son of God was not co-equal
and co-eternal with the Father, but created by Him out of nothing, and
before the world.&nbsp; His opinions were condemned in the famous Council
of Nic&aelig;a, A.D. 325.</p>
<p><a name="footnote67"></a><a href="#citation67">{67}</a>&nbsp; If
St. Antony could use so extreme an argument against the Arians, what
would he have said to the Mariolatry which sprang up after his death?</p>
<p><a name="footnote68a"></a><a href="#citation68a">{68a}</a>&nbsp;
<i>I.e</i>. those who were still heathens.</p>
<p><a name="footnote68b"></a><a href="#citation68b">{68b}</a>&nbsp;
&iota;&epsilon;&rho;&epsilon;&upsilon;&sigmaf;.&nbsp; The Christian
priest is always called in this work simply &pi;&rho;&epsilon;&sigma;&theta;&upsilon;&tau;&epsilon;&rho;&omicron;&sigmaf;,
or elder.</p>
<p><a name="footnote72a"></a><a href="#citation72a">{72a}</a>&nbsp;
Probably that of A.D. 341, when Gregory of Cappadocia, nominated by
the Arian Bishops, who had assembled at the Council of Antioch, expelled
Athanasius from the see of Alexandria, and great violence was committed
by his followers and by Philagrius the Prefect.&nbsp; Athanasius meanwhile
fled to Rome.</p>
<p><a name="footnote72b"></a><a href="#citation72b">{72b}</a>&nbsp;
<i>I.e</i>. celebrated there their own Communion.</p>
<p><a name="footnote77"></a><a href="#citation77">{77}</a>&nbsp; Evidently
the prim&aelig;val custom of embalming the dead, and keeping mummies
in the house, still lingered among the Egyptians.</p>
<p><a name="footnote108"></a><a href="#citation108">{108}</a>&nbsp;
These sounds, like those which St. Guthlac heard in the English fens,
are plainly those of wild-fowl.</p>
<p><a name="footnote115"></a><a href="#citation115">{115}</a>&nbsp;
The Brucheion, with its palaces and museum, the residence of the kings
and philosophers of Egypt, had been destroyed is the days of Claudius
and Valerian, during the senseless civil wars which devastated Alexandria
for twelve years; and monks had probably taken up their abode in the
ruins.&nbsp; It was in this quarter, at the beginning of the next century,
that Hypatia was murdered by the monks.</p>
<p><a name="footnote116"></a><a href="#citation116">{116}</a>&nbsp;
Probably the Northern, or Lesser Oasis, Ouah el Baharieh, about eighty
miles west of the Nile.</p>
<p><a name="footnote117a"></a><a href="#citation117a">{117a}</a>&nbsp;
Jerome (who sailed that sea several times) uses the word here, as it
is used in Acts xxvii. 27, for the sea about Malta, &ldquo;driven up
and down in Adria.&rdquo;</p>
<p><a name="footnote117b"></a><a href="#citation117b">{117b}</a>&nbsp;
The southern point of Sicily, now Cape Passaro.</p>
<p><a name="footnote118"></a><a href="#citation118">{118}</a>&nbsp;
In the Morea, near the modern Navarino.</p>
<p><a name="footnote119a"></a><a href="#citation119a">{119a}</a>&nbsp;
At the mouth of the Bay of Cattaro.</p>
<p><a name="footnote119b"></a><a href="#citation119b">{119b}</a>&nbsp;
This story&mdash;whatever belief we may give to its details&mdash;is
one of many which make it tolerably certain that a large snake (Python)
still lingered in Eastern Europe.&nbsp; Huge tame snakes were kept as
sacred by the Macedonian women; and one of them (according to Lucian)
Peregrinus Proteus, the Cagliostro of his time, fitted with a linen
mask, and made it personate the god &AElig;sculapius.&nbsp; In the &ldquo;Historia
Lausiaca,&rdquo; cap. lii. is an account by an eye-witness of a large
snake in the Thebaid, whose track was &ldquo;as if a beam had been dragged
along the sand.&rdquo;&nbsp; It terrifies the Syrian monks: but the
Egyptian monk sets to work to kill it, saying that he had seen much
larger&mdash;even up to fifteen cubits.</p>
<p><a name="footnote121"></a><a href="#citation121">{121}</a>&nbsp;
Now Capo St. Angelo and the island of Cerigo, at the southern point
of Greece.</p>
<p><a name="footnote123a"></a><a href="#citation123a">{123a}</a>&nbsp;
See p. 52.&nbsp; [Around footnote 52a in the text&mdash;DP.]</p>
<p><a name="footnote123b"></a><a href="#citation123b">{123b}</a>&nbsp;
Probably dedicated to the Paphian Venus.</p>
<p><a name="footnote130"></a><a href="#citation130">{130}</a>&nbsp;
The lives of these two hermits and that of St. Cuthbert will be given
in a future number.</p>
<p><a name="footnote131"></a><a href="#citation131">{131}</a>&nbsp;
Sihor, the black river, was the ancient name of the Nile, derived from
the dark hue of its waters.</p>
<p><a name="footnote159"></a><a href="#citation159">{159}</a>&nbsp;
Ammianus Marcellinus, Book xxv. cap. 9.</p>
<p><a name="footnote160"></a><a href="#citation160">{160}</a>&nbsp;
By Dr. Burgess.</p>
<p><a name="footnote163"></a><a href="#citation163">{163}</a>&nbsp;
History of Christianity, vol. iii. p. 109.</p>
<p><a name="footnote203"></a><a href="#citation203">{203}</a>&nbsp;
An authentic fact.</p>
<p><a name="footnote204"></a><a href="#citation204">{204}</a>&nbsp;
If any one doubts this, let him try the game called &ldquo;Russian scandal,&rdquo;
where a story, passed secretly from mouth to mouth, ends utterly transformed,
the original point being lost, a new point substituted, original names
and facts omitted, and utterly new ones inserted, &amp;c. &amp;c.; an
experiment which is ludicrous, or saddening, according to the temper
of the experimenter.</p>
<p><a name="footnote209"></a><a href="#citation209">{209}</a>&nbsp;
Les Moines d&rsquo;Occident, vol. ii. pp. 332-467.</p>
<p><a name="footnote210"></a><a href="#citation210">{210}</a>&nbsp;
M. La Borderie, &ldquo;Discours sur les Saints Bretons;&rdquo; a work
which I have unfortunately not been able to consult.</p>
<p><a name="footnote212a"></a><a href="#citation212a">{212a}</a>&nbsp;
Vit&aelig; Patrum, p. 753.</p>
<p><a name="footnote212b"></a><a href="#citation212b">{212b}</a>&nbsp;
Ibid. p. 893.</p>
<p><a name="footnote212c"></a><a href="#citation212c">{212c}</a>&nbsp;
Ibid. p. 539.</p>
<p><a name="footnote212d"></a><a href="#citation212d">{212d}</a>&nbsp;
Ibid. p. 540.</p>
<p><a name="footnote212e"></a><a href="#citation212e">{212e}</a>&nbsp;
Ibid. p. 532.</p>
<p><a name="footnote224"></a><a href="#citation224">{224}</a>&nbsp;
It has been handed down, in most crabbed Latin, by his disciple, Eugippius;
it may be read at length in Pez, Scriptores Austriacarum Rerum.</p>
<p><a name="footnote238"></a><a href="#citation238">{238}</a>&nbsp;
Scriptores Austriacarum Rerum.</p>
<p><a name="footnote245"></a><a href="#citation245">{245}</a>&nbsp;
H&aelig;ften, quoted by Montalembert, vol. ii. p. 22, in note.</p>
<p><a name="footnote256"></a><a href="#citation256">{256}</a>&nbsp;
Dr. Reeves supposes these to have been &ldquo;crustacea:&rdquo; but
their stinging and clinging prove them surely to have been jelly-fish&mdash;medus&aelig;.</p>
<p><a name="footnote257"></a><a href="#citation257">{257}</a>&nbsp;
I have followed the Latin prose version of it, which M. Achille Jubinal
attributes to the eleventh century.&nbsp; Here and there I have taken
the liberty of using the French prose version, which he attributes to
the latter part of the twelfth.&nbsp; I have often condensed the story,
where it was prolix or repeated itself: but I have tried to follow faithfully
both matter and style, and to give, word for word, as nearly as I could,
any notable passages.&nbsp; Those who wish to know more of St. Brendan
should consult the learned <i>brochure</i> of M. Jubinal, &ldquo;La
L&eacute;gende Latine de St. Brandaines,&rdquo; and the two English
versions of the Legend, edited by Mr. Thomas Wright for the Percy Society,
vol. xiv.&nbsp; One is in verse, and of the earlier part of the fourteenth
century, and spirited enough: the other, a prose version, was printed
by Wynkyn de Worde, in his edition of the &ldquo;Golden Legend;&rdquo;
1527.</p>
<p><a name="footnote260a"></a><a href="#citation260a">{260a}</a>&nbsp;
In the Barony of Longford, County Galway.</p>
<p><a name="footnote260b"></a><a href="#citation260b">{260b}</a>&nbsp;
3,000, like 300, seems to be, I am informed, only an Irish expression
for any large number.</p>
<p><a name="footnote269"></a><a href="#citation269">{269}</a>&nbsp;
Some dim legend concerning icebergs, and caves therein.</p>
<p><a name="footnote270"></a><a href="#citation270">{270}</a>&nbsp;
Probably from reports of the volcanic coast of Iceland.</p>
<p><a name="footnote272"></a><a href="#citation272">{272}</a>&nbsp;
This part of the legend has been changed and humanized as time ran on.&nbsp;
In the Latin and French versions it has little or no point or moral.&nbsp;
In the English, Judas accounts for the presence of the cloth thus:&mdash;</p>
<p>&ldquo;Here I may see what it is to give other men&rsquo;s (goods)
with harm.<br />As will many rich men with unright all day take,<br />Of
poor men here and there, and almisse (alms) sithhe (afterwards) make.&rdquo;</p>
<p>For the tongs and the stone he accounts by saying that, as he used
them for &ldquo;good ends, each thing should surely find him which he
did for God&rsquo;s love.&rdquo;</p>
<p>But in &ldquo;the prose version of Wynkyn de Worde, the tongs have
been changed into &ldquo;ox-tongues,&rdquo; &ldquo;which I gave some
tyme to two preestes to praye for me.&nbsp; I bought them with myne
owne money, and therefore they ease me, bycause the fysshes of the sea
gnaw on them, and spare me.&rdquo;</p>
<p>This latter story of the ox-tongues has been followed by Mr. Sebastian
Evans, in his poem on St. Brendan.&nbsp; Both he and Mr. Matthew Arnold
have rendered the moral of the English version very beautifully.</p>
<p><a name="footnote274"></a><a href="#citation274">{274}</a>&nbsp;
Copied, surely, from the life of Paul the first hermit.</p>
<p><a name="footnote283"></a><a href="#citation283">{283}</a>&nbsp;
The famous Cathach, now in the museum of the Royal Irish Academy, was
long popularly believed to be the very Psalter in question.&nbsp; As
a relic of St. Columba it was carried to battle by the O&rsquo;Donnels,
even as late as 1497, to insure victory for the clan.</p>
<p><a name="footnote290"></a><a href="#citation290">{290}</a>&nbsp;
Bede, book iii. cap. 3.</p>
<p><a name="footnote292"></a><a href="#citation292">{292}</a>&nbsp;
These details, and countless stories of St. Cuthbert&rsquo;s miracles,
are to be found in Reginald of Durham, &ldquo;De Admirandis Beati Cuthberti,&rdquo;
published by the Surtees Society.&nbsp; This curious book is admirably
edited by Mr. J. Raine; with an English synopsis at the end, which enables
the reader for whom the Latin is too difficult to enjoy those pictures
of life under Stephen and Henry II., whether moral, religious, or social,
of which the book is a rich museum.</p>
<p><a name="footnote299"></a><a href="#citation299">{299}</a>&nbsp;
&ldquo;In this hole lie the bones of the Venerable Bede.&rdquo;</p>
<p><a name="footnote303"></a><a href="#citation303">{303}</a>&nbsp;
An English translation of the Anglo-Saxon life has been published by
Mr. Godwin, of Cambridge, and is well worth perusal.</p>
<p><a name="footnote312"></a><a href="#citation312">{312}</a>&nbsp;
Vita S. Godrici, pp. 332, 333.</p>
<p><a name="footnote316"></a><a href="#citation316">{316}</a>&nbsp;
The earlier one; that of the Harleian MSS. which (Mr. Stevenson thinks)
was twice afterwards expanded and decorated by him.</p>
<p><a name="footnote323"></a><a href="#citation323">{323}</a>&nbsp;
Reginald wants to make &ldquo;a wonder incredible in our own times,&rdquo;
of a very common form (thank God) of peaceful death.&nbsp; He makes
miracles in the same way of the catching of salmon and of otters, simple
enough to one who, like Godric, knew the river, and every wild thing
which haunted it.</p>
<p><a name="footnote330"></a><a href="#citation330">{330}</a>&nbsp;
That of the Salisbury Manual is published in the &ldquo;Ecclesiologist&rdquo;
for August 1848, by the Rev. Sir W. H. Cope, to whom I am indebted for
the greater number of these curious facts.</p>
<p><a name="footnote331"></a><a href="#citation331">{331}</a>&nbsp;
I owe these facts to the courtesy of Mr. John Stuart, of the General
Register Office, Edinburgh.</p>
<p><a name="footnote333"></a><a href="#citation333">{333}</a>&nbsp;
&ldquo;History of England,&rdquo; vol. iii. p. 256, note.</p>
<div class="GutenbergBlankLines3"><br /><br /><br /></div>
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