The Lausiac History 1 part 5/7

And I arrived in eighteen days, partly going on foot, partly also sailing on the river.

Now the time was that of the rising of the Nile, in which many fall sick;

having gone off, then, I found his vestibule shut;

for afterward the brethren had built on a very large vestibule, in which about a hundred men have room;

and locking it with a little key, on the Sabbath and the Lord's Day they would open it.

Having learned, then, the reason for which it was shut, I kept quiet until the Sabbath.

And having arrived at the second hour at the meeting, I found him seated by the window, through which he seemed to exhort those who happened to be present.

Having greeted me, then, he said through an interpreter:

"Whence are you, and why have you come? For I conjecture that you are of the company of Evagrius."

I said: "I am a stranger, set out from Galatia";

and I confessed that I was also of the fellowship of Evagrius.

In the meantime, while we were speaking, there came in the governor of the region, Alypius by name;

to whom, running, he left off my conversation.

Having withdrawn a little, then, I gave them room, standing far off.

But as they conversed at length, I grew weary in spirit, and growing weary I murmured against the good old man, as having despised me but honoured that one.

And being vexed in mind on this account, I considered withdrawing, despising him.

Having called the interpreter, Theodore by name, he says to him:

"Go, say to that brother:

I am just now dismissing the governor and will speak with you."

I supposed, then, having attended to him as to a spiritual man, to persevere.

And when the governor had gone out, he calls me and says to me:

"The healthy have no need of a physician, but those who are ill? You I find whenever I wish, and you me."

"And if I do not exhort you, other brothers exhort you and other fathers."

"But this man has been given over to the devil through worldly affairs, and having breathed for a brief hour, like a runaway servant from his master, he has come to be helped;

it would have been improper, then, to leave him and to spend the time with you, while you give yourself unceasingly to your salvation."

Having entreated him, then, to pray on my behalf, I was fully assured that he was a spiritual man.

Then, jesting, with his right hand having gently cuffed my left cheek, he says to me:

"Many tribulations await you, and you have been much warred upon to go out of the desert;

and you have grown faint-hearted and have put it off."

"The demon, bringing you pious and plausible pretexts, fans the flame."

"For he has suggested to you both the longing for your father, and the catechizing of your brother and your sister unto the solitary life."

"Behold, then, I bring you good tidings:

Your father too has yet other years to live."

"Persevere, then, in the desert, and do not, for the sake of these things, wish to depart to your homeland;

and abundantly I gave thanks to God, having learned that the pretexts driving me out had been brought to naught.

Then again he says to me, jesting:

"Do you wish to become a bishop?" I said to him: "I am one."

"Where?" I said: "Over the kitchens, the taverns, the tables, the jars;

I oversee them, and if there be sour wine I set it apart, but the good I drink;

likewise I oversee also the pot, and if salt or any of the seasonings be lacking I put it in and season it, and so I eat it.

This is my episcopate;

for gluttony ordained me."

He says to me, smiling:

"You are to be ordained bishop and to labour much and to be afflicted;

if then you flee tribulations, do not go out of the desert;

for in the desert no one can ordain you bishop."

Having withdrawn from him, then, I came to the desert, to my accustomed place, having related these very things to the blessed fathers;

who, two months later, having sailed, came and met with him.

But I forgot his words.

For after three years I fell ill of an ailment of the spleen and stomach;

from there I was sent off by the brethren to Alexandria, having developed dropsy.

From Alexandria, the physicians having advised, for the sake of the air, that I should make for Palestine;

for it has light airs, as suited to our constitution;

from Palestine I made for Bithynia;

and in this place—I know not how, whether from human endeavour, or from the good pleasure of the Higher One;

God may know—I was deemed worthy of the ordination beyond my deserts, having shared in the circumstance concerning the blessed John;

and for eleven months hidden in a gloomy little cell I remembered that blessed man, that he had foretold me these things which I endured.

And this too he related to me, as one who ought through the narrative to bring me to perseverance in the desert, that: "I have forty-eight years in this cell;

I have not seen a woman's face, nor the form of a coin;

no one has seen me eating or drinking."

He also did not meet with the servant of God, Poemenia, who passed by for the sake of [seeing] sights, but he revealed to her certain things even of hidden matters.

And he charged her, as she was going down from the Thebaid, not to turn aside to Alexandria, "Since you are bound to fall into temptations."

But she, having miscalculated or forgotten, turned aside to Alexandria to see the city.

And along the way, near the city of Nicius, her boats put in for the sake of rest.

Her servants, then, having gone out, out of some disorderliness joined in a fight with the local inhabitants, men reckless and desperate.

Concerning Posidonius. The things concerning Posidonius the Theban are many and hard to relate—how gentle he was and how exceedingly ascetic, and how great a guilelessness he had within himself—I do not know if I have met with anyone like him.

For I lived together with this man for one year in Bethlehem, when he had settled beyond Poemenium, and I observed many of his virtues;

among which he himself related to me one of the days that: "Having dwelt one year in the Porphyrite place, for the whole year I met with no man, I heard no conversation, I touched no bread;

but I sustained myself on a few small dates, and wherever I found wild herbs."

"Among which once, when my provisions had failed me, I went out of the cave to come into the inhabited world."

"And having walked the whole day, I scarcely got two miles away from the cave."

"Looking about, then, I see a horseman having the appearance of a soldier, having on his head a turban-shaped helmet;

and expecting him to be a soldier, I hurried back as far as the cave, and I found a basket of grapes and freshly-cut figs;

which having taken, and having become exceedingly glad, I entered into the cave, having those provisions for two months as a comfort."

And this miracle he performed in Bethlehem:

[a woman] about to give birth was in hard travail, the [evil] spirit racking her.

The woman, then, being demon-possessed, her husband came and entreated that holy man to come.

When we had gone in together to pray, then, he stood and prayed, and after the second bending of the knee he cast out the spirit.

"Pray, for the unclean spirit is just now being driven out;

and there is to be a certain sign, that we may be assured."

As the demon was going out, then, it threw down the whole wall of the courtyard from its foundation.

Now the little woman had not spoken for six years;

after the demon had gone out, then, she gave birth and spoke.

Of this man I came to know also this prophecy:

A certain presbyter Jerome dwelt in those places, adorned with the virtue of Latin eloquence and with natural ability;

but he had such envy that by it the virtue of his eloquence was overshadowed.

Having spent many days in his company, then, Posidonius says to me in my ear that: "The free-born Paula, who cares for him, will die first, set free from his envy, as I think."

"And on account of this man no holy man will dwell in these places, but his jealousy will reach even to his own brother."

Among which the thing actually came to pass.

For indeed he drove out the blessed Oxyperentius the Italian, and another, a certain Peter the Egyptian, and Symeon, admirable men, whom I have meanwhile noted.

This Posidonius related to me that he had not had a taste of bread since his fortieth year, nor indeed bore any grudge against anyone for so much as half a day.

Concerning Serapion. There was another certain Serapion, surnamed the Sindonite, for except for a linen sheet he never wrapped anything about himself;

who practised great poverty, and being well-lettered he had committed to memory all the Scriptures;

and out of much poverty and study of the Scriptures he was not even able to remain quiet in a cell, not being distracted by material things, but going about this inhabited world he perfected virtue;

for he was of this nature also;

for there are differences of natures, not of essences.

And having sealed the coins, he kept them by himself.

To such an extent, then, he remained and served the mimes who had bought him, until he made them Christians and removed them from the theatre, taking nothing except bread and water, nor giving his mouth rest from the study of the Scriptures.

In the long course of time the man was first pricked in conscience, then the mime-woman, then their whole household.

And it was said that, as long as they were ignorant of him, he washed the feet of both.

Both, then, having been baptized, ceased from acting in the theatre, and having driven on to the sober and God-fearing life, they greatly revered the man and say to him:

"Since God has wrought and your soul has been saved, let us tell you the mystery of the drama;

I, taking pity on your soul, being a free ascetic by birth an Egyptian, for this cause sold myself that I might save you."

"And since God has done this and your soul has been saved through my humbling, take back your gold that I may go and help others."

But they, having entreated him much and firmly assured him that: "We will have you as a father and master, only remain with us;

but at least visit us once a year."

This man, by his continual journeys, arrived in Greece, and having spent three days in Athens he was not deemed worthy of bread by anyone;

for he carried neither small coin, nor wallet, nor goatskin cloak, nor anything of such things.

When the fourth day, then, had come upon him, he was exceedingly hungry;

for involuntary hunger is dreadful, having unbelief as its advocate.

And standing on a hillock of the city, where the magistrates of the city were gathering, he began to bewail with clapping of hands and to cry out:

"Men of Athens, help!"

all running up, both those wearing the threadbare cloak and those wearing the cloak, say to him:

"What ails you? And whence are you? And what do you suffer?" He says to them:

"By birth I am an Egyptian;

but since I departed from my true homeland I have fallen in with three creditors;

and the two of them have been satisfied, the debt having been paid, having nothing of which to accuse me;

but the one of them is not released."

Making careful inquiry, then, about the creditors, that they might satisfy them, they questioned him:

"Where are they, and who are they? Who is the one troubling you? Show him to us that we may help you."

"From my youth there have troubled me love of money and gluttony and fornication;

from two I have been freed, from love of money and fornication;

but from gluttony I am not able to be freed."

"For this is the fourth day that I have not eaten, and the belly remains troubling me and seeking the customary debt, without which I cannot live."

Then some of the philosophers, suspecting it to be a piece of play-acting, give him a coin;

and having received it he set it down at a baker's shop, and taking one loaf he withdrew at once, having journeyed out of the city and no longer returning to it.

Then the philosophers knew that he was truly virtuous, and having given the baker the price of the loaf they took back the coin.

Having come, then, to the regions about Lacedaemon, he heard that one of the chief men of the city was a Manichaean together with all his household, virtuous in other respects.

To this man again he sold himself, after the manner of the first drama;

and within two years, having removed him from the heresy, he brought both him and his free-born wife to the Church.

Then, having come to love him, they had him no longer as a household servant but as a genuine brother or father, and they glorified God.

This man once put himself on a ship as one bound to sail to Rome;

the sailors, supposing that he had either brought provisions on board or possessed in gold the means for his expenses, received him without question, each supposing that another had taken charge of his baggage.

When they had set sail and were five hundred furlongs from Alexandria, the passengers began at sunset to eat, the sailors having eaten first.

They saw, then, that he did not eat the first day, and they thought it was on account of the voyage;

likewise also the second, and the third, and the fourth.

On the fifth day they see him sitting quietly while all are eating, and they say to him:

They made careful inquiry, then, among themselves:

"Who took his baggage or his provisions?" And when they found that no one had, they began to contend with him and to say:

"How did you come aboard without provisions? Whence have you to give us the fare? Or whence have you to be fed?" He says to them:

"Take me up and throw me where you found me."

But they would not gladly have let him go even for a hundred gold pieces, but pursued their aim.

So, then, was he in the ship, and they were found feeding him as far as Rome.

Having come, then, to Rome, he made careful inquiry as to who might be a great ascetic, man or woman, in the city.

Having met with him, then, and having been helped by him—for he was a man polished both in character and in knowledge—learning from him who else there might be, ascetic man or woman, he came to know of a certain virgin living in stillness who met with no one.

And having learned where she remained, he went off and says to the old woman who served her:

"Say to the virgin: I must necessarily meet with you, for God has sent me."

Having waited, then, two or three days, he afterward met with her and says to her:

"Are you alive or have you died?" She says to him:

"I believe in God that I have died;

for one living in the flesh will not undertake a journey."

"Then, that you may assure me that you have died, do what I do."

"To a dead person all things are possible, except to act impiously."

"I have the twenty-fifth year and I have not gone out;

and why should I go out?" He says to her:

"If you have died to the world, and the world to you, it is the same to you both to go out and not to go out;

and after she went out and came as far as a certain church, he says to her in the church:

"Then, if you wish to assure me that you have died and no longer live pleasing men, do what I do, and I shall know that you have died."

"Having stripped off all your garments after my manner, place them upon your shoulders and pass through the middle of the city, with me going before in this fashion."

"I shall scandalize many by the unseemliness of the thing, and they will be able to say that: 'She is out of her mind and is demon-possessed.'"

"And what does it matter to you if they say that: 'She is out of her mind and is demon-possessed'? For you have died to them."

"For to this measure I do not even pray to come."

"See, then, no longer think great things of yourself, as being more pious than all and as having died to the world;

for I am more dead than you, and by deed I show that I have died to the world;

for without passion and without shame I do this."

Then, having left her in humility and having broken her self-conceit, he withdrew.

Many also are the other wonderful deeds which he performed, tending toward dispassion.

This man dies at the sixtieth year of his age, having been buried in Rome itself.

Concerning Evagrius. The things concerning Evagrius the renowned deacon, a man who had lived according to the apostles, it is not right to pass over in silence, but to hand them down in writing for the edification of those who happen upon them and for the glory of the goodness of our Saviour, having deemed it worthy to set forth from the beginning, both how he came to his purpose, and how, having exercised himself worthily, he dies at fifty-four years in the desert, according to that which is written:

In a short time he fulfilled many years.

This man was by birth a Pontic from the city of Ibora, the son of a chorepiscopus (country bishop).

He was ordained a reader by Saint Basil, the bishop of the church of the Caesareans.

After the death of Saint Basil, Gregory of Nazianzus the bishop—a man most wise, most free from passion, and shining in learning—noting his fitness, advanced him to deacon.

From there, at the great synod held at Constantinople, he left him with the blessed bishop Nectarius, since he was most skilled in disputation against all the heresies.

He flourished in the great city, in his youthful vigour contending in word against every heresy.

Now it happened that, while he was being intensely honoured by the whole city, he was caught fast by the idol of desire for a woman—as he himself told us, after he was later set free in his understanding.

The woman in turn fell in love with him.

But Evagrius, fearing God and respecting his own conscience, and setting before his eyes the greatness of the disgrace and the malicious gloating of the heretics, prayed, beseeching God that he might be hindered by Him.

As the woman pressed on and raged with passion, though he wished to withdraw he was unable, held back by the bonds of this attachment.

Not long after, his prayer having succeeded before the deed itself was attempted, there came upon him an angelic vision in the form of soldiers of the prefect, who seized him and led him as into a tribunal and cast him into what is called custody, binding his neck and hands with iron collars and chains; and those who had come upon him did not, of course, state the charge.

But in his conscience he knew that he was undergoing this on account of that woman, supposing that her husband had laid information against him.

While he was in great anguish, another trial being conducted and others being tortured on a charge, he remained in deep distress.

Then the angel who had granted the vision transformed himself into the appearance of a genuine friend, and said to him—bound as he was among a chain of forty condemned men:

"For what reason are you held here, lord deacon?" He said to him:

"In truth I do not know, but I suspect that so-and-so, a former prefect, has informed against me, smitten with senseless jealousy."

"If you will listen to your friend, it is not good for you to remain in this city."

"If God delivers me from this calamity, and you see me in Constantinople, know that I am rightly undergoing this punishment."

"I am bringing the Gospel; swear to me upon it that you will withdraw from this city and take thought for your soul, and I will release you from this distress."

So he brought the Gospel, and he swore to him upon the Gospel: "Except for one single day, that I may manage to put my clothes aboard the ship, I will not stay."

When the oath had been completed, he came out of the trance that had come upon him in the night;

and rising he reasoned thus: "Even if the oath was made in a trance, nevertheless I have sworn."

So, putting all his belongings on a ship, he came to Jerusalem.

And there he was welcomed by the blessed Melania the Roman.

But again the devil hardened his heart, as he had Pharaoh's; and being young and in the prime of his vigour, a kind of double-mindedness came over him: he wavered, saying nothing to anyone, and there too he changed back to fine clothes and to discourse, and vainglory was lulling him.

But God, the hinderer of the ruin of us all, cast him into a bout of fever, and from there into a long illness, for the space of six months wasting away his poor flesh, by which he was being checked.

When the physicians were at a loss and could find no method of healing, the blessed Melania said to him:

"Your protracted illness does not please me, my son."

"Tell me then what is in your mind."

"For this illness of yours is not without God's hand."

Then he confessed to her the whole matter.

And she said: "Even though I happen to be a sinner, I will pray that respite of life may be granted to you."

And so within a few days he recovered;

and rising up, he changed his clothing at her own hands, and went away, departing for the mountain of Nitria in Egypt.

Having dwelt there a second year, in the third he plunged into the desert.

So, having lived fourteen years in the so-called Cells, he used to eat a pound of bread, and a pint of oil every three months—a man brought up from a most delicate, luxurious, and pampered life.

He used to make a hundred prayers, writing in the year only the value of what he ate;

for he wrote elegantly in the Oxyrhynchus script.

So within fifteen years, having purified his mind to the utmost, he was deemed worthy of the gift of knowledge and wisdom and discernment of spirits.

He therefore composed three sacred books for monks, called "Antirrhetic" (refutations), setting forth methods against the demons.

The demon of fornication oppressed him grievously, as he himself related to us;

and for a whole night he stood naked in a well, it being winter, so that his very flesh froze stiff.

At another time again a spirit of blasphemy oppressed him;

and for forty days he did not come under a roof, as he himself told us, so that his body broke out with ticks like those of irrational animals.

Three demons in the guise of clerics once stood before him in a single day, disputing about the faith;

and the one called himself an Arian, another a Eunomian, and another an Apollinarian;

and by his wisdom he overcame them in a few words.

Again, one day the key of the church being lost, he sealed the face of the lock with the sign of the cross and pushed it with his hand, and it opened, when he had called upon Christ.

So greatly was this man scourged by demons, and so great experience of demons did he receive, of which there is no number.

To one of his own disciples he foretold the things that would befall him eighteen years later, prophesying everything to him in detail.

He used to say: "From the time I reached the desert I have touched no lettuce, nor any other green vegetable, nor fruit, nor grape, nor meat, nor bath."

He died among them, having communicated at the feast of Epiphany in the church.

Now near his death he related to us: "This is the third year that I have not been troubled by carnal desire,"—after so great a life, and labour, and toil, and unceasing prayer.

To this man the death of his father was announced, and he said to the one who reported it:

"For my father is immortal."

Concerning Pior. A certain Pior, an Egyptian, while young renounced the world and left his father's house, and gave his word to God, out of an excess of zeal, never again to see any of his own kin.

After fifty years, his sister, having grown old and hearing that he was alive, was being driven to distraction unless she might see him.

Being unable to come into the far desert, she besought the local bishop to write to the fathers in the desert, that they might send him so that she might see him.

When much pressure had been brought to bear on him, he thought it best to take one other companion along and to go.

And word was given in his sister's house: "Your brother Pior has arrived."

So standing outside, and perceiving from the sound of the door that the old woman had come out to meet him, he shut his eyes and cried out to her:

"So-and-so, so-and-so, I am Pior your brother, I am he;

She therefore, being satisfied and glorifying God, and not having persuaded him to enter her house, returned to her own home;

while he, having said a prayer at the doorposts, departed again into the desert.

This too is recounted as his marvel: that in the place where he dwelt, having dug, he found most bitter water;

and until he died he remained there, holding fast to the bitterness of the water, that he might display his own endurance.

Many of the monks, after his death, contended to stay in his cell, but could not complete a single year;

for the place is fearful and comfortless.

Moses the Libyan, a man exceedingly gentle and most loving, was deemed worthy of the gift of healings.

This man related to me: "While I was a young man in the monastery, we dug a very large well, twenty feet wide;

in this, eighty men digging for three days, and having passed the usual and likely water-vein by about a cubit, we found no water.

Being therefore greatly grieved, we were considering withdrawing from the work;

and Pior, coming up from the deep desert at the very sixth hour of the burning heat—an old man wrapped in his sheepskin—greeted us, and said after the greeting:

"Why are you faint-hearted, O you of little faith? For I have seen you losing heart since yesterday."

And going down the ladder into the pit of the well, he made a prayer with them;

and taking the mattock, on striking the third blow he said:

"O God of the holy patriarchs, do not render vain the toil of your servants, but send them the supply of waters they need."

And at once water leaped forth so that all were sprinkled.

Then again, having prayed, he went his way.

When they pressed him to eat, he would not consent, saying:

"for it was not for that purpose that I was sent."

Concerning Ephrem. The story of Ephrem the deacon of the church of the Edessenes you have surely heard;

for he became one of those worthy to be remembered by the holy ones.

This man, having worthily run the way of the Spirit and not having turned aside from the straight path, was deemed worthy of the gift of natural knowledge, which is succeeded by theology and the highest blessedness.

Having therefore always practised the quiet life, and edifying those who came to him for a good many years, at last he came forth from his cell for the following reason:

a great famine having seized the city of the Edessenes, taking pity on the whole countryside which was perishing, he went to the wealthy in the district and said to them:

"Why do you not have pity on human nature perishing, but let your wealth rot to the condemnation of your souls?" They considered and said to him: "We have no one we can trust to minister to the famished;

for all turn the matter into profiteering."

"What do I seem to you?" Now he had a great reputation among all, not falsely but truly.

"Then," said he, "entrust it to me;

I appoint myself your hospitaller (steward of the poor)." And taking the money, and partitioning off the porticoes, and setting up about three hundred beds, he nursed the famished—burying those who were failing, and tending those who had hope of life; and simply, to all the country-folk who had come because of the famine, he provided lodging and daily service out of what was supplied to him.

When the year had passed and plenty had succeeded, and all were going home, having no further occupation he entered his own cell and died a month later, God having furnished him this occasion as a kind of crown at his end.

He also left writings, most of which are worthy of study.

Concerning holy women. It is necessary also to make mention in the book of courageous women, to whom God granted prizes equal to those of the men, that they might not make excuse as being weaker for the accomplishment of virtue.

Now I have seen many, and have met with many refined women, both virgins and widows;

[among whom was also Paula the Roman, the mother of Toxotius, a woman most refined in the spiritual life;

for though she was able to fly above all others, being most gifted, [Jerome] by his own jealousy hindered her, drawing her to his own purpose.

Her daughter, who is now in ascetic life, is named Eustochium, in Bethlehem;

with whom I have not happened to meet, but she is said to be exceedingly chaste, having a community of fifty virgins.

I came to know also Veneria, the wife of Vallovicus the count, who nobly scattered abroad the camel's load [of riches], and was freed from the wounds that come from material things;

and Theodora, wife of the tribune, who pressed on to such poverty that, having received alms, she so died in the monastery of Hesychas by the sea.