制度與會談錄 第 2 章 第 8/15 段

Being both inflamed with the desire of dwelling there and lending undoubting faith to the assertions of so great a man, we gladly embraced the matter and received the cell with all its furniture and utensils. And so, having by a religious stratagem prevailed, after a few days—in which he might prepare the expenses for building a cell—he departed from the place, and afterwards returning built himself another with the greatest labour; which again, not long after, when brethren came who longed with the same desire to dwell there, he handed over to them with all its equipment, they being deceived by a like falsehood of charity. But he himself, persevering untiring in the work of charity, built himself a third cell, in which he might remain.

It seems to me worth the effort to hand down to memory yet another work of charity of the same man, by which the monks of our regions may be instructed by the example of one and the same man to retain not only the rigour of continence, but also the most sincere affection of love. For this man, born of no ignoble family, fled in his boyhood years, despising the affection of this world and of his parents, to a monastery which is distant about four miles from the aforesaid town. There he so spent his whole life's span that never at all, through the whole fifty years, did he not only not enter, nor even see, the village from which he had gone out, but did not even behold the face of any woman, not even of his own mother.

Meanwhile his father, overtaken by death, left behind a debt of a hundred solidi. And although this man was utterly a stranger to every disquiet, inasmuch as he had been exiled from all his father's property, yet he learned that his mother was being vehemently harassed by the creditors. Then this man, from that evangelical rigour by which formerly, while his parents were established in prosperous estate, he had known himself to have neither father nor mother on earth, being softened by the consideration of filial piety, believed that he had a mother, and hastened to succour her in her oppression, in such a way that he relaxed nothing from his purposed strictness.

For remaining within the enclosure of the monastery, he demanded that his accustomed task of daily work be tripled for himself; and there, throughout the whole space of a year, sweating alike by day and by night, paying the creditors the measure of work brought forth by his sweat, he freed his mother from all the injury of harassment—thus rescuing her from the burden of debt in such a way that he suffered nothing of his purposed rigour to be lessened under the pretext of pious necessity: so he guarded his wonted strictness that he in no way denied the work of piety to his mother's womb, whom he had before despised for the love of Christ, and now again acknowledged for the sake of piety toward Him.

When a brother most dear to us, Symeon by name, wholly ignorant of the Greek tongue, had journeyed from the regions of Italy, a certain one of the elders, desiring to show towards him, as a stranger, a work of charity under a certain colour of requital, inquired of him why he sat idle in his cell—conjecturing thereby that he could not endure long in it, both from the wandering restlessness of idleness and from the lack of necessary things, being sure that no one can bear the assaults of solitude except him who is content to procure his own food with his own hands.

When he answered that he neither knew nor was able to do any of those things which were practised there by the brethren, save the copyist's hand, if only anyone in the region of Egypt should have need of a Latin manuscript, then that elder at last, having found an occasion by which he might purchase the desired work of piety as though under the colour of a debt, said: 'This occasion has been found by God: for I was long seeking one who might write out for me the Apostle in Latin by this hand of yours. For I have a brother bound by the snares of military service and thoroughly instructed in Latin, to whom I desire to send something from the holy Scriptures for reading, for the purpose of his edification.'

And so, when Symeon gratefully received this occasion as though offered him from God, the old man too, having the more gladly embraced the pretext under whose cover he might freely fulfil the work of piety, straightway not only conveyed to him all his necessities under the guise of wages for a whole year, but also, bringing the parchment and the implements which were necessary for writing, received back, after the manuscript was written, a book that would be of no use or advantage to anyone (since all in that region were utterly ignorant of the knowledge of this tongue), except for this: that by this subtlety and rather lavish expense he purchased the means whereby that man too, without the shame of confusion, might receive the necessary nourishment of his food as the just wage of his labour and work, and he himself might fulfil the piety of his own munificence as though under the constraint of a debt—

acquiring for himself a reward the more abundant, in that with the greater generosity he had bestowed upon the stranger brother not only the necessaries of food, but also the instruments of work and, at the same time, the opportunity of working. But since, in a place where we had proposed to say something about the rigour of fastings and continence, the affection and works of charity seem to be intermingled, returning again to our purpose we shall insert into this little work a certain memorable deed done by those who were boys in age, though not in understanding.

For when someone, beyond all wonder, had brought certain figs from the region of Mareotis in Libya—as a thing never before seen in that place—to Abbot John the steward, in the desert of Scete, who administered the dispensation of the church committed to him by the blessed presbyter Paphnutius in his time, he straightway sent them by two young men to a certain elder who, in the inner parts of the desert, was labouring under ill health; for he dwelt eighteen miles distant from the church. And when, having received the fruits, they were making their way to the cell of the aforesaid elder, that which is wont to happen very easily there even to the older men, a very dense fog suddenly poured down and they lost the track of the right way.

And when, running to and fro through the pathless vastness of the desert all the day and night, they could in no way find the sick man's little cell, worn out both by the weariness of the journey and by hunger and thirst, with knees fixed in the office of prayer they rendered up their spirit to the Lord. These, being afterwards sought out for a very long time by the tokens of their footprints—which in those sandy places are imprinted as though stamped in snow, until the fine sand, running about even at a light breath of the winds, again covers them—were found to have kept the figs untouched, just as they had received them, choosing indeed to yield up their soul rather than to betray the faith of the thing entrusted to them, and to lose their temporal life rather than to violate the elder's command.

There shall yet be brought forward for us one salutary command of the blessed Macarius, that the sentence of so great a man may close the little book on fastings and continence. He said that a monk ought so to give heed to fastings as though he were to abide a hundred years in the body, and so to bridle the motions of the mind and to forget injuries and to reject sorrows, and likewise to despise pains and losses, as though he were to die daily.

For in the former, a useful and prudent discretion is profitable, making the monk always advance with even strictness and not permitting him, under the occasion of the body's weakness, to be rolled down from lofty heights to the most ruinous precipices; but in the latter, a salutary greatness of soul, which may avail not only to despise those things of the present world that seem prosperous, but also not to be broken by adverse and sad things and to despise them as small and of no account, keeping there its mind's gaze ever fixed, whither it believes that it must daily and at every moment be summoned. ON THE SPIRIT OF FORNICATION. CHAPTERS. I. Of the twofold battle against the spirit of fornication. II. Of the chief correction against the spirit of fornication. III.

How much solitude, together with continence, contributes to the remedy for overcoming the vice of fornication. IV. What difference there is between continence and chastity, and whether both are always possessed together. V. That the assault of fornication cannot be overcome by human effort alone. VI. Of the special grace of God in the gift of chastity. VII. An example drawn from a worldly contest, according to the discourse of the Apostle. VIII. Of the comparison of the purification of those who are about to have a contest in an earthly contest. IX. How great a purity of heart we ought always to prepare for the eyes of God. X. What is the sign of perfect and entire purity. XI. From what vice nocturnal illusion proceeds. XII. That purity of the flesh cannot be obtained without cleanness of heart. XIII.

What is the first guard of carnal purgation. XIV. That we should not strive to weave a praise of chastity, but to set forth its effect. XV. That the virtue of chastity is specially called 'holiness' (sanctimonia) by the Apostle. XVI. Of another testimony of the Apostle concerning this same holiness of chastity. XVII. That the hope of a loftier reward ought to increase the guarding of chastity. XVIII. That, just as chastity cannot be obtained without humility, so neither can knowledge without chastity. XIX. The sentence of the holy bishop Basil concerning the quality of his own virginity. XX. What is the end of true integrity and purity. XXI. In what manner we may be able to retain the state of perfect purity. XXII.

Up to what measure the integrity of our body can be purity, or what is the sign of a mind purged to the utmost. XXIII. The remedies of cure by which the perfect purity of our heart and body may be able to endure. According to the tradition of the Fathers, our second combat is against the spirit of fornication—a combat longer than the rest and of long duration, and by very few thoroughly overcome; an immense war, and one which, since it begins to assail the human race from the first time of puberty, is not extinguished unless the other vices are first overcome. For it is a twofold assault, arising to battle armed with a double vice.

And therefore it must likewise be resisted with a twofold line of battle; for, since it acquires strength as a disease compounded of flesh and soul, so it cannot be vanquished unless both fight together. For bodily fasting alone does not suffice to acquire or to possess the purity of perfect chastity, unless there have gone before contrition of spirit and prayer persevering against this most unclean spirit; then continual meditation on the Scriptures; and unless spiritual knowledge have been joined thereto; the labour also and work of the hands, restraining and recalling the unstable wanderings of the heart; and above all, unless true humility have been laid as a foundation, without which the triumph over no vice whatsoever can ever be obtained.

For chiefly the correction of this vice descends from the perfection of the heart, from which even the poison of this disease is signified by the Lord's voice to proceed. 'Out of the heart,' He says, 'come forth evil thoughts, murders, adulteries, fornications, thefts, false witness,' and the rest. That, therefore, is first to be cleansed, whence the fountain of life and of death is known to flow, as Solomon says: 'With all watchfulness keep thy heart, for out of these are the issues of life.' For the flesh serves at its will and command. And therefore, with the utmost zeal the sparing measure of fastings is to be pursued, lest the flesh, refreshed by an abundance of food, becoming insolent and opposing the salutary precepts of the soul, cast down its ruler, the spirit.

But if we place the whole sum only in the chastisement of the body, the soul not likewise fasting from the other vices, nor being occupied with divine meditation and spiritual pursuits, we shall in no way be able to ascend to that most sublime summit of true integrity, that principal part which is in us assailing the purity of our body. It behoves us, therefore, first to cleanse, according to the Lord's sentence, that which is within of the cup and the platter, that that also which is without may become clean. Then the other vices are wont to be purged even by the use and daily exercise of men, and in a manner cured by the very offence of their own lapse:

as, for instance, the languor of anger, sadness, and impatience is healed by meditation of the heart and by watchful solicitude, and also by the frequent company of the brethren and their constant provocation; and while, being stirred, they are more often and more repeatedly manifested and reproved, they come the more quickly to health. But this disease requires, together with affliction of the body and contrition of heart, solitude also and withdrawal, that it may be able to attain to the full state of health, the pernicious fever of the passions being laid aside.

Just as it is often useful to those labouring under a certain sickness that harmful foods be not even offered to the gaze of their very eyes, lest by occasion of sight a deadly desire be engendered in them, so quiet and solitude contribute very much to driving away this disease especially, that the sick mind, least interrupted by diverse figures, coming to a purer gaze of contemplation, may more easily be able to tear up by the roots the pestiferous kindling of concupiscence. Yet let no one on this account suppose that we deny that continent men are found even placed in the congregation of the brethren; which we confess can very easily come to pass.

For it is one thing to be continent, that is, egkratēs, another to be chaste, and, so to say, to pass into the affection of integrity or incorruption, which is called hagnos—a virtue which is granted especially to those alone who persevere as virgins either in flesh or in mind, as in the New Testament both the Johns, and in the Old also Elias, Jeremias, Daniel, are known to have been. In whose rank these too will not undeservedly be reckoned, who after the experiences of corruption have attained, through long labour and industry, to a like state of purity of mind and body, and feel the stings of the flesh not so much by the assault of base concupiscence as only by the motion of nature.

Which state we say can very hardly be attained amid the crowds of men. But whether it be even impossible, let each one look to know, not from our judgment, but let him search it out by the examination of his own conscience. For the rest, we do not doubt that there exist many continent men who, either rarely or daily, extinguish and repress the assault of the flesh, whereby they are made anxious, whether through fear of hell or through desire of the kingdom of heaven. Whom the elders, just as they declare to be able not to be utterly overwhelmed by the incitements of vices, so they define that they cannot always exist secure and unwounded. For it is necessary that each one placed in the struggle, however frequently he conquer and overcome the adversary, should yet himself also sometimes be troubled.

Wherefore, if it is our heart's desire to contend lawfully in the spiritual contest with the Apostle, and to overcome this most unclean spirit, let us hasten to do so with all intention of mind, not trusting in our own strength (for human industry does not avail to accomplish this), but by the help of the Lord. For it is necessary that the soul be assailed by this vice so long, until it recognize that it is waging a war beyond its own strength, and that it cannot obtain the victory by its own labour or effort, unless it be supported by the aid and protection of the Lord.

And truly, since in all progress in virtues and in the conquest of all vices there is the grace and the victory of the Lord, in this above all the special benefit of God and singular gift is most manifestly declared, both by the sentence of the Fathers and by the experience of this very purgation, to those who have deserved to possess it. For in a manner it is to go out of the flesh while dwelling in the body, and it is beyond nature, being surrounded by frail flesh, not to feel the stings of the flesh. And therefore it is impossible for a man to fly up, so to speak, by his own wings to so lofty and heavenly a reward, unless the grace of the Lord lead him out of the mire of earth by the gift of chastity.

For by no virtue are carnal men so properly made equal to the spiritual angels in the imitation of their manner of life as by the merit and grace of chastity, through which, while yet dwelling on earth, they have, according to the Apostle, their citizenship in heaven—which is promised to the saints that they shall have in the future when carnal corruption has been laid aside, here already possessing it in frail flesh. Hear what the Apostle says: 'Everyone who strives in the contest abstains from all things.' Let us inquire from what 'all things' he spoke, that the instruction of the spiritual contest may be acquired for us by comparison with the carnal. For those who strive to contend lawfully in this visible contest have not the liberty of using all foods which the desire of appetite may suggest, but those

only those which the discipline of those same contests has appointed. And not only must they abstain from forbidden foods and from drunkenness and every excess, but also from all sloth and idleness and indolence, that by daily exercises and continual practice their strength may be able to increase. And so they are made strangers to all anxiety and sadness and worldly business, and even to conjugal affection and act, so that they know nothing else save the exercise of their discipline, nor are they at all involved in any worldly care, hoping from Him alone who presides over the contest for the substance of their daily food and the glory of the crown and rewards worthy of the praise of victory.

And to such a degree do they guard themselves pure from all defilement of intercourse that, when they prepare themselves for the contest of the games, lest perchance, deluded through sleep by some nocturnal deception, they diminish the strength acquired over a long time, they cover the region of the loins with plates of lead, so that, namely, the hardness of the metal applied to the generative members may be able to restrain the obscene humours; understanding that they are without doubt to be conquered, and can no longer accomplish the proposed contest with their strength taken away, if the deceitful image of noxious pleasure should have corrupted the provided firmness of their chastity.

So then, if we have understood the discipline of the worldly contest, by the example of which the blessed Apostle willed to instruct us, teaching how great is the observance in it, how great the diligence, how great the guarding—what will it behove us to do, with what purity will it be fitting to guard the chastity of our body and soul, we who must daily feed upon the sacrosanct flesh of the Lamb, which the precepts even of the old law do not permit any unclean person to touch? For in Leviticus it is thus commanded: 'Everyone that is clean shall eat of the flesh; and the soul whatsoever shall eat of the flesh of the sacrifice of salvation, which is the Lord's, having uncleanness upon it, shall perish before the Lord.'

How great, therefore, is the gift of integrity, without which even those who were under the old testament could not be present at the typical sacrifices, and those who desire to attain the corruptible crown of this world cannot be crowned. And so, with all watchfulness the hidden recesses of our heart are first to be cleansed; for that which those men desire to attain in purity of body, we ought to possess even in the secret places of conscience, in which the Lord, sitting as judge and umpire of the games, ever beholds the battle of our course and contest, so that those things which we shrink from admitting in the open, we may not suffer to coalesce within us even through incautious thought, and in those things wherein we are put to confusion by human knowledge, we may not be defiled even by hidden connivance.

Which, although it may escape the notice of men, yet cannot be hidden from the knowledge of the holy angels and of the omnipotent God Himself, from whom no secrets escape. Of which purity this will be the evident sign and full proof, if either no enticing image occur to us when we are at rest and relaxed into sleep, or at least, if it interpose itself, it can excite no motions of concupiscence. For although such a commotion may be reckoned as by no means a full guilt of sin, yet it is not yet the sign of a perfect mind, nor the manifestation of a vice purged to the utmost, when an illusion of this kind operates through deceptive images. For the quality of the thoughts, which is guarded more negligently amid the distractions of the day, is proved by the quiet of the night.

And therefore, when any such illusion has intervened, it is not to be believed a fault of sleep, but the negligence of the preceding time and the manifestation of a disease lurking within, which the hour of night did not first give birth to, but, hidden in the inmost fibres of the soul, the refreshment of sleep brought up to the surface of the skin, exposing the hidden fevers of the passions which, feeding on noxious thoughts throughout the whole space of the day, we have contracted: as bodily maladies too are wont not to be gathered in that season in which they seem to emerge, but are acquired by the negligence of past time, when someone, feeding imprudently on contrary foods, has drawn upon himself noxious and deadly humours.

Therefore God, the creator and framer of the human race, knowing before all things the nature of His own workmanship and its amendment, applied there the care of medicine whence He knew the causes of the disease chiefly to emanate, saying: 'Whosoever shall look upon a woman to lust after her, hath already committed adultery with her in his heart.' Noting the wanton eyes, He does not so much censure them as that inner sense which ill uses their service for seeing. For the heart is sick and wounded by the dart of lust which looks in order to lust, twisting the benefit of sight, rightly granted to it by the Creator, by its own vice to the ministries of depraved works, and bringing forth the disease of concupiscence hidden within itself by the occasion of contemplation.

Therefore, for this reason, this salutary command is enjoined upon that member by whose vice the worst languor proceeds by the occasion of sight; for it is not said, 'With all watchfulness keep thy eyes'—which certainly it would have behoved chiefly to guard, if from them proceeded the affection of concupiscence (for the eyes afford nothing more than the simple office of vision to the soul)—but it says, 'With all watchfulness keep thy heart,' the medicine being laid especially upon that which can everywhere abuse the ministry of the eyes. This, then, will be the first guard of this purgation, that, when the memory of the female sex has crept upon our mind through the subtle suggestion of diabolical cunning, we should first recall

lest, if we have lingered longer upon it, the informer of evils, once having gained an occasion through the sex, should thence subtly roll and precipitate the mind onto those persons through whom he may be able to insinuate noxious thoughts, let us as quickly as possible thrust it out of our recesses by putting before us the memory of our mother, sisters, or kinsfolk, or at least of holy women. Wherefore we ought to be ever mindful of that precept:

'With all watchfulness keep thy heart,' and, according to God's chief command, carefully to observe the noxious head of the serpent, that is, the beginnings of evil thoughts, by which the devil attempts to creep into our soul, and let us not through negligence permit the rest of its body—that is, the consent of delight—to penetrate into our heart; which, without doubt, if it be admitted, will with venomous bite slay the mind taken captive.

The sinners of our land that spring up, that is, the carnal senses, we ought to slay at the very dawn of their rising; and while they are still tiny we must dash the children of Babylon against the rock. For unless they are killed while still most tender, when grown up they will, through our own connivance, rise against us the more strongly to our ruin, or at the very least will not be overcome without great groaning and toil. For while the strong one, namely our spirit, guards his house fully armed, fortifying the inmost recesses of his heart with the fear of God, all his substance will be in peace, that is, the fruits of his labours and the virtues acquired over a long time.

But if a stronger one comes upon him and overcomes him, that is, the devil through the consent to evil thoughts, he will take away the arms in which he trusted, that is, the memory of the Scriptures or the fear of God, and will divide his spoils, that is, scattering by opposite vices the merits of his virtues, whatever they were.

And to pass over all those things that are inserted in the Holy Scriptures in praise of this virtue (for it is not my purpose to weave together a panegyric of chastity, but to set forth, according to the traditions of the Fathers, its character, how it ought to be acquired and preserved, and what its goal is), I will set down only one saying of the blessed Apostle, by which it may be plain how, writing to the Thessalonians, he preferred it to all the virtues, commending it with such noble words. 'This,' he says, 'is the will of God, your sanctification.'

And lest perhaps he should leave us in doubt or obscurity as to what he meant to call sanctification—whether justice or charity or humility or patience (for in all these virtues sanctification is believed to be acquired)—he adds and plainly designates what he properly meant by sanctification: 'This is the will of God, your sanctification, that you abstain,' he says, 'from fornication, that every one of you should know how to possess his vessel in honour and sanctification, not in the passion of lust, even as the Gentiles who know not God.' See with what praises he attends it, calling it the honour of the vessel, that is, of our body, and its sanctification.

Therefore, on the contrary, he who is in the passion of lust stands in ignominy and uncleanness and lives as a stranger to sanctification. A third time also, a little later, he adds, again pronouncing it holiness: 'For God has not called us unto ignominy, but unto holiness. Therefore he who despises these things despises not man but God, who has also given his Holy Spirit within us.' He joined an inviolable authority to his precept, saying: he who despises these things—that is, the things I have set forth concerning holiness—despises not man, that is, me who command these things, but God, who speaks in me, who has also appointed our heart a dwelling-place for his Holy Spirit.

You see with what simple and pure words, with what proclamations and how great praises he has exalted it: first, by properly attributing sanctification to this virtue; then, by asserting that through it the vessel of our body is to be freed from uncleanness; thirdly, that with ignominy and shame cast off it will abide in honour and sanctification; and finally—which is the sum of the perfect reward and recompense of blessedness—he has shown that through it the Holy Spirit will become the inhabitant of our breast. And although my discourse is drawing toward the end of the little book, I will yet set down another testimony of the same Apostle, similar to this and beyond what I promised. For writing to the Hebrews he says: 'Follow peace with all men, and holiness, without which no man shall see God.'