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ST. JEROME

AGAINST VIGILANTIUS

[Translated by The Hon. W. H. Fremantle, M.A., Canon of Canterbury
Cathedral and Fellow and Tutor of Balliol College, Oxford, with the
assistance of the Rev. G. Lewis, M.A., of Balliol College, Oxford, Vicar of
Dodderhill near Droitwick, and the Rev. W. G. Martley, M.A., of Balliol
College, Oxford.]


   1. The world has given birth to many monsters; in 'Isaiah we read of
centaurs and sirens, screech-owls and pelicans. Job, in mystic language,
describes Leviathan and Behemoth; Cerberus and the birds of Stymphalus, the
Erymanthian boar and the Nemean lion, the Chimaera and the many-headed
Hydra, are told of in poetic fables. Virgil describes Cacus. Spain has
produced Geryon, with his three bodies. Gaul alone has had no monsters, but
has ever been rich in men of courage and great eloquence. All at once
Vigilantius, or, more correctly, Dormitantius, has arisen, animated by an
unclean spirit, to fight against the Spirit of Christ. and to deny that
religious reverence is to be paid to the tombs of the martyrs. Vigils, he
says, are to be condemned; Alleluia must never be sung except at Easter;
continence is a heresy; chastity a hot-bed of lust. And as Euphorbus is
said to have been born again in the person of Pythagoras, so in this fellow
the corrupt mind of Jovinianus has arisen; so that in him, no less than in
his predecessor, we are bound to meet the snares of the devil. The words
may be justly applied to him:[2] "Seed of evil-doers, prepare thy children
for the slaughter because of the sins of thy father." Jovinianus, condemned
by the authority of the Church of Rome, amidst pheasants and swine's flesh,
breathed out, or rather belched out his spirit. And now this tavern-keeper
of Calagurris, who, according to the name of his[1] native village is a
Quintilian, only dumb instead of eloquent, is[2] mixing water with the
wine. According to the trick which he knows of old, he is trying to blend
his perfidious poison with the Catholic faith; he assails virginity and
hates chastity; he revels with worldlings and declaims against the fasts of
the saints; he plays the philosopher over his cups, and soothes himself
with the sweet strains of psalmody, while he smacks his lips over his
cheese-cakes; nor could he deign to listen to the songs of David and
Jeduthun, and Asaph and the sons of Core, except at the banqueting table.
This I have poured forth with more grief than amusement, for I cannot
restrain myself and turn a deaf ear to the wrongs inflicted on apostles and
martyrs.

   2. Shameful to relate, there are bishops who are said to be associated
with him in his wickedness--if at least they are to be called bishops--who
ordain no deacons but such as have been previously married; who credit no
celibate with chastity--nay, rather, who show clearly what measure of
holiness of life they can claim by indulging in evil suspicions of all men,
and, unless the candidates for ordination appear before them with pregnant
wives, and infants wailing in the arms of their mothers, will not
administer to them Christ's ordinance. What are the Churches of the East to
do? What is to become of the Egyptian Churches and those belonging to the
Apostolic Seat, which accept for the ministry only men who are virgins, or
those who practice continency, or, if married, abandon their conjugal
rights? Such is the teaching of Dormitantius, who throws the reins upon the
neck of lust, and by his encouragement doubles the natural heat of the
flesh, which in youth is mostly at boiling point, or rather slakes it by
intercourse with women; so that there is nothing to separate us from swine,
nothing wherein we differ from the brute creation, or from horses,
respecting which it is written:[1] "They were toward women like raging
horses; everyone neighed after his neighbour's wife." This is that which
the Holy Spirit says by the mouth of David:[2] "Be ye not like horse and
mule which have no understanding." And again respecting Dormitantius and
his friends: [3]"Bind the jaws of them who draw not near unto thee with bit
and bridle."

   3. But it is now thee for us to adduce his own words and answer him in
detail. For, possibly, in his malice, he may choose once more to
misrepresent me, and say that I have trumped up a case for the sake of
showing off my rhetorical and declamatory powers in combating it, like the
letter[4] which I wrote to Gaul, relating to a mother and daughter who were
at variance. This little treatise, which I now dictate, is due to the
reverend presbyters Riparius and Desiderius, who write that their parishes
have been defiled by being in his neighbourhood, and have sent me, by our
brother Sisinnius, the books which he vomited forth in a drunken fit. They
also declare that some persons are found who, from their inclination to his
vices, assent to his blasphemies. He is a barbarian both in speech and
knowledge. His style is rude. He cannot defend even the truth; but, for the
sake of laymen, and poor women, laden with sins, ever learning and never
coming to a knowledge of the truth, I will spend upon his melancholy
trifles a single night's labour, otherwise I shall seem to have treated
with contempt the letters of the reverend persons who have entreated me to
undertake the task.

   4. He certainly well represents his race. Sprung from a set of brigands
and persons collected together from all quarters ([mean those whom Cn.
Pompey, alter the conquest of Spain, when he was hastening to return for
his triumph, brought down from the Pyrenees and gathered together into one
town, whence the name of the city Convenae[1]), he has carried on their
brigand practices by his attack upon the Church of God. Like his ancestors
the Vectones, the Arrabaci, and the Celtiberians, he makes his raids upon
the churches of Gaul, not carrying the standard of the cross, but, on the
contrary, the ensign of the devil. Pompey did just the same in the East.
After overcoming the Cilician and Isaurian pirates and brigands, he founded
a city, bearing his own name, between Cilicia and Isauria. That city,
however, to this day, observes the ordinances of its ancestors, and no
Dormitantius has arisen in it; but Gaul supports a native foe, and sees
seated in the Church a man who has lost his head and who ought to be put in
the strait-jacket which Hippocrates recommended. Among other blasphemies,
he may be heard to say," What need is there for you not only to pay such
honour, not to say adoration, to the thing, whatever it may be, which you
carry about in a  little vessel and worship?" And again, in the same book,"
Why do you kiss and adore a bit of powder wrapped up in a cloth?" And
again, in the same book," Under the cloak of religion we see what is all
but a heathen ceremony introduced into the churches: while the sun is still
shining, heaps of tapers are lighted, and everywhere a paltry bit of
powder, wrapped up in a costly cloth, is kissed and worshipped. Great
honour do men of this sort pay to the blessed martyrs, who, they think, are
to be made glorious by trumpery tapers, when the Lamb who is in the midst
of the throne, with all the brightness of His majesty, gives them light?"

   5. Madman, who in the world ever adored the martyrs? who ever thought
man was God? Did not[2] Paul and Barnabas, when the people of Lycaonia
thought them to be Jupiter and Mercury, and would have offered sacrifices
to them, rend their clothes and declare they were men? Not that they were
not better than Jupiter and Mercury, who were but men long ago dead, but
because, under the mistaken ideas of the Gentiles, the honour due to God
was being paid to them. And we read the same respecting Peter, who, when
Cornelius wished to adore him, raised him by the hand, and said, [3]"Stand
up, for I also am a man." And have you the audacity to speak of "the
mysterious something or other which you carry about in a little vessel and
worship?" I want to know what it is that you call "something or other."
Tell us more clearly (that there may be no restraint on your blasphemy)
what you mean by the phrase" a bit of powder wrapped up in a costly cloth
in a tiny vessel." It is nothing less than the relics of the martyrs which
he is vexed to see covered with a costly veil, and not bound up with rags
or hair-cloth, or thrown on the midden, so that Vigilantius alone in his
drunken slumber may be worshipped. Are we, therefore guilty of sacrilege
when we enter the basilicas of the Apostles? Was the Emperor Constantius I.
guilty of sacrilege when he transferred the sacred relics of Andrew, Luke,
and Timothy to Constantinople? In their presence the demons cry out, and
the devils who dwell in Vigilantius confess that they feel the influence of
the saints. And at the present day is the Emperor Arcadius guilty of
sacrilege, who after so long a thee has conveyed the bones of the blessed
Samuel from Judea to Thrace? Are all the bishops to be considered not only
sacrilegious, but silly into the bargain, because they carried that most
worthless thing, dust and ashes, wrapped in silk in golden vessel? Are the
people of all the Churches fools, because they went to meet the sacred
relics, and welcomed them with as much joy as if they beheld a living
prophet in the midst of them, so that there was one great swarm of people
from Palestine to Chalcedon with one voice re-echoing the praises of
Christ? They were forsooth, adoring Samuel and not Christ, whose Levite and
prophet Samuel was. You Show mistrust because you think only of the dead
body, and therefore blaspheme. Read he Gospel--[1]"The God of Abraham, the
God of Isaac, the God of Jacob: He is not the God of the dead, but of the
living." If then they are alive, they are not, to use your expression, kept
in honourable confinement.

   6. For you say that the souls of Apostles and martyrs have their abode
either in the bosom of Abraham, or in the place of refreshment, or under
the altar of God, and that they cannot leave their own tombs, and be
present there they will. They are, it seems, of senatorial rank. and are
not subjected to the worst kind of prison and the society of murderers, but
are kept apart in liberal and honourable custody in the isles of the
blessed and the Elysian fields. Will you lay down the law for God? Will you
put the Apostles into chains? So that to the day of judgment they re to be
kept in confinement, and are not with their Lord, although it is written
concerning them, [3]"They follow the Lamb, whithersoever he goeth." If the
Lamb is present everywhere, the same must be believed respecting those who
are with the Lamb. And while the devil and the demons wander through the
whole world, and with only too great speed present themselves everywhere;
are martyrs, after the shedding of their blood, to be kept out of sight
shut up in a[1] coffin, from whence they cannot escape? You say, in your
pamphlet, that so long as we are alive we can pray for one another; but
once we die, the prayer of no person for another can be heard, and all the
more because the martyrs, though they[2] cry for the avenging of their
blood, have never been able to obtain their request. If Apostles and
martyrs while still in the body can pray for others, when they ought still
to be anxious for themselves, how much more must they do so when once they
have won their crowns, overcome, and triumphed? A single man, Moses, oft[3]
wins pardon from God for six hundred thousand armed men; and[4] Stephen,
the follower of his Lord and the first Christian martyr, entreats pardon
for his persecutors; and when once they have entered on their life with
Christ, shall they have less power than before? The Apostle Paul[6] says
that two hundred and seventy-six souls were given to him in the ship; and
when, after his dissolution, he has begun to be with Christ, must he shut
his mouth, and be unable to say a word for those who throughout the whole
world have believed in his Gospel? Shall Vigilantius the live dog be better
than Paul the dead lion? I should be right in saying so after[6]
Ecclesiastes, if I admitted that Paul is dead in spirit. The truth is that
the saints are not called dead, but are said to be asleep. Wherefore[7]
Lazarus, who was about to rise again, is said to have slept. And the
Apostle[8] forbids the Thessalonians to be sorry for those who were asleep.
As for you, when wide awake you are asleep, and asleep when you write, and
you bring before me an apocryphal book which, under the name of Esdras, is
read by you and those of your feather, and in this book it is[9] written
that after death no one dares pray for others. I have never read the book:
for what need is there to take up what the Church does not receive? It can
hardly be your intention to confront me with Balsamus, and Barbelus, and
the Thesaurus of Manichaeus, and the ludicrous name of Leusiboras; though
possibly because you live at the foot of the Pyrenees, and border on
Iberia, you follow the incredible marvels of the ancient heretic[1]
Basilides and his so-called knowledge, which is there ignorance, and set
forth what is condemned by the authority of the whole world. I say this
because in your short treatise you quote Solomon as if he were on your
side, though Solomon never wrote the words in question at all; so that, as
you have a second Esdras you may have a second Solomon. And, if you like,
you may read the imaginary revelations of all the patriarchs and prophets,
and, when you have learned them, you may sing them among the women in their
weaving-shops, or rattler order them to be read in your taverns, the more
easily by these melancholy ditties to stimulate the ignorant mob to
replenish their cups.

   7. As to the question of tapers, however, we do not, as you in vain
misrepresent us, light them in the daytime, but by their solace we would
cheer the darkness of the night, and watch for the dawn, lest we should be
blind like you and sleep in darkness. And if some persons, being ignorant
and simple minded laymen, or, at all events, religious women--of whom we
can truly say, [2]"I allow that they hive a zeal for God, but not according
to knowledge"--adopt the practice in honour of the martyrs, what harm is
thereby done to you? Once upon a thee even the Apostles[3] pleaded that the
ointment was wasted, but they were rebuked by the voice of the Lord. Christ
did not need the ointment, nor do martyrs need the light of tapers; and yet
that woman poured out the ointment in honour of Christ, and her heart's
devotion was accepted. All those who light these tapers have their reward
according to their faith, as the Apostle says: [4]"Let every one abound in
his own meaning." Do you call men. of this sort idolaters? I do not deny,
that all of us who believe in Christ have passed from the error of
idolatry. For we are not: born Christians, but become Christians by being
born again. And because we formerly worshipped idols, does it follow that
we ought not now to worship God lest we seem to pay like honour to Him and
to idols? In the one case respect was paid to idols, and therefore the
ceremony is to be abhorred; in the other the martyrs are venerated, and the
same ceremony is therefore to be allowed. Throughout the whole Eastern
Church, even when there are no relics of the martyrs, whenever the Gospel
is to be read the candles are lighted, although the dawn may be reddening
the sky, not of course to scatter the darkness, but by way of evidencing
our joy. [1]And accordingly the virgins in the Gospel always have their
lamps lighted. And the Apostles are[2] told to have their loins girded, and
their lamps burning in their hands. And of John Baptist we read, [3]"He was
the lamp that burneth and shineth"; so that, under the figure of corporeal
light, that light is represented of which we read in the Psalter, [4]"Thy
word is a lamp unto my feet, O Lord, and a light unto my paths."

   8. Does the bishop of Rome do wrong when he offers sacrifices to the
Lord over the venerable bones of the dead men Peter and Paul, as we should
say, but according to you, over a worthless bit of dust, and judges their
tombs worthy to be Christ's altars? And not only is the bishop of one city
in error, but the bishops of the whole world, who, despite the tavern-
keeper Vigilantius, enter the basilicas of the dead, in which" a worthless
bit of dust and ashes lies wrapped up in a cloth," defiled and defiling all
else. Thus, according to you, the sacred buildings are like the sepulchres
of the Pharisees, whitened without, while within they have filthy remains,
and are full of foul smells and uncleanliness. And then he dares to
expectorate his filth upon the subject and to say: "Is it the case that the
souls of the martyrs love their ashes, and hover round them, and are always
present, lest haply if any one come to pray and they were absent, they
could not hear? " Oh, monster, who ought to be banished to the ends of the
earth! do you laugh at the relics of the martyrs, and in company with
Eunomius, the father of this heresy, slander the Churches of Christ? Are
you not afraid of being in such company, and of speaking against us the
same things which he utters against the Church? For all his followers
refuse to enter the basilicas of Apostles and martyrs, so that, forsooth,
they may worship the dead Eunomius, whose books they consider are of more
authority than the Gospels; and they believe that the light of truth was in
him. just as other heretics maintain that the Paraclete came into Montanus,
and say that Manichaeus himself was the Paraclete. You cannot find an
occasion of boasting even in supposing that you are the inventor of a new
kind of wickedness, for your heresy long ago broke out against the Church.
It found, however, an opponent in Tertullian, a very learned man, who wrote
a famous treatise which he called most correctly Scorpiacum,[5] because, as
the scorpion bends itself like a bow to inflict its wound. so what was
formerly called the heresy of Cain pours poison into the body of the
Church; it has slept or rather been buried for a long thee, but has been
now awakened by Dormitantius. I am surprised you do not tell us that there
must upon no account be martyrdoms, inasmuch as God, who does not ask for
the blood of goats and bulls, much less requires the blood of men. This is
what you say, or rather, even if you do not say it, you are taken as
meaning to assert it. For in maintaining that the relics of the martyrs are
to be trodden under foot, you forbid the shedding of their blood as being
worthy of no honour.

   9. Respecting vigils and the frequent keeping of night-watches in the
basilicas of the martyrs, I have given a brief reply in another letter[1]
which, about two years ago, I wrote to the reverend presbyter Riparias. You
argue that they ought to be abjured, lest we seem to be often keeping
Easter, and appear not to observe the customary yearly vigils. If so, then
sacrifices should not be offered to Christ on the Lord's day lest we
frequently keep the Easter of our Lord's Resurrection, and introduce the
custom of having many Easters instead of one. We must not. however, impute
to pious men the faults and errors of youths and worthless women such as
are often detected at night. It is true that, even at the Easter vigils,
something of the kind usually comes to light; but the faults of a few form
no argument against religion in general, and such persons, without keeping
vigil, can go wrong either in their own houses or in those of other people.
The treachery of Judas did not annul the loyalty of the Apostles. And if
others keep vigil badly, our vigils are not thereby to be stopped; nay,
rather let those who sleep to gratify their lust be compelled to watch that
they may preserve their chastity. For if a thing once done be good, it
cannot be bad if often done; and if there is some fault to be avoided, the
blame lies not in its being done often, but in its being done at all. And
so we should not watch at Easter-tide for fear that adulterers may satisfy
their long pent-up desires, or that the wife may find an opportunity for
sinning without having the Key turned against her by her husband. The
occasions which seldom recur are those which are most eagerly longed for.

   10. I cannot traverse all the topics embraced in the letters of the
reverend presbyters; I will adduce a few points from the tracts of
Vigilantius. He argues against the signs and miracles which are wrought in
the basilicas of the martyrs, and says that they are of service to the
unbelieving, not to believers, as I though the question now were for whose
advantage they occur, not by what power. Granted that signs belong to the
faithless, who, because they would not obey the word and doctrine, are
brought to believe by means of signs. Even our Lord wrought signs for the
unbelieving, and yet our Lord's signs are not on that account to be
impugned, because those people were faithless, but must be worthy of
greater admiration because they were so powerful that they subdued even the
hardest hearts, and compelled men to believe. And so I will not have you
tell me that signs are for the unbelieving; but answer my question--how is
it that poor worthless dust and ashes are associated with this wondrous
power of signs and miracles? I see, I see, most unfortunate of mortals, why
you are so sad and what causes your fear. That unclean spirit who forces
you to write these things has often been tortured by this worthless dust,
aye, and is being tortured at this moment, and though in your case he
conceals his wounds, in others he makes confession. You will hardly follow
the heathen and impious Porphyry and Eunomius, and pretend that these are
the tricks of the demons, and that they do not really cry out, but feign
their torments. Let me give you my advice: go to the basilicas of the
martyrs, and some day you will be cleansed; you will find there many in
like case with yourself, and will be set on fire, not by the martyrs'
tapers which offend you, but by invisible flames; and you will then confess
what you now deny, and will freely proclaim your name--that you who speak
in the person of Vigilantius are really either Mercury, for greedy of gain
was he; or Nocturnus, who, according to Plautus's "Amphitryon," slept while
jupiter, two nights together, had his adulterous connection with Alcmena,
and thus begat the mighty Hercules; or at all events Father Bacchus, of
drunken fame, with the tankard hanging from his shoulder, with his ever
ruby face, foaming lips, and unbridled brawling.

   11. Once, when a sudden earthquake in this province in the middle of
the night awoke us all out of our sleep, you, the most prudent and the
wisest of men, began to pray without putting your clothes on, and recalled
to our minds the story of Adam and Eve in Paradise; they, indeed, when
their eyes were opened were ashamed, for they saw that they were naked, and
covered their shame with the leaves of trees; but you, who were stripped
Mike of your shirt and of your faith, in the sudden terror which
overwhelmed you, and with the fumes of your last night's booze still
hanging about you, showed your wisdom by exposing your nakedness in only
too evident a manner to the eyes of the brethren. Such are the adversaries
of the Church; these are the leaders who fight against the blood of the
martyrs; here is a specimen of the orators who thunder against the
Apostles, or, rather, such are the mad dogs which bark at the disciples of
Christ.

   12. I confess my own fear, for possibly it may be thought to spring
from superstition. When I have been angry, or have had evil thoughts in my
mind, or some phantom of the night has beguiled me, I do not dare to enter
the basilicas of the martyrs, I shudder all over in body and soul. You may
smile, perhaps, and deride this as on a level with the wild fancies of weak
women. If it be so, I am not ashamed of having a faith like that of those
who were the first to see the risen Lord; who were sent to the Apostles;
who, in the person of the mother of our Lord and Saviour, were commended to
the holy Apostles. Belch out your shame, if yon will, with men of the
world, I will fast with women; yea, with religious men whose looks witness
to their chastity, and who, with the cheek pale from prolonged abstinence,
show forth the chastity of Christ.

   13. Something, also, appears to be troubling you. You are afraid that,
if continence, sobriety, and fasting strike root among the people of Gaul,
your taverns will not pay, and you will be unable to keep up through the
night your diabolical vigils and drunken revels. Moreover, I have learnt
from those same letters that, in defiance of the authority of Paul, nay,
rather of Peter, John, and James, who gave the right hand of fellowship to
Paul and Barnabas, and commanded them to remember the poor, you forbid any
pecuniary relief to be sent to Jerusalem for the benefit of the saints.
Now, if I reply to this, you will immediately give tongue and cry out that
I am pleading my own cause. You, forsooth, were so generous to the whole
community that if you had not come to Jerusalem, and lavished your own
money or that of your patrons, we should all be on the verge of starvation.
I say what the blessed Apostle Paul says in nearly all his Epistles; and he
makes it a rule for the Churches of the Gentiles that, on the first day of
the week, that is, on the Lord's day, contributions should be made by every
one which should be sent up to Jerusalem for the relief of the saints, and
that either by his own disciples, or by those whom they should themselves
approve; and if it were thought fit, he would himself either send, or take
what was collected. Also in the Acts of the Apostles, when speaking to the
governor Felix, he says,[1] "After many years I went up to Jerusalem to
bring alms to my nation and offerings, and to perform my vows, amidst which
they found me purified in the temple." Might he not have distributed in
some other part of the world, and in the infant Churches which he was
training in his own faith, the gifts he had received from others? But he
longed to give to the poor of the holy places who, abandoning their own
little possessions for the sake of Christ, turned with their whole heart to
the service of the Lord. It would take too long now if I purposed to repeat
all the passages from the whole range of his Epistles in which he advocates
and urges with all his heart that money be sent to Jerusalem and to the
holy places for the faithful; not to gratify avarice, but to give relief;
not to accumulate wealth, but to support the weakness of the poor body, and
to stave off cold and hunger. And this custom continues in Judea to the
present day, not only among us, but also among the Hebrews, so that they
who[1] meditate in the law of the Lord, day and night, and have[2] no
father upon earth except the Lord alone, may be cherished by the aid of the
synagogues and of the whole world; that there may be[3] equality--not that
some may be refreshed while others are in distress, but that the abundance
of some may support the need of others.

   14. You will reply that every one can do this in his own country, and
that there will never be wanting poor who ought to be supported with the
resources of the Church. And we do not deny that doles should be
distributed to all poor people, even to Jews and Samaritans, if the means
will allow. But the Apostle teaches that alms should be given to all,
indeed,[4] especially, however, to those who are of the household of faith.
And respecting these the Saviour said in the Gospel,[5] "Make to yourselves
friends of the mammon of unrighteousness, who may receive you into
everlasting habitations." What! Can those poor creatures, with their rags
and filth, lorded over, as they are, by raging lust, can they who own
nothing, now or hereafter, have eternal habitations? No doubt it is not the
poor simply, but the poor in spirit, who are called blessed; those of whom
it is written,[6] "Blessed is he who gives his mind to the poor and needy;
the Lord shall deliver him in the evil day." But the fact is, in supporting
the poor of the common people, what is needed is not mind, but money. In
the case of the saintly poor the mind has blessed exercises, since you give
to one who receives with a blush, and when he has received is grieved, that
while sowing spiritual things he must reap your carnal things. As for his
argument that they who keep what they have, and distribute among the poor,
little by little, the increase of their property, act more wisely than they
who sell their possessions, and once for all give all away, not I but the
Lord shall make answer:[1] "If thou wilt be perfect, go sell all that thou
hast and give to the poor, and come, follow Me." He speaks to him' who
wishes to be perfect, who, with the Apostles, leaves father, ship, and net.
The man whom you approve stands in the second or third rank; yet we welcome
him provided it be understood that the first is to be preferred to the
second, and the second to the third.

   15. Let me add that our monks are not to be deterred from their
resolution by you with your viper's tongue and savage bite. Your argument
respecting them runs thus: If all men were to seclude themselves and live
in solitude, who is there to frequent the churches? Who will remain to win
those engaged in secular pursuits? Who will be able to urge sinners to
virtuous conduct? Similarly, if all were as silly as you, who could be
wise? And, to follow out your argument, virginity would not deserve our
approbation. For if all were virgins, we should have no marriages; the race
would perish; infants would not cry in their cradles; midwives would lose
their pay and turn beggars; and Dormitantius, all alone and shrivelled up
with cold, would lie awake in his bed. The truth is, virtue is a rare thing
and not eagerly sought after by the many. Would that all were as the few of
whom it is said: [2]"Many are called, few are chosen." The prison would be
empty. But, indeed, a monk's function is not to teach, but to lament; to
mourn either for himself or for the world, and with terror to anticipate
our Lord's advent. Knowing his own weakness and the frailty of the vessel
which he carries, he is afraid of stumbling, lest he strike against
something, and it fall and be broken. Hence he shuns the sight of women,
and particularly of young women, and so far chastens himself as to dread
even what is safe.

   16. Why, you will say, go to the desert? The reason is plain: That I
may not hear or see you; that I may not be disturbed by your madness; that
I may not be engaged in conflict with you; that the eye of the harlot nay
not lead me captive: that beauty may not lead me to unlawful embraces. You
will reply: "This is not to fight, but to run away. Stand in line of
battle, put on your armour and resist your foes, so that, having overcome,
you may wear the crown." I confess my weakness. I would not fight in the
hope of victory, lest some thee or other I lose the victory. If I flee, I
avoid the sword; if I stand, I must either overcome or fall. But what need
is there for me to let go certainties and follow after uncertainties?
Either with my shield or with my feet I must shun death. You who fight may
either be overcome or may overcome. I who fly do not overcome, inasmuch as
I fly; but I fly to make sure that I may not be overcome. There is no
safety in sleep with a serpent beside you. Possibly he will not bite me,
yet it is possible that after a thee he may bite me. We call women mothers
who are no older than sisters and daughters,[1] and we do not blush to
cloak our vices with the names of piety. What business has a monk in the
women's cells? What is the meaning of secret conversation and looks which
shun the presence of witnesses? Holy love has no restless desire. Moreover,
what we have said respecting lust we must apply to avarice, and to all
vices which are avoided by solitude. We therefore keep clear of the crowded
cities, that we may not be compelled to do what we are urged to do, not so
much by nature as by choice.

   17. At the request of the reverend presbyters, as I have said, I have
devoted to the dictation of these remarks the labour of a single night, for
my brother Sisinnius is hastening his departure for Egypt, where he has
relief to give to the saints, and is impatient to be gone. If it were not
so, however, the subject itself was so openly blasphemous as to call for
the indignation of a writer rather than a multitude of proofs. But if
Dormitantius wakes up that he may again abuse me, and if he thinks fit to
disparage me with that same blasphemous mouth with which he pulls to pieces
Apostles and martyrs, I will spend upon him something more than this short
lucubration. I will keep vigil for a whole night in his behalf and in
behalf of his companions, whether they be disciples or masters, who think
no man to be worthy of Christ's ministry unless he is married and his wife
is seen to be with child.


Taken from "The Early Church Fathers and Other Works" originally published
by Wm. B. Eerdmans Pub. Co. in English in Edinburgh, Scotland, beginning in
1867. (LNPF II/VI, Schaff and Wace). The digital version is by The
Electronic Bible
Society, P.O. Box 701356, Dallas, TX 75370, 214-407-WORD.

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