The Lausiac History

OLYMPIAS

[i] That most venerable and devoted lady Olympias followed the counsel of Melania, attending to her precepts and walking in her footsteps. She was the daughter of Seleucus the ex-count, grand-daughter of

^ Omitted by leading authorities for the text, as in the other places where he is mentioned by Palladius. * I Tim. vi. 20.

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Ablavius the ex-prefect, and bride for a few days of Nebridius, the ex-prefect of the city, but the wife of no man. For she is said to have died a virgin, but the spouse of the Word of Truth. [2] She dispersed all her goods and gave to the poor. She engaged in no mean combats for truth's sake, instructed many women, addressed priests reverently, and honoured bishops ; she was accounted worthy to be a confessor for truth's sake. The inhabitants of Constantinople reckon her life among the confessors, for she died thus and went away to the Lord in the midst of her struggles for God's honour.

ICH AFTER LVII

' CANDIDA

[i] Attending to her precepts and imitating her like a mirror, the blessed Candida, daughter of Trajan the general, lived a worthy life and attained to the height of sanctity, paying honours both to churches and bishops. Having instructed her own daughter for the condition of virginity she brought her to Christ as a gift of her own body, afterwards following her own daughter in temperance and chastity and the distribution of her goods. [2] I knew her labour all night long with her hands at the mill to subdue her body ; and she used to say : " Fasting is insufficient ; I give it an ally in the shape of toilsome watching, that I may destroy the insolence of Esau." ^ She abstained absolutely from anything with blood ^ and life in it, but taking fish and vegetables with oil on feast days, at other times she continued to content herself with a mixture of sour wine and dry bread.

1 Cf. Heb. xii. 16.

* Is this one of the rare traces in the later Church of the influence of the compromise of Acts xv. 20 ?

THE MONKS OF ANTINOE 163

[3] In emulation of her example the most venerable lady Gelasia, a tribune's daughter, walked in the path of religion, having put on the yoke of virginity. Her virtue is renowned in that the sun never went down ^ on her irritation against man-servant or maid-servant or any one else.

THE MONKS OF ANTINOE

[i] Having spent four years ^ at Antinoe in the Thebaid, in so long a time I acquired knowledge also of the local monasteries. For some 1200 men are settled round the city, who live by their hands and are extremely ascetic. Reckoned among these there are also anchorites who have shut themselves up in the caves of the rocks. One of these is a certain Solomon, a man of very mild disposition and restrained and possessing the gift of endurance. He used to say that he had been fifty years in the cave. He provided for himself by the work of his hands and had learned by heart all the holy Scriptures.

[2] In another cave lived Dorotheus, a priest. He was extraordinarily good, and having himself lived an irreproachable life was counted worthy of the priesthood, and ministered to the brethren in the caves. To him Melania the younger, grand-daughter of the great Melania, concerning whom I shall speak later,^ once sent 500 pieces of money, beseeching him to spend them on the brethren there. But he took three only and sent the rest to Diodes the anchorite, a most learned man, saying : " Brother Diodes is wiser than I, and can administer them without doing harm, knowing

^ Eph. iv. 26. ^ From 406 onwards.

» Ch. LXI.

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those who should rightly be helped. For myself, I am content with these."

[3] This Diodes began in the first instance with the grammar course, but afterwards gave himself to philosophy. However, in course of time grace drew him on, and in the twenty-eighth year of his life he gave up the cycle of studies ^ and gave himself up ^ to Christ ; and he had spent thirty-five years in the caves.^ He told us this : " Intelligence which is separated from the thought of God becomes either a demon or a brute beast." But since we were curious to know his manner of speaking he explained thus: "Intelligence separated from the thought of God inevitably falls into concupiscence or anger." And he said concupiscence was beast-like and anger demoniacal. [4] But when I objected : " How can human intelligence be continually with God ? " this same man said : " Whenever the soul is engaged in a thought or action that is pious and godly, then it is with God."

There lived near him a certain Capiton, who had been a robber. He had completed fifty years in the caves four miles from the city of Antinoe, and did not come down from his cave, not even as far as the river Nile, saying that he was not yet able to meet crowds because the Adversary at that instant would oppose him.

[5] With these we saw also another anchorite, himself also (living) in a cave in similar fashion. Being mocked in dreams by the frenzy of vainglory, he mocked in his turn those that deceived themselves, "feeding the winds."* And he possessed bodily continence thanks to his age and his long time (in the desert), and perhaps

^ Cf. XXI. 3. ^ direrdilaTO — avi'eTd^aTO.

■^ FVom here to the end of section [3] the Greek given in the textual note to Butler's text is translated, in accordance with Butltr's later judgment.

* Prov. ix. 12 (LXX).

AMMA TALIS AND TAOR 165

also thanks to his vainglory.^ On the other hand, his judgment was perverted owing to the unrestrained character of his vainglory.

^^f CHAPTER LIX

AMMA TALIS AND TAOR

[i] In this city of Antinoe there are twelve convents of women ; in one of them I met Amma ^ Talis, an old woman who had spent eighty years in asceticism, as she and the neighbours told me. With her dwelt sixty young women who loved her so greatly that no key even was fixed on the outer wall of the monastery, as in other monasteries, but they were kept in by love of her. Such a height of impassivity did the old woman reach that when I entered and sat down she came and sat by me and put her hands on my shoulders in a transport of freedom.

[2] In this monastery there was a disciple of hers by name Taor, a virgin who had been thirty years in the monastery ; she would never accept a new habit or hood or shoes, saying : " I do not need them, lest I be forced also to go out." For all the others go out on Sunday to church for the Communion ; but she remains in the house clothed in rags, ceaselessly sitting at her work. But her looks were naturally so charming that even the

^ Cf. Cassian, Coll. V. 12. " But in one matter vainglory is found to be a useful thing for beginners. I mean by those who are still troubled by carnal sins, as for instance, if, when they are troubled by the spirit of fornication, they formed an idea of the dignity of the priesthood, or of reputation among all men, by which they may be thought saints and immaculate ; and so with these considerations they repel the unclean suggestions of lust, as deeming them base and at least unworthy of their rank and reputation ; and so by means of a smaller evil they overcome a greater one."

^ I.e. " Mother."

i66 THE LAUSIAC HISTORY

most stedfast would almost have been deceived by her beauty, if she had not had her chastity as an exceedingly strong sentinel, and by her modesty had been compelling the unrestrained eye to reverence and fear.