Part 21

The “Vitæ Patrum Eremiticorum.”

The “Acta Sanctorum.” The Bollandists are, of course, almost exhaustive of any subject on which they treat. But as they are difficult to find, save in a few public libraries, the “Acta Sanctorum” of Surius, or of Aloysius Lipommasius, may be profitably consulted. Butler’s “Lives of the Saints” is a book common enough, but of no great value.

M. de Montalembert’s “Moines d’Occident,” and Ozanam’s “Etudes Germaniques,” may be read with much profit.

Dr. Reeves’ edition of Adamnan’s “Life of St. Columba,” published by the Irish Archæological and Celtic Society, is a treasury of learning, which needs no praise of mine.

The lives of St. Cuthbert and St. Godric may be found among the publications of the Surtees Society.

FOOTNOTES

{12} About A.D. 368. See the details in Ammianus Marcellinus, lib. xxviii.

{15} In the Celtic Irish Church, there seems to have been no other pattern. The hermits who became abbots, with their monks, were the only teachers of the people—one had almost said, the only Christians. Whence, as early as the sixth century, if not the fifth, they, and their disciples of Iona and Scotland, derived their peculiar tonsure, their use of bells, their Eastern mode of keeping the Paschal feast, and other peculiarities, seemingly without the intervention of Rome, is a mystery still unsolved.

{17a} A book which, from its bearing on present problems, well deserves translation.

{17b} “Vitæ Patrum.” Published at Antwerp, 1628.

{23} He is addressing our Lord.

{24} “Agentes in rebus.” On the Emperor’s staff?

{27} St. Augustine says, that Potitianus’s adventure at Trêves happened “I know not when.” His own conversation with Potitianus must have happened about A.D. 385, for he was baptized April 25, A.D. 387. He does not mention the name of Potitianus’s emperor: but as Gratian was Augustus from A.D. 367 to A.D. 375, and actual Emperor of the West till A.D. 383, and as Trêves was his usual residence, he is most probably the person meant: but if not, then his father Valentinian.

{29} See the excellent article on Gratian in Smith’s Dictionary, by Mr. Means.

{30} I cannot explain this fact: but I have seen it with my own eyes.

{32} I use throughout the text published by Heschelius, in 1611.

{33} He is said to have been born at Coma, near Heracleia, in Middle Egypt, A.D. 251.

{34} Seemingly the Greek language and literature.

{35} I have thought it more honest to translate ασκήσις by “training,” which is now, as then, its true equivalent; being a metaphor drawn from the Greek games by St. Paul, 1 Tim. iv. 8.

{41} I give this passage as it stands in the Greek version. In the Latin, attributed to Evagrius, it is even more extravagant and rhetorical.

{42} Surely the imagery painted on the inner walls of Egyptian tombs, and probably believed by Antony and his compeers to be connected with devil-worship, explain these visions. In the “Words of the Elders” a monk complains of being troubled with “pictures, old and new.” Probably, again, the pain which Antony felt was the agony of a fever; and the visions which he saw, its delirium.

{44} Here is an instance of the original use of the word “monastery,” viz. a cell in which a single person dwelt.

{45} An allusion to the heathen mysteries.

{49} A.D. 311. Galerius Valerius Maximinus (his real name was Daza) had been a shepherd-lad in Illyria, like his uncle Galerius Valerius Maximianus; and rose, like him, through the various grades of the army to be co-Emperor of Rome, over Syria, Egypt, and Asia Minor; a furious persecutor of the Christians, and a brutal and profligate tyrant. Such were the “kings of the world” from whom those old monks fled.

{52a} The lonely alluvial flats at the mouths of the Nile. “Below the cliffs, beside the sea,” as one describes them.

{52b} Now the monastery of Deir Antonios, over the Wady el Arabah, between the Nile and the Red Sea, where Antony’s monks endure to this day.

{60} This most famous monastery, i.e. collection of monks’ cells, in Egypt is situate forty miles from Alexandria, on a hill where nitre was gathered. The hospitality and virtue of its inmates are much praised by Ruffinus and Palladius. They were, nevertheless, the chief agents in the fanatical murder of Hypatia.

{65} It appears from this and many other passages, that extempore prayer was usual among these monks, as it was afterwards among the Puritans (who have copied them in so many other things), whenever a godly man visited them.