The Lausiac History 61–71

Since I promised above to tell about the girl Melania, I must pay the debt. For it is not right to pass over her youth in the flesh and leave so great a virtue unrecorded, since she far surpassed old women and earnest ones. Her parents forced her into marriage with one of the first men of Rome. But she was constantly pricked by the stories about her grandmother, and was so goaded by them that she could not serve the marriage. For when two male children were born to her and both died, she came to such hatred of marriage that she said to her husband Pinianus, son of Severus the ex-prefect, “If you choose to practise asceticism with me according to the rule of chastity, I recognize you as master and lord of my life. But if this seems too heavy for you, being young, take all my property and set my body free, so that I may fulfil my desire according to God, becoming heir to the zeal of my grandmother, whose name I also bear. For if God wished us to have children, he would not have taken my offspring untimely.” After they had struggled together a long time, God at last took pity on the young man and put into him too the zeal for renunciation, so that in them the Scripture was fulfilled: “For how do you know, wife, whether you will save your husband?” Married at thirteen, and having lived with her husband seven years, she renounced the world in her twentieth year.

First she gave her silk garments to the altars; this the holy Olympias also did. The rest of the silks she cut up and made into various church furnishings. Her silver and gold she entrusted to a certain Paul, a presbyter, a monk of Dalmatia, and sent by sea to the East: to Egypt and the Thebaid ten thousand gold pieces; to Antioch and its regions ten thousand; to Palestine fifteen thousand; to the churches in the islands and to those in exile ten thousand; and to the churches in the West she supplied likewise by her own hand. All this, and four times as much, she snatched, as before God, out of the mouth of the lion Alaric by her faith. She set free eight thousand slaves who wished it; the rest did not wish it, but chose to serve her brother, to whom she allowed them all to be sold for three gold pieces each. Selling her estates in Spain, Aquitaine, Tarraconensis, and Gaul, she kept for herself only those in Sicily, Campania, and Africa, and used them to support monasteries. This was her wisdom concerning the burden of wealth.

Her asceticism was this: she ate every other day (at first even every five days), and she put herself on the daily rota with her own slave women, whom she also made her fellow ascetics. She has with her also her mother Albina, practising asceticism likewise and distributing her own wealth separately. They live in the country, sometimes in Sicily, sometimes in Campania, with fifteen eunuchs and sixty virgins, both free and slave. Likewise Pinianus her husband lives with thirty monks, reading and occupied with the garden and with holy conversation. They honoured us not a little, when many of us went to Rome on behalf of the blessed John the bishop, refreshing us with hospitality and the most generous provisions for the journey, with great joy reaping eternal life by the God-given works of the best way of [life].

Their kinsman, Pammachius by name, an ex-proconsul, likewise renounced the world and lived the best life, scattering all his wealth, part while living and leaving the rest to the poor at his death. So likewise did a certain Macarius, an ex-vicar, and Constantius, who had been assessor to the prefects of Italy, distinguished and most learned men who reached the height of love for God. I believe they are still in the flesh, practising the best life.

In Alexandria I knew a virgin whom I found about seventy years old. The whole clergy bore witness to her that when she was young, about twenty, and very beautiful, she was avoided because of her beauty, lest she give anyone occasion for blame through suspicion. Now when the Arians plotted against the blessed Athanasius, bishop of Alexandria, through Eusebius the chamberlain under the emperor Constantius, and accused him falsely of unlawful things, he fled to avoid being tried by a corrupt court. He confided in no one, neither relative nor friend nor cleric nor anyone else; but when the prefect's officers suddenly entered the bishop's house looking for him, he took his tunic and cloak and in the middle of the night fled to this virgin. She was startled at the thing and terrified. He said to her, “Since I am being sought by the Arians and falsely accused of unlawful things, I decided to flee, so that I might not bear an irrational reputation and lead into sin those who wish to punish me. And God revealed to me this night, ‘You can be saved with no one but her.’” She, in great joy, cast away every misgiving and gave herself wholly to the Lord; and she hid that most holy man for six years, until the end of Constantius's life, washing his feet, taking care of his needs, managing all his necessities, and borrowing books and supplying them to him. And no one in all Alexandria knew in those six years where the blessed Athanasius was living. When the death of Constantius was announced and reached his ears, he dressed properly and appeared again at night in the church, everyone being amazed and seeing him as one alive from the dead. He explained to his close friends, “I did not take refuge with you for this reason, so that you might be able to swear truthfully, and also because of the searches. I took refuge with one about whom no one could have suspicion, since she was beautiful and young, achieving two things: her salvation, for I helped her, and my own reputation.”

Again, a certain virgin Juliana in Caesarea of Cappadocia was said to be most learned and most faithful. When Origen the writer was fleeing the uprising of the pagans, she received him for two years and supported the man at her own expense and with her own service. I found this written in a very old book in verse-lines, in which was written in Origen's hand: “I found this book with Juliana the virgin in Caesarea, when I was hiding with her; she said she had received it from Symmachus himself, the translator of the Jews.”

I have not set down the virtues of these women as a side matter, but so that we may learn that there are many ways to gain profit if we are willing.

In another very old book inscribed with the name of Hippolytus, the acquaintance of the apostles, I found a story of this kind. There was a most noble and very beautiful virgin in the city of Corinth practising virginity. At that time, in the time of the persecutors, they slandered her to the judge then in office, who was a pagan, as blaspheming the times and the emperors and reviling the idols. Those who dealt in such things praised her beauty to him. The judge, being mad about women, gladly received the slander with his horse-like ears. When he had moved every device and could not persuade the woman, then, in a rage against her, he did not hand her over to punishment or torture, but put her in a brothel and ordered the keeper of the women, “Take her, and bring me three gold pieces a day from her.” He, exacting the gold, gave her up to whoever wished. When the woman-hunters learned of it, they haunted that workshop of destruction, and giving the money they spoke to her with a view to seduction. But she pleaded with them, begging them and saying, “I have a sore in a hidden place which smells very badly, and I am afraid that you will come to hate me. Allow me a few days, and then you may have me even for nothing.” In those days she entreated God with petitions; and God, seeing her chastity, put into a young man, a magistrianus, fair in mind and in appearance, a burning zeal even unto death. Going in the guise of licentiousness, he came late in the evening to the man who kept the women, gave him five gold pieces, and said to him, “Let me stay with her this night.” Going into the hidden room, he said to her, “Get up, save yourself.” And taking off her clothes and dressing her in his own garments, his shirts, his cloak, and all his man's clothing, he said to her, “Cover yourself with the edge of the cloak and go out.” And so, signing herself with the cross and going out, she was saved uncorrupted and undefiled. The next day the play was discovered; the magistrianus was handed over and thrown to the beasts, so that in this too the demon might be put to shame, because he became a double martyr, both for himself and for that blessed woman.

In Ancyra of Galatia, in the city itself, I met a certain most illustrious Verus, an ex-count, of whom I had long experience, together with his wife Bosporia. They attained such good hope that they even disregarded their children, seeing the things to come in practice. For they spend the revenues of their estates on the poor, though they have two daughters and four sons, to whom they give not even a vine-twig, except to the daughters who have married, saying, “After our death everything is yours.” They collect the fruits of their properties and distribute them in the churches of cities and villages. This too is a virtue in them: when a famine came and struck at people's very bowels, they brought the heretics over to orthodoxy, providing their granaries in many places for the feeding of the poor. In the rest of their way of life, having adopted a very holy and simple manner, they wear very inexpensive clothes and live on the simplest food, practising self-control toward God, spending most of their time in the country and avoiding the cities, lest through taking pleasure in society they draw in some of the city's tumult and fall from their purpose.

In this city of Ancyra many other virgins, about two thousand or more, and distinguished women practising continence are eminent. Among them Magna, a most holy woman, excels in devotion; I do not know what to call her, virgin or widow. For she was joined to a husband by force by her own mother, but by enticing him and putting him off, as most people say, she remained untouched. When he died soon after, she gave herself wholly to God, caring for her own household in a holy way, living a most ascetic and chaste life, and having such a manner of conversation that even bishops revered her for her exceeding devotion. Supplying the rest and the surplus of her necessities to hospices, the poor, and travelling bishops, she does not cease working secretly, by herself and through most faithful servants, nor does she fail to attend the church in the …

… so merciful that he even goes round at night and shows mercy to the needy. He neglects no prison, no hospital, no poor man, no rich man, but helps everyone: to some he gives words of compassion, as to the hard-hearted; others he protects; others he reconciles; to others he provides bodily necessities and clothing. What tends to happen in all great cities happens there too: in the portico of the church a crowd of sick people lie, begging their daily food, some unmarried, some married. One day it happened that at midnight, in winter, the wife of one of them gave birth in the portico. As she cried out in her pain, he heard; and leaving his usual prayers, he went out and looked, and finding no one, he himself took the place of a midwife, not loathing the defilement that accompanies women giving birth, his mercy having made him insensible to it. His clothing is not worth an obol, and his food is on a par with his clothing. He cannot bear to bend over a book, his love of others driving him away from reading. If one of the brothers gives him a book, he sells it at once, saying to those who mock him, “How can I persuade my teacher that I have learned his art, unless I sell him himself for the success of the art?”

A virgin ascetic living with two others had practised asceticism for nine or ten years. Seduced by a certain cantor, she fell, conceived, and gave birth. Coming to the utmost hatred of the one who had seduced her, she was pierced to the depths of her soul with compunction, and went so far in repentance that she was determined outright to starve herself to death. Praying, she besought God, saying, “Great God, who bear the evils of all creation and do not desire the death and destruction of those who stumble, if you wish me to be saved, show me your wonders in this: take away the fruit of my sin which I have borne, so that I may not use a rope or throw myself down.” Making these petitions, she was heard; for the child died not long after. From that day she never again met the man who had taken her captive, but giving herself up to the most extreme fasting, she served the sick and the crippled women for thirty years, so moving God that it was revealed to one of the holy presbyters, “So-and-so has pleased me more in her repentance than in her virginity.” I write this so that we may not despise those who genuinely repent.

The daughter of a certain presbyter in Caesarea of Palestine, a virgin, having fallen, was taught by the man who had corrupted her to slander a reader of the city. When she was already pregnant, being questioned by her father, she accused the reader. The presbyter confidently reported it to the bishop. The bishop assembled the clergy and had the reader summoned. The case was examined; questioned by the bishop, the reader did not confess, for how could what had not happened be told? The bishop, angry, said to him sternly, “Do you not confess, wretched, miserable man, full of uncleanness?” The reader answered, “I have told what is: that I have nothing to do with the matter; for I am innocent even of any thought toward her. But if you wish to hear what is not, I did it.” When he had said this, the bishop deposed the reader. Then the reader came forward and pleaded with the bishop, saying to him, “Since, then, I have stumbled, order her to be given to me as wife; for I am no longer a cleric, nor is she a virgin.” So he gave her over to the reader, supposing that the young man was attached to her and could not otherwise be cut off from his intimacy with her. The young man, receiving her from both the bishop and her father, placed her in a monastery of women and asked the deaconess of the sisterhood there to bear with her until her delivery.

In a short time the days of her giving birth were fulfilled. The critical hour came: groans, pangs, pains, visions of the underworld; and the baby did not come out. The first day passed, the second, the third, the seventh. The woman, conversing with Hades from her pain, did not eat, did not drink, did not sleep, but cried out, saying, “Woe is me, wretched one! I am in danger for having slandered that reader.” They went and told her father. The father, afraid of being condemned as a slanderer, kept quiet for two more days. The girl neither died nor gave birth. Since the ascetics could not bear her cries, they ran and told the bishop, “So-and-so has been confessing, crying out for days, that she slandered the reader.” Then he sent deacons to him with the message, “Pray that the woman who slandered you may give birth.” But he gave them no answer and did not open his door, from the day he had gone in praying to God. The father went again to the bishop; prayer was made in the church; and even so she did not give birth. Then the bishop got up and went to the reader, knocked at the door, went in to him, and said to him, “Eustathius, rise; loose what you have bound.” At once, as the reader bent his knee together with the bishop, the woman gave birth. His petition and his perseverance in prayer had the power both to reveal the slander and to chasten the woman who had slandered, so that we may learn to persevere in prayers and to know their power.

Having said a little, then, about the brother who has been with me from youth until today, I will end my account. I have known him for a long time not to eat from passion nor to fast from passion; to have conquered, I think, the passion for money, and for the most part that of vainglory; content with what he has, not adorning himself with clothes, giving thanks when despised, running great risks for true friends, having had experience of demons a thousand times and more. So much so that one day a demon tried to make a pact with him and said, “Agree with me to sin just once, and whatever woman you name to me in the world, I will bring her to you.” And again at another time the demon wrestled with him for fourteen nights, as he told me, and pulled him by the foot at night, addressing him with a voice and saying, “Do not worship Christ, and I will not come near you.” He answered, “For this very reason I worship him, and will glorify and worship him infinitely more, since you are altogether displeased at it.” Having set foot in a hundred and six cities and stayed in most of them, by God's mercy he has had no experience of a woman, not even in a dream, except for the war. Three times I knew him to receive his need of food from an angel. One day, in the most remote desert, without even a crumb, he found three hot loaves in his sheepskin; another time wine and loaves. Another time I knew of someone telling him, “You are in want; go and get grain and oil from so-and-so.” He went to the one to whom he had been sent, who said to him, “Are you so-and-so?” And he said, “Yes.” “Someone ordered me to give you thirty bushels of grain and twelve pints of oil.” “On behalf of such a man I will boast,” such as this one was. I knew him to weep often over men in need, at a loss in their poverty, and he gave them all he had except his flesh. I knew him also to weep over one who had fallen into sin; and by his tears he brought the fallen man to repentance. He once swore to me, “I have asked God never to prompt anyone, especially the rich and worthless, to give me anything in my necessities.”

For me it is enough to have been counted worthy to remember all these whom I have committed to writing. For it was not without God that your mind was moved to command the writing of this book and to commit to writing the lives of these saints. As for you, most faithful servant of Christ, reading them gladly, taking their lives, their labours, and their great endurance as sufficient proof of the resurrection, follow eagerly, nourished by good hope, seeing that the days ahead of you are shorter than those behind. Pray for me, keeping yourself such as I have known you from the consulship of Tatian until today, and such as I found you again when you were appointed chamberlain of the most pious bedchamber. For one whom such rank, with wealth, and such great power have not made worse in the fear of God, is consecrated to Christ, who heard from the devil, “All these I will give you, if you fall down and worship me.”