Bad Advertisement?
Are you a Christian?
Online Store:Visit Our Store
| Chapter X. A revelation on the trial of perfect chastity.
PREVIOUS SECTION - NEXT SECTION - HELP 
Chapter X.
A revelation on the trial of perfect chastity.
And to prove this that we
have said both by the testimony of the ancients and divine oracles, we
had better bring forward in his own words and experience what the
blessed Paphnutius1960
| 1960 Cf. the note on the
Conferences III. i. | felt on the
subject of admiration of miracles and the grace of purity, or rather
what he learnt from the revelation of an angel. For this man had been
famous for many years for his signal strictness so that he fancied that
he was completely free from the snares of carnal concupiscence because
he felt himself superior to all the attacks of the demons with whom he
had fought openly and for a long while; and when some holy men had come
to him, he was preparing for them a porridge of lentiles which they
call Athera,1961
| 1961 Athera. This
is noticed by Pliny (Hist. Nat. xxii. 25, 57, § 121) as the
Egyptian name for a decoction made from grain. | and his hand, as
it happened, was burnt in the oven, by a flame that darted up. And when
this happened he was much mortified and began silently to consider with
himself, and ask why was not the fire at peace with me, when my more
serious contests with demons have ceased? or how will that unquenchable
fire which searches out the deserts of all pass me by in that dread day
of judgment, and fail to detain me, if this trivial temporal fire from
without has not spared me? And as he was troubled by thoughts of this
kind and vexation a sudden sleep overcame him and an angel of the Lord
came to him and said: “Paphnutius, why are you vexed because that
earthly fire is not yet at peace with you, while there still remains in
your members some disturbance of carnal motions that is not completely
removed? For as long as the roots of this flourish within you, they
will not suffer that material fire to be at peace with you. And
certainly you could not feel it harmless unless you found by such
proofs as these that all these internal motions within you were
destroyed. Go, take a naked and most beautiful virgin, and if while you
hold her you find that the peace of your heart remains steadfast, and
that carnal heat is still and quiet within you, then the touch of this
visible flame also shall pass over you gently and without harming you
as it did over the three children in Babylon.” And so the Elder
was impressed by this revelation and did not try the dangers of the
experiment divinely shown to him, but asked his own conscience and
examined the purity of his heart; and, guessing that the weight of
purity was not yet sufficient to outweigh the force of this trial, it
is no wonder, said he, if when the battles with unclean spirits come
upon me, I still feel the flames of the fire, which I used to think of
less importance than the savage attacks of demons, still raging against
me. Since it is a greater virtue and a grander grace to extinguish the
inward lust of the flesh than by the sign of the Lord1962
| 1962 i.e. the sign of
the cross. | and the power of the might of the Most
High to subdue the wicked demons which rush upon one from without, or
to drive them by invoking the Divine name from the bodies which they
have possessed. So far Abbot Nesteros, finishing the account of the
true working of the gifts of grace accompanied us to the cell of the
Elder Joseph which was nearly six miles distant from his, as we were
eager for instruction in his doctrine.E.C.F. INDEX & SEARCH
|
