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| Chapter XIII. A story of a barber's payments, introduced for the sake of recognizing the devil's illusions.
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Chapter XIII.
A story of a barber’s payments, introduced for the
sake of recognizing the devil’s illusions.
For as you hope that you
can save others also, and are eager to return to your country with the
hope of greater gain, hear also on this subject a story of Abbot
Macarius, very neatly and prettily invented, which he also gave to a
man in a tumult of similar desires, to cure him by a most appropriate
story. “There was,” said he, “in a certain city a
very clever barber, who used to shave everybody for three pence and by
getting this poor and wretched sum for his work, out of this same
amount used to procure what was required for his daily food, and after
having taken all care of his body, used every day to put a hundred
pence into his pocket. But while he was diligently amassing this gain,
he heard that in a city a long way off each man paid the barber a
shilling as his pay. And when he found this out, ‘how
long,’ said he, ‘shall I be satisfied with this beggary, so
as to get with my labour a pay of three pence, when by going thither I
might amass riches by a large gain of shillings?’ And so at once
taking with him the implements of his art, and using up in the expense
all that he had got together and saved during a long time, he made his
way with great difficulty to that most lucrative city. And there on the
day of his arrival, he received from everyone the pay for his labour in
accordance with what he had heard, and at eventide seeing that he had
gained a large number of shillings he went in delight to the
butcher’s to buy the food he wanted for his supper. And when he
began to purchase it for a large sum of shillings he spent on a tiny
bit of meat all the shillings that he had gained, and did not take home
a surplus of even a single penny. And when he saw that his gains were
thus used up every day so that he not only failed to put by anything
but could scarcely get what he required for his daily food, he thought
over the matter with himself and said: ‘I will go back to my
city, and once more, seek those very moderate profits, from which, when
all my bodily wants were satisfied, a daily surplus gave a growing sum
to support my old age; which, though it seemed small and trifling, yet
by being constantly increased was amounting to no slight sum. In fact
that gain of coppers was more profitable to me than is this nominal one
of shillings from which not only is there nothing over to be laid by,
but the necessities of my daily food are scarcely met.’”
And therefore it is better for us with unbroken continuance to aim at
this very slender profit in the desert, from which no secular cares, no
worldly distractions, no pride of vainglory and vanity can detract, and
which the pressure of no daily wants can lessen (for “a small
thing that the righteous hath is better than great riches of the
ungodly”2312
) rather than to
pursue those larger profits which even if they are procured by the most
valuable conversion of many, are yet absorbed by the claims of secular
life and the daily leakage of distractions. For, as Solomon says,
“Better is a single handful with rest than both hands full with
labour and vexation of mind.”2313
And in
these allusions and inconveniences all that are at all weak are sure to
be entangled, as while they are even doubtful of their own salvation,
and themselves stand in need of the teaching and instruction of others,
they are incited by the devil’s tricks to convert and guide
others, and as, even if they succeed in gaining any advantage from the
conversion of some, they waste by their impatience and rude manners
whatever they have gained. For that will happen to them which is
described by the prophet Haggai: “And he that gathereth riches,
putteth them into a bag with holes.”2314
For indeed a man puts his gains into a
bag with holes, if he loses by want of self control and daily
distractions of mind whatever he appears to gain by the conversion of
others. And so it results that while they fancy that they can make
larger profits by the instruction of others, they are actually deprived
of their own improvement. For “There are who make themselves out
rich though possessing nothing, and there are who humble themselves
amid great riches;” and: “Better is a
man who serves himself in a humble
station than one who gains honour for himself and wanteth
bread.”2315
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