CHAP. V. ESTA A VIEW OF MONASTICISM AND OTHER MISCEL- CENT. Ir seemed most convenient to preserve the connexion of the Arian controversy without interruption. If the evangelical reader has not gained much information concerning the spirit of true religion, during this violent contest, the times and the materials must bear the blame. There were probably, in that whole period, many sincere souls, who mourned in secret over the abominations of the age; but history, ever partial to the great, and dazzled with the splendor of kings and bishops, condescends not to notice them. The people of God were in lower life, and remain, therefore, unknown. We left Athanasius in the desert, where he employed the leisure, which the iniquity of the persecution gave him, in visiting the monks. He had been acquainted with their most renowned leader Anthony, but had not the satisfaction to meet with him again, he dying in the beginning of the year 356. 356. Let us leave Athanasius and the Arian controversy awhile, and see what we can find concerning the monks, and other particulars of the dealings of God with his Church in the mean time. We are not to form an idea of ancient monks from modern ones. It was a mistaken thing in holy men of old to retire altogether from the world. But there is every reason to believe the mistake originated in piety. We often hear it said, how ridiculous to think of pleasing God by austerities and solitude! Far be it from me to vindicate the superștitions of monks, and particularly the vows of Death of Anthony the Monk, A. D. V. CHAP. celibacy. But the error is very natural, has been reprehended much too severely, and the profaneness of men of the world is abundantly more dangerous. The enormous evils of Monasticism are to be ascribed to its degeneracy in after-times, not to its first institution. What could for instance be better intentioned, than the determination of Anthony to follow literally our Lord's rule, "Sell what thou hast, and give to the poor?" Say that he was ignorant and superstitious; he was both but he persevered to the age of a hundred and five years in voluntary poverty with admirable consistency. Surely it could be no slight cause that could move a young person of opulence to part with all, and live in the abstemiousness of a solitary life with such unshaken perseverance. Let us, from the memorials of his life, written by Athanasius, omitting the miracles which the then fashionable credulity imposed on men, endeavour to collect, as far as we can, a just idea of his spirit. Athanasius tells us that he had often seen him, and had received information concerning him from his servant. It was a great disadvantage to Anthony's judgment, that he was unwilling to be instructed in literature. There is a medium in all things secular. We have seen numbers corrupted by an excess of literary attachments: we see here one misled by the want of proper cultivation. When a youth, he had heard read in the church our Lord's words to the rich young man, and his ignorance led him to sell all, and give to the poor, and enter into the monastic life. Monks, as yet, had not learned to live in perfect deserts unconnected with mankind, and hitherto they lived at a small distance from their own village. Anthony endeavoured to form himself on the severest models, and pushed the genius of solitude to rigours before unknown. His fame increased; he was looked on as a mirror of perfection, and the Egyptians were studious to follow his example. His instructions to those who listened to him are not, in general, worth transcribing. The faith of Christ is very obscure, at least in the best of them; yet his sincerity is evident; his love to divine things must have been ardent; his conflicts and temptations, which are confusedly written by Athanasius, demonstrated a mind too humble, and knowing too much of himself, to trust in his own righteousness. He preached well by his life, and temper, and spirit, however he might fail in doctrinal knowledge. In the persecution by Dioclesian he left his beloved solitude, and came to Alexandria, strengthening the minds of Christian sufferers, exposing himself to danger for 'the love of the brethren, and yet not guilty of the excess of delivering up himself to martyrdom. In all this there was what was better than the monk,—the sincere and charitable Christian. Nor did he observe to perfection the rules of solitude. There were two sorts of monks, the solitary, and those who lived in societies. Anthony, though he had a strong inclination to follow the first sort altogether, sometimes joined the latter, and even on some occasions appeared in the world. The Arian heresy gave him another opportunity of showing his zeal. He again entered Alexandria, and protested against its impiety, which, he observed, was of a piece with heathenism itself. "Be assured,' said he, "all nature is moved with indignation against those who reckon the Creator of all things to be a creature." And this is one circumstance, which convinces me, that genuine godliness, the offspring of Christian principles, must have been with the primitive monks, because they generally vindicated the Nicene faith, and could not endure Arianism. They must, many of them at least, have felt the motions of the divine life, which will not connect itself with any principles that depreciate the dignity. of Jesus Christ. CENT. IV. CHAP. V. In conversing with Pagan philosophers, he observed, that Christianity held the mystery, not in the wisdom of Grecian reasoning, but in the power of faith supplied to them from God by Jesus Christ. "Faith," says he, "springs from the affection of the mind; Logic from artificial contrivance. Those who have the energy that is by faith, need not perhaps the demonstration that comes by reasoning." He very justly appealed to the glorious fruits of Christianity in the world, and exhorted the philosophers "to believe and know that the Christian art is not merely verbal, but of faith which worketh by love, with which ye being once endowed, shall not need demonstrations by arguments, but shall deem these words of Anthony sufficient to lead you to the faith of Christ." * The evangelical reader will see here something better than mere monasticism. But he sullied all this by a foolish attempt, to make mankind believe, that he lived without food, while he ate in secret, and by a vain parade of conversation concerning temperance, which savoured more of Pythagorean fanaticism than of Christian piety. In his extreme old age he gave particular directions, that his body should be interred, not preserved in a house after the Egyptian manner of honouring deceased saints and martyrs, and charged his two attendants to let no man know the place of his burial. "At the resurrection of the dead I shall receive my body," says he, "from the Saviour incorruptible." He guarded his friends against the Arian heresy, and bade them not be disturbed, though the judicial power, an imaginary fading domination, should be against them. "Do ye observe what ye have received from the fathers, and particularly the pious faith in our Lord Possibly the attentive reader may observe, without my mentioning it, that I have seen, on a closer inspection, reason to think better of Anthony, than from the short account of him in Vol. I. pp. 524, 525, one might seem to conclude. IV. Jesus Christ, which ye have heard from the Scrip- CENT. tures, and of which I have often reminded you. Divide my clothes in this manner: Give one of my sheep-skins to the bishop Athanasius, together with the garment which I received from him when new, and now return him when old. And give the other sheep-skin to Serapion the bishop. The sackcloth keep for yourselves," says he to his two attendants. "Farewell, children, Anthony is going, and is no more with you." He stretched out his feet, and appearing pleased at the sight of his friends coming to him, he expired with evident marks of cheerfulness on his face. His last will was punctually executed. Such was the death of this father of monasticism: the account is taken wholly from his life by Athanasius, and is a monument of the genuine piety and deep superstition both of the monk and his biographer. Such was the state of godliness in those times, existing obscure in hermitages; while abroad in the world the Gospel was almost buried in faction and ambition; yet probably in ordinary life it thrived the best in some instances, though quite unknown. By the assistance of Fleury, it would be easy to enlarge the history of men of this sort. There were others of great monastic renown in the time of Anthony. But their narratives, if true, are neither entertaining nor instructive, and a great part of them at least is stuffed with extravagant fables. Let us turn to other objects. At the time when the bishops were travelling to the council of Nice, Licinius, bishop of Cæsarea in Cappadocia, in his way thither, arrived at a small town called Nazianzum in Cappadocia. There he met with Gregory, afterwards bishop of Nazianzum, who applied for baptism. This man had led a life of great moral strictness, belonging to a particular sect, who observed the Sabbath and a distinction of meats like the Jews. His wife Nonna was an exemplary Christian, and |