...what was ever lacking? You drink from gems, he satisfied himself with the concave palms of nature. You weave gold into tunics, he did not even have the garment of your lowest servant. But on the contrary, paradise lies open to that poor man, while hell will receive you in your gold. He kept the garment of Christ, though naked; you, clothed in silks, have lost the garment of Christ. Paul lies covered in the vilest dust, destined to rise into glory; you are pressed by elaborate sepulchers of stone, to burn with your own wealth. Spare, I pray, yourselves; spare at least the riches you love. Why do you wrap your dead in gilded garments? Why does ambition not cease even amidst grief and tears? Do the corpses of the rich not know how to rot except in silk?

18. I beseech whoever reads these things to remember Jerome the sinner; if the Lord were to give him the choice, he would much rather choose the tunic of Paul with his merits, than the purples of kings with their punishments.

One Vatican manuscript adds to the end: "Here ends the life of blessed Paul the Monk, which Jerome the priest wrote, who was before Saint Antony, whom he himself buried in the desert. He was never in cities after he dwelt in solitude."

390

THE LIFE OF ST. HILARION.

Hilarion the monk, born in the village of Thabatha in Palestine, and a disciple of the great Antony, is described by Jerome as living with such abstinence and holiness, and shining with such miracles even in solitude, providing an exemplar of the perfect monk.

1. About to write the Life of blessed Hilarion, I invoke the Holy Spirit, his inhabitant; that He who granted virtues to him may grant me the speech to narrate them, so that deeds may be matched by words. For the virtue of those who have acted is held to be as great as, according to Sallust, illustrious minds have been able to exalt it with words. Alexander the Great of Macedon, whom Daniel calls either a ram, or a leopard, or a he-goat, when he reached the tomb of Achilles, said: "Happy are you, young man, who enjoy such a great herald of your merits!" referring to Homer. Furthermore, the way of life and the life of so great and such a man must be told by me, that even if Homer were present, he would either envy the subject matter or succumb to it. Although Saint Epiphanius, Bishop of Salamis in Cyprus, who spent much time with Hilarion, wrote his praise in a short letter which is commonly read, it is one thing to praise a deceased person with commonplaces, and another to recount the specific virtues of the deceased.

B Whence we too, initiating the work begun by him with more favor than injury, despise the voices of slanderers who, once detracting from my Paul, will now perhaps detract from Hilarion as well. Some calumniate the former for his solitude, while others object to the latter for his frequency of visitors; so that he who always hid is said not to have existed, and he who was seen by many is considered common. Their ancestors, the Pharisees, did this once before, to whom neither the desert and fasting of John, nor the crowds, food, and drink of the Lord Savior were pleasing. But I will set my hand to the work intended, and I will pass by the dogs of Scylla with ears stopped.

2. Hilarion, born in the village of Thabatha, which is situated about five miles to the south of the city of Gaza in Palestine, was a rose that blossomed from thorns, as they say, although his parents were devoted to idols. Sent by them to Alexandria, he was handed over to a grammarian; and there, as much as that age allowed, he gave great proofs of his talent and character; in a short time he was dear to all and skilled in the art of speaking. And what is greater than these...