(5TH CENT.)
[From the Philotheus of Theodoret, cap. 20.]
S. Mares spent thirty-seven years in a small damp cell, constant in
prayer. Theodoret says that towards his end, "I went to his door, and he
bade me open. He was aged ninety, and wore common goat's hair garments.
All his food was bread and salt. As, for long, he had desired to see the
Holy Sacrifice offered, but was not able, he asked that the oblation of
the Divine Gift might be made there. I willingly obeyed, and having
ordered the sacred vessels to be brought from the village, and using for
an altar the hands of the deacons, I offered the mystic, divine, and
salutary Sacrifice. But he was filled with all spiritual delight, and
thought that he saw heaven, and declared he had never had such joy. I
was greatly pleased with him, and I should be doing him and myself a
wrong, if after his death I did not praise him."