ST. JOHN was born about the year 305, was of a mean extraction, and
brought up to the trade of a carpenter. At twenty-five years of age he
forsook the world, and put himself under the guidance and direction of
an ancient holy anchoret with such an extraordinary humility and
simplicity as struck the venerable old man with admiration; who inured
him to obedience by making him water a dry stick for a whole year as if
it were a live plant, and perform several other things as seemingly
ridiculous, all which he executed with the utmost fidelity. To the
saint's humility and ready obedience, Cassian[1] attributes the
extraordinary gifts he afterwards received from God. He seems to have
lived about twelve years with this old man, till his death, and about
four more in different neighboring monasteries.
Being about forty years of age, he retired alone to the top of a rock of
very difficult ascent, near Lycopolis.[2] His cell he walled up, leaving
only a little window through which he received all necessaries, and
spoke to those who visited him what might be for their spiritual comfort
and edification. During five days in the week he conversed only with
God: but on Saturdays and Sundays all but women had free access to him
for his instructions and spiritual advice. He never ate till after
sunset, and then very sparingly; but never any thing that had been
dressed by fire, not so much as bread. In this manner did he live from
the fortieth or forty-second to the ninetieth year of his age. For the
reception of such as came to him from remote parts, he permitted a kind
of hospital to be built near his cell or grotto, where some of his
disciples took care of them. He was illustrious for miracles, and a
wonderful spirit of prophecy, with the power of discovering to those
that came to see him, their most secret thoughts and hidden sins. And
such was the fame of his predictions, and the lustre of his miracles
which he wrought on the sick, by sending them some oil which he had
blessed, that they drew the admiration of the whole world upon him.
Theodosius the Elder was then emperor, and was attacked by the tyrant
Maximus, become formidable by the success of his arms, having slain the
emperor Gratian in 383, and dethroned Valentinian in 387. The pious
emperor, finding his army much inferior to that of his adversary, caused
this servant of God to be consulted concerning the success of the war
against Maximus. Our saint foretold him that he should be victorious
almost without blood. The emperor, full of confidence in the prediction,
marched into the West, defeated the more numerous armies of Maximus
twice in Pannonia; crossed the Alps, took the tyrant in Aquileia, and
suffered {665} his soldiers to cut off his head. He returned triumphant
to Constantinople, and attributed his victories very much to the prayers
of St. John, who also foretold him the events of his other wars, the
incursions of barbarians, and all that was to befall his empire. Four
years after, in 392, Eugenius, by the assistance of Arbogastes, who had
murdered the emperor Valentinian the Younger, usurped the empire of the
West. Theodosius sent Eutropius the Eunuch into Egypt, with instructions
to bring St. John with him to Constantinople, if it was possible; but
that if he could not prevail with him to undertake the journey, to
consult whether it was God's will that he should march against Eugenius,
or wait his arrival in the East. The man of God excused himself as to
his journey to court, but assured Eutropius that his prince should be
victorious, but not without loss and blood: as also that he would die in
Italy, and leave the empire of the West to his son; all which happened
accordingly. Theodosius marched against Eugenius, and in the first
engagement lost ten thousand men, and was almost defeated: but renewing
the battle on the next day, the 6th of September, in 394, he gained an
entire victory by the miraculous interposition of heaven, as even
Claudian, the heathen poet, acknowledges. Theodosius died in the West,
on the 17th of January, in 395, leaving his two sons emperors, Arcadius
in the East, and Honorius in the West.
This saint restored sight to a senator's wife by some of the oil he had
blessed for healing the sick. It being his inviolable custom never to
admit any woman to speak to him, this gave occasion to a remarkable
incident related by Evagrius, Palladius, and St. Austin in his treatise
of Care for the Dead. A certain general officer in the emperor's service
visiting the saint, conjured him to permit his wife to speak to him; for
she was come to Lycopolis, and had gone through many dangers and
difficulties to enjoy that happiness. The holy man answered, that during
his stricter enclosure for the last forty years since he had shut
himself up in that rock, he had imposed on himself an inviolable rule
not to see or converse with women; so he desired to be excused the
granting her request. The officer returned to Lycopolis very melancholy.
His wife, who was a person of great virtue, was not to be satisfied. The
husband went back to the blessed man, told him that she would die of
grief if he refused her request. The saint said to him: "Go to your
wife, and tell her that she shall see me tonight, without coming hither
or stirring out of her house." This answer he carried to her, and both
were very earnest to know in what manner the saint would perform his
promise. When she was asleep in the night, the man of God appeared to
her in her dream, and said: "Your great faith, woman, obliged me to come
to visit you; but I must admonish you to curb the like desires of seeing
God's servants on earth. Contemplate only their life, and imitate their
actions. As for me, why did you desire to see me? Am I a saint, or a
prophet like God's true servants? I am a sinful and weak man. It is
therefore only in virtue of your faith that I have had recourse to our
Lord, who grants you the cure of the corporal diseases with which you
are afflicted. Live always in the fear of God, apd never forget his
benefits." He added several proper instructions for her conduct, any
disappeared. The woman awaking, described to her husband the person she
had seen in her dream, with all his features, in such a manner as to
leave no room to doubt but it was the blessed man that had appeared to
her. Whereupon he returned the next day to give him thanks for the
satisfaction he had vouchsafed his wife. But the saint on his arrival
prevented him, saying: "I have fulfilled your desire, I have seen your
wife, and satisfied her in all things she had asked: go in peace." The
officer received his benediction, and continued his journey to Seyne.
What the man of God foretold happened to him, as, {666} among other
things, that he should receive particular honors from the emperor.
Besides the authors of the saint's life, St. Austin relates this history
which he received from a nobleman of great integrity and credit, who had
it from the very persons to whom it happened. St. Austin adds, had he
seen St. John, he would have inquired of him, whether he himself really
appeared to this woman, or whether it was an angel in his shape, or
whether the vision only passed in her imagination.[3]
In the year 394, a little before the saint's death, he was visited by
Palladius, afterwards bishop of Helenopolis, who is one of the authors
of his life. Several anchorets of the deserts of Nitria, all strangers,
the principal of whom were Evagrius, Albinus, Ammonius, had a great
desire to see the saint. Palladius, one of this number, being young, set
out first in July, when the flood of the Nile was high. Being arrived at
this mountain, he found the door of his porch shut, and that it would
not be open till the Saturday following. He waited that time in the
lodgings of strangers. On Saturday, at eight o'clock, Palladius entered
the porch, and saw the saint sitting before his window, and giving
advice to those who applied to him for it. Having saluted Palladius by
an interpreter, he asked him of what country he was, and what was his
business, and if he was not of the company or monastery of Evagrius:
Palladius owned he was. In the mean time arrived Alypius, governor of
the province, in great haste. The saint, on the arrival of Alypius,
broke off his discourse with Palladius, who withdrew to make room for
the governor to discourse with the saint. Their conversation was very
long, and Palladius being, weary, murmured within himself against the
venerable old man, as guilty of exception of persons. He was even just
going away, when the saint, knowing his secret thoughts, sent Theodorus,
his interpreter, to him, saying: "Go, bid that brother not to be
impatient: I am going to dismiss the governor, and then will speak to
him." Palladius, astonished that his thoughts should be known to him,
waited with patience. As soon as Alypius was gone, St. John called
Palladius, and said to him: "Why was {sic} you angry, imputing to me in
your mind what I was no way guilty of? To you I can speak at any other
time, and you have many fathers and brethren to comfort and direct you
in the paths of salvation. But this governor being involved in the hurry
of temporal affairs, and being come to receive some wholesome advice
during the short time his affairs will allow him time to breathe in, how
could I give you the preference?" He then told Palladius what passed in
his heart, and his secret temptations to quit his solitude; for which
end the devil represented to him his father's regret for his absence,
and that he might induce his brother and sister to embrace a solitary
life. The holy man bade him despise such suggestions; for they had both
already renounced the world, and his father would yet live seven years.
He foretold him that he should meet with great persecutions and
sufferings, and should be a bishop, but with many afflictions: all which
came to pass, though at that time extremely improbable.
The same year, St. Petronius, with six other monks, made a long journey
to pay St. John a visit. He asked them if any among them was in holy
orders. They said: No. One, however, the youngest in the company, was a
deacon, though this was unknown to the rest. The saint, by divine
instinct, knew this circumstance, and that the deacon had concealed his
orders out of a false humility, not to seem superior to the others, but
their inferior, as he was in age. Therefore, pointing to him, he said:
"This man is a deacon." The other denied it, upon the false persuasion
that to lie with a view to one's own humiliation was no sin. St. John
took him by {667} the hand, and kissing it, said to him: "My son, take
care never to deny the grace you have received from God, lest humility
betray you into a lie. We must never lie, under any pretence of good
whatever, because no untruth can be from God." The deacon received this
rebuke with great respect. After their prayer together, one of the
company begged of the saint to be cured of the tertian ague. He
answered: "You desire to be freed from a sickness which is beneficial to
you. As nitre cleanses the body, so distempers and other chastisements
purify the soul." However, he blessed some oil and gave it to him: he
vomited plentifully after it, and was from that moment perfectly cured.
They returned to their lodgings, where, by his orders, they were treated
with all proper civility, and cordial hospitality. When they went to him
again, he received them with joyfulness in his countenance, which
evidenced the interior spiritual joy of his soul; he bade them sit down,
and asked them whence they came. They said, from Jerusalem. He then made
them a long discourse, in which he first endeavored to show his own
baseness; after which he explained the means by which pride and vanity
are to be banished out of the heart, and all virtues to be acquired. He
related to them the examples of many monks, who, by suffering their
hearts to be secretly corrupted by vanity, at last fell also into
scandalous irregularities; as of one, who, after a most holy and austere
life, by this means fell into fornication, and then by despair into all
manner of disorders: also of another, who, from vanity, fell into a
desire of leaving his solitude; but by a sermon he preached to others,
in a monastery on his road, was mercifully converted, and became an
eminent penitent. The blessed John thus entertained Petronius and his
company for three days, till the hour of None. When they were leaving
him, he gave them his blessing, and said: "Go in peace, my children; and
know that the news of the victory which the religious prince Theodosius
has gained over the tyrant Eugenius, is this day come to Alexandria: but
this excellent emperor will soon end his life by a natural death." Some
days after their leaving him to return home, they were informed he had
departed this life. Having been favored by a foresight of his death, he
would see nobody for the last three days. At the end of this term he
sweetly expired, being on his knees at prayer, towards the close of the
year 394, of the beginning of 395. It might probably be on the 17th of
October, on which day the Copths, or Egyptian Christians, keep his
festival: the Roman and other Latin Martyrologies mark it on the 27th of
March.
* * * * *
The solitude which the Holy Ghost recommends, and which the saints
embraced, resembled that of Jesus Christ, being founded in the same
motive or principle, and having the same exercises and employments, and
the same end. Christ was conducted by the Holy Ghost into the desert,
and he there spent his time in prayer and fasting. Woe to those whom
humor or passion leads into solitude, or who consecrate it not to God by
mortification, sighs of penance, and hymns of divine praise. To those
who thus sanctify their desert, or cell, it will be an anticipated
paradise, an abyss of spiritual advantages and comforts, known only to
such as have enjoyed them. _The Lord will change the desert into a place
of delights, and will make the solitude a paradise and a garden worthy
of himself._[4] In it only joy and jubilee shall be seen, nothing shall
be heard but thanksgiving and praise. It is the dwelling of a
terrestrial seraph, whose sole employment is to labor to know, and
correct, all secret disorders of his own soul, to forget the world, and
all objects of vanity which could distract or entangle him; to subdue
his senses, to purify the faculties of his soul, and entertain in his
{668} heart a constant fire of devotion, by occupying it assiduously on
God, Jesus Christ, and heavenly things, and banishing all superfluous
desires and thoughts; lastly, to make daily progress in purity of
conscience, humility, mortification, recollection, and prayer, and to
find all his joy in the most fervent and assiduous adoration, love, and
praise of his sovereign Creator and Redeemer.
Footnotes:
1. Coll. b. 4, c. 21, p. 81.
2. A city in the north of Thebais, in Egypt.
3. S. Aug. l. pro cura de mortuis, c. 17, p. 294.
4. Isa. lxiii.