“Be joyful; leave sadness to the happy ones of this world.”
Thus he passed along the front of his filial army, exhorting and comforting. Paphnutius, seeing him approach, fell on his knees, his heart torn by fear and hope.
“My father! my father!” he cried in his agony. “My father! come to my help, for I perish. I have given to God the soul of Thais; I have lived upon the top of a column, and in the chamber of a tomb. My forehead, unceasingly in the dust, has become horny as a camel’s knee. And yet God has gone from me. Bless me, my father, and I shall be saved; shake the hyssop, and I shall be washed, and I shall shine as the snow.”
Anthony did not reply. He turned to the monks of Antinoe those eyes whose looks no man could sustain. He gazed for a long time at Paul, called the Fool; then he made a sign to him to approach. And, as all were astonished that the saint should address himself to a man who was not in his senses, Anthony said—
“God has granted to him more grace than to any of you. Lift thy eyes, my son Paul, and tell me what thou seest in heaven.”
Paul the Fool raised his eyes; his face shone, and his tongue was unloosed.
“I see in heaven,” he said, “a bed adorned with hangings of purple and gold. Around it three virgins keep constant watch that no soul may approach it, except the chosen one for whom the bed is prepared.”
Believing that this bed was the symbol of his glorification, Paphnutius had already begun to return thanks to God. But Anthony made a sign to him to be silent, and to listen to the Fool, who murmured in his ecstasy—
“The three virgins speak to me; they say unto me: ‘A saint is about to quit the earth; Thais of Alexandria is dying. And we have prepared the bed of her glory, for we are her virtues—Faith, Fear, and Love.’”
Anthony asked—