INDIAN ROCK-CUT TEMPLE: PORCH OF THE CHAITYA CAVE TEMPLE, AJUNTA.
There can be no doubt that, during the first ages of Christianity many an unknown anchorite retired to some solitary cave, as to a harbour of refuge from the rude contact of the world; but the first hermit mentioned in ecclesiastical history is St. Paul of Thebes, in Egypt, who, during the persecution of Decius, in the middle of the third century, retreated to the desert, where, dwelling in a cave, and living on the fruits of trees, he reached his hundredth year. His friend and disciple, St. Anthony, who first roused among his contemporaries a wide-spread inclination for hermit seclusion, plays a far more conspicuous part in the annals of the Church. Born of wealthy Coptic peasants, this remarkable man, at the age of twenty, divided his whole property among the poor, and thenceforth devoted himself to a life of the strictest ascetism. He retired first to a rock-cave in the neighbourhood of his native village, and then to the more distant ruins of a deserted castle, where he spent twenty years as a hermit. Meanwhile his reputation for sanctity had spread throughout all Egypt, and numerous candidates for a hermit life besought him to take them under his spiritual care. He yielded to their entreaties, and soon the neighbouring desert was crowded with the huts of zealous anchorites, who revered him as their model. But he was surrounded not only by these pious disciples; the worldly-minded also came flocking to his cave for advice or assistance; for the belief was general that, like the first Apostles, he was gifted with the power of casting out devils and foretelling future events. Anthony, thus disturbed in his solitary meditations, resolved to bury himself still deeper in the desert, and fled to a cave in the furthest parts of Egypt, near a source shaded by a few date-palms. Here he hoped to be able to live entirely for prayer and contemplation, but his hopes proved vain, for, after a long search, his disciples discovered his retreat, and again anchorites and worldlings broke in upon his solitude. In his hundredth year he was prevailed upon by St. Athanasius to visit Alexandria, where, whenever he appeared, crowds gathered round him to kiss the hem of his garment and to implore his blessing. Even the Emperor Constantine the Great wrote to him; yet so indifferent had he become to all worldly distinctions that he could with difficulty be prevailed upon to have the letter read to him. Thus, honoured by high and low, and yet avoiding all honour, Anthony reached the patriarchal age of 105. At the approach of death he begged two of his most beloved disciples to conduct him to the wildest part of the desert. Here he died in their arms, after having first made them promise to keep the place of his burial secret, as he feared that an undue reverence might be paid to his bones.
Anthony’s example was followed far and wide over the eastern world. Whole colonies of hermits settled in the desert of Thebes, near Lake Moeris, in Southern Palestine, in Armenia, and Pontus. Their numbers amounted to thousands, many living in rude huts, which they erected with their own hands, while others found a congenial retreat in the grottoes and rock-tombs which abound in many of the countries where they dwelt.
From the East the spirit of monastic seclusion soon spread to Western Europe. St. Benedict, the founder of the order which has rendered such signal service to learning during the Middle Ages, spent three years in an inaccessible cave near Subiaco, five leagues from Tivoli. Romanus, a monk in a neighbouring convent, alone knew of his retreat, and daily let down by a rope, from the top of the rock in which the cave was situated, the small quantity of bread which he needed for his subsistence. Here he was at length discovered by some shepherds, who at first sight took him for a wild beast, as he was clothed in skins, but soon discovered that he was a saint by the wise lessons he gave them.
A similar longing for a life of pious seclusion induced St. Cuthbert to quit the Convent of Lindisfarne, of which he had been prior, and to seek a retreat in a grotto excavated by his own hands, on one of the Farne Islands, on the coast of Northumberland. An ox-hide, which he hung before its entrance and turned towards the side whence the wind blew, afforded a scanty shelter against the rigours of a northern winter. But the fame of his sanctity spread over all England, and numerous pilgrims resorted to his cave, to profit by his advice, or to seek consolation in their troubles. One day, when he had spent eight years in seclusion, the king of Northumbria, attended by his principal nobles, landed on Cuthbert’s island-rock to beg him to accept the episcopal dignity of Durham, to which he had been elected. The holy anchorite yielded, with many tears, and after an obstinate resistance, for he was loth to accept duties which tore him from his solitude. After two years he resigned his bishopric, and returned to his beloved cave, where he shortly after died. According to a popular legend the Entrochi, or calcareous joints of the petrified Lily-Encrinites, which are found among the rocks of the Farne Islands, are forged by his spirit, and pass there by the name of ‘St. Cuthbert’s beads.’ While at this task, he is supposed to sit during the night upon a certain rock, and to use another as his anvil.
‘Such tales had Whitby’s fishers told,
And said they might his shape behold,
And hear his anvil sound;
A deadened clang—a huge dim form,
Seen but, and heard, when gathering storm