The Temptation of St. Anthony

by Gustave Flaubert

Hilarion. "Shake the vermin from thy rags! Rise up from thy filth! Thy God is not a Moloch who demands human flesh in sacrifice!"

Anthony. "Yet suffering is blessed. The cherubim stoop to receive the blood of confessors."

Hilarion. "Admire, then, the Montanists!—they surpass all others."

Anthony. "But it is the truth of the doctrine which makes the martyrdom."

Hilarion. "How can martyrdom prove the excellence of the doctrine, inasmuch as it bears equal witness for error?"

Hilarion. "Silence!—thou viper!"

Anthony. "Perhaps martyrdom is not so difficult as thou dost imagine! The exhortations of friends, the pleasure of insulting the people, the oath one has taken, a certain dizzy excitement, a thousand circumstances all aid the resolution of the martyrs...."

(Anthony turns his back upon Hilarion, and moves away from him. Hilarion follows him.)

" ... Moreover this manner of dying often brings about great disorders. Dionysius, Cyprian and Gregory fled from it. Peter of Alexandria has condemned it; and the council of Elvira...."