Yes, I can heal him.  Power goes forth from me. 
     They say that they are heal’d.  Ah, hark! they shout
     ‘St. Simeon Stylites.’  Why, if so,
     God reaps a harvest in me.  O my soul,
     God reaps a harvest in thee.  If this be,
     Can I work miracles and not be saved?”

Once, the devil, in shape like an angel, riding in a chariot of fire, came to carry Simeon to the skies.  He whispered to the weary Saint, “Simeon, hear my words, which the Lord hath commanded thee.  He has sent me, his angel, that I may carry thee away as I carried Elijah.”  Simeon was deceived, and lifted his foot to step out into the chariot, when the angel vanished, and in punishment for his presumption an ulcer appeared upon his thigh.

But time plays havoc with saints as well as sinners, and death slays the strongest.  Bowed in prayer, his weary heart ceased to beat and the eyes that gazed aloft were closed forever.  Anthony, his beloved disciple, ascending the column, found that his master was no more.  Yet, it seemed as if Simeon was loath to leave the spot, for his spirit appeared to his weeping follower and said, “I will not leave this column, and this blessed mountain.  For I have gone to rest, as the Lord willed, but do thou not cease to minister in this place and the Lord will repay thee in heaven.”

His body was carried down the mountain to Antioch.  Heading the solemn procession were the patriarch, six bishops, twenty-one counts and six thousand soldiers, “and Antioch,” says Gibbon, “revered his bones as her glorious ornament and impregnable defence.”

The Cenobites of the East

We cannot linger with these hermits.  I pass now to the cenobitic[C] life.  We go back in years and return to Egypt.  Man is a social animal, and the social instinct is so strong that even hermits are swayed by its power and get tired of living apart from one another.  When Anthony died the deserts were studded with hermitages, and those of exceptional fame were surrounded by little clusters of huts and dens.  Into these cells crowded the hermits who wished to be near their master.

[Footnote C:  Appendix, Note C.]

Thus, step by step, organized or cenobitic monasticism easily and naturally came into existence.  The anchorites crawled from their dens every day to hear the words of their chief saint,—­a practice giving rise to stated meetings, with rules for worship.  Regulations as to meals, occupations, dress, penances, and prayers naturally follow.

The author of the first monastic rules is said to have been Pachomius, who was born in Egypt about the year 292 A.D.  He was brought up in paganism but was converted in early life while in the army.  On his discharge he retired with a hermit to Tabenna, an island in the Nile.  It is said he never ate a full meal after his conversion, and for fifteen years slept sitting on a stone.  Natural gifts fitted him to become a leader, and it was not long before he was surrounded by a congregation of monks for whom he made his rules.