Letters 108.17–108.28

But these things may be shared with (not) a few, and the devil knows that they are not set at the highest peak of the virtues. That is why, after Job had lost his substance, his house had been overthrown, and his children killed, he says to the Lord: 'Skin for skin; all that a man has he will give for his life. But stretch out your hand and touch his bones and his flesh, and see if he does not bless you to your face.' We know that many have given alms but have given nothing of their own body; that they have held out a hand to the needy, but, overcome by the pleasure of the flesh, have whitened what was outside while within they were full of dead men's bones. Not so Paula, who was of such continence that she almost exceeded measure and brought weakness on her body by excessive fasts and toil. Except on feast days she scarcely took oil with her food, so that from this one fact one may judge what she thought of wine, fish sauce, fish, milk, honey, eggs, and the other things that are sweet to the taste; in taking which some think themselves most abstinent and, if they have gorged their belly with them, suppose their chastity safe.

Envy always follows virtue, 'and the lightning strikes the highest mountains.' Is it any wonder if I say this of human beings, when even our Lord was crucified through the jealousy of the Pharisees, and all the saints have had rivals, and even in paradise there was the serpent, through whose envy death entered the world? The Lord had raised up against her Hadad the Edomite to buffet her, lest she be lifted up, and often admonished her, as with a thorn in the flesh, not to think too highly of herself because of the greatness of her virtues and believe herself set on high above the faults of other women. I used to say that one should give way to spite and yield to madness, as Jacob did with his brother Esau and David with Saul, the most obstinate of his enemies, of whom the one fled to Mesopotamia and the other gave himself up to the Philistines, preferring to be subject to enemies rather than to the envious. But she would answer: 'You would say this rightly if the devil did not fight everywhere against the servants and handmaids of God and go ahead of those who flee to every place; if I were not held here by love for the holy places and could find my Bethlehem in another part of the earth. Why should I not overcome spite by patience? Why should I not break pride by humility, and offer the other cheek to him who strikes me, since Paul says, “Overcome evil with good”? Did not the apostles glory when they suffered insult for the Lord? Did not the Saviour himself humble himself, taking the form of a slave and becoming obedient to the Father unto death, even the death of the cross, so as to save us by his passion? Job, had he not fought and won in the battle, would not have received the crown of righteousness nor heard from the Lord: “Do you think I spoke to you otherwise than that you might appear righteous?” Those are called blessed in the Gospel who suffer persecution for righteousness' sake. Let our conscience be secure that we do not suffer for our sins; and affliction in this world is the material of rewards.' If ever an enemy grew more insolent and broke out into a quarrel of words, she would sing the words of the Psalter: 'When the sinner stood against me, I was dumb and humbled, and kept silence from good things'; and again: 'But I, like a deaf man, did not hear, and like a dumb man who does not open his mouth; and I became like a man who does not hear and has no rebukes in his mouth.' In temptations she turned over the words of Deuteronomy: 'The Lord your God tests you, to know whether you love the Lord your God with all your heart and with all your soul.' In tribulations and distress she would repeat the words of Isaiah: 'You who are weaned from the milk, you who are drawn from the breast, expect tribulation upon tribulation, hope upon hope, yet a little, yet a little, because of the malice of the lips, because of a strange tongue.' And she explained this testimony of Scripture for her own consolation: that it is for the weaned, that is, for those who have come to maturity, to endure tribulation upon tribulation so as to deserve to receive hope upon hope, knowing that 'tribulation works patience, patience approval, approval hope, and hope does not put to shame'; that 'if our outward man is corrupted, the inward man is renewed'; and 'our present momentary and light affliction works for us an eternal weight of glory, while we look not at the things that are seen but at the things that are not seen; for the things that are seen are temporal, but the things that are not seen are eternal'; and that it would not be long, even if it seems slow to human impatience, before the help of God follows, who says, 'In an acceptable time I have heard you, and in the day of salvation I have helped you'; and that deceitful lips and the tongues of the wicked are not to be feared, since we rejoice in the Lord as our helper and ought to hear him warning us: 'By your patience you will possess your souls,' and, 'The sufferings of this present time are not worthy to be compared with the glory to come that will be revealed in us'; and elsewhere, that we should act patiently in all that befalls us: 'For the patient man is of great understanding, but the faint-hearted is very foolish.'

In sicknesses and frequent infirmity she would say: 'When I am weak, then I am strong'; and, 'We have this treasure in earthen vessels, until this mortal puts on immortality and this corruptible is clothed with incorruption'; and again: 'As the sufferings of Christ abound in us, so through Christ our consolation also abounds'; and then: 'As you are partners of the sufferings, so will you be also of the consolation.' In sorrow she would sing: 'Why are you sad, my soul, and why do you trouble me? Hope in God, for I shall yet praise him, the salvation of my countenance and my God.' In dangers she would say: 'If anyone will come after me, let him deny himself and take up his cross and follow me'; and again: 'He who would save his life will lose it'; and, 'He who loses his life for my sake will save it.' When losses to her estate and the ruin of her whole patrimony were reported, she would say: 'For what does it profit a man if he gains the whole world and suffers the loss of his soul? Or what will a man give in exchange for his soul?' and, 'Naked I came out of my mother's womb, and naked I shall return; as it pleased the Lord, so it has been done; blessed be the name of the Lord'; and that saying: 'Do not love the world or the things in the world; for all that is in the world is the desire of the flesh and the lust of the eyes and the pride of this life, which is not from the Father but from the world. And the world passes away, and its lust.' I know that she was sent word of the very grave illnesses of her children, and especially of her Toxotius, whom she loved very much. And when she had fulfilled by her virtue that saying, 'I was troubled and did not speak,' she broke out into these words: 'He who loves son or daughter more than me is not worthy of me'; and praying to the Lord she would say: 'Take possession of the sons of those who are put to death, who for your sake put their bodies to death every day.' I knew a certain whisperer (the most pernicious kind of man) who, as if out of goodwill, reported to her that because of her excessive fervour for the virtues some thought her mad and said that her brain needed to be treated. She answered him: 'We have been made a spectacle to the world, to angels and to men; we are fools for Christ's sake, but the foolishness of God is wiser than men.' Hence the Saviour too says to the Father: 'You know my foolishness.' In the Gospel his relatives wished to bind him as out of his mind, and his adversaries mocked him, saying, 'He has a demon and is a Samaritan,' and, 'He casts out demons by Beelzebul, the prince of demons.' 'But let us hear the apostle exhorting us: This is our boast, the testimony of our conscience, that we have conducted ourselves in the world in holiness and sincerity and the grace of God; and the Lord saying to the apostles: Therefore the world hates you, because you are not of the world; for if you were of the world, the world would love its own.' And she turned her words to the Lord himself: 'You know the secrets of the heart,' and, 'All this has come upon us, yet we have not forgotten you, nor dealt falsely with your covenant, nor has our heart turned back,' and, 'For your sake we are put to death all day long; we are counted as sheep for the slaughter'; but, 'The Lord is my helper; I will not fear what man can do to me.' For I have read: 'My son, honour the Lord, and you will be strong, and apart from him fear no one.' With these and such testimonies, as with the armour of Christ, she armed herself against all vices, but especially against raging envy, and by bearing injuries she calmed the fury of a heavy heart. In short, until the day of her death both her patience and the jealousy of others were plain to all; jealousy which gnaws its own author and, while it strives to hurt its rival, rages against itself in its own fury.

I will speak also of the order of her monastery, how she turned the continence of the saints to her own gain. She sowed carnal things that she might reap spiritual; she gave earthly things that she might take heavenly; she gave up brief things to exchange them for eternal. After founding a monastery of men, which she handed over to men to govern, she divided the many virgins whom she had gathered from various provinces, noble as well as of middle and lowest rank, into three companies and monasteries, in such a way that, separate in work and food, they were joined in psalmody and prayer. After the Alleluia was sung, the signal by which they were called to the assembly, no one was allowed to remain behind; but she, coming first or among the first, waited for the (gathering) of the rest, urging them to work by shame and example, not by terror. At dawn, at the third, sixth, and ninth hours, at evening, and at midnight they sang the Psalter in order; and no sister was allowed not to know the Psalms or not to learn something from the holy Scriptures every day. Only on the Lord's day did they go out to the church, beside which they lived, and each company followed its own mother; and returning from there together they applied themselves to the allotted work and made clothes either for themselves or for others. If any was noble, she was not allowed to have a companion from her own household, lest, remembering her former doings and the wantonness of childhood, she should revive old error and renew it by frequent conversation. All had one dress; they used linen only for drying their hands. So strict was the separation from men that she kept them apart even from eunuchs, so as to give no occasion to the slanderous tongue, which is wont to carp at the saints to console itself for its own sins. If any came late to the psalms or was lazier at work, she approached her in various ways: if she was hot-tempered, with coaxing; if patient, with rebuke; imitating the apostle's words: 'What do you wish? Shall I come to you with a rod, or in a spirit of gentleness and meekness?' Apart from food and clothing she allowed no one to have anything, since Paul says, 'Having food and clothing, with these we are content,' lest by the habit of having more she should give room to avarice, which is filled by no riches, and the more it has the more it seeks, and is lessened neither by plenty nor by want. Those who quarrelled with one another she reconciled with the gentlest speech. The wanton flesh of the young girls she broke with frequent and doubled fasts, preferring that their stomachs rather than their minds should ache. If she saw one too well dressed, she rebuked the offender with a frowning brow and a sad face, saying that cleanliness of body and dress was uncleanness of soul, and that a foul or wanton word must never come out of a virgin's mouth, since by such signs a lustful mind is shown and through the outer man the vices of the inner man are revealed. One whom she saw to be talkative, chattering, and pert, and delighting in quarrels, and who, often warned, would not change, she made to pray among the last, outside the gathering of the sisters at the door of the dining room, and to eat apart, so that shame might correct her whom rebuke had not corrected. She detested theft as sacrilege, and what among people of the world is thought light or nothing, she said was a very grave offence in monasteries. Why should I mention her kindness and attentiveness to the sick, whom she cared for with wonderful services and ministrations? And while to others who were ill she gave everything generously, and even provided meat to eat, if ever she herself was sick she did not indulge herself, and in this she seemed unequal, that the kindness she showed to others she changed to harshness toward herself.

None of the young girls, with sound and vigorous bodies, had given herself to such continence as she did with her broken, aged, and weakened little body. I confess that in this she was too obstinate, not sparing herself and not yielding to anyone who advised her. I will relate what I experienced. In the month of July, in the most burning heat, she fell into a high fever, and when, after she had been despaired of, she recovered by God's mercy, and the doctors advised that, to restore her body, she needed a little light wine, lest by drinking water she should fall into dropsy, and I secretly asked the blessed pope Epiphanius to admonish her, or rather to compel her, to drink wine, she, being prudent and of shrewd mind, at once sensed the plot and, smiling, hinted that what he was saying came from me. What more? When the blessed bishop came out after much exhortation and I asked him what he had achieved, he answered: 'I have achieved this much, that she has almost persuaded an old man not to drink wine.' I relate these things not because I approve of burdens taken up inconsiderately and beyond one's strength, since Scripture warns, 'Do not lift a burden above yourself,' but because I wish to prove from this perseverance too the ardour of her mind and the longing of her faithful soul, saying, 'My soul has thirsted for you; how much more my flesh!' It is hard to keep the mean in all things. And truly, according to the saying of the philosophers, 'virtues are means, excesses are vices,' which we can express in one little phrase: 'Nothing too much.' She who had such obstinacy in despising food was gentle in grief and was broken by the deaths of her own, especially of her children; for at the falling asleep of her husband and of her children she was always in danger. And when she signed her mouth and breast and strove to ease a mother's grief by the impress of the cross, her affection overcame her, and a mother's heart overwhelmed her believing mind; conquering in spirit, she was conquered by the frailty of her body, which, once sickness had seized it, it held for a long time, bringing us anxiety and her danger. In this she rejoiced, often saying: 'Wretched man that I am, who will deliver me from the body of this death?' The prudent reader may say that I am writing blame instead of praise. I call Jesus to witness, whom she served and I desire to serve, that on neither side do I invent anything, but, as a Christian writing of a Christian, set out what is true; that is, I am writing a history, not a panegyric, and her faults would be virtues in others. I call them faults according to my own feeling and the longing of all the sisters and brothers who love her and miss her now that she is gone.

But she has finished her course and kept the faith, and now enjoys the crown of righteousness. She follows the Lamb wherever he goes; she who hungered is filled, and she sings joyfully: 'As we have heard, so have we seen, in the city of the Lord of hosts, in the city of our God.' O blessed exchange! She wept that she might always laugh; she despised broken cisterns that she might find the Lord as a fountain, so that she might joyfully sing: 'As the hart longs for the springs of water, so my soul longs for you, O God. My soul has thirsted for the mighty, living God: when shall I come and appear before the face of God?'

I will touch briefly, then, on how she avoided the muddy cisterns of the heretics and held them no better than the heathen. A certain crafty old rogue, learned and knowing in his own opinion, began without my knowledge to put questions to her and say: 'What sin has an infant committed that it should be seized by a demon? At what age shall we rise again? At the age at which we die? Then we shall need nurses after the resurrection. At another age? Then there will be no resurrection of the dead but a transformation into others. And will there or will there not be a difference of sex, male and female? If there is, marriage, intercourse, and procreation will follow. If there is not, then, with the difference of sex taken away, the same bodies will not rise again (for “the earthly dwelling weighs down the mind that is busy with many things”), but thin and spiritual bodies, since the apostle says, “It is sown a natural body, it is raised a spiritual body.”' From all this he wished to prove that rational creatures had fallen into bodies because of certain faults and ancient sins, and were born in this or that condition according to the difference and deserts of their sins, so that they either rejoiced in health of body and in their parents' riches and nobility, or, coming into diseased flesh and the houses of the poor, paid the penalties of former offences and were shut up in the present world and body as in a prison. When she had heard this and reported it to me, pointing out the man, and the necessity lay upon me of resisting a most wicked viper and deadly beast, of which the psalmist speaks, saying, 'Do not deliver to the beasts the soul that confesses you,' and, 'Rebuke, Lord, the beasts of the reed,' who, writing iniquity, speak lies against the Lord and lift up their mouth on high, I met the man, and by the prayers of her whom he was trying to deceive I cornered him with a short questioning: did he believe there would be a resurrection of the dead or not? When he answered that he believed it, I went on: 'Do the same bodies rise or others?' When he said, 'The same,' I asked, 'In the same sex or in another?' As he kept silent at the questions and, like a snake, turned his head this way and that so as not to be struck, I said: 'Since you are silent, I will answer for you myself and draw the consequences. If neither woman nor man rises, there will be no resurrection of the dead, because sex has members, and members make up the whole body. And if there are no sex and members, where will be the resurrection of bodies, which does not exist without sex and members? Further, if there is no resurrection of bodies, there will be no resurrection of the dead at all. And your objection about marriage, that if the same members exist marriage follows, is refuted by the Saviour: “You err, not knowing the Scriptures nor the power of God; for in the resurrection of the dead they neither marry nor are given in marriage, but will be like the angels.” Where it is said, “they neither marry nor are given in marriage,” the difference of the sexes is shown. For no one says of a stone or a piece of wood, “they neither marry nor are given in marriage,” since these have no nature for marrying; it is said of those who can marry and, by the grace and power of Christ, do not. And if you object, “How then shall we be like the angels, since among the angels there is neither male nor female?” listen briefly: he promises us not the substance of angels but their manner of life and blessedness, just as John the Baptist, before he was beheaded, was called an angel, and all the saints and virgins of God even in this world express in themselves the life of angels. For when it is said, “You will be like the angels,” a likeness is promised; the nature is not changed.'

'And at the same time answer how you interpret this: that Thomas felt the hands of the risen Lord and saw his side wounded by the spear, and that Peter saw the Lord standing on the shore and eating a honeycomb and part of a broiled fish? He who stood certainly had feet; he who showed his wounded side certainly had a belly and a chest, without which there are no sides, which are joined to the belly and chest; he who spoke, spoke with tongue and palate and teeth (for as the plectrum strikes the strings, so the tongue strikes the teeth and gives out the sound of the voice); he whose hands were felt had arms as well. Since, then, he is said to have had all the members, he must have had the whole body which is made up of members; not a woman's, of course, but a man's, that is, of the same sex in which he died. And if you object, “Then shall we too eat after the resurrection? And how did he enter when the doors were shut, contrary to the nature of dense and solid bodies?” you will hear: do not, because of food, bring the faith of the resurrection into slander. For he commanded that food be given to the raised daughter of the ruler of the synagogue, and Lazarus, four days dead, is written to have attended a banquet with him, lest their resurrection should be thought a phantom. But if, because he entered when the doors were shut, you strive to prove that his body was spiritual and ethereal, then before he suffered, because he walked on the sea contrary to the nature of heavier bodies, he had a spiritual body; and the apostle Peter, because he too walked with suspended step on the waters, must be believed to have had a spiritual body; whereas the power and might of God are rather shown when something is done contrary to nature. And that you may know that in the greatness of signs it is not a change of nature but the omnipotence of God that is displayed, he who walked by faith began to sink through unbelief, had not the Lord's hand lifted him up, saying, “Why did you doubt, O you of little faith?” I wonder that you harden your forehead when the Lord says: “Put your finger here and touch my hands, and reach out your hand and put it into my side, and do not be unbelieving but believing”; and elsewhere: “See my hands and feet, that it is I myself. Handle me and see, for a spirit does not have flesh and bones as you see that I have. And when he had said this, he showed them his hands and feet.” You hear of bones and flesh, feet and hands; and you invent for me the globes of the Stoics and some airy ravings!'

‘Further, you ask why an infant, who has no sins of its own, is seized by a demon, or at what age we shall rise again, since we die at different ages. You will accept, whether you like it or not: “The judgments of the Lord are a great deep,” and, “O the depth of the riches of the wisdom and knowledge of God! How unsearchable are his judgments and his ways past finding out! For who has known the mind of the Lord, or who has been his counsellor?” But difference of age does not change the reality of bodies. For since our bodies are in daily flux and either grow or shrink, shall we then be as many men as the changes we undergo each day? Was I one man when I was ten years old, another at thirty, another at fifty, another now that my whole head is grey? So, according to the traditions of the churches and the apostle Paul, the answer must be that we shall rise to the perfect man, to the measure of the age of the fullness of Christ, the age at which the Jews hold that Adam was created and at which we read that the Lord and Saviour rose.’ And I brought forward many other things from both Testaments to stifle the heretic. From that day she began so to detest the man and all who held the same doctrine that she publicly proclaimed them enemies of the Lord. I have said this, not to refute the heresy briefly, which must be answered in many volumes, but to show the faith of so great a woman, who preferred to incur the lasting enmity of men rather than to provoke God's displeasure by harmful friendships.

I will speak, then, as I began: nothing was more teachable than her mind. She was slow to speak and quick to hear, mindful of the precept, 'Hear, O Israel, and be silent.' She knew the Scriptures by heart, and though she loved the literal history and called it the foundation of truth, she rather followed the spiritual understanding and with this roof protected the building of her soul. At last she compelled me to go through the Old and New Testaments with her and her daughter, with my explanations. Out of modesty I refused, but because of her persistence and frequent requests I agreed to teach what I had learned, not from myself, that is, from presumption, the worst of teachers, but from illustrious men of the church. Wherever I hesitated and frankly confessed that I did not know, she would by no means accept it, but by continual questioning forced me to indicate which of many weighty opinions seemed to me the more probable. I will say something else which may seem incredible to rivals: she wished to learn the Hebrew language, which I learned in part from my youth with much labour and sweat and do not abandon by unwearied study, lest it abandon me; and she achieved it, so that she sang the Psalms in Hebrew and sounded the language without any trace of Latin pronunciation. We see the same even today in her holy daughter Eustochium, who always so clung to her mother and obeyed her commands that she never slept apart from her, never went out, never took food without her, did not have a single coin in her own power, but rejoiced that her father's and mother's small estate was distributed by her mother to the poor, and believed that devotion to her parent was the greatest inheritance and riches. I must not pass over in silence how greatly she rejoiced when she heard that Paula, her granddaughter, born of Laeta and Toxotius, or rather conceived by a vow and a promise of future virginity, was singing 'Alleluia' in her cradle among her rattles with stammering tongue and breaking the names of her grandmother and aunt into half-words. In this alone did she long for her homeland, that she might know that her son, her daughter-in-law, and her granddaughter had renounced the world to serve Christ. This she obtained in part; for her granddaughter is being kept for the bridal veil of Christ, and her daughter-in-law, giving herself to lifelong chastity, follows her mother-in-law's works by faith and almsgiving and tries to express at Rome what Paula accomplished at Jerusalem.

What are we doing, my soul? Why do you fear to come to her death? For a long while now the book has been drawn out, as we fear to reach the end, as though, while we are silent and busy in her praises, her death could be put off. Up to now we have sailed with favourable winds, and the gliding keel has furrowed the rippling sea; now the speech runs onto rocks, and with mountains of swelling waves shipwreck threatens both monasteries, so that we are compelled to say, 'Master, save us, we perish,' and, 'Awake, why do you sleep, Lord?' For who could tell of Paula dying with dry eyes? She fell into a most grave illness, or rather she found what she desired, to leave us and be joined more fully to the Lord. In that sickness the devotion to her mother of her daughter Eustochium, always proven, was proved still more before all. She herself sat by the bed, held the fan, supported her head, placed the pillow under it, rubbed her feet with her hand, warmed her stomach, arranged soft bedding, tempered the hot water, brought the towel, anticipated the duties of all the maids, and thought that whatever another did was taken from her own reward. With what prayers, what laments and groans did she run back and forth between her mother lying ill and the Lord's cave, that she might not be deprived of such companionship, that she might not live without her, that she might be carried on the same bier! But, O frail and perishable nature of mortals! Unless faith in Christ lifts us to heaven and eternity is promised to the soul, the condition of bodies is one with that of beasts and cattle. There is the same death for the righteous and the ungodly, the good and the bad, the clean and the unclean, for him who sacrifices and him who does not sacrifice; as is the good man, so is the sinner; as he who swears, so is he who fears an oath. Men and beasts alike are dissolved into dust and ashes.

Why do I delay so long and prolong my grief by dwelling on other things? The wisest of women felt that death was near, and that, while the rest of her body and limbs grew cold, only the warmth of the soul still beat in her holy and sacred breast; and nonetheless, as though she were going to her own and leaving strangers, she whispered those verses: 'Lord, I have loved the beauty of your house and the place where your glory dwells,' and, 'How lovely are your dwellings, Lord of hosts! My soul longs and faints for the courts of the Lord,' and, 'I have chosen to be an outcast in the house of my God rather than to dwell in the tents of sinners.' And when I asked her why she was silent, why she would not answer when I called her, whether she was in any pain, she answered in Greek that she had no trouble, but saw all things calm and tranquil. After this she fell silent, and with closed eyes, as though already despising human things, she repeated the same verses until she breathed out her soul, so that I could scarcely hear what she said; and holding her finger to her mouth she traced the sign of the cross on her lips. Her breath had failed and she was gasping toward death; and her soul, eager to break out, turned the very rattle with which mortal life ends into praises of the Lord. There were present the bishops of Jerusalem and other cities, and a countless multitude of priests of lower rank and of Levites. The whole monastery was filled with choirs of virgins and monks. And as soon as she heard the Bridegroom calling, 'Arise, come, my neighbour, my fair one, my dove; for behold, the winter is past, the rain is gone,' she answered joyfully, 'The flowers have appeared on the earth, the time of pruning has come,' and, 'I believe that I shall see the good things of the Lord in the land of the living.'