Edition Masquer
Vita Malchi monachi captivi

VII

[Formicarum exemplo excitatur.]

Post grande intervallum, dum solus in eremo sedeo et praeter caelum terramque nihil video, coepi mecum tacitus volvere et inter multa monachorum quoque contubernii recordari maximeque vultus patris mei, qui me erudierat, tenuerat, perdiderat. Sicque cogitans aspicio formicarum gregem angusto calle fervere. Video onera maiora quam corpora. Aliae herbarum quaedam semina forcipe oris trahebant; aliae egerebant humum de foveis et aquarum meatus aggeribus excludebant. Illae venturae hiemis memores, ne madefacta humus in herbam horrea verteret, illata semina praecidebant; hae luctu celebri corpora defuncta portabant. Quodque magis mirum est in tanto agmine: egredientes non obstabant intrantibus; quin potius, si quam sub fasce vidissent et onere concidisse, suppositis umeris adiuvabant. Quid multa? Pulchrum mihi spectaculum dies illa praebuit. Unde recordatus Salomonis ad formicarum sollertiam nos mittentis et pigras mentes sub tali exemplo suscitantis coepi taedere captivitatis et monasterii cellulas quaerere ac formicarum illarum similitudinem desiderare, ubi laboratur in medium et, cum nihil cuiusquam proprium sit, omnibus omnia sunt.

Traduction Masquer
The Life of Malchus, the Captive Monk

7.

After a long time as I sat one day by myself in the desert with nothing in sight save earth and sky, I began quickly to turn things over in my thoughts, and amongst others called to mind my friends the monks, and specially the look of the father who had instructed me, kept me, and lost me. While I was thus musing I saw a crowd of ants swarming over a narrow path. The loads they carried were clearly larger than their own bodies. Some with their forceps were dragging along the seeds of herbs: others were excavating the earth from pits and banking it up to keep out the water. One party, in view of approaching winter, and wishing to prevent their store from being converted into grass through the dampness of the ground, were cutting off the tips of the grains they had carried in; another with solemn lamentation were removing the dead. And, what is stranger still in such a host, those coming out did not hinder those going in; nay rather, if they saw one fall beneath his burden they would put their shoulders to the load and give him assistance. In short that day afforded me a delightful entertainment. So, remembering how Solomon sends us to the shrewdness of the ant and quickens our sluggish faculties by setting before us such an example, I began to tire of captivity, and to regret the monk’s cell, and long to imitate those ants and their doings, where toil is for the community, and, since nothing belongs to any one, all things belong to all.