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The Life of S. Hilarion

14.

This his first miracle was succeeded by another still greater and more notable. Aristæneté the wife of Elpidius who was afterwards pretorian prefect, a woman well known among her own people, still better known among Christians, on her return with her husband, from visiting the blessed Antony, was delayed at Gaza by the sickness of her three children; for there, whether it was owing to the vitiated atmosphere, or whether it was, as afterwards became clear, for the glory of God’s servant Hilarion, they were all alike seized by a semi-tertian ague and despaired of by the physicians. The mother lay wailing, or as one might say walked up and down between the corpses of her three P. 306 sons not knowing which she should first have to mourn for. When, however, she knew that there was a certain monk in the neighbouring wilderness, forgetting her matronly state (she only remembered she was a mother) she set out accompanied by her handmaids and eunuchs, and was hardly persuaded by her husband to take an ass to ride upon. On reaching the saint she said, “I pray you by Jesus our most merciful God, I beseech you by His cross and blood, to restore to me my three sons, so that the name of our Lord and Saviour may be glorified in the city of the Gentiles. Then shall his servants enter Gaza and the idol Marnas shall fall to the ground.” At first he refused and said that he never left his cell and was not accustomed to enter a house, much less the city; but she threw herself upon the ground and cried repeatedly, “Hilarion, servant of Christ, give me back my children: Antony kept them safe in Egypt, do you save them in Syria.” All present were weeping, and the saint himself wept as he denied her. What need to say more? the woman did not leave him till he promised that he would enter Gaza after sunset. On coming thither he made the sign of the cross over the bed and fevered limbs of each, and called upon the name of Jesus. Marvellous efficacy of the Name! As if from three fountains the sweat burst forth at the same time: in that very hour they took food, recognized their mourning mother, and, with thanks to God, warmly kissed the saint’s hands. When the matter was noised abroad, and the fame of it spread far and wide, the people flocked to him from Syria and Egypt, so that many believed in Christ and professed themselves monks. For as yet there were no monasteries in Palestine, nor had anyone known a monk in Syria before the saintly Hilarion. It was he who originated this mode of life and devotion, and who first trained men to it in that province. The Lord Jesus had in Egypt the aged Antony: in Palestine He had the youthful Hilarion.

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Vita S. Hilarionis

14.

Mulier nobilis uxor praefecti praetorio. Monachi non erant in Syria ante S. Hilarionem. – Hoc signorum eius principium, maius aliud signum nobilitavit. Aristaenete Elpidii, qui postea praefectus praetorio fuit, uxor, valde nobilis inter suos, et inter Christianos nobilior, revertens cum marito et tribus liberis a beato Antonio, Gazae propter eorum infirmitatem remorata est. Ibi enim sive ob corruptum aerem, sive (ut postea claruit) propter gloriam Hilarionis servi Dei, hemitritaeo pariter arrepti, omnes a medicis desperati sunt. Iacebat [0034B] ululans mater, et quasi inter tria filiorum discurrens cadavera, quem prius plangeret, nesciebat. Cognito autem quod esset quidam Monachus in vicina solitudine, oblita matronalis pompae (tantum se matrem noverat) vadit comitata ancillulis, et eunuchis [al. vernaculis]: vixque a viro persuasum est, ut asello sedens pergeret. Ad quem cum pervenisset: Precor te, ait, per Iesum clementissimum Deum nostrum: obtestor per crucem eius et sanguinem, ut reddas mihi tres filios; et glorificetur in urbe Gentilium nomen Domini Salvatoris, et ingrediatur servus eius Gazam, et idolum Marnas corruat. Renuente illo, et dicente, numquam se eggressum de cella, nec habere consuetudinem, ut non modo civitatem, sed ne villulam quidem ingrederetur, [0034C] prostravit se humi crebro clamitans: Hilarion, serve Christi, redde mihi liberos meos. Quos Antonius tenuit in Aegypto, a te serventur in Syria. Flebant cuncti qui aderant, sed et ipse negans flevit. Quid multa? non prius mulier recessit, quam ille pollicitus est se post solis occasum Gazam introiturum. Quo postquam venit, singulorum lectulos et ardentia membra consignans, invocavit Iesum. Et, o mira virtus! quasi de tribus fontibus sudor pariter erupit: eadem hora acceperunt cibos, lugentemque matrem cognoscentes, et benedicentes Deum, sancti manus deosculati sunt. Quod postquam auditum est, et longe lateque percrebuit, certatim ad eum de Syria et Aegypto confluebant: ita ut multi crederent in Christum, et se monachos [0034D] profiterentur. Necdum enim tunc monasteria erant in Palaestina, nec quisquam monachum ante [0035A] sanctum Hilarionem in Syria noverat. Ille fundator et eruditor huius conversationis et studii in hac provincia fuit. Habebat Dominus Iesus in Aegypto senem Antonium; habebat in Palaestina Hilarionem iuniorem.