Page:Decline and Fall of the Roman Empire vol 6 (1897).djvu/528

 506 THE DECLINE AND FALL Constantinople and mount Athos, the monk Joasaph was re- spected as the temporal and spiritual father of the emperor ; and, if he issued from his retreat, it was as the minister of peace, to subdue the obstinacy, and solicit the pardon, of his rebellious son.-ii Dispntecon. Yet in the cloister, the mind of Cantacuzene was still exer- ughtof mount cised by theological war. He sharpened a controversial pen i3^-:iSi ' against the Jews and Mahometans ; ■*- and in every state he de- fended with equal zeal the divine light of mount Thabor, a mem- orable question which consummates the religious follies of the Greeks. The fakirs of India ^-^ and the monks of the Oriental church were alike persuaded that in total abstraction of the faculties of the mind and body the purer spirit may ascend to the enjoyment and vision of the Deity. The opinion and prac- tice of the monasteries of mount Athos ^^ will be best repre- sented in the words of an abbot who flourished in the eleventh century. " When thou art alone in thy cell," says the ascetic teacher, " shut thy door, and seat thyself in a corner ; raise thy mind above all things vain and transitory ; recline thy beard and chin on thy breast ; turn thy eyes and thy thoughts towards the middle of thy belly, the region of the navel ; and search the place of the heart, the seat of the soul. At first, all will be dark and comfortless ; but, if you persevere day and night, you will feel an ineffable joy ; and no sooner has the soul discovered the place of the heart than it is involved in a mystic and ethe- rial light." This light, the production of a distempered fancy, the creature of an empty stomach and an empty brain, was [Hcruxa- adored by the Quietists as the pure and perfect essence of God himself ; and, as long as the folly was confined to mount Athos, (Fleury, Hist. Eccles. torn. xx. p. 250). His death is placed, by a respectable au- thority, on the 20th of November, 1411 (Ducange, Fam. Byzant. p. 260). But, if he were of the age of his companion Andronicus the Younger, he must have lived 116 years : a rare instance of longevity, which in so illustrious a person would have attracted universal notice. FDate of death : A. D. 1383.] •*- His four discourses, or books, were printed at Basil, 1543 (Fabric. Bibliot. Grasc. torn. vi. p. 473) [reprinted in Migne, Patr. Gr. vol. 154, p. 372 s<7</.'. He composed them to satisfy a proselyte who was assaulted with letters from his friends of Ispahan. Cantacuzene had read the Koran ; but I imderstand from Maracci that he adopts the vulgar prejudices and fables against Mahomet and his religion. ^^ See the Voyages de Bernier, tom. i. p. 127. ■•^Mosheim, Institut. Hist. Eccles. p. 522, 523. Fleury, Hist. Eccles. tom. xx. p. 22, 24, 107-114, &c. The former unfolds the causes with the judgment of a philosopher, the latter transcribes and translates with the prejudices of a Catholic priest.
 * i Cantacuzene, in the year 1375, was honoured with a letter from the pope