Page:Theparadiseoftheholyfathers.djvu/199

 devil was brought unto Macarius, being carefully fettered by two other men, and his mother had caused him to be brought unto him. Now the devil used to act upon him in the following manner. After he had eaten three baskets of bread and drunk three bottles of water he used to vomit, and scatter the bread and water in the air in the form of smoky vapour, and in this wise his food and his drink were consumed in waste, even as anything which is cast into the fire is consumed. Now there are certain kinds of devils which are called “fiery,” for there are varieties among devils even as there are among men, in disposition if not in nature. And inasmuch as his mother had not that wherewith to satisfy him, he used to eat his own offal and drink his own water; and his mother besought the blessed man with tears on behalf of her son, and Macarius took him and prayed over him, and entreated God on his behalf. And a day or two after he had healed him of his trial, the blessed man cried unto the mother of the young man, and said unto her, “How much hast thou need of for the food of one day for him?” And she said unto him, “Ten pounds of bread.” Then he rebuked her and said, “Thou hast said too much.” And after seven days Macarius made the young man so that he needed to eat three pounds [only, which was sufficient for him] to work upon and live. Now this miracle God wrought by the hand of the blessed Macarius, whose soul now sojourneth with the angels. I never saw this man, for he died one year before I entered the desert.

S for the other Macarius, the Alexandrian, I did see him, for he was an elder in the place which is called the “Cells,” wherein I myself lived for nine years, and he lived for three years after I entered therein; some of [his] wonderful acts I myself have seen, and some of them I have learned from others, and [of others] I have also heard rumours. Now his sad, stern life of self-denial was as follows: Whensoever he heard of any beautiful deed being done by any man whatsoever, he must straightway carry it into practice in a fuller form. He once heard from a certain man that all the brethren of Tabenna never tasted any food whatsoever which had been cooked by fire during the whole of the Forty Days’ Fast, and he straightway determined within himself that for seven years he would not eat any food which had been cooked by fire, and that he would not partake of anything except young wild herbs, and vegetables which had been made soft by soaking in water, or similar things. And when he had completed this rule of life he