The Temptation of St. Anthony

"Ah! he is off to join the others. What solitude! what weariness!" (Laughing bitterly.)

"A happy life this indeed! – bending palm-branches in the fire to make shepherds' crooks, fashioning baskets, stitching mats together – and then exchanging these things with the Nomads for bread which breaks one's teeth! Ah! woe, woe is me! will this never end? Surely death were preferable! I can endure it no more! Enough! enough!"

(He stamps his foot upon the ground, and rushes frantically to and fro among the rocks; then pauses, out of breath, bursts into tears, and lies down upon the ground, on his side.

The night is calm; multitudes of stars are palpitating; only the crackling noise made by the tarantulas is audible.

The two arms of the cross make a shadow upon the sand; Anthony, who is weeping, observes it.)

"Am I, then, so weak, O my God! Courage, let me rise from here!"

(He enters his hut, turns over a pile of cinders, finds a live ember, lights his torch and fixes it upon the wooden desk, so as to throw a light upon the great book.)

"Suppose I take the Acts of the Apostles? – yes! – no matter where!"

'And he saw the heaven opened, and a certain vessel descending, as it were a great linen sheet let down by the four corners from heaven to the earth – wherein were all manner of four-footed beasts, and creeping things of the earth and fowls of the air. And there came a voice to him: Arise, Peter! Kill and eat!'[1 - Acts X: 11-13 – T.]

"Then the Lord desired that his apostle should eat of all things?.. while I…"

(Anthony remains thoughtful, his chin resting against his breast. The rustling of the pages, agitated by the wind, causes him to lift his head again; and he reads:)

'So the Jews made a great slaughter of their enemies with the sword, and killed them, repaying according to what they had prepared to do to them…[2 - Esther IX: 5 – T.]

"Then, comes the number of people slain by them – seventy-five thousand. They had suffered so much! Moreover, their enemies were the enemies of the true God. And how they must have delighted in avenging themselves thus by the massacre of idolaters! Doubtless the city must have been crammed with the dead! There must have been corpses at the thresholds of the garden gates, upon the stairways, in all the chambers, and piled up so high that the doors could no longer move upon their hinges!.. But lo! here I am permitting my mind to dwell upon ideas of murder and of blood!.."

(He opens the book at another place.)

'Then King Nabuchodonosor fell on his face, and worshipped Daniel…'[3 - Daniel II: 46. – T.]

"Ah! that was just! The Most High exalts his prophets above Kings; yet that monarch spent his life in banqueting, perpetually drunk with pleasure and pride. But God, to punish him, changed him into a beast! He walked upon four feet!"

(Anthony begins to laugh; and in extending his arms, involuntarily disarranges the leaves of the book with the tips of his fingers. His eyes fell upon this phrase: – )

'And Ezechias rejoiced at their coming, and he showed them the house of his aromatical spices, and the gold and the silver, and divers precious odours and ointments, and the house of his vessels, and all that he had in his treasures…'[4 - Kings XX: 13 (Vulg.). – T.]

"I can imagine that spectacle; they must have beheld precious stones, diamonds and darics heaped up to the very roof. One who possesses so vast an accumulation of wealth is no longer like other men. While handling his riches he knows that he controls the total result of innumerable human efforts – as it were the life of nations drained by him and stored up, which he can pour forth at will. It is a commendable precaution on the part of Kings. Even the Wisest of all did not neglect it. His navy brought him elephants' teeth and apes… Where is that passage?"

(He turns the leaves over rapidly.)

"Ah! here it is:"

'And the Queen of Saba, having heard of the fame of Solomon in the name of the Lord, came to try him with hard questions.'[5 - III Kings X: I (Vulg.). – T.]

"How did she hope to tempt him? The Devil indeed sought to tempt Jesus! But Jesus triumphed because he was God; and Solomon, perhaps, owing this knowledge of magic! It is sublime – that science! For the world – as a philosopher once explained it to me, forms a whole, of which all parts mutually influence one another, like the organs of one body. It is science which enables us to know the natural loves and natural repulsions of all things, and to play upon them?.. Therefore, it is really possible to modify what appears to be the immutable order of the universe?"

(Then the two shadows formed behind him by the arms of the cross, suddenly lengthen and project themselves before him. They assume the form of two great horns. Anthony cries out: – )

"Help me! O my God!"

(The shadows shrink back to their former place.)

"Ah!.. it was an illusion … nothing more. It is needless for me to torment my mind further! I can do nothing! – absolutely nothing."

(He sits down and folds his arms.)

"Nevertheless … it seems to me that I felt the approach of… But why should He come? Besides, do I not know all his artifices? I repulsed the monstrous anchorite who laughingly offered me little loaves of warm, fresh bread, the centaur who sought to carry me away upon his croup, and that black child who appeared to me in the midst of the sands, who was very beautiful, and who told me that he was called the Spirit of Lust!"

(Anthony rises and walks rapidly up and down, first to the right, then to the left.)

"It was by my order that this multitude of holy retreats was constructed – full of monks all wearing sackcloth of camel's hair beneath their garments of goatskin, and numerous enough to form an army. I have cured the sick from afar off; I have cast out demons; I have passed the river in the midst of crocodiles; the Emperor Constantine wrote me throe letters; Balacius, who had spat upon mine, was torn to pieces by his own horses; when I reappeared the people of Alexandria fought for the pleasure of seeing me, and Athanasius himself escorted me on the way back. But what works have I not accomplished Lo! for these thirty years and more I have been dwelling and groaning unceasingly in the desert! Like Eusebius, I have carried thirty-eight pounds of bronze upon my loins; like Macarius, I have exposed my body to the stings of insects; like Pacomus, I have passed fifty-three nights without closing my eyes; and those who are decapitated, tortured with red hot pincers, or burned alive, are perhaps less meritorious than I, seeing that my whole life is but one prolonged martyrdom." (Anthony slackens his pace.)

"Assuredly there is no human being in a condition of such unutterable misery! Charitable hearts are becoming scarcer. I no longer receive aught from any one. My mantle is worn out. I have no sandals – I have not even a porringer! – for I have distributed all I possessed to the poor and to my family, without retaining so much as one obolus. Yet surely I ought to have a little money to obtain the tools indispensable to my work? Oh, not much! a very small sum… I would be very saving of it…

"The fathers of Nicæa, clad in purple robes, sat like magi, upon thrones ranged along the walls; and they were entertained at a great banquet and overwhelmed with honours, especially Paphnutius, because he is one-eyed and lame, since the persecution of Diocletian! The Emperor kissed his blind eye several times; what foolishness! Besides, there were such infamous men members of that Council! A bishop of Scythia, Theophilus! another of Persia, John! a keeper of beasts, Spiridion! Alexander was too old. Athanasius ought to have shown more gentleness towards the Arians, so as to have obtained concessions from them.

"Yet would they have made any? They would not hear me! The one who spoke against me – a tall young man with a curly beard – uttered the most captious objections to my argument; and while I was seeking words to express my views they all stared at me with their wicked faces, and barked like hyenas. Ah! why cannot I have them all exiled by the Emperor! or rather have them beaten, crushed, and see them suffer! I suffer enough myself."

(He leans against his cabin in a fainting condition.)

"It is because I have fasted too long; my strength is leaving me. If I could eat – only once more – a piece of meat." (He half closes his eyes with languor.)

"Ah! some red flesh – a bunch of grapes to bite into … curdled milk that trembles on a plate!..

"But what has come upon me? What is the matter with me? I feel my heart enlarging like the sea, when it swells before the storm. An unspeakable feebleness weighs down upon me, and the warm air seems to waft me the perfume of a woman's hair. No woman has approached this place; nevertheless? – "

(He gazes toward the little pathway between the rocks.)

"That is the path by which they come, rocked in their litters by the black arms of the eunuchs. They descend and joining their hands, heavy with rings, kneel down before me. They relate to me all their troubles. The desire of human pleasure tortures them; they would gladly die; they have seen in their dreams God calling to them … and all the while the hems of their robes fall upon my feet. I repel them from me. 'Ah! no!' they cry, 'not yet! What shall I do?' They gladly accept any penitence I impose on them. They ask for the hardest of all; they beg to share mine and to live with me.

"It is now a long time since I have seen any of them! Perhaps some of them will come! why not? If I could only hear again, all of a sudden, the tinkling of mule-bells among the mountains. It seems to me…"

(Anthony clambers upon a rock at the entrance of the pathway, and leans over, darting his eyes into the darkness.)

"Yes! over there, far off I see a mass moving, like a band of travellers seeking the way. She is there!.. They are making a mistake." (Calling.)

"This way! Come! Come!"

(Echo repeats: Come! Come! he lets his arms fall, stupefied.)

"What shame for me! Alas! poor Anthony."

(And all of a sudden he hears a whisper: – "Poor Anthony"!)

"Who is there? Speak!"

(The wind passing through the intervals between the rocks, makes modulations; and in those confused sonorities he distinguishes Voices, as though the air itself were speaking. They are low, insinuating, hissing.)

The First: "Dost thou desire women?"