Page:Aelfric's Lives of Saints Vol 2.djvu/355

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daughter is gone.' When the abbot heard this, he became very sorrowful, and bade then all the brothers assemble before him, and said: ' show now true charity to our friend, and pray we God in common that He would vouchsafe to show him what has been done with his daughter.' Then all the week they fasted and continued in their prayers, but no revelation came to them such as was customary to them when they prayed for anything. Truly, the holy woman Euphrosyne's prayer to God was, both day and night, that she might never during her life be discovered. So when no revelation came to the abbot or the brethren, then he consoled him and said: 'son, weary thou not of the Lord's discipline, because He correcteth every son whom He loveth; and know thou that, without God's will, not one sparrow falleth on the earth. How much more can anything happen to thy daughter without God's ordinance? I know that she hath chosen for herself some good counsel, and therefore was nothing revealed to us concerning her; and if it were the case — and far be it from it — that thy daughter had slidden into any harm, God would not despise the labour of these brethen; but I trust in God that He will yet in this life reveal her.' Then was he heartened by these words, and went home praising God, and busied himself in good works and alms. Then one day came he again to the abbot, and said: ' pray for me, because my sorrow about my daughter waxeth more and more in me with anguish.' Then the abbot, compassionating him, said: 'wouldest thou speak with a brother who came from king Theodosius' household? ' For he knew not that she was his daughter. Then said he, that he gladly would do so. Then the abbot bade Agapitus to take him to brother Smaragdus. Then, when she looked on her father, she became all suffused with tears; and he thought that it had been from devotion, and recognised her not, because she was much thinned by reason of the severe and austere life; and she covered her head with her cowl, that he should not know her; and when they had ended their prayers, they sat together. Then began she to speak to him of the heavenly kingdom's blessedness, and how the entrance to it is to be won by