the more humble he will become, and the more he will think scorn of himself, and because [I wish] you to emulate his example, I will, before you all, fearlessly ascribe blessing to him. Thou, O Theodore, and all those, who like thee, strive in the fight, have bound the Calumniator with fetters like a kid of the goats, and have placed him under your feet, and daily ye trample upon him as ye trample upon dust; but if ye are the least unmindful of yourselves, the Calumniator, who hath been cast under your feet, will rise up again, and will set himself against you like an armed man. But this young man Sylvanus, who but a short time since was about to be expelled from the monastery, hath, by his strenuousness, so completely subjugated the Calumniator, and slain him, that he will never again be able to approach him, for he hath vanquished him utterly by his exceedingly great humility. Ye have humbled yourselves as if ye possessed works of righteousness, and the addition which ye would make to your spiritual excellence is reduced, for ye rely upon the things which have already been performed by you; but this young man, however much he striveth, never sheweth himself to the gaze [of his fellows], and he thinketh with all his mind and soul that he is a useless and contemptible being. And tears are always nigh unto him because he is always belittling himself, and because he saith that he is unworthy of the things which are visible. Ye, in your knowledge, and in your patient endurance, and in your strivings against the Calumniator, which cannot be measured, are better than he is, but he hath surpassed you in humility, because he, in this manner, cutteth off for the Calumniator nothing but humility, and the power of action which ariseth from the whole soul.” Now therefore when Sylvanus had striven in this manner for eight years, he completed his fight, and laid down his life in such wise that his servant, a mighty man of God, testified concerning his departure, and said that an endless throng of holy angels, with great rejoicing and singing, received his soul as a choice sacrifice, and that they offered it up unto God like the marvellous incense which is found among the children of men.
Chapter III: Of A Certain Sinner Who Died
AND it came to pass once that Abbâ Pachomius went to another monastery to visit the brethren who were there, and as he was on his journey he met the funeral of a certain brother of the monastery who was dead, and [the monks] were going to the funeral and were singing as they went; and there were also among them the parents of the man
