110 Mr. PETRIE'S Inquiry into the Origin and 



And again : 



" Symeon, (proceeds Evagrius), wore out 56 Years in these extreme Severities ; for he spent 9 in 

 a Monastery, wherein he had first learned the Rudiments of Divine Precepts of living, and in this 

 Hovell 47 ; of which last Number he spent 1 in a very narrow Place (which others say was a dry 

 Well) 7 in smaller Pillars, and at length 30 in a Pillar of 40 Cubits high, which stood 300 Furlongs 

 at most from Antioch." (Hist. Eccl. Lib. 14. Cap. 51.) 



This translation, to my mind, carries on its very face sufficient evidence as 

 well of its own inaccuracy as of the falseness of the conclusions which Harris 

 endeavours to draw from it: for, if the pillar were hollow from its base, what ne- 

 cessity was there to build a domicilium of scarce two cubits on its top ? and, 

 if even the Stylite were stated to have instituted the station in and not on the 

 pillar, is it not evident that nothing more could be meant than such a pulpit or 

 tub-like cavity on its summit as would be necessary to prevent the enthusiast 

 from falling. In this sense only has the passage been always understood and 

 translated, as far as I can find; as an instance of which take the old Cambridge 

 version of Evagrius, by Valesius, 1692. 



" In these times, Symeon, a person of an holy and most celebrated memory, flourished, and was 

 eminent ; he was the first person that instituted the station upon a pillar, the circumference of whose 

 mansion was scarce two cubits," &c. " Moreover, Symeon spent six and fifty years in this afflictive 

 and austere mode of life. In the first monastery wherein he had been imbued with the precepts of 

 a divine life (he spent) nine years, and seven and forty in that place called the Mandra during ten 

 years (of which time) he performed his combat in a certain narrow place ; (he dwelt) seven years in 

 the shorter pillars, and thirty years upon a pillar of forty cubits long." 



Harris next quotes Raderus, the Tyrolese Jesuit, and Petrus Galesinius, an 

 Italian priest, to support his hypothesis, neither of whom, however, assists him 

 in the matter, and even if they did, could not be received as authorities of any 

 weight. The former says (I quote Harris's translation), that " The Hole or Cell 

 or Domicile placed at the Top of the Pillars, in which the Stylites stood, were 

 2 Cubits, or 3 Feet broad, and were not covered with a Roof, that they 

 might have the freer Liberty of contemplating the Heavens," &c. ; and that, 

 " When any Person went up to the Stylites, or they came down to others, it was 

 by the Means of Ladders." Galesinius, indeed, says that the Stylite " was shut 

 up in a hollow Pillar for forty years ;" but might not this be very properly 

 said of a person enclosed in such a cell or hole as that already described ? and 

 yet Harris has the weakness to consider this authority as conclusive, and for- 



