ves in their resistance to the troops that were sent to fetch
recruits.

[Illustration: 237.jpg REMAINS OF A CHRISTIAN CHURCH IN THE TEMPLE OF
LUXOR]

The monastic institutions of Egypt had already reached their
full growth. They were acknowledged by the laws of the empire as
ecclesiastical corporations, and allowed to hold property; and by a new
law of this reign, if a monk or nun died without a will or any known
kindred, the property went to the monastery as heir at law. One of the
most celebrated of these monasteries was on Tabenna, where Pachomius
had gathered round him thirteen hundred followers, who owned him as the
founder of their order, and gave him credit for the gift of prophecy.
His disciples in the other monasteries of Upper Egypt amounted to six
thousand more. Anuph was at the head of another order of monks, and he
boasted that he could by prayer obtain from heaven whatever he wished.
Hor was at the head of another monastery, where, though wholly unable
to read or write, he spent his life in singing psalms, and, as his
followers and perhaps he himself believed, in working miracles.
Sera-pion was at the head of a thousand monks in the Ar-sinoite nome,
who raised their food by their own labour, and shared it with their
poorer neighbours. Near Nitria, a place in the Mareotic nome which gave
its name to the nitre springs, there were as many as fifty cells; but
those who aimed at greater solitude and severer mortification withdrew
farther into the desert, to Scetis in the same nome, a spot already
sanctified by the trials and triumphs of St. Anthony. Here, in a
monastery surrounded by the sands, by the side of a lake whose waters
are Salter than the brine of the ocean, with no grass or trees to rest
the aching eye, where the dazzling sky is seldom relieved with a
cloud, where the breezes are too often laden with dry dust, these monks
cultivated a gloomy religion, with hearts painfully attuned to the
scenery around them. Here dwelt Moses, who in his youth had been a
remarkable sinner, and in his old age became even more remarkable as a
saint. It was said that for six years he spent every night in prayer,
without once closing his eyes in sleep; and that one night, when his
cell was attacked by four robbers, he carried them all off at once on
his back to the neighbouring monastery to be punished, because he would
himself hurt no man. Benjamin also dwelt at Scetis; he consecrated oil
to heal the diseases of those