chap, xxxviij OF THE ROMAN EMPIRE 65 and five years) beheld the numerous progeny -which had been formed by his example and his lessons. The prolific colonies of monks multiplied with rapid increase on the sands of Libya, upon the rocks of Thebais, and in the cities of the Nile. To the south of Alexandria, the mountain, and adjacent desert, of Nitria were peopled by 5000 anachorets; and the traveller may still investigate the ruins of fifty monasteries, which were planted in that barren soil by the disciples of Antony. 11 In the Upper Thebais, the vacant Island of Tabenne 12 was occupied tTabennisi by Pachomius, and fourteen hundred of his brethren. ThatA.D. 318] holy abbot successively founded nine monasteries of men, and one of women ; and the festival of Easter sometimes collected fifty thousand religious persons, who followed his angelic rule of discipline. 13 The stately and populous city of Oxyrinchus, the seat of Christian orthodoxy, had devoted the temples, the public edifices, and even the ramparts, to pious and charit- able uses ; and the bishop, who might preach in twelve churches, computed ten thousand females, and twenty thousand males, of the monastic profession. 14 The Egyptians, who gloried in this marvellous revolution, were disposed to hope, and to believe, that the number of the monks was equal to the remainder of the people ; 15 and posterity might repeat the saying, which had formerly been applied to the sacred animals of the same country, that, in Egypt, it was less difficult to find a god than a man. Athanasius introduced into Eome the knowledge and 11 Jerom, torn. i. p. 146 [ep. 22], ad Eustochium. Hist. Lausiac. c. 7, in Vit. Patruin, p. 712. The P. Sicard (Missions du Levant, torn. ii. p. 29-79) visited, and has described, this desert, which now contains four monasteries, and twenty or thirty monks. See D'Anville, Description de l'Egypte, p. 74. 12 Tabenne is a small island in the Nile, in the diocese of Tentyra or Dendera, between the modern town of Girge and the ruins of ancient Thebes (D'Anville, p. 194). M. de Tillemont doubts whether it was an isle ; but I may conclude, from his own facts, that the primitive name was afterwards transferred to the great monastery of Bau or Pabau [Phboon] (Mem. Eccles. torn. vii. p. 678, 688). 13 See in the Codex Regularum (published by Lucas Holstenius, Eome, 1661) a preface of St. Jerom to his Latin version of the Rule of Pachomius, torn. i. p. 61. [See Appendix 3.] 14 Rufin. c. 5, in Vit. Patrum, p. 459. He calls it, civitas ampla valde et popu- losa, and reckons twelve churches. Strabo (1. xvii. p. 1166 [c. 1, § 40]) and Am- mianus (xxii. 16) have made honourable mention of Oxyrinchus [Oxyrhynchus in the Fayum], whose inhabitants adored a small fish in a magnificent temple. 15 Quanti populi habentur in urbibus, tantae peene habentur in desertis multi- tudines monachorum. Rufin. c. 7, in Vit. Patrum, p. 461. He congratulates the fortunate change. vol. iv. — 5
