desert, and I found a den of hyenas, and I laid myself down naked at the entrance thereof that they might come out and devour me. And when it was evening—as it is written, ‘He hath made the darkness, and it becometh night, wherein all the beasts of the forest do move (Psalm 104:20), and the lions roar to break [their prey]’—the hyenas, both male and female, came out, and they all sniffed at (or smelt) me, and licked my body from my head to my feet, and while I was thinking that they would eat me they went away from me; and there I remained the whole of that night, and they ate me not. And again I thought that God had had compassion upon me, and straightway I returned and came to my cell. And that devil of lust, having forborne with me a little, returned once again, and moreover he attacked me more fiercely than before, and he did so with such vigour that by reason of my affliction I well nigh cursed myself. Now, this devil of lust used to take the form of an Ethiopian damsel whom I saw in my early manhood gathering canes in the summer, and he came in her form and sat upon my knees, and he used to set me on fire with lust to such an extent that I imagined I was having intercourse with her, and when through the burning of my heart and the madness thereof, I gave her the cheek, straightway she would lift herself up from me and take to flight. And from the time when I touched her my hand was so polluted that for the space of two hours [afterwards] whensoever I brought my hand near me I was unable [to free it] from her foulness. But again I went forth because of my affliction, and I began to wander about in the desert, and I found a small asp, and I took it and placed its head upon the members of my body, and I squeezed the head of the asp so that it might bite me and I might die, and so find relief, but it bit me not. And after this I heard a voice which came to my ears and said unto me, ‘Depart, Pachomius, and be strong; I have allowed thee to be overcome in order that thou mightest not imagine that thou wast a mighty man and a man of perfection, and that thou hadst triumphed through thine own life and deeds, but that thou mightest know thine infirmity, and the feebleness of thy nature, and that thou mightest not rely upon thine asceticism but mightest confess the help of God and cry out to Him always.’ And having heard these words I returned to my cell, and I dwelt therein with great boldness of heart, and I never again had anxious care concerning this warfare of lust, but I continued in peace for the rest of my days after this warfare. Now, the devil of lust, seeing that I no longer meditated about the matter, never again approached me.” With
