CHAPTER IX

OF AURELIUS [ADOLIUS?]

I USED to know a man in Jerusalem whose name was Aurelius [Adolius?], and by race (or origin) he came from the city of Tarsus, and when this man arrived in Jerusalem, he walked wholly in the path wherein are no stumblings and wherein not many have walked. Now he laid down for himself ascetic rules of life of new kinds, and [these were so severe] that the devils were afraid of him, and they were unable to stand up before him, and by reason of the greatness of his toil he might have been thought to be a shadow, for he would pass the whole weeks of the Forty Days in fasting, and he would spend the other days in constant vigils. Now the greatest of all his acts of asceticism was this. Whilst the brethren were gathered together each evening in the house of prayer, he would go up to the highest peak of the Mount of Olives, to the place where our Lord was lifted up, and as he stood there upon his feet he would recite the whole Office, and whether rain, or snow, or sleet fell he would never leave his place; and when he had finished the Office according to [his] custom, he would take a hammer and beat [a board], and rouse up those that slept, and having gone round to the doors of all [the monks] he would gather them together to the places for prayer, and in each place he would recite the Office with them; and he would also stand up in the midst of companies [of monks], and would recite the Office. In the daytime he would go to his cell, and in very truth on several occasions his brethren had to strip off [his clothes] from him because they were wet through, and to put others on him; and he would rest until the third hour of the day, and then he would come to the service [in the church and stay] until the evening. Such was the manner in which Aurelius lived, and in this way; he brought his life to an end; and he was buried at Jerusalem.