Sacred Texts  Christianity  Early Church Fathers  Index  Previous  Next 

Chapter XI.

The kind of food which is considered the greater delicacy by them.

I pass over, too, that difficult and sublime sort of self-control, through which it is considered the greatest luxury if the plant called cherlock, 766 prepared with salt and steeped in water, is set on the table for the repast of the brethren; and many other things like this, which in this country neither the climate nor the weakness of our constitution would permit. And I shall only follow up those matters which cannot be interfered with by any weakness of the flesh or local situation, if only no weakness of mind or coldness of spirit gets rid of them.


Footnotes

222:766

Labsanion. Cf. below, c. xxiii., where cherlock is mentioned again, together with other delicacies (!) of the Egyptians.


Next: Chapter XII. How they leave off every kind of work at the sound of some one knocking at the door, in their eagerness to answer at once.