Ten Timeless Lessons from the Fourth-Century Desert Dwellers

"Go sit in your cell and your cell will teach you everything."
~ Abba Shepherd

"Many people living the secluded life have died like worldly people. It is better to live in the world and long for solitude than to live in solitude and long for the world."
~ Mother Matrona

"Never stay in a well-known place nor sit with a famous person nor lay foundation for building a cell someday."
~ Zeno, disciple of Silvanus

"To prepare for tomorrow means to cut away the fruit of the spirit and dry oneself up."
~ one of the hermits

"Never be sated with bread, and never run out of wine."
~ Mother Syncletice

"Teach your heart to follow what your tongue tells others."
~Abba Poemen

"Just as smoke drives out bees and takes their honey away from them, so a life of ease drives God from our souls and cancels our good deeds."
~ Abba Shepherd

"Never judge a fornicator. The person who said not to fornicate also said not to judge."
~ one of the old men

Serapion sold his Gospel and gave the money to the hungry. When we asked him why, he said he had sold the book that told him to feed the hungry.
~ the desert fathers

"The hen who stops sitting on the eggs will hatch no chicks; you, too, should stay where you are."
~ one of the mothers

from Spirituality & Health, May/June 2007, "Extreme Simplicity: Ten Lessons from the Fourth-Century Desert Dwellers", by Clair McPherson, p. 57.