Section 51

Thus Antony lived alone on the inner mountain, spending his time in prayer and ascetic discipline. The brothers who served him asked permission to come once a month and bring him olives, legumes, and oil, since by then he was an old man.

There he continued his life and endured great struggles, “not against flesh and blood,” as Scripture says, but against hostile demons, as we learned from those who visited him. They heard disturbances there, many voices, and what sounded like the clashing of weapons. At night they saw the mountain appear to be filled with wild beasts, and they saw Antony himself fighting as though against visible opponents and praying against them.

He encouraged those who came to him, while he himself knelt, struggled, and prayed to the Lord. It was truly astonishing that a man living alone in such a desert feared neither the demons that rose against him nor the ferocity of the many four-footed animals and reptiles.

But in truth, as Scripture says, “he trusted in the Lord like Mount Zion,” with a mind unshaken and undisturbed. The demons therefore fled from him instead, and the wild animals, as Scripture says, were at peace with him.