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20 Cf. Dan. iii. 6; and see below Book VI. c. xvii. where Cassian once more speaks of the devil as the Babylonish king.
21 Compare a similar illustration in the Conferences I. v.
24 Mentis robore non quoesito.-Petschenig. Gazaeus omits the negative and reads conquisito.
25 S. Jerome's version. which was certainly know to Cassian (cf. Conferences XXIII. viii.) has "Temptatio vos non apprehendat nisi humana."
27 Quia (Petschenig) Qui (Gazaeus).
29 Properatione, others Proeparatione.
41 Statio. This is properly the term for the weekly fasts on Wednesday and Friday, observed by the early Church in memory of our Lord's betrayal and crucifixion. See Tertullian on Prayer c. xix.; on Fasting c. i. x. In this place the word appears to be used by Cassian for the close of the fast; while elsewhere he uses it for fasting generally (not specially on Wednesday and Friday,) as in c. xxlv. Of the present book, and in the Conferences, II.. xxv.; XXI. xxi. The origin of the word is somewhat uncertain (a) because the fast was observed on stated days (stasis diebus); or (b), as S. Ambrose suggests, because "our fasts are our encampments which protect us from the devil's attacks: in short, they are called stationes, because standing (stantes) and staying in them we repel our plotting foe" (Serm. 25). See Dictionary of Christian Antiquities, vol. ii. p. 1928.
47 The allusion is here to the sparing diet and voluntary fasts of the monks, among whom but one meal a day was usual (see the note on III. xiii.), and though this was ordinarily taken at midday, yet many of the more celebrated anchorites never broke their fast till the evening e.g. S. Antony is said never to have eaten till sunset (Vita Anton.) and S. Jerome gives a similar account of Hilarion (Vita Hill § 4), while other instances of voluntary fasts are given by Cassian in the following chapters, xxv.-xxvii. The "station" days, however, viz., Wednesday and Friday, being of ecclesiastical authority, were strictly observed as a matter of rule, but these other voluntary fasts at other times were to be freely broken through on account of the arrival of visitors. See the Conferences II. xxvi., XXI. xiv., XXIV. xxi., and cf. Rufinus, History of the Monks II. vii., Palladius the Lausiac History, c. lii. So the Rule of S. Benedict (c. liii.) orders that on the arrival of visitors the Superior is to sit at table with them and break his fast, unless it be a special fast day which may not be broken; but the brethren are to observe the regular fasts.
48 S. Matt. ix. 15. The Latin has sponsus in each clause.
49 There is a Paesius mentioned by Palladius in the Lausiac History, but it is not clear whether he is the same man whom Cassian mentions. John is a different person from the one already mentioned in Book IV. xxiii. He is mentioned again below in xl., and the Nineteenth Conference is assigned to him.