Once, when Cosmas was alone in the church, he turned to the Mother of God on the icon with the following words: "Most Holy Mother of God, beseech Thy Son and our God, that He may guide me on the path of salvation." And at the same moment he heard a voice from the icon: "My Son and My God, guide Thy servant on the path of salvation." Christ answered the Mother of God: "Let him leave the monastery and go to silence." Leaving the church, the monk told the hegumen about all that he had heard, and he settled him in a quiet cell near the monastery. Remaining silent there for several years, the monk, with the help of God, attained all the virtues, and was even vouchsafed to receive the gift of clairvoyance, so that many came to him for confession.

 Once two hieromonks came to him from the Hilandar monastery, who hid a pumpkin with wine on the way in order to pick it up on the way back. Having received a blessing from the monk, they were about to leave, when the clairvoyant elder said to them: "Break the pumpkin that you have hidden near the road, for a snake has crawled into it; and do not drink this wine, otherwise you will be poisoned." The hieromonks did so: having broken the pumpkin, they found a snake inside and glorified God, Who had delivered them from death, while also thanking the Monk Cosmas.

 There was a certain monk of a virtuous life named Damian. He asceticized near the monastery of Esphigmenou in a place called Samaria, and had a blessing not to spend the night in someone else's cell. One day, Damian came to an acquaintance on some urgent business, and since he was not at home, he had to wait for him until the evening. Having done his business, Damian was about to return to his cell, but his friend urged him to stay, because it was already very dark and it began to rain. But Damian, because of the blessing he had, did not stay with his friend. Since it was very dark and it was raining heavily, he eventually got lost. Not knowing what to do, he cried out to the Lord: "Lord, save me, I am perishing." After this request, he immediately found himself in his cell. Later, coming to the monk, he told him about what had happened to him, in order to find out why it had happened and whether he had not involuntarily sinned in anything before God. The saint answered him: "Brother, thou hast fulfilled the commandment, and God hath preserved thee from death." Thus comforted, Damian returned to his cell, glorifying God.

 Once the monk fell ill and, like a simple man, wanted fish. At the same moment (lo and behold!) an eagle brought him a fish. And next to him asceticized a certain spiritual elder Christopher, who also fell ill and asked a man to send him fish. When Christopher was already washing this fish, an eagle flew in and snatched it from the hands of the elder. It was this fish that he put in front of Cosmas. Thanking God, Cosmas fried the fish and was about to eat it, when he heard a voice: "Leave a part for Christopher, so that he too may taste it." Soon Christopher came to the monk and knocked at the door of the cell. The monk answered: "Enter, for I am waiting for thee, that thou mayest eat thy part of the fish." Christopher asked the saint with amazement how he knew whose fish it was. And he told him everything in detail, after which both rejoiced, and Christopher returned to his cell. Once, on Great Thursday, the monk saw in the air a soul tormented by demons. Learning that this was the soul of the Hilandar abbot, he sent his disciple to the monastery to tell the brethren to pray to God for this soul. The disciple came and announced to the brethren about the vision of the monk, but they did not believe it, and said: "The hegumen had just left the church and went to his cell to bring everything necessary for the Liturgy, and he, deceived, commanded us to pray for him." Nevertheless, they went to the abbot's cell, where they discovered that the abbot had indeed died.

 On another occasion the same Christopher came to the monk to converse about the word of God. Knocking on the door, he heard voices and thought that someone was confessing in the cell. He waited a long time until the conversation ended, and then knocked on the door. The monk met him, kissed him, they went inside, made a prayer and sat down. Since Christopher saw no one, he asked the saint with whom he had spoken. The elder could not conceal this and replied that he had talked with Christ: "He told me what the demons would soon do to me, and that in a few days I would repose and pass into His Kingdom. You go in peace, but on such and such a day be sure to come here again." Christopher departed, and on the appointed day he again came to the monk, whom he found lying in bed and dying. Asking for the reason, he heard the answer:

 "The chief of demons came tonight with many demons, wept and said: 'O powerless and negligent ones, none of you could kill this terrible enemy of mine, who so grieved me that in the end he took my throne from me.' With these words, the evil demon took the rod and beat me severely, as you see.

 Christopher remained there and cared for the sick man. Two days later the monk asked to commune of the Most-Pure Ones, and having reverently received them and thanked God, he gave up his spirit into His hands in the month of September, on the 22nd day of the year 1233 from the Nativity of Christ.

 Learning of his death, the fathers, priests and monks came to bury the sacred remains of the monk. And God, Who glorifies those who glorify Him, glorified this saint after death in the following way. When the brethren sang the Funeral Service, all the animals of the wilderness gathered and stood quietly until he was buried, after which each one shouted loudly in his own way, and all fled again. After forty days the brethren came to the cell of the monk and served the All-Night Vigil, after which they opened the tomb in order to take his honorable relics to the monastery, but (O Thy ineffable miracles, O Christ the King!) they did not find his body there, and to this day no one knows where it is, only God, to Whom belongs glory and dominion forever and ever. Amen.

The Life and Deeds of Our Venerable and God-bearing Father Gregory the Sinaite, Who Asceticized in the Fourteenth Century

 This divine Gregory was a native of the Asia Minor village of Koukoulos, near Klazomenou, and was descended from parents who were rich and noble, and at the same time God-fearing and virtuous. Diligently educated by them, he was given over to teachers, from whom he learned the divine and sacred sciences. At that time (then reigned the great Andronicus Palaiologos) the Hagarian family attacked Asia, plundered it and enslaved almost all the Christians there. Together with them, the divine Gregory was enslaved with his parents and brothers. They were brought to Laodicea, and by God's Providence the barbarians allowed them to go to church. During the usual psalmody and doxology, the local Christians, seeing that they stood with great reverence, sang beautifully and were taught music, were amazed at their piety and singing; immediately after their dismissal they came to the Hagarites and, having given them much money, ransomed Gregory and his family from slavery. After this, the divine Gregory went to Cyprus. He lived there for a short time, but everyone loved his virtue and natural gifts. His pleasant face indicated the inner state of his divine soul, and his modesty, piety and reverence for God amazed everyone, and the people greatly revered Gregory.

 At the time when the venerable Gregory was living on the island, God, Who knew of his strong love for virtue living in his heart, pointed out to him a certain virtuous monk who asceticized in silence. Gregory immediately came to the monk with joy, was clothed by him in monastic garb and became a novice. Having spent some time with the elder, he repeatedly talked with him on spiritual topics, and then went to Mount Sinai, where he was tonsured a monk. Together with the cutting of his hair, Gregory cut off all desires and movements of the flesh and with great spiritual courage continued his ascetic labors. A little time passed, and the fathers there were amazed at his almost immaterial bodiless life in fasting, vigil, all-night vigil, incessant psalmody and prayer, and a little more, and they would have begun to think that he was indeed bodiless.

 In obedience, the root and mother of virtues, and in uplifting humility, he was so skilful that it is difficult to describe them separately, otherwise it may seem to the lazy that I am speaking of the incredible for the sake of exaggeration. At the same time, it is precisely because of the sloths that I am not going to hush up the truth and will write about what I heard from his closest disciple, St. Gerasimus. This blessed one told me that the divine Gregory fulfilled with diligence and all zeal the obedience assigned to him by the superior, as if the Most High God had seen him, and never omitted even the usual fraternal rule. In the evening, having bowed down to the abbot according to custom and having received a blessing from him, the monk entered his cell. Having closed the door, he raised his hands and mind to God, and, completely withdrawing from this material world and trying to draw closer to God, with extraordinary zeal he began the rule. All night long he sang psalms to God and prayed with strong heartfelt desire and genuflections, until he had finished all the psalms of David, the singing of which gave him joy. Then in the morning, when they knocked on the beat, the monk, according to custom, was the first to find himself at the door of the church. He was always so strict with himself that he never left the church until the end of the service. Thus, Gregory entered the temple first, and left last. His food was only bread and water, and even then in such quantities as only to maintain life in the body. Gregory had been fulfilling the obedience of a cook and baker for more than three years, and had never even thought of serving people; on the contrary, he was sure that he was serving the ranks of angels, and he considered the place of his obedience to be the true altar of God and altar. In addition, almost every day he ascended to the top of Mount Sinai to worship the place where the famous great miracles were performed. The monk was very skilled in calligraphy, and he devoted himself to reading so much that day and night he diligently selected sayings from the Old and New Testaments, and tried to fill them in. I do not know if there was a father who studied the Holy Scriptures as well as he did, and who surpassed all the fathers there in knowledge. However, the evil devil could not calmly observe the feats of the monk. He secretly led the monks into a passion of envy and, being a sower of tares, sowed great confusion and agitation in them. Gregory, a disciple of the meek and peace-loving Jesus, realizing that the monks envied him, secretly left the monastery, taking with him Gerasimus, who was a native of the island of Euripus and was a relative of the ruler of the island - Riga. Despising wealth, glory and noble birth, renouncing the world and what is in the world, Gerasim came to Mount Sinai, where he met the divine Gregory. Struck by his extreme virtue, Gerasimus became one of his disciples and, with the help of God, attained a high level of activity and contemplation, becoming after the great Gregory an example for others.

 Leaving Sinai, they came to Jerusalem to venerate the Life-Giving Sepulchre. Having visited the holy places, the ascetic boarded a ship and sailed to Crete to a place called Good Havens, where the monk with great zeal began to seek a calm and quiet place to live. After a long search, they finally found quiet caves and happily settled there. Immediately that good worker began to apply labor to labor, podvig to podvig, in a certain way struggling with himself with even greater courage. His food was bread and water once a day, but there was nothing else, although there was a danger of dying of thirst. The face of the monk acquired a yellow hue from dry eating, the limbs of the body dried up and were exhausted by many labors, weakened from physical exertion and incapable of any other action. In addition, the blessed one tried to find a spiritual man who could instruct him in what he himself could not understand in the Holy Scriptures and what he had not been taught by the spirit-bearing divine fathers.

 God, in response to his pleas, sent him such a husband. In a divine revelation He showed the divine Gregory and revealed his desire to a certain hermit named Arsenius, who was silent in those parts and was adorned with pious deeds and Divine contemplation. Moved by the Spirit of God, Arsenius came to the cell of the monk, knocked at the door and was received by him with great joy. After the usual prayer and greeting, Arsenius began the conversation as if from some divine book, speaking about the guarding of the mind, about sobriety, about prayer, about mental prayer and how the mind is purified through the fulfillment of the commandments and becomes like light. Having spoken about this and many other things, the elder, turning to the monk, asked: "And you, child, what work do you do?" Then the divine Gregory from the very beginning told him everything about himself: about his departure from the world, about his love for wilderness, and about all his actions. The Divine Arsenius, knowing perfectly well the path that elevates a person to the height of virtue, remarked with a smile: "Child, all that you have told me about, the God-bearing fathers call deeds, but not visions." Hearing these words, Blessed Gregory immediately fell down at his feet and began to fervently beseech, adjuring by God, to teach what there is mental prayer, silence and guarding of the mind. That Divine father, accepting the request of the monk as a kind of find, did not hesitate to teach him everything, omitting nothing of what he himself had generously received with the help of Divine grace. In addition, the elder revealed to him what happens to those who strive in the feat of virtue, for they are attacked right and left by the haters of good, demons, and envious people, whom the evil one uses as an instrument of his malice. Arseny told Grigory about all this in detail.