(40) I came to see this same Abba Cosmas in the laura of Pharan; for I lived there for ten years, while he was speaking to me about the salvation of the soul, the old man used a quotation from St. Athanasius, the archbishop of Alexandria; and he said to me: “Whenever you find a saying of Saint Athanasius, if you have no paper (to write it down), write it on your clothes”. So great was the old man’s love for our Fathers and teachers. He also told me about himself: on the night of holy Sunday, he used to stand from evening until dawn, chanting Psalms and reading, either in his cell or in the church, never sitting down; and at sunrise, after having completed the divine office, he sat reading the holy Gospel until (the hour of) Mass.
(41) In this same laura of Pharan we also saw Abba Paul, a holy man, wholly dedicated to God, very meek and ascetic, who used to shed many tears every day. I do not think that I ever met in my life such a man (so blessed with the grace of tears). This holy elder spent about fifty years in seclusion, content with the offering-bread given out by the Church and nothing more, and never speaking to anybody. He came from Anazarbos.
(42) In the same monastery we also saw Abba Auxanon in his cell - a man of great compassion and abstinence, a solitary, who kept such a harsh discipline, that in four days he only ate an offering (of bread) weighing twenty bits [lepton – a very small unit of weight]; sometimes he was content with this even for a whole week. In his last days he contracted an intestinal disease. Therefore we took him to the Patriarch’s hospital in the holy city. One day, while we were at his bedside, Abba Conon, the hegumen of the laura of our holy father Sabas, sent him a kerchief containing a blessing bread and six coins, with this message: “Pardon me, for my infirmity prevents me from coming to embrace you”. The old man accepted the blessing bread, but sent him back the coins with this message: “Father, if it is God’s will that I remain in this life, I have ten coins (for my expenses). If I spend them all, I shall let you know, and you can send me this money. But be advised, father, that in two days I shall depart from this world”. And so it happened. Then we carried him down to the laura of Pharan and buried him there. This blessed man had been synkellos <‘companion’, secretary and often presumptive heir of a patriarch> of Eustochius and Gregory <patriarchs of Jerusalem in 552-563 and 569-593>, now with the saints, but had left them both in order to finish his life in the desert. He was born in Ancyra of Galatia.