ANTONY, SAINT, surnamed THE GREAT, and also ANTONY OF THEBES, the father of monachism, was b. about the year 251 A.D., at Loma, near Heraklea, in upper Egypt. His parents were both wealthy and pious, and bestowed on him a religious education. Having, in obedience to what he believed to be a divine injunction, sold his possessions, and distributed the proceeds among the poor, lie withdrew into the wilderness, where he disciplined himself in all those austerities which have hallowed his memory in the Catholic church, and formed the model of the monastic life. When 30 years of age, how ever, desirous of obtaining a deeper repose than his situation afforded, he penetrated further into the desert, and took up his abode in an old ruin on the top of a hill, where he spent twenty years in the most rigorous seclusion; but, in 305, he was persuaded to leave this retreat by the prayers of numerous anchorites, who wished to live under his direction. He now founded the monastery of FaIoum, which at first was only a group of separate and scattered cells near Memphis and Arsino6; but which, neverthe less, may be considered the origin of cenobite life. The persecution of the Christians by Maximian, in 311 A.D., induced St. A. to leave his cell, and proceed to Alexandria, in the hope of obtaining the crown of martyrdom; but, having failed in this, he returned to his solitude in • the course of a year, which, however, he soon left, and plunged yet deeper into the desert. At length he found a lodgment on a hill, about a day's journey from the Red sea; but his disciples, discovering his retreat, so pressed him with their affectionate importunities, that lie ventured to accompany them back. After many pious exhortations, he once more left them, and soon became the mighty oracle of the whole valley of the Nile. In 355, the venerable hermit, then 104 years of age, made a journey to Alexandria to dispute with the Arians. He had interviews with Athanasius and other distinguished persons; but feeling his end approaching, he retired to his desert home, where he d., 356 A.D.
Athanasius states, in his Life of St. A., that the saint wore only a coarse shirt of hair, and never washed his body, which is more credible than the stories he relates of his encounters with the devil, or his miracles. His whole conduct indicates the pre dominance of a glowing and yet gloomy fancy, which is the proper condition of religious asceticism. Although the father of monachism, St. A. is not the author of any monastic "rules;" those which the monks of the eastern schismatic sects attribute to him are the production of St. Basil. He is, perhaps, the most popular saint in the Catholic church. Accounts of his life and miracles are given in the Acta Ssactorum of the Bollandists, under the date of the 17th Jan., oh which day Ills festival was kept.
Sr. ANTHONY'S FIRE.—The Rev. Alban Butler, in his Lives of the Saints, gives the following account of the origin of this name: "In 1089, a pestilential eyrsipelatous distemper, called the sacred fire, swept off great numbers in most provinces of France; public prayers and processions were ordered against this scourge. At length, it pleased God to grant many miraculous cures of this dreadful distemper to those who implored his mercy through the intercession of St. A., especially before his relics; the church [of La 3Iotte St. Didier, near Vienne, in Dauphine] in which they were deposited was resorted to by great numbers of pilgrims, and his patronage was implored over the whole kingdom against this disease." The " order of canons regular of St. Anthony," a religious fraternity, founded about 1090, for the relief of persons afflicted with the fire of St. A., survived in France till 1790.
Sr. ANritoxv's WELL, a small fountain near the ruined chapel of St. A., on the northern slope of Arthur's seat (q.v.), near Edinburgh. This interesting fountain, which i consists only of a stone basin, into which water trickles from under an incumbent rock, is celebrated in the Scottish song—"0, scaly, scaly."