Perfect Obedience
They said that Silvanus had a disciple in Scetis called Mark, who possessed the virtue of obedience in large measure. He was a copyist of old manuscripts: and the hermit loved them for his obedience. He had seven other disciples, and they were sad that he loved Mark more than them.
When the nearby hermits heard that he loved Mark above the others, they took it badly. One day when they visited him, Silvanus took them with him out of his cell, and began to knock on the door of each of his disciples, saying, “Brother, come out, I have work for you.” Not one of them appeared immediately. When he came to Mark’s cell, he knocked, saying, “Mark,” and as soon as Mark heard the voice of the hermit he came out and Silvanus sent him on some errand.
So he said to the other hermits, “Where are the other brothers?” He went into Mark’s cell, and found a book which he had just begun to copy, and he was making the letter O, but when he had heard the hermit’s voice, he had not finished the line of the O. The visitors said, “You are right, abba, and we also love the one whom you love, for God loves him too.”
– De vitis Patrum, Sive Verba Seniorum, Liber V
